Another Broken Egg Cafe Serving Up Powerful Refranchising Program

Over the summer, Another Broken Egg Cafe announced a major refranchising campaign, making between 20 and 25 of its company-operated locations in Georgia, the Carolinas, and Ohio available to franchisees. The effort is the brainchild of CEO Jorge Salvat, who joined the brand in February of 2025 and has already overseen a period of strong growth for the breakfast and brunch franchise.

This year, Another Broken Egg has opened eight cafes, with another three to four set to open between now and 2027. Moving forward, their goal is to open 15 to 25 each year.

We sat down with Jorge to learn more about the greater strategy behind the decision to refranchise many of Another Broken Egg’s own cafes and uncover why he’s confident it’s the best move for the company, its franchisees, and their customers.

Refranchising strategy

“We’ve wanted to clarify our identity in the marketplace,” Salvat explains. “It’s our ambition to be a premier franchisor that holds the success of its franchisees as its North Star. This refranchising program came to being as a way we could reduce our operational responsibilities in order to double-down on our commitment to providing outstanding opportunities and supporting our operators.”

When Salvat joined Another Broken Egg, the brand’s cafes were approximately 40% company-owned. He’s targeting bringing that number down to 10-15%, not to abandon operations but because the brand’s internal data shows that franchisees simply do the job better.

“If you look at our system, our franchisees outperform our corporate locations for just about every conceivable KPI, from sales to guest satisfaction,” he says. “Typically, our most successful cafes are run by someone – either the franchisee or their operator – who really knows their local market. You need to have connections in the community and the desire to build real ties with your employees and guests. Owners like that do far better than us, from an operations standpoint.”

Once Jorge saw just how good the franchise operators in his system were, he realized there was major opportunity to replicate their success while also reducing the scope and complexity of Another Broken Egg’s company-run operations. The brand is headquartered in Orlando, Florida but operates restaurants as far away as Ohio.

“I think a franchise brand should have some skin in the game, and we will always have company-owned locations where we can test and experiment and validate things,” Salvat affirms. “I want to make sure our operations make sense geographically, though. Metro Atlanta and the Carolinas and the Midwest are different markets in terms of customers and staffing and everything; I’d rather we reconfigure our efforts to support someone who can ultimately operate in that market better than we’re capable of doing.

We want to work with people who are going to take the time to entrench themselves in their local market.”

Program details

The refranchising program, which is managed by Vice President of Development Chris Eby, is essentially a turnkey opportunity wherein franchisees take over a cafe with an existing customer base, an existing team, and existing managers.

“This is probably the fastest path to revenue in this space right now for a new franchise owner because you’re starting with a foothold in the market and absolutely no delays or buildout costs,” says Salvat. “You’re taking over a successful restaurant with the expectations that you’ll build on its success through fostering those authentic local relationships.”

Jorge’s vision is to reclaim the time and effort Another Broken Egg puts into running its far-reaching network of company-owned cafes and reinvest those resources in franchisee support. As locations are refranchised, their general managers will transition into franchisee support and coaching roles throughout the system, where they can apply the authentic knowledge they’ve honed on the frontlines to help enable the next generation of franchisees.

“This will enable us to shift our focus toward franchisee support and enablement across the board,” he says. “Whether it’s finance, HR, marketing, or operations, every single department will be able to rededicate itself to helping franchisees be as successful as possible.”

Future growth plans

Looking into the future, Jorge foresees this refranchising push as the first stage of a steady long-term growth strategy that’s focused on predictability. After an assessment period, he hopes to build around the most successful refranchised cafes, developing three-to-five units in collaboration with the local owner-operators who are driving success in those markets.

“A huge portion of our growth will be tied to this initiative,” Salvat explains. “Hypothetically, if you look five years down the road, this initiative could be setting the stage for more than a hundred new cafes. That doesn’t even account for any openings in completely new markets.”

Jorge is confident in Another Broken Egg’s ability to continue growing for a variety of reasons, from market opportunity to the competitive advantage their business model offers over other QSR and fast casual concepts. He says industry data shows that breakfast and brunch are continuing to grow, but he’s unintimidated by competitors jumping into the marketplace because he’s confident in the strength of what Another Broken Egg has built.

“We’re a highly differentiated concept. We lead with our food, an exceptionally high-quality product, and seasonal menus that drive first-time guests to our cafes,” he says. “Because we’re a one-shift model where people know they’ll be done by 3:00 in the afternoon and home for the evening, we’re able to attract high-quality managers, who in turn can build strong teams and retain employees.

This is an industry where 200-250% yearly employee turnover is not unheard of in certain markets. We keep that number down to 40-50%, which means our teams are more productive because they’ve gotten more reps doing the work and are generally more bought-in. That also improves guest experience because they’re consistently seeing the same faces and feel like they’re forging connections with people.

That’s key to establishing loyalty.”

Under Jorge’s leadership, Another Broken Egg Cafe’s system is continuing to find new ways to execute strategic growth while also increasing the brand’s capacity to support and enable franchisees. With franchisee success as the system’s North Star, Jorge and Another Broken Egg are doing something truly special.