Skip to content
MarketScale
‹ Back to IndustriesFood & Beverage

How Can Your Restaurant Engineer More ‘Wow’ Moments

Food is serious business. Now, on The Main Course, host Barbara Castiglia will invite insiders on the front lines of food to share their expertise, strategies, and forecasts for navigating the ever-changing restaurant industry. Food quality and customer experience are fundamental to the restaurant business and are often the result of a dedicated team that puts customers first…

This story was produced through MarketScale. See how Food & Beverage teams put it to work with Customer Stories & Case Studies.

Promoted content from The Main Course on MarketScale.

Share

Get featured

Want to get featured in MarketScale Food & Beverage?

Create a free MarketScale workspace and get your company's expertise featured across our Food & Beverage coverage. No credit card, no demo required.

Start free

Food is serious business. Now, on The Main Course, host Barbara Castiglia will invite insiders on the front lines of food to share their expertise, strategies, and forecasts for navigating the ever-changing restaurant industry.

Food quality and customer experience are fundamental to the restaurant business and are often the result of a dedicated team that puts customers first and invests in technologies and procedures that are focused on the whole customer journey.

On this episode of The Main Course, host Barbara Castiglia talked with Tony Darden, President of MOOYAH Burgers, Fries & Shakes. MOOYAH is a fast-casual restaurant chain with over a hundred locations. With a focus on fresh food — from never-frozen beef to buns baked in-house — MOOYAH continues to expand locations and is always striving to create the best customer experience.

“We’ve got to make a great impression on our guests,” Dared said. “We have things we call wow moments.” Customers are greeted by smiling faces and a welcoming dining room with attentive and cheerful team members. The goal is a frictionless and convenient experience for customers that involves everything from an app for ordering and display screens in the kitchen that makes the process seamless.

Darden has 25 years of experience in the restaurant business and knows how important company culture is to the success of the brand. He began as a server and loved the sense of community and teamwork he found in food service. Now as president of MOOYAH he is putting his experience to work in creating what he calls a “ridiculicious” customer experience.

A New Episode is Served Up Every Tuesday and Thursday!

Follow us on social media for the latest updates in B2B!

Twitter – @MarketScale

Facebook – facebook.com/marketscale

LinkedIn – linkedin.com/company/marketscale

The Main Course

Part of this channel

The Main Course

Where restaurant and food industry insiders talk real business.

Visit the channel

Your experts belong here

Every story in MarketScale Food & Beverage starts with a company putting its plant managers, quality leads, and R&D teams on the record. Buyers are already reading this topic. The only question is whose experts they find.

Processors and grocery buyers vet suppliers hard, and your operations people are the ones who can satisfy them.

Get your team featuredSee how it works15 minutes, straight to a calendar.

Follow Food & Beverage Insights

Get new expert content in your inbox.

Food & Beverage: are you visible to AI?

Before they reach out, Food & Beverage buyers ask AI engines which vendors to trust. Explore how your experts, customers, and partners can become useful content for buyers and AI search.

Free plan

You just read one Food & Beverage expert. Your company is full of them.

This article was produced through MarketScale. The same platform turns your plant managers, quality leads, and R&D teams into the articles, video, and social content Food & Beverage buyers are searching for. Create a free workspace and see it with your own people. No credit card, no demo required.

NPS +73 · 1,000+ creators · 38+ countries

What you get, free

Your own MarketScale workspace, up to 10 people
One professional video edit a month for qualifying companies
Media requests to your crowd, remote recording, AI writing tools
$0, no credit card, nothing that expires

More Food & Beverage Insights

Alternative protein specs are shifting from imitation to repeatable, processing-focused quality

Alternative protein specs are shifting from imitation to repeatable, processing-focused quality

Science|Business, in a report supported by EIT Food, says alternative proteins are moving from novelty to procurement-ready categories judged on taste, price, and processing. Nature and ScienceDirect reviews point to unresolved safety, regulatory, and environmental assessments for microbial and cultured proteins. For food manufacturers, the near-term work is specification discipline, not hype.

  • 01Formulation and QA teams should define what ‘cleaner labels’ means for each SKU, specifying which processes and inputs are avoided as the industry moves past direct mimicry and ultra-processing.
  • 02Nature flags that environmental impacts for microbe-derived proteins and cultured meat are still not fully assessed, which can complicate sustainability reporting and supplier scorecards.
  • 03ScienceDirect notes plant-based products can rely on ultra-processed inputs and have amino-acid limitations, making protein quality metrics a better spec than ‘plant-based’ alone.

Sep 14, 2026

44% of higher-income shoppers are buying more private label

44% of higher-income shoppers are buying more private label

Simon-Kucher found 44% of higher-income U.S. shoppers are increasing private label purchases, according to Food Business News. Circana put U.S. private-label sales at $330 billion in 2025, according to Food Business News. Retailers are offering tiered private label lines, including premium options, according to Food Business News.

  • 01Premium private label is no longer a niche: Simon-Kucher found 56% of higher-income consumers intentionally buy premium store brands, a useful benchmark for assortment planning.
  • 02Before budgeting, align definitions: Circana’s $330B figure spans broader private label, while Mintel’s $141.2B estimate is food-and-drink only, according to IFT.org.

Sep 13, 2026

Food Plant Awards Weigh Layout and Utility Performance

Food Plant Awards Weigh Layout and Utility Performance

Food Engineering named Carolina Foods' Pineville, N.C. facility its 2025 Plant of the Year, citing linear layout, automation and fryer-room zoning. Food Processing's Sept. 8, 2026 Green Plant of the Year feature highlighted Perdue Farms' Lewiston, N.C. plant for greenhouse gas and water reductions.

  • 01Carolina Foods' award-winning 425,000-square-foot expansion in Pineville, North Carolina was cited for a linear setup, high automation and updated equipment that raised throughput while maintaining safety and quality, with fryer room separation credited as a novel design choice.
  • 02Food Engineering judges prioritize automation strategy, processing and packaging line design, and supply chain management as plant evaluation criteria.
  • 03MarketScale analysis suggests operators may find it useful to document material flow paths, separate high-heat or high-variability steps like frying from the rest of production, and set a metering and verification baseline for utility and emissions data to support later comparisons.

Sep 13, 2026

Explore More Food & Beverage Insights

Read more expert perspectives from across Food & Beverage.

Browse Food & Beverage Hub

For B2B teams

Your experts could be publishing here

Stories like this one run on content MarketScale captures from real practitioners. See how your team's expertise becomes coverage in Food & Beverage and beyond.

Book a 15-minute demo

Or call us. No forms required. We pick up. 214-945-2512