Hello everyone and welcome to the latest episode of QSR Uncut. I'm your host Danny Klein, the editorial director here at QSR. So we have a very special episode this week. I think I often say this, but I really do enjoy stepping outside into some forms and parts of the industry that you may not be familiar with. And we are doing that this week with Morley Ivers Head of Global Strategic Partnerships and CEO of Cook in Canada. So or just cooking in this case I suppose more than. The Canadian part is true because I am actually in Toronto today. So there you go Danny. Yeah, once in a while we actually do have Canadian guests. I think we wrote a story this past month in QSR actually about the kind of rise of Canadian fast casuals. So it is a versioning segment that our sort of larger space of QSR which has historically been like Asia, India, America, sort of Europe. But anyway, that could be a whole nother rant for another day. But thank you again for being here Morley. Really appreciate the time. But I want to start as we always do by opening the floor. Give you a chance. Tell us a little bit about the company. Also tell us about yourself, how you're background, how you got to where you are today and we'll take it from there. Okay. Well, first of all Danny, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here with you today. So as you mentioned, my name is Morley Ivers. I'm the co-founder and CEO of Cookin. My company was acquired in 2024 by Cook Unity. And yes, you're right. Here I play a role leading up strategic partnerships globally for the company. And back to the Canadian side, we also had responsibility for launching our first international market for Cook Unity, which happens to be in Toronto, Canada. A bit about the business and actually we'll very much speak to my background as well. I have been myopically focused for a good portion of my career on trying to bring people closer together. And my thesis that I'm still working on quite frankly is that food has this unique ability to do that. I actually think it's one of the most powerful ways to bring us together from all different walks of life, different political spectrums. I think food is a commonality that I believe most people can agree upon to a certain degree. And the way that we went about trying to execute against that thesis is by enabling chefs to reinvent their livelihoods and their careers. By starting their own food pickup and delivery businesses with a company called Cookin. And Cookin is a SaaS platform that enables people to do exactly that. There are thousands of chefs that are utilizing our software to start food pickup and delivery businesses. We have been at that for a few years. And when I met Mateo, the founder and CEO of Cook Unity, we immediately connected any. He told me that he had a very similar vision for the world to enable chefs to reinvent their livelihoods and ultimately to take what their gift in life is, which is cooking food for other people and bring people closer together. Except he had done it with a little bit of a different go-to-market. His go-to-market was setting up large-scale commercial kitchens all throughout America. There was seven at that time located throughout America. And he was enabling chefs, some of whom are the most celebrated chefs in the country, to come in to those kitchens as entrepreneurs with their own teams in a very simple value proposition. You come up with the recipe and cook the food and we will take care of everything else. The real estate, the smallwares, the packaging, the marketing, the customer service, the delivery and will enable consumers to access incredibly affordable meals on a subscription basis from those chefs delivered directly to their homes. One thing led to another and we decided that wow, you know, one plus one really could equal three if we brought these two ideas together. And since the end of 2024, we've been doing exactly that. That's a little bit about the business and a little bit about me and in nutshell. But I'd love to tell you a little bit about where the company is at and sort of our level of scale because I think it will surprise you. Yeah, let's get into that. I mean, one of the things I really like about what you all are doing is it is kind of geared toward empowering the chef, you know. I, our industry has, I mean, the process of delivery and some of the digital marketplace and it has not been overly operator friendly. Let's just say that on a friendly sort of level in the history of our business. Just because those are the economics and the dynamics of how you take something that takes X amount of time to cook, but thinks only so much time to deliver and then figure out the labor. It just caused a lot of confusion over the years as that marketplace continued to grow as the convenience demand was out there. But yeah, tell us a little bit about your scale and kind of how you're approaching this in a way that is helping. Because I think I read actually today here as we record on March 16th, or at least that you've got, you know, the average shift on the cook unity platform is earning approximately $850,000 annually, which is an amazing figure, right? Yeah, I mean, I got your note prior to the podcast letting me know that you're about to get into cooking yourself after moving that. And I might join you. But it is a bit of an ominous day because we did release our 2025 results today. And, you know, we're very humbled by what I'm about to share with you. But as I share with you our results, I think what's most important one is exactly what you just touched on, which is how we have reinvented the livelihoods for the chefs themselves. So our business today, in 2025, we ended the year with about $750 million ARR. And that's, I knew overcurring revenue. That was the strongest year in our corporate history. And just to give you an idea of the scale of which this company is growing, the year prior to that, we were, you know, about 350 million ARR. And just to give you a little hint, it's not released at all. But the first quarter of this year would be even faster growth, like the fastest growth quarter in our company's history. So we're just getting started. Last year, I think we enabled individuals to access, you know, well over 40 million meals that were made by individual chef entrepreneurs who are coming into our kitchens all throughout North America, seven in the United States, one in Toronto. And they're bringing their teams, they're cooking the food. And then for every meal that is sold, we pay them as an entrepreneur to their own business. And you're right, the average chef in our platform last year, the average was $850,000, fully that their take. Our top chef, our top chef made over $7 million last year. Yeah, it's just crazy. I mean, it's an amazing thing. And I have to think from a growth standpoint, this is one of those things that's going to kind of compound itself as people start realizing this. You know, the chef community is a relatively tightly net one, right? So, you know, to kind of talk about the option they now have in life that's out there for them to go into this. I mean, I think so. And, you know, if I think about some of the more recent chefs that we were very proud to welcome to our platform, we added 30 chefs in 2025. Some of the like top chefs in the entire country are now moving on to the co-puternity platform because they realize that this quite frankly is a way better way for them to achieve their life's goals, utilizing their gift in life, which is making food for other people. So chefs like Marcus Samuels and Kat Goura joined us in 2025 and, you know, they're seeing levels of growth that quite frankly no single restaurant can produce anywhere. Right. So, this past year too, I mean, there were a couple of things that you all did in terms of fueling growth. I read on here. There was, you know, sort of this couple acquisitions, one to help you with the storytelling and engagement, which I think is coming ever vital with consumers these days, especially with all the options they have and also partnering with Airbnb and acquiring a company that I cannot pronounce. Or at least I could try to pronounce it and probably end up making a fool of myself. So talk about some of those investments and how they helped in, of course, positioning you for even more growth here in 26. Yeah, I mean, I think 2025 is a year of innovation and expansion for our business. So we expanded to our first international market, which is Toronto, Canada. And just to give you an idea, this model works internationally. I mean, are the growth rate that we were able to realize in the Toronto market from like zero to over 20 million in revenue and literally just a few months of operations is indicative of consumers really loving the idea of getting an incredible high quality fresh, never frozen meal made by a chef that they recognize delivered to them for like 10 to $15 all in. That has never happened before. The second is we acquired a company by the name of Frash.
fresh allows us to put fridges into business and residential environments so that, you know, office workers can enjoy in many cases a subsidized meal that is made fresh and, you know, microwavable in two minutes ready to eat, right in their cafeteria or their lobby. We also acquired a very innovative company called Flavors, which is a shop-able video platform that enhances meal discovery and chef storytelling. So as you start to look at our app now, what you'll start to see is we're bringing this chef's entire experience in a digital format to life for consumers. So today, I, you know, for lunch, I'm here in the Toronto office today, I had a catcho a pepe with shrimp made by James Beard Award-winning chef Jose Garcis. And I was able to get really into deciding on which meal to pick today based on this unbelievable video that I watched about him preparing the catcho pepe with the shrimp directly inside the cook unity app, which I thought was cool. And the last one you mentioned, right? We unveiled a really interesting partnership, strategic partnership with Airbnb. And now, I've spoken about this a bit, but Airbnb is an amazing platform, right? And one of the, one of the traditional gaps that you've had when you're selecting hotel versus Airbnb is some people like when they get into the Airbnb, you open up the fridge, it's empty. It's like, oh gosh, maybe I should have stayed in a hotel and been able to have room service or go downstairs and get some food. Well, we have, we've leveled the playing field for Airbnb. So now, when you stay in an Airbnb in 22 different US states, you can, at the time of your booking or thereafter, have that shrimp with catcho pepe delivered directly to your Airbnb waiting for you by the time you check in. And it's quite affordable and an amazing experience. So you'll start to see a lot more from us in the way of large-scale strategic partnerships moving forward. Yeah, it's a really fascinating thing. I really thought about that. I have thought in my past, if I stare at an Airbnb, I find it to be a little less awkward to order than I do if I'm in a hotel. You know, and I'm going down to the lobby to get it, but you're right in the sense of like, I can go downstairs and actually eat. But from the other side of sort of the the B2B spin here, if I am a chef or someone who wants to get on the platform, how does that process begin? Because everything that you're mentioning doesn't seem like a difficult cell, right? But I have to imagine there's a process of how you get on there, who you are, you know, what the exposure looks like. Also, it's kind of things of getting onboarded and becoming a part of what you're doing. So I think chefs are sort of realizing that running a restaurant is a really tough way to live their dreams in their life. And even if they are completely addicted and totally into making that happen, they are, you know, by virtue of the challenges that they're faced with. Labor, real estate, overhead, legalities, the cost of ingredients, margins are just so tight, Annie, that they are looking for other ways to realize their dreams. And we're very fortunate that we happen to be one of, if not the best way for them to do so. So we have an entire recruiting team that spends all day talking to the most well-renowned chefs in the market about what it's like to come in as an entrepreneur as your own boss inside of one of our eight facilities located throughout North America with their teams, create incredible recipes and bring the variety of their dishes to the masses. And I think, you know, beyond obviously we spoke about this, the incredible income that they're able to drive from this. Some of the other things that I think are most appealing to these chefs are, a few, one of the most appealing things is they can be in different locations, different geographies. Right, if you think about a chef like Jose Garcis, right, he is incredibly well-renowned on the East Coast of America, Philly, New York, where traditionally if he wanted, you know, people to eat his food, he's going to open up a restaurant and invest in that and in high capital expenditure. Well, I'm in Toronto, I mentioned to you today, and I, his meal for lunch today. So we've been, we've been able to showcase that a chef can take their team and their recipe, transport them into different geographies where they might not even have a restaurant and give the community in those areas the ability to access their food for the first time. Right, no, I mean, it makes a lot of sense. It's like your ability to see to market while not also losing all your money. You know, if that makes sense from a, from a time-in perspective of, you know, whether seeing kind of what the demand is out there for what you're offering or to get your just branding out in front of folks, it's a, it's definitely a powerful tool to do so. And, and I'm kind of scrolling through the website now and just looking at all the different applications here. You mentioned kind of the smart fridge, which is very cool, but now you've also got healthcare services and you know, some of the ability to have kind of, you know, corporate event catering, which in our industry has become such a huge added revenue since I think as a larger restaurant space, you know, the, the reality is right now that you're probably trying to make up for the fact that your margins are so tight by diversifying your revenue stream since you've run out of pricing. So, you know, here we are, right? So in this catering world, but yeah, I mean, talk about kind of the extensions here because of this theme is this ecosystem is, is really growing and, you know, probably not closely even really tapping out the places you can go. I think that's exactly right. And by the way, just before we go there and talk about like some of the B2B work that we do, I think it's important to point out a couple things. The first is not only is there, you know, very little risk. I would say that there is no risk to a chef joining our platform. We, we announced a major strategic partnership with James Beard. And as part of that partnership, one of the things that James Beard was looking for from us was a commitment to underwrite even some of the early startup costs associated with a James Beard awarding any chef coming into our kitchens and even hiring a few people to help them execute their meals. We're so confident at this stage of scale. We're 10 years now in business that we know how long it takes a chef to turn profit come into our platform. We take care of that risk. We underwrite it. So James Beard awarding chef can walk into our restaurant, into our facility and execute their meals and become profitable from the get go. And it's, it's actually the exact same common denominator, whether you're cooking for a consumer or cooking for the B2B side of our business that stays the same. So meals, meals being served to diabetic patients who have their insurance covering their cost of a community meal in sort of the form of, you know, food is medicine, which is a big deal for us. The meals are made by the same chefs that are cooking for our consumers with a lot of love. And the reason this works is because the amount a chef makes on our platform, Danny, is a derivative of the rating that their meal gets. So we actually pay the chefs per meal sold and that amount goes up based on the quality rating from the consumer. And that is enabled us to get into the B2B space. So you're right, we're, we are now serving catering meals. We are serving office environments. We are servicing the healthcare industry. And as, you know, we have 25 different diets represented on our platform. It's allowed for us to customize meals based on the needs, wants, desires and, and, and author requirements of individuals and all sorts of different environments. Yeah. So more like you talked a little bit of this kind of a little personal question for you, but you talked at the beginning about your journey into finding this and, and kind of connecting. Did you think it was going to get this big? I mean, if the answer is yes, you know, good, you know, good that you dream large, but it's just really impressive to kind of hear about this. But did that vision materialize in your brainers? It just happening so fast. I really have that time to think about it sometimes. You know, the, the, the real answer to that question is, I always believe this had to happen, right? I, I really did believe that one of the biggest issues when, when I think about the future and I look at my children, I, I think about, you know, the fact that we become so polarized as, as people, I worry about their futures as a result of that. So I have always been an ardent believer that food has its ability to solve that. What I did not get right was knowing how that would actually happen. But I knew I needed to run at it and run, run at this problem as my life is.
work and that's how we started the business. That's how I currently think about my day every single day. I think about it as my life's work to solve that challenge. I did not realize how it would manifest. We started off with a software solution to bring that to scale. Mateo started out with individual kitchen facilities. Did I ever foresee that coming together and one plus one truly equaling three or more? No. Am I happy it happened? I could not be happier. I feel like we're closer than ever to realizing our vision and our mission and yet I still feel like it's day one here. Yeah, you know, you're kind of overarching point about food. I was just having this discussion with someone earlier because everyone is listening. You'll see this in a future podcast. But you know, there was I think a little bit of a misstep in our QSR category in particular during the pandemic era of thinking that this transactional nature of it was here to stay. That turned out to be so very wrong in so many different avenues. You could just look around the landscape now. It's some of the larger brands and listen to the way that they're just building restaurants, let alone kind of how they're transacting on the technology side. But even just from how they look when they go inside and realizing what consumers actually didn't want. And that version of eating and not having sort of the collective upward social gains from the process that we're always inherent to having a meal. We're now going backward. It feels like they're the traditional is becoming sort of the story again. And you know, you see brands that really live in the experience realm sort of overcoming some of those inflationary price concerns and not being seen as being super expensive. And it's just been a it's just been a very interesting ride is what I'll say in the past four years from going we're all drive through only no more globbies to run here about that anymore. So turns out in the end that people when they go out to eat they wanted an excuse to eat with other people. And when they were eating at home, that was off in the case too. So I guess that was a really long roundabout way to say I agree with you. And I see the benefit of that world. We think food is incredibly personal. We think food is the opposite of transactional. And we think food has a power to bring you know the most important things in your life together with others. And the chefs that are coming into our kitchens and like putting all of their effort into these amazing meals. I promise you that's where they're thinking of when they're executing. I agree. And it's great. By the way, it's great to see the QSR world moving in that in that mode again. And we're fortunate right? Like this is exactly what I think you and I both want from an experiential standpoint just as human beings. Yeah, I think so. I think the customer really guides this sector more than some others because hospitality at the end of the day is kind of a an answer to how people want to have experience. So you don't usually get to set the terms all the time the way that you might in some other places. But I do want to ask you about the future. Yeah. So much growth happening so quickly. You know, how do you keep that momentum going? What's next? You know, what are you trying to hope to achieve maybe in 2026 and beyond and gearing up to to sort of continue to elevate this conversation? So I think a few things. The first is we announced in in fourth quarter of last year that we were fortunate to take on a non-dilutive structure of $250 million vehicle with general catalyst. So that sort of really set us up to focus on our future in a very, very meaningful way. We obviously are, you know, very ardent on dramatically growing our subscriber base across North America. So acquiring customers so they can enjoy the flavors, the variety, the health focus of our chefs, unbelievable efforts. That's like priority number one. Priority number two and this is what gets me excited. I think our brand awareness in America right now is under 10%, just under 10%. Yeah. And you know, some people might say like, what's going on? I look at that as one of the most exciting things possible. I'm like, wow, if we're able to achieve this level of growth, the types of reviews that we're getting from consumers who love our chefs meals and nobody's heard about us yet, it's really time to, you know, deploy our execution tactics so we can expand our brand presence and attract the best chefs in the best locations to make the best food for as many consumers as we possibly can. Growing our brand is going to be a big deal. And then of course, the last thing is we look forward to welcoming more and more award-winning chefs onto our platform so that Cucunity can be a first choice for consumers when they think about nourishing themselves and their families. Right. And so very am I listening. I believe right now you're in eight major metropolitan markets, New York LA, Miami, Atlanta, Austin, Chicago, Seattle, and the one you're mentioning internationally here with Toronto. So is there a sense of kind of where this could go? I mean, obviously there's a thread between those markets that are mentioned there as they are both of course very dense from a population standpoint, but then also culinary capitals. But you know, is this the type of thing that could scale many more states or what is kind of their map there? Yeah. So first off, with all credit to, you know, many colleagues who are responsible for the logistics side of our business, those represents our like kitchen facilities, but we service the entire contiguous United States. So the entire populist outside of the Dakotas and Montana, we are delivering fresh meals next day directly to Holmes coast to coast. However, I think I think you're touching on a great point, Danny. Like, you know, the notion of having an amazing meal delivered to you is not one that is restricted just to North America, right? Like this idea, the notion of a chef reinventing their livelihood with this type of business model can apply and will apply elsewhere globally. Canada was our personal national market, but I think you can expect us to be realizing this ambition globally as we move forward. Yeah, I mean, when we kind of talk about a lot of or big restaurant chains in our space, the retreat is that their technology delivery arms are larger internationally than they are in the US in terms of consumer acceptance. Like, there are a lot of those markets, especially in Europe, are so used to eating this way already that it's a lot of times in the US they're actually kind of a little bit trailing in the technology. This is something you hear from brands like McDonald's, you know, sometimes where it's like, "Oh, the kiosks and sweeten, you know, vinear for 10 years." And, you know, no one even thinks twice. And so it's like a truth is that, you know, that marketplace is a global one now in food and chefs too. I mean, that's sort of a benefit too. It's, although of course there's amazing chefs all over. These are global names. I mean, Jose Garcis was on the cover of our magazine seven years ago, I think, but he's at this point as ubiquitous as, you know, any mascot of any restaurant chain, I could think of, right? So it's like these chefs have managed to brand themselves into entire organizational pieces themselves as well as whatever restaurants they might be opening. It probably is actually works in reverse there, right? I don't know the name of most of his restaurants, but I do know who he is, right? Yeah, I think, I mean, and we look at it as our job to help them expand their universe, right? Like, Jose Garcis has never had a restaurant in Toronto. The fact that I ate his meal here today, his recipe, executed by his team, is mind-boggling, right? And our company is well set up now to be able to take Jose Garcis to other locations across the pond as well. Right. Okay, well, morally, it's been great catching up and learning all these things today. It's really been enlightening, but I want to do what I always do here, which is two things. One is give you the final word in case there's something to bring up that we haven't before, but the second being perhaps equally, if not more important for those who are listening here, interested in learning more how they can do so the best way for them to reach out to find information, to connect to, maybe start cooking. You know, it's, I would advise, but yeah, what are the, where would they get started? Well, the first thing is, I think Danny, if we're forever to do a look back episode and say like, hey, how are you doing in the future? I hope that a bit about this vision that we spoke about today of leveraging the food of these incredible chefs to bring people closer together is one that we're closer to the next time we talk. And for those of you in the listening audience that are interested in cooking, learning more, trying the food.
getting on the platform or discussing what a strategic partnership may look like between our organization and yours. I'd love to hear from you. So our website is www.cookunity.com. My email
[email protected]. M-O-R-L-A-Y @cookunity and I look forward to being in touch. All right cool well thank you again Mourly for sharing all this. We should do a look back when those numbers are even more eye-popping than they are today. So thank you again for your time and for everybody out there who's listening as always we appreciate it and we'll see you on the next one. Thanks Danny.
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