Goodbye, Wahlburgers -- and Thanks for Everything

After 6 1/2 years, I am leaving Wahlburgers effective Friday, June 15th. My time here has been the highlight of my career and the ride of my life. Before I move on to my next position, I wanted to spend a little time looking back and thanking everyone who has been part of making this company and this journey so special.

Highlights are way too many to cover them all, but here are a few of my standouts:

* Watching Paul the day after the Hingham grand opening trying to control the absolute chaos and suggesting he give out tater tot samples to pacify the massive line. Soon the tots were flying. It was my first taste of Paul as the all-in restaurateur.

* Meeting with Mark in New York at Nobu a week later for dinner to discuss the long-term growth strategy. Like most initial plans, things turned out just a little differently, but we were both right about the enormous potential of the business.

* Meeting with Donnie for the first time on the set of Blue Bloods two weeks later in his trailer surrounding by hundreds of mid-life women and trying to talk to him while he caught his breath after filming a chase scene. It was my first peek into the incredible relationship between Donnie and his fans.

* Another dinner with Mark to meet potential investors that turned out to be a group of extroardinarily wealthy people and celebrities and wondering how did I get here?

* Going to New York with Paul and Alma to meet Mark to pitch the reality show. Watching Mark meet Alma at the door, there was no doubt this world-class celebrity was first and foremost mom's son.

* Eliminating the high tops and expanding choice/adding salads to the Hingham menu. It gave us a much more viable suburban model and opened the door to many more units.

* Hearing for the first time that the Wahlburgers show would be paired with Duck Dynasty. In a million years, I never would have guessed before joining Wahlburgers that Duck Dynasty would play a major role in my career. I will always be grateful to Rasha Drachkovitch of 44 Blue for coming up with the show idea and pushing it forward, and I will never forget the insanity of the Hingham restaurant the day after the show first aired. I doubt I'll ever experience a day like that again.

* Signing our first traditional franchise deal for Philadelphia, following our Canadian deal. It set the pattern for everything to follow.

* Opening Fenway. Planting the flag in Boston was a long time coming.

* Returning to my family's former home in metro Detroit to open the Greektown location. It felt like being on a championship-winning team returning home for the parade.

* Signing the Hy-vee deal. They are an amazing group, and it helped push us from being a pure restaurant company to being a multi-channel retailer as well. It also put us in some very big-league company.

* Adding the Impossible Burger and a dedicated Wahlbowls/salad category to our menu. Those changes positioned the company to address an increasingly health-oriented, sustainability-focused population, and I hope that evolution continues.

* Launching the food truck and re-announcing the South Bay restaurant site in Dorchester. The weather forecast was terrible, and I thought we should cancel it, but my wife (head of marketing) said the show must go on -- and it was a heck of a show.

* Seeing the first packages of Wahlburgers beef hit retail stores across the country.

* Attending the Mall of America VIP Party and watching thousands of people go crazy when the Wahlbergs were introduced. Extrarodinarily relevant family when I joined the company and decades prior, and still extraordinarily relevant 6 1/2 years later. In this day of nanosecond news, that is very hard to pull off and a credit to their collective staying power.

And on, and on, and on.

There are so many thank-yous owed to the people who made this happen, it would be impossible to get to them all, but I will try my best:

It starts and ends with family. Thank you to my incredible wife of 27 years Liz who helped advise me all 6 1/2 years and took on the challenge of building the foundation for our marketing department last year as CMO. During that time she led the creation of our new brand strategy and "Real Family Flavor" mantra, transitioned two new agencies, revamped all of our social media and web platforms to make them scalable and managed multiple major launches, including the most recent Wahlburgers at Home retail beef platform, the corporate food truck launch and the Wahlclub email program. I woke up every morning to see her at the computer and went to bed every night with her either on the phone or at her computer working on Wahlburgers and Alma Nove. I appreciate the sacrifices she made on behalf of the company and, more importantly, the greater sacrifice of putting up with me for half her life!

Thanks to my children, Danielle, Jacqueline and Grant, who also lived through the sometimes chaos of Wahlburgers while growing up and served as our personal focus group. Much more importantly, they are the ones who turned our house into a happy home and created so many fantastic moments. Of all the things I am proud of, I am most proud of them. I couldn't ask for better.

Thanks to an amazing group of employees who have brought their dedication and heart to build this brand every day.

To start, I've appreciated the support of our leadership team: COO Norm MacLennan, Sr. Director of Operations John Rogan, VP of Purchasing Chris Snyder and CFO Patrick Renna. Norm and I met on Linkedin as I was looking to add an operations leader, and I thought his posts were right in line with our values and priorities. He took the leap of faith to join early, and he wound up being everything we hoped for. Norm brought on John as his right-hand man, and he has been a terrific add. I met Patrick for lunch on what I thought was a lark as he was transitioning away from his CEO role at Boloco. Little did I know how integral he would be to our development years later. He was and is one of the best hires I ever made. The company is in good hands with him as interim CEO. Patrick brought on Chris as head of purchasing, and he added tremendous value from day 1. They give me a lot of faith and confidence in the future of the business.

We have other great managers who have been with us since the first Hingham restaurant, many of whom have taken multiple steps in their careers already. Ashley Freddura kept things together amidst the mayhem of our original Hingham store until we were ready to expand and is now the Regional Manager for metropolitan Boston. She recently was named a Rising Star on the South Shore, and she has always been a star at Wahlburgers. Lisa Corrado developed the original designs and logos as a consultant and now leads the brilliant creative for the business. Theresa Hogan was also part of the original store team and grew into the General Manager for Hingham. Katee Trinkle started in Hingham, and my first memory of her was bailing us out on a NKOTB party gone sideways, where her in-depth knowledge of the band and "Blockheads" kept the party rolling. Now she runs our food truck program. And on and on.

These are just some of the Boston area employees among the thousands across the country who have kept Wahlburgers growing successfully from the beginning. I cannot thank them enough for all they've done to build the brand.

Thanks also to our investors, both in the holding company and the Boston metro restaurants, who supported the business early on and continue to back the brand with their hard-earned money. I know the team is fully committed to doing the work necessary to make sure your faith in the business gets rewarded. We're fortunate for the investors we have backing the brand.

Next are our franchisees, without whom we'd be a fraction of what we are today. It all started with Henry Wu and Mike Wekerle negotiating the first franchising deal for Canada in our then-very-spartan Hingham offices (featuring Mark almost killing himself leaning back in our broken $60 Staples chair). We now have dozens of deals and have gone global, and that is due to the faith our franchise partners have shown in the business and their commitment to building the brand. It seems fitting for my last major event as CEO to be the Mall of America grand opening with Hy-vee. They are everything you'd want in a franchise partner, and we're very lucky to have the quality of our current franchisees.

Thank you as well to all of the suppliers and other partners who worked with us to build the business. You helped us out, especially in our early days, and I will never forget that.

I also want to thank the great team at Alma Nove, the original Wahlberg restaurant that made everything possible. Lisa Acker, Julie Schorle, Anne Stenfors and Chris Lincoln were the team the last several years that held things together while the business managed the ups and downs of the Shipyard development. It is great to see how reinvigorated the business is as it passes its 8th anniversary, and I am happy Paul has a new GM in Fred Pahl that he can lean on. I'd also like to send a special shout-out to Jim Caputo, Annmari Vasconcelos and Carrie Casagrande for helping Alma Nove thrive in its early days.

And that brings me to the brothers.

What can I say about Mark? Little did I realize when we had that dinner at Nobu how committed he would be to the business. He has poured an unthinkable amount of his time, energy and money into building Wahlburgers and making it great. He has always been available when needed and honored every commitment he made to me or this business. Without him, we would be nowhere close to where we are today, and he has never been more committed to Wahlburgers. He is much more than an entertainer; he is a consummate businessman, and I have learned a lot from him about crystallizing issues and pushing initiatives. I don't know how he juggles everything he does so successfully. It has been an honor and a pleasure to be his partner, and I hope we find ways to work together down the road.

Donnie is similarly amazing. He has a gift for branding and making people feel special. As time has gone by, his involvement in the business has increased, and he has played a particularly strong role in developing our brand voice and, most recently, approach to promoting the retail beef program. There is a reason NKOTB is still so topical and relevant after decades, along with Blue Bloods. Donnie understands how to keep things top of mind and stay true to his core fan base. Wahlburgers is lucky to have him helping drive its success.

Then there's Paul. He is every bit the humble, hardworking, dedicated, quality-oriented perfectionist you read about and see on TV. I have met very few people with his work ethic or attention to craft. I have also rarely met a more decent human being who gives more of himself to others. I could say so, so much more about Paul, but I will leave it with a very heartfelt thank you for working shoulder-to-shoulder with me to build this business from the ground up these last 6 1/2 years. The South Shore and metropolitan Boston should be very grateful to have him as a community asset.

Alma, Jim and Bob Wahlberg have also pitched in to support Wahlburgers at various times in various ways, always to the brand's great benefit. It is a family affair in the best sense.

So what's next? After the extraordinary intensity of helping to build Wahlburgers, I am ready for a brief break this summer. In August, I will begin a new position as CEO of a different restaurant concept, and I am excited for the opportunity. I'll provide more details once I start. I am also excited to see the direction a new leader takes Wahlburgers. I think a fresh perspective and new energy will be good for the brand. The opportunities are endless -- almost too endless! Wherever life takes me, I will always look at Wahlburgers as a career highlight, and I will always be ready to help Patrick, the team and the brothers any way I can.

Now I end, and as I said before, it starts and ends with family. Thanks again to Liz, Danielle, Jackie and Grant for supporting me on this journey, and I can't wait to continue the journey with you, starting this summer.

As Mark always says, at the end of the day, it is all about family. I can't put into words how lucky I am to have been associated with the Wahlberg family; I'm even luckier to be able to share the rest of my life with my own.

So long for now. Maybe I'll see you at a Wahlburgers down the road!

Regards, Rick