Sarah:
So Scott, the Cheesecake Shop is an iconic Aussie brand. It started out as a family-owned cake shop back in 1991. And it recently celebrated the opening of its 200th Australian store, which is fantastic, I think, in Mittagong, in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales. So what is it that’s special about this brand? What’s special about the Cheesecake Shop?

Scott Bush:
Yes, I think that’s a really good questions here because it kind of starts there. It is a family created business back in 1991. It started with one, so it actually started as a wholesale business. And then the original founders were trying to work out what to do with cakes outside of wholesale, and they went direct to the public and very quickly they had queues around the block of the public in general wanting these fantastic cheesecakes and cakes back in the early 90s. So the business started there. In my eight months early on, I had the opportunity, the wonderful opportunity in fact to sit down with both the founders, and I wanted to understand the DNA of the business. and really what was the thread that ran right through the entire organization. And I very quickly established it. And it was basically a couple of key points to that for me, the orientation of that family concept and the celebration part. And they’re coming together of the families and friends and communities and everything else. And I think when you use that phrase iconic business, that’s the heart of what we do is, you know, we help people celebrate life’s events, life’s achievements. And any number of focuses sort of beyond that as well is gonna be the thing that’ll lead us into the next five or 10 years in the Businesses chapter.

Sarah:
So when you’re kind of talking about that, you’re talking about kind of DNA and the fact that we’re talking about celebration. And I think everyone would associate, everyone who knows the cheesecake shop associates that with going to buy the big cake for the birthday party or whatever. Customer experience is really important in retail these days, but it’s a very, in a sense it’s a very transactional process, isn’t it, at the cheesecake shop. You’re probably not coming in to kind of to browse. You don’t have that opportunity to maybe develop customer experience. So I just wondered how you see kind of customer experience and how you get that sense of celebration through quite a transactional process.

Scott Bush:
Yeah, I think historically we’ve been able to get away with that and retail in general has been able to get away with that, but moving forward you can’t. There’s a real love at the moment for brands, iconic brands that have been able to reinvent themselves and that’s what we want to do going forward. We’ve done a lot of research in recent weeks and months around what… what both our current customers and our lax customers think about us as a brand. And they’ve really given us the license, if you like, to go and do something really funky with the store look and feel and the logo and our product, our offering. They love us at the heart of what we do, which is fantastic cheesecakes and cakes and those celebrationary moments. But in the true spirit of driving frequency back through communities and the consumer, we do need to reinvent ourselves. And I think that’s the most exciting part of my job at the moment, Sarah, is being able to lead a team of people in a process around that. I’ve got some fantastic people surrounding me that are really gonna do that. So I guess watch this space in terms of where we end up. So yeah, exciting times.

Sarah:
just kind of pick you up a little bit there. You talked about the fact that you’d just been in the role for eight months, nearly nine months now. I just wanted to take a moment out to just kind of find out a little bit more about your perspective on leadership because you describe yourself on LinkedIn as the CEO and the chief cake decorator, which I love.And I know that you’ve had hands-on roles in Domino’s. You’ve been with, you were with Domino’s for more than 20 years. So what did you learn on the front line there and have you learned perhaps in the last few months? at the cheesecake shop that’s really kind of informed your leadership.

Scott Bush:
I think in line with that conversation that we just had around the way the consumer likes to engage, that’s very true from a team member colleague perspective. You know, to really get a team of people to engage, in particular in the current environment. We know that it’s a tough environment out there for both retail and businesses in general in terms of tenure. And the best way to engage with people is by being able to roll your sleeves up and get on the front line. And it’s something I’ve always enjoyed doing. You’re right, 20 plus years in Domino’s across many, many different roles. And I think one of the parts of my journey in that Domino’s brand, as exciting as it is, was the different roles that I take on every two or three years. And genuinely in the… in the hope of being able to work alongside of people and understand that no one is ever too good to clean the toilet. No one is ever too good to make a pizza. No one is ever too good to pick up the rubbish in the car park. And the same is true now in terms of my current role. So very much hands-on. I am an operator at the heart of what I do. And I think by pure definition, that puts me in that place of being able to roll your sleeves up and rub shoulders with everyone in every facet of the business, which is super exciting.

Sarah:
And how’s your cake decorating?

Scott Bush:
Terrible. So, well, I think there’s a lot of similarities between cake and pizza, weirdly. They’re both round, they both come in a box. But there’s something very therapeutic, very satisfying about making cakes. I understand it, I like it. And you watch, you know, because every one of our products is baked fresh in-store, you know, from scratch. So the ingredients come in. and every one of our 238 stores across Australia, New Zealand bake fresh back of house. And you know, the exciting part about that is the fact that you do learn both the science and the art. And the science part is easy because that’s just the formula. It’s the art. And you know, part of our plan going forward is we want to try and create and introduce more multi-unit franchisees to the system. So people that own two, three, four stores and then give their team. their colleagues, the people that come in through their system, the opportunity to go on and become franchisees as well. So it’s just super exciting from all aspects.

Sarah:
So there’s a lot happening, obviously, and that’s pretty exciting, as you’ve said. You recently rebuilt the leadership team. So what was the key element to the restructure? And what do you look for in a leader? And we’ve kind of talked about operations, I suppose, and being hands-on, but is there more to what you look for in a leader in your team?

Scott Bush:
Well, I think, yeah, you’re right. And it’s a fair point. The only comment I’d make is I didn’t rebuild it. We just added to it. We invested. As a brand, I think it was very lean. As a business, it was super lean. And full credit to previous management for keeping things that lean, considering the environment of COVID and everything else. But as we look to the future and look at our growth aspirations, it is super important that we invest. And this is a team sport. And as we know, in every team sport, The team that wins the game is the team that come together in the best possible way. And that’s through strengths and weaknesses. And I think this is the same. We’ve got a fantastic leadership team in place now where we’re going through the process of finishing that particular project off. And we hope to announce a new CIO into the business in the coming weeks, which is super exciting. We want to invest in digital and tech. We want to invest operationally, we want to invest in our supply chain, across every aspect of the business, and it’s quite important that you get the right people in place. So I think leadership is more about pushing people through as opposed to dragging them along, if that makes any sense.

Sarah:
It does, it does. And in terms of kind of leadership, we’ve talked about the cheesecake shop being a family-owned business initially. It’s been part of private equity for some time and I know River Capital is the latest owner and at the acquisition River Capital said that it would plan an active role in the business and I just wonder what form that takes and how that kind of influences the leadership aspect.

Scott Bush:
Super supportive, the two words that come to mind immediately are super supportive. And I think as the discussions prior to me coming on board evolved, one of the things that was important to me was that whatever I did outside of Domino’s, it was the right fit culturally. The people aspect is super important. River themselves are an incredible PE, an incredible group of individuals, family at the core of everything they do, ironically. And eight months in, we’re flying. We’re having a really good time. We’re opening stores, we’re growing sales. We’ve attracted the talent to the business. through people that really wanna join the brand and wanna be a part of this journey. And so that starts at the board and runs right through to what happens at the front counter of each and every one of our stores. And I think this little bit of brand refresh that we’re gonna go through over the next four to six months is really gonna play a key role in that as well.

Sarah:
So can you tell us a little bit more then about the strategy for the business and what the time scale is for implementation?

Scott Bush:
Yeah, I think I’m a very impatient person. I like to get things done at pace. And every now and then I need to pause and just think about the approach. And again, it’s the key of having the right people around me that feel that the environment’s, the right environment and they feel safe enough to be able to challenge that process, but very ambitious, very audacious in terms of driving the business forward. Because I think… As I said earlier, we’ve got the license to do that both from the consumer and the public in general. So we do want to build 15, 20 stores a year. We’d like to think we could scale that up. And in the next five years, have a very cool looking business from all aspects. It’s more about frequency and day part and just celebrating the life’s moments. It doesn’t have to be a birthday. It can be a cheesecake or a cake on the couch after a nice meal that you’ve had delivered in or made at home. So there is opportunity everywhere in the business area and I think it’s just a case of trying to define what that process is going forward. But growing the business organically. at the heart of what we do is our number one priority. And number two is where do we put the right stores, both in our metro markets and our regional markets to really push the brand forward and give everyone the opportunity to experience our product.

Sarah:
And what’s changed in that in terms of location, finding the right sites? What’s new?

Scott Bush:
Yeah, I think one of the things that’s probably changed is our process around the occasion part. Like if we’re going to have more people coming to us more often, we’ve probably got to be in slightly better foot traffic style areas. So, you know, on the outside of maybe smaller shopping centres with car parking at the door, the regional opportunity in Australia is tremendous. I think post-COVID, there are a lot of people that are looking for that lifestyle change still. We’re still seeing a lot of people moving out of the cities and commuting backwards and forwards. I think it’s a hot topic at the moment, isn’t it? I don’t think anyone’s ever gonna go back to the office five days a week. And so for us, it’s just as important that we are in those locations regionally where people can access our products. We think we’re great value. We really do you know a lot of our products You can’t make it home for the price we sell them for so by virtue of that being what it is We want to attract as many people to the brand as often as we can and it means getting into some of those more remote locations So there’s probably three or four different key touch points there

Sarah:
And in regard to obviously there you’re talking about kind of customer demand, but that opens it up, I guess, too, to in terms of because you’re a franchise expanding to regional areas for new franchisees. This is the profile changing. Would you see that the profile of the franchise owner would change?

Scott Bush:
I think it is. I think there’s a lot around governance, there’s a lot around compliance, and I think 20 years in the pizza industry has taught me a lot about that. So it’s all about having the right systems in place. and taking people on a journey. People will tell you that they buy a franchise because they wanna buy the systems, but the first thing they wanna do is reinvent them when they get here. So you do, I think my answer is always with franchising, the three words that come to mind is firm, fair, and friendly. You know, you’ve got to, you do have to keep in all aspects of those three contributing factors. So yeah, again, it’s an opportunity for entrepreneurial people to come into the system. You hear a lot in franchising, oh, you know, franchising is all about just buying the systems, not being overly, you know, entrepreneurial. That’s not right. That categorically isn’t right. We want entrepreneurial people in our business. A big part of our store success is based purely at what happens on the ground in that local area, activity of marketing and engaging with the community and sponsoring different clubs and events and charitable organizations. And that’s really a key role of any franchisee’s job. when they come into a brand, no matter how big or small. So again, another good cross-section, the tools are there, we’ll provide the support, and the guard rails will be there as well. And very specific around making sure that people stay within the confines of those guard rails, because it’s a health check of the brand.

Sarah:
Well, I mean, compliance is such an important issue and it’s probably the biggest issue, isn’t it, for most franchisers. And as you say, it’s but it’s at the heart of it. In terms of kind of developing the brand and the growth, what would be the success markers for you in terms of saying, yeah, okay, we’re on track with the strategy. What are you looking to achieve specifically?

Scott Bush:
Yeah, really cracking question. I think the success markers again would be that to create a win-win-win. So obviously a win for the community, win for the customer. being there with a great product at the right price. That is the core, that’s the heart of what we’re trying to achieve. Win for our franchisees in terms of those who wanna be multi-unit franchisees and give them the opportunity to do that. For those who just want one store, that’s fine as well. So a real cross section in that franchise community. And then of course we’ll win for ourselves. This is very much gonna be a marathon, it’s not gonna be a sprint race. And you know, we just want to sort of get in one end of the pool and just swim at lap after lap in some sort of well orchestrated relay type event. But yeah, if we can grow 15, 20 stores a year and scale that up over time. and get to any number of stores in the next five years, that’d be great. There might be the opportunity to take it offshore again. The brand did go offshore 15, 20 years ago, and I think they learned a lot of lessons back then, but one thing’s for sure about taking any business away from your heart, or from your homeland, is that you have to have great systems in place. So we’re very ambitious in that space. Who knows, we might even look at something that complements the cake business in other parts of the world. So really ambitious, really focused on growing customer care ultimately and just doing the right thing by the community and by individuals, isn’t it? There’s no easier way to put a smile on someone’s face than walking through the door with a fantastic cake of some description, right?

Scott Bush:
So you know, I always thought I’d made it when I was in pizza, because that’s an easy thing, but this is heaps cooler than that, so. So it’s, yeah, it is. It’s just a, it’s a great business. It’s a great brand with a tremendous 32 year history founded by some very, very cool individuals. And I just want to be able to grow it forward and really lean in as a team and see where success takes us.

Sarah:
So are there friction points within the business? I mean, what would you see as the friction points and perhaps the obstacles to these goals?

Scott Bush:
Yeah, I think in franchising there’s always friction. I think there should be always friction. You know, I think any franchise business that’s harmonious, you’re not pushing as hard as you can. I said earlier on, I’m a big believer of getting things done and done at pace. And with that comes a truckload of pressure. I think that the friction is predominantly between the franchiser and the franchisor and taking them on the journey, but comms is key. I’ve spent a lot of time in the eight months I’ve been around, a lot of time in stores talking to franchisees. I’ve met or bar a couple of franchisees in that eight months, sort of face to face, which has been tremendous. And I’ve visited probably in excess of 100 odd stores, 100 of their 230 stores. So I’ve spent plenty of time in stores understanding their concerns and trying to remove some of those frictions because it is all about… show me, don’t tell me. You can come in and you can say whatever you want. You say, oh, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that. Even eight months in, if there’s not that arbitrary line in the sand, if there’s not that arbitrary point of difference, people just start to lose trust and faith in you very quickly. There’s a number of processes we’re going to launch this month, because we are now in August, around the comms and the way we talk and communicate with franchise needs. Not two. It’s not a one-way conversation. Franchising needs to be two-way. And it’s all about taking them on a journey and showing them what is possible and the power of possible. And, you know, I’ve said to them all recently in 10 years time, we could be sitting here thinking, goodness me, 10 years ago, we’re at 238 stores and now we’re at a scary number, 800 stores, 700 stores, you know, it could be anywhere, really could be anywhere. So I think the more you start those conversations now and take them on the journey, the more engaging they are. But the friction point will always be there, will always be there.

Sarah:
Do you think business is instinctive or is it a mindset that you can develop?

Scott Bush:
I think it’s a bit of both. I think it’s both instinctive and something you can learn if you really put your mind to it. But one thing you can’t learn, as is the case with most things, is having the right attitude. You have to have the right attitude. And you have to, I think you’ve got to do the right amount of research and you’ve got to understand that it’s bloody hard work. It’s really, really hard work. And for the few lucky people in the world that by chance succeeded. They’re very, very few, but I think for the majority of people, they’ll all tell you, you’ve got to go through that process of school of hard knocks. Excuse me, you’ve got to be able to be resilient. You have to be able to bounce back. And I think resilience comes a little bit of Teflon coating. You know, you’ve got to let a lot of stuff just slip off your back. Because yeah, there’s people out there that like to see you succeed, but only to a point. So yeah, it’s a bit of both, but it should always be good fun though. Should always be fun.

Sarah:
So just getting back then to talking about, you know, kind of the business development. And you mentioned early on about looking at things like kind of technology. And I’m just wondering what we can expect to see. It’s in the business as you develop those elements, you know, what’s changed and what can we expect to see on the technical front?

Scott Bush:
I think one of our key principles going forward is going to be world class. So everything we do has to be world class. And a big part of my thinking is because if we are ever fortunate enough to play on the world stage again, it just has to be because people expect it. I think people expect it more and more. And it’s becoming, I actually think it’s becoming easier to get it right, because there’s very little interaction from a human element. now in most retail experiences. You know, if you want to, you could buy whatever you want for a week, do an exercise for a week and not engage with you, buy a new car, you could buy a house, you could buy clothes, you could food, everything you want. You don’t have to have a human touch whatsoever. No engagement with human beings at all. But I think people are gonna yearn for that more and more. So in terms of our own space, I think we have to be both conscious and cognizant of it. I think there’s a real opportunity to drive drive forward in that tech digital space in our own business because we’ve never done it. So, you know, our online presence at the moment isn’t huge and I think we can be going forward. We can really have a presence on that stage of being able to to showcase the brand. So, you know, with the thinking being world-class, I mentioned earlier that we are gonna announce a CIO into the brand in the next couple of weeks, and he’s a world-class individual. He’s far too good for our business, but that’s only because of where it is now, because, you know, I’ve got this mindset of anything that’s going to be introduced into the business has to be to future-proof the growth. So, you know, world-class people coming into the business all over the show, and that goes for our franchisees as well. So we’re going to have some principles in and around how we bring people in the business and support them through that process, both internally and from a franchising perspective.

Sarah:
So when people think about technical aspects of IT, I mean nowadays, AI is kind of very much the buzzword, isn’t it?

Scott Bush:
It is.

Sarah:
And people see the good and the bad in that. What’s your perspective? How do you view the AI development?

Scott Bush:
I think a bit like that. I think you just know that the good and the bad, you know, I think it’s so exciting, so, so exciting in so many aspects, but then a little bit daunting as well. You know, it’s a bit like different modes of delivery. It doesn’t make any sense in my mind to have, you know, a… five kilo cake or pizza or any sort of food delivered in a one ton car. That doesn’t make any sense at all. So at some stage, the world is gonna have to get their heads around automation. So this wonderful thing the other day, the robotic waiter in a restaurant, there was still a waiter there moving around and doing things, but your food was actually bought to the table on this automated, it was brilliant. I’m sure it’s been around for a while, but it was the first time I’d seen it. And I was like, oh, that’s great. So you still ordered through a person or a touch screen or whatever else, and it just streamlined the process. So I think it is fascinating. It’s a very, very exciting time to be alive. I’ve got three little kids and I say, this is the best time to be alive, I think in the history of the world as we modernize ourselves around all things automated, but we need to be careful, as is the case with anything. You know, anything, any other revolutions over time, it’s you need governance and you need balance. But yeah, I think the tech part is really cool, really, really cool. and it’s definitely the way of the future.

Sarah:
And I mean, data is so important, isn’t it, in terms of kind of driving the business. So do you, are you a data person? Do you see that as the way forward? It’s absolutely crucial, but I just wonder where that kind of balance sits between data and the kind of the customer experience.

Scott Bush:
One of my favorite comments is let the data guide us. And I think, especially in the business that we’re in, selling cakes, it’s a good fun thing to sell, but you can’t have it to opinion-based. You can’t think, I know people are gonna buy that because I like it. It’s like we have to have a look at the data and things around foot traffic and where our stores are located and what people think of the varying products. And we’re seeing it so much now through some of the social platforms where what was once old is now new again. And that’s only coming to fruition because of the data. And I think as a brand, as a business, we haven’t done anything with our data. We’ve got a lot of data that sort of sits there in the background. And again, we need to be able to take it and mine the data and let that guide us in terms of the process forward. And take a bit of that opinion out of it. I think we’re gonna have opinion around store look and feel and design and those soft furnishings, soft finishings of anything we do, whether it be a cake or a store look and feel. But in terms of the right location, the right product. how it’s, you know, all those other critical data touch points. It’s super exciting. It is super exciting.

Sarah:
In terms of talking a little bit about the softer side of the business there, I mean, you’ve also recently, I think, appointed four agencies to support the marketing, the creative, the media and the PR. So it’s quite a thorough approach. What’s the thinking behind that? I know you said earlier that it was very lean business in the way it’s run. So you’ve kind of, you’ve gone big. You’ve got four agencies. It’s

Scott Bush:
very audacious,

Sarah:
very audacious.

Scott Bush:
very ambitious. Yeah, very ambitious. Yeah. I think we all should have a b-hag. But look, yeah, and again, world-class, world-class businesses and the guys who were here previously, they were great as well. And the relationships were 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 years. So these were long-term, long-standing relationships. And they were fantastic relationships for a system that was 250-odd stores strong. They were great and wonderful capability. But I think as we came into the business and looked at the history, this is all about the next chapter. This isn’t about a new beginning or even, I made that comment earlier in terms of sort of out with the old and in with the new. It wasn’t even the case of that. It was just building on in this very modular way. And we’re going to do a lot more of that with our product as well. We’re going to take some of those wonderful products and see how we can make them a little bit sexier, you know, and a little bit more appealing to a bigger group of people. So to do that, we need the right partnerships and we need the right direction. But again, our number one principle is culturally the right fit. So all of those agencies that we’ve bought on and there’s some big, big hitters in there. they’re culturally the right fit. It’s the first question. And that doesn’t mean that they just come in and say yes to everything that I suggest or, you know, our CMO or, you know, anyone else in the business suggests. It’s not like, oh, because it’s not approval by committee. It’s genuinely a conversation, a two-way debate, a rigorous discussion around, is this the right thing for the brand? Is this the right thing for our customer? And I think these four businesses specifically are going to deliver on that. And the pressure is on them. But you know the wonderful thing is that it’s just the turning of the page. And they’re all super, super excited. They’re super excited to be on the journey. So that’s the coolest part.

Sarah:
Does that include a look at the brand itself, as in the brand logo?

Scott Bush:
Yeah.

Sarah:
It’s such a classic

Scott Bush:
It is.

Sarah:
And it’s old, but it’s served its purpose. But I wonder whether that’s something that might get a fresh take.

Scott Bush:
And you know, that’s a really good question and a good point right there, because one of the things that we put in our logo now is baked in store. And one of the things that we found when we did our customer research was that a massive majority, like I mean almost everybody, thought that our product was baked elsewhere and bought into stores. And that is categorically

Sarah:
Right.

Scott Bush:
incorrect. Yeah, it’s categorically incorrect. And I think it plays into that comment around, show me, don’t tell me perfectly. Like, I wanna see that you bake them in stores. Our stores, historically, of what’s happened out the back has been a bit of a secret, but they’re a full-bomb bakery. We’ve got big mixes and beautiful, big decorating benches. They’re a beautiful store. They’re a bakery. All of our stores, except for the handful, it might be either a kiosk or a dry store where we supply product just because of footprint for overall size, product might come in from the neighboring store, in the country. It’s all baked fresh in-store. And you know, I think that is a wonderful opportunity to get that food theatre element because people like to see it now. People like to see the creativity and the creation of what they’re eating and especially in the world. I said it earlier, you know, it’s very therapeutic, it’s very satisfying decorating a cake, you know, playing with fondant and cake mixture, you know, all this stuff. You know, we buy a million litres of cream a year. A million litres of fresh cream, it’s massive, right? We should show people what we do with it. So yeah, in terms of that element of the business and the opportunity, it’s tremendous. The logo, yeah, I think it’s time. The green, that very, very important green box, and it’s an iconic colour. I’m sure in time we’ll get our say, you know, where people will call it, you know, the cheesecake shop green or something to that effect. We are going to, we’re going to soft, we’re going to soften certain elements of the brand and just modernize it a little bit. But again, really fun exercise and a super exciting journey to be on.

Scott Bush:
So watch this space.

Sarah:
It’s an interesting challenge, isn’t it, taking? And I always find this interesting when I talk to other heritage brands.

Scott Bush:
Mm.

Sarah:
You’ve got the heritage brand and you need to modernize it. And it’s that balance of how far you go without losing your customer loyalty and without losing that kind of core element that makes you who you are. I think it’s interesting. So finally, what can we expect to see? within the next kind of 12 months, what will customers notice about the business and what’s going to make it more appealing to franchise buyers, do you think? Two questions.

Scott Bush:
Store look and feel, yeah, no, yeah, I think the first one in terms of franchise buyers and growing our franchise partner sort of base will be store look and feel. Store look and feel and logo and all those, you know you said earlier that heritage brand, ironically we’ve got a heritage green as our base color,

Sarah:
Yeah.

Scott Bush:
so we might, we’ll tweak that a little bit, so I think that’s going to be super exciting. The second part of it will be the growth part. And not for our own benefit, but just because we want more people to enjoy our products, to enjoy cake, to celebrate life’s moments. Last night was a perfect example watching the soccer.

Sarah:
Mmm.

Scott Bush:
You know, we should have been so busy. We should have had stores open at eight o’clock and delivering our wonderful cakes through the aggregators and everything else. But, you know, that’s a journey we want to go on. So in terms of the occasion, the day part, tremendous growth there. You know, more office parties, more community organizations, a lot more in-depth local activity in terms of engaging with the public. So I think that’ll be the second part in and around that organic growth part. And then just accessibility to our stores. You know, I find that we have these massive drive times from one store to the other. And I just, we just want to get closer to people. You know, we think there’s an opportunity to do something as an online business for sure, of course we do. But equally, we think there’s a tremendous opportunity to just continue to grow the brand and that in-store customer experience.

Sarah:
Scott, it’s been fantastic, exciting times ahead. Thank you.