How a Soviet Refugee Built a $12M Restaurant Empire

Orhan Veli’s story sounds like a movie.

At age 6, he watched the Soviet Union collapse overnight: chaos, violence, and uncertainty took over.

His family fled with nothing.

Within months, his father built a small business…until the mafia burned it down and demanded payment.

They eventually escaped to the United States with just $25,000.

From there:

• Roofing jobs in Florida

• Delivering pizzas

• Living in a small apartment with no English

Orhan now owns 12 restaurant locations generating over $12M in revenue.

But it didn’t come easy:

• Borrowing money from family to buy the first store

• Working 7 days a week, open to close

• Firing his entire staff two weeks into his second location

• Nearly going under during the 2008 financial crisis

In this episode, we break down:

• How he scaled from 1 to 11 locations

• Why he doubled down when others were selling

• The real economics behind fast-casual franchises

• And the mindset required to build an empire from nothing

This is one of the craziest operator stories we’ve ever recorded.

00:00 From the Soviet Collapse to Chaos 06:00 Building a Business in the Wild West of Capitalism 12:00 Escaping to America with $25K 18:00 Starting Over: Roofing, Pizza Delivery, and Survival 24:00 Learning to Hustle: First Jobs & College Years 30:00 Turning Down Wall Street for Entrepreneurship 36:00 Buying the First Restaurant (All-In with Family Money) 42:00 Early Struggles: Long Hours, Debt, and Doubt 48:00 Scaling to Multiple Locations + Near Collapse in 2008 54:00 The Saladworks Bet & Aggressive Expansion Strategy 60:00 Building an 11-Unit Empire + What Comes Next