Something spooky this way comes...
Something spooky this way comes...
about spooky kitchens
This is spooky kitchens, a newsletter about the latest and strangest in ghost kitchen news, weekly.
What’s spooky kitchens? A little more specifically — spooky kitchens is a weekly newsletter that covers the latest headlines and trends in ghost kitchen and food tech news in one breezy, informative, enjoyable digest. There’s a lot happening in this space; I’ll read everything and boil it down into what’s happening and why it matters, so (boo) don’t have to. And you’ll even like reading it. Wow!
Who’s spooky kitchens? I’m Mitch — I was at Kitchen United from 2018-2021, among other things producing an internal newsletter a little like this one to keep the company informed of the goings-on in our space. And now I’m here. We’ll call it a lateral career move. Sure. You can find out more about me in my full boo-o (bio, a reach) below.
When’s spooky kitchens? Every Friday AM — 6am PST, 8am CST, 9am EST.
How’s spooky kitchens? Oh my gosh, that’s…so kind of you to ask. Good, you know, making it work, one day at a time haha, yeah…you?
the subscription situation
spooky kitchens will be free to all, weekly, through January 2022. Starting in February 2022 subscriptions will change to two tiers:
Paid ($5 monthly or $36 annually ($3/month): the weekly newsletter + access to future deep dives and special reports.
Free: the newsletter, monthly — first week of every month, to be exact.
Once that change is made in February, no one will be automatically transferred to paid subscriptions (this is not a streaming service) — it will be fully voluntary opt-in at that point. If you don’t want to miss a week (love it) you will have plenty of warning in advance to update your subscription.
boo-o: who’s the spook?
The hood is pulled back, the snarling, grotesque mask torn away, and Scooby and Shaggy reveal — me! I’m Mitch.
⏩ TL;DR: I worked in the ghost kitchen space since nearly its US beginning, and now I write distilled summaries of the weekly industry news because I have to do something with this collection of incredibly niche knowledge stored up in my head — and also because the industry’s still exciting, innovative, and just plain wild enough to keep things interesting.
📖 The longer version:
I worked at Kitchen United for 3.5 years, which, if you do the math, is very close to its entire life span. I was employee number 5. My dad is Jim Collins who was the first CEO of Kitchen United. He didn’t hire me and was, before I started, quite understandably reluctant to do so.
Working alongside him and a lean team of astoundingly bright restaurant minds, I participated in my own small way in the birth of a niche industry that has grown to change the entire restaurant landscape, along the way learning more about the macro food industry than I ever expected to — and I expected to learn a lot.
In my position at KU, among many other things, I monitored news, current events, and trade analysis in our burgeoning, unheard-of ghost kitchen industry. In addition to the nascent to-go kitchens, I kept tabs on the rapidly-growing third-party delivery business, Big Food, food tech, finance, and more relevant topics across global sources, and then consolidated all of that information down into a weekly internal news digest. It was a resource for the company to keep in touch with our place in the industry and remain aware of the events and innovation occurring around the globe that might inspire or impact us. Which, eventually, they often did — directly.
And so I’ve taken my show on the road. I figure the ghost kitchen-heads out there could use something fun, insightful, and digestible to read — one can only take so much direct input from RBO, NRN, FOD, Fast Casual, and Restaurant Dive (great material from all, there’s just lots of it). A truly complete picture of the industry pulls from all those sources and more and boils them down into one simple, goofy digest.
And that’s spooky kitchens.
Welcome to the oddest niche newsletter on the Internet. See you on Fridays.
Boo ✌️,
Mitch
Lastly, if you really, really need to reach me, you can @ boo@spookykitchens.com.
Like it so far? I’ll just leave this riiiight here: