It all began with sliders. Customers can choose three of Daddy’s four chicken sandwich flavors to try in slider-style.
As a fine dining chef, sliders weren’t in Pace Webb’s wheelhouse, but she’s since created an entire restaurant concept around them. Her Daddy’s Chicken Shack is set to grow with two deals signed for 40 units.
Webb and her husband, Chris Georgalas, launched Daddy’s Chicken Shack in Pasadena, California, in 2018 and next month will open their second corporate location, in Houston. As the owner of fine dining catering company Taste of Pace, Webb devised the recipe for what would be Daddy’s signature chicken sliders when she was building the menu for a party in Los Angeles.
“Sliders weren’t really in my repertoire,” Webb said. “But in my mind, I was like, ‘I’m also a business owner. So, I want to make it work.’ So I ended up creating some really fun flavors of sliders, like pork, beef and then a fried chicken slider.”
The party attendees enjoyed the chicken sliders so much that Webb and her sous chef at the time considered ditching the fine dining concept to “just sling fried chicken sliders, and simplify our lives a little bit here,” Webb said.
Daddy’s Chicken Shack has deals signed to open 40 more restaurants in California, Arizona and Colorado.
Daddy’s Chicken opened in what Georgalas called “the most challenging location that you could possibly have.” It’s 700 square feet, lacks parking, there’s not much room for dine-in seating and its proximity to a fire station makes for a lot of noise.
“That forces us to think outside the box,” said Georgalas, who specializes in consumer trends and behavior. In 2018 he was mainly focusing on younger generations. “Then the pandemic happened, and my mom’s on DoorDash and my dad is scanning QR codes,” he said.
Daddy’s built its technology infrastructure to maximize off-premises channels and by 2020 it was doing more than $1 million in sales. Future locations will be larger and have indoor seating, Georgalas said.
The chicken is an American-meet-South-Asian blend, but “it’s not in your face,” Webb said. “It’s a really nice fusion.”
The pair didn’t want to be known as just another Nashville hot chicken brand, so Webb held off adding a hot version, the Nashville Daddy, to the menu until recently. Now, there are four chicken varieties, as well as a vegan cauliflower-based option, in addition to breakfast menu items, including the Waffle Daddy. The Big Daddy is the brand’s classic sandwich.
Daddy’s Chicken Shack founders Chris Georgalas, left, and Pace Webb, right, with Dave Liniger, the founder of Re/Max who’s also an investor in Daddy’s and is opening locations.
Daddy’s has signed agreements for 40 units between two franchisees: 20 units in California, 10 in Phoenix and 10 in Denver.
Re/Max founder Dave Liniger established Area 15 Franchising to open 20 restaurants in Arizona and Denver. The brand is his first restaurant endeavor.
The California franchisees, Robin Bieker and Blair Salisbury, signed a 20-unit regional development deal. Feeling confident in the investment when Daddy’s has just one store open was tough, Salisbury said, but after meeting with the brand’s team multiple times he felt prepared.
“I just looked at the entire team and thought, they’ve got all the ducks in place here,” Salisbury said. “I can see there’s very huge success.”
Salisbury comes from a restaurant family. His father runs El Cholo, a Mexican restaurant chain, and Salisbury operates an El Cholo location in Pasadena, just half a mile from Daddy’s Chicken Shack.
The cost to open a Daddy’s franchise ranges from $168,800 to $825,900.