Victoria Fausnaught, an operating partner within a franchise group based out of Middle Tennessee, has spent years navigating the complex challenges of franchise operations. One of the most significant hurdles she has faced has been supply chain management—no matter before, during, or after the COVID-19 pandemic. These challenges forced her to adapt quickly and find creative solutions to keep operations running smoothly, even in the most uncertain times. Through this journey, she developed a deep understanding of how critical it is to have both practical strategies and innovative approaches in place. It was out of these challenges that Victoria founded Pink Unicorn AI, a company that focuses on providing solutions like customized training and operational support, specifically designed to tackle the real-world issues we face in the franchise space. She is excited to share how her personal experiences and the lessons she has learned along the way can help other franchise operators across the market.

Josh Halpern is the Chief Executive Officer for Big Chicken. Josh is a dynamic, partnership-focused, thought leader with a robust career in streamlining efficiency, driving innovation, building diverse engaged teams, and growing economic results across the CPG, retail, and restaurant verticals. Most recently, Josh served as the Chief Sales Officer for FIFCO USA, the 8th largest US brewing company, where he was responsible for commercial operations and building top and bottom-line results for Off-Premise, On-Premise, and company-owned brewpubs. Prior, Josh led the Anheuser-Busch InBev, On-Premise and Small Format channels in the US, and Shopper Marketing globally.

John Lucas is an industry veteran with over 35 years of hospitality and restaurant experience. In his role, John ensures Farmer Boys upholds our consistent operational standards and delivers a high-quality, reliable guest experience in every restaurant. Additionally, Lucas oversees all the system’s franchised locations and is responsible for building upon Farmer Boys’ high service standards at those locations. Lucas joined the Farmer Boys team in 2017 as a franchise business consultant and now serves as the Vice President of Brand and Franchise Development.

After 15 years of working his way up through the competitive ranks of NYC’s financial sector, Andrew Pudalov made a conscientious decision to leave his most recent position as Global Head of Fixed Income Derivative Trading at National Australia Bank to pursue an interest he felt was a virtue of higher importance. While he worked his entire adult life for a number of prestigious financial institutions to achieve an expertise in institutional fixed income derivative trading, he simply felt it time to gratify another more altruistic ambition he had always held. Andrew founded Boulder’s University Hill District’s first all-natural bowl/smoothie bar in the fall of 2004, providing a healthy alternative to the common “Hill” fare. After enormous success, Andrew launched a line of frozen grab-n-go bowls soon to meet the ever-mounting demand. Today, he operates Rush Bowls retail, wholesaling, and franchising with over 100 stores in various stages of development throughout the US.

Priya Monga is a GM at Instacart Business leading the GTM Strategy for Instacart Business, a service from Instacart built to help restaurants get the ingredients and supplies that they need delivered the same-day. The team at Instacart Business work with restaurants of all sizes to help them streamline their ordering processes and save them time and money by not sending their employees out of their stores to pick up missing ingredients. She lives in San Francisco with her husband and puppy named Gobi and when she's not working with restaurants, she's exploring the restaurant scene in the Bay Area!