Black Box Intelligence LLC (BBI), Consumer Edge Research LLC (CER), GuestMetrics LLC (GM), and People Report announced the formation of a joint venture that will capture the combined product offerings of the four companies and provide revolutionary foodservice industry data and analytics. Together the four firms track the financial, consumer, and human capital metrics of more than 200 hospitality and restaurant companies, 60,000 annual household surveys, and one million employees.
BBI provides benchmarked weekly and monthly financial reports and insights, directly captured from more than 12,000 locations in the quick-serve, fast casual, casual, and fine dining segments. GM is the leading enterprise management provider of foodservice industry spending data, and currently captures more than 250 million transactions per year across the quick serve, fast casual, casual, fine dining, bar, and hotel industries. CER is an independent research boutique firm, focused on the global consumer sector, combining primary research with rigorous analytics. People Report is the only source of benchmarked human capital metrics for public and private foodservice companies, reporting on 20,000 outlets monthly on the demographics, turnover, and compensation practices in the service sector workforce.
Commenting on the new partnership, Wallace B. Doolin, founder, chairman and CEO of BBI, says, “This joint venture allows BBI and People Report to deepen its penetration into restaurants, enter hotel foodservice, and add leading macro and consumer research insights to its rich executive summary and benchmarked reports. Our combined goal is to provide our members and clients the predictive analytics that lead to best-in-class performance and a sustainable competitive advantage.”
Doolin is a widely recognized and respected global restaurant industry leader, who has served as the CEO of multiple brands, including Carlson Restaurants Worldwide, La Madeleine, and Buca di Beppo. His accomplishments include serving as president of Applebee’s and leading the global expansion of T.G.I. Friday’s from 135 restaurants in two countries to more than 750 units in 55 countries, exceeding $2 billion in revenue. He has served on the board of the National Restaurant Association for 15 years, and was the chairman of its Educational Foundation. Today he serves on several public, private, and non-profit boards.
Bill Pecoriello, CEO of Consumer Edge Research, says, “I’m thrilled to be bringing the collective best in class capabilities of these four companies together to help revolutionize the data and value added insights we can collectively provide on the foodservice industry”.
Prior to founding CER in January 2009, Pecoriello was a managing director at Morgan Stanley covering the beverages and household/personal care sectors. He also spent more than five years at Sanford Bernstein, where he was a partner, and was a project manager at Mars & Co where he consulted to the senior management teams of consumer product companies.
