Dive Brief:

• Portillo’s COO Derrick Pratt will leave the company on June 30, the company confirmed in an email to Restaurant Dive.
• The company has engaged The Elliot Group to find a new head of operations. Until then, operations leaders will report to CEO Michael Oslanloo, the company said.
• Pratt, who spent over three years at Portillo’s, will become CEO at Condado Tacos, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Dive Insight:

While COO, Pratt was responsible for restaurant operations, marketing and off-premise, information technology, new restaurant openings, restaurant support, operations services and culinary refinement, according to his LinkedIn profile. He originally joined the company in 2020 as senior vice president of restaurants and became COO in May 2021. The bulk of his career has been with Starbucks and McDonald’s, where he spent 11 years and 21 years, respectively, in the roles of vice president of operations. 

“We are grateful for his contributions to drive operations forward during his time with Portillo’s,” the company said in a statement. “This decision comes as we continue to execute our accelerated growth strategy and seek to uncover operational efficiencies and improvements at scale.”

Portillo’s is in the midst of executing a four-point plan to improve operations, innovate and amplify the brand experience, build restaurants with high average-unit volumes and improve the employee experience. This also includes improving drive-thru speeds, which are slower than 2019 levels. Improving drive-thru speeds by 30 seconds can add one point to same-store sales, the company previously said. Portillo’s reported a same-store sales decline of 1.2% last quarter — the first time it reported negative comparable sales since its IPO in 2021.