Sweetgreen CEO Admits Dislike for Kale Amid Menu Speed Efforts
The salad chain is implementing changes like de-stemmed kale and new wraps to improve service and prices, as the CEO reveals a personal aversion to the ingredient.
Sweetgreen is implementing changes to its menu and service to address declining same-store sales and perceived slowness, including the use of de-stemmed kale and the introduction of salad wraps. However, CEO Jonathan Neman has publicly stated his personal dislike for kale.
"I really don't like kale. I'm not a huge fan," Neman said on the "Being Jewish with Jonah Platt" podcast. He noted that if kale wasn't a key component of the popular harvest bowl, he might remove it from the menu entirely. Neman acknowledged the labor-intensive nature of preparing kale, which involves washing, chopping, and messaging the leaves, with average stores spending two to three hours daily on this task before the adoption of de-stemmed kale.
The chain is also introducing lower-priced items and aiming to speed up service. CFO Jaimie McConnell told The Wall Street Journal that customers perceive Sweetgreen as slow. To combat this, the company is using de-stemmed kale, which requires less preparation time per serving. Previously, employees would de-stem kale by hand.
Sweetgreen, which operates approximately 880 locations, has added less expensive salad wraps to its menu. This initiative follows a period of reduced sales, partly influenced by fears stemming from a cyclospora outbreak, though Sweetgreen stated it was not impacted by the contamination.
The cheapest wrap available in New York City is priced around $13, with the lowest-priced salad at $13.50, comparable to offerings from competitors like Cava. Initially, the salad wraps presented challenges to service speed, with employees struggling to roll them quickly during peak hours. Despite this, Sweetgreen reported that over half of customers who tried the wraps returned within the same month.
McConnell, formerly of Chipotle, expressed a goal of enabling customers to enter and exit a restaurant with their salad in under five minutes. This contrasts with the approximately 50 minutes it reportedly took employees to prepare a batch of guacamole at Chipotle in 2023.
Sweetgreen is projecting a decline in same-store sales for the year, estimated to be between 7% and 8%.