Reports to: Vice President of Development
With a projected 1,000 cafes in the United States by 2030,
Paris Baguette is one of the fastest-growing neighborhood bakery cafés in the
world. Our vision is to reestablish the neighborhood bakery café as the heart
of the community around the world. Paris
Baguette’s mission is to bring expertly crafted baked and brewed goods through
a warm and welcoming bakery café experience that delivers joy to everyone.
If you are someone who has heart, wants to spread joy,
nourish community and is ready to rise to the occasion, we are looking for you
to join our growing team!
WHAT WE ARE HUNGRY FOR
The Director of New Café Openings will lead the
strategy, execution, and continuous improvement of the New Café Opening
function across North America, ensuring every new bakery café opens
efficiently, consistently, and positioned for long-term franchisee success. The
role is responsible for designing and scaling best-in-class new café opening
systems and for the training, deployment, and performance management of a
30+ person on-site opening support organization operating both pre- and
post-opening. The Director serves as the senior leader and primary point of
contact for franchisee readiness during the pre-operational lifecycle, ensuring
a seamless transition from Development to Operations while driving efficiency,
accountability, and repeatable results at scale.
KNOWLEDGE AND RESPONSIBILITIES
- Leads all new café openings across North America, including
transfers, with full ownership of opening outcomes.
- Develops and executes opening strategy, timelines, and
capacity planning to support aggressive year-over-year growth.
- Oversees the training, deployment, and on-site
execution of a 30+ person New Café Opening team supporting cafés
before, during, and after opening.
- Establishes clear performance expectations, KPIs, and
accountability frameworks for opening teams and franchise partners.
- Prepares franchise owners for long-term operational success,
not just opening day readiness, through structured training, coaching, and
post-opening follow-up.
- Standardizes and continuously improves new café opening
processes, playbooks, and tools, driving efficiency, speed, and quality.
- Leads cross-functional alignment with Development,
Construction, Supply Chain, IT, Training, and Operations to ensure flawless
execution.
- Establishes and leads post-opening review and performance
validation programs to identify trends, risks, and opportunities for
improvement.
- Builds strong, trust-based relationships with franchisees
and serves as a partner throughout the opening journey.
- Recruits, develops, mentors, and retains senior leaders’
managers and team members within the New Café Opening organization.
- Drives vendor strategy and alignment to support scalable,
repeatable openings.
- Supports enterprise initiatives tied to growth, scale, and
operational excellence.
- Other duties may be assigned.
WHAT YOU NEED TO HAVE
- Bachelor’s degree required in Business Administration,
Operations, Organizational Development, or equivalent experience.
- At least 10+ years of progressive leadership experience in
multi-unit restaurant, retail, or franchise environments with significant
exposure to high-volume new unit openings.
- Proven experience leading large, geographically distributed
teams and building scalable systems in fast-growth organizations.
- Demonstrated success in franchise environments, including
preparing owners for operational readiness and long-term success.
- Strong strategic mindset with the ability to balance
big-picture planning and disciplined execution.
- Exceptional leadership presence with the ability to
influence cross-functional partners and franchise stakeholders at all levels.
- Highly organized, data-driven, and process-oriented leader
with a passion for continuous improvement.
- Ability to travel extensively across North America in
support of new café openings.
- Flexible, adaptive, upbeat, open and visible work style,
with a successful track record of supporting operations leaders across a large
geographically decentralized portfolio.
- Passion for people! Dynamic and engaged leader who has a
passion for empowering, inspiring, motivating & developing team members and
franchisee relationships.
- Exceptional organizational and communication skills with the
ability to effectively balance priorities and deliver results in a fast-paced,
ever-changing, and highly entrepreneurial environment.
- Feedback is a gift! Ability to provide constructive feedback
and recognition to every member of the organization, along with Franchisees, to
ensure we have an open and transparent culture of high performance standards.
- High emotional intelligence with the ability to work with,
and support diverse teams by being highly empathetic, intuitive, self-motivated
and driven.
- Teams Win! Has to be a team player who fosters a
collaborative and engaged teamwork environment.
- Being a Brand Ambassador, with an excellent knowledge of and
commitment to Paris Baguette’s Mission, Vision, Brand Values and Culture.
- Love of travel! Ability to commute to all current Corporate
and Franchise locations, as well as proposed openings.
SWEET BENEFITS
- Competitive compensation
- Free Cake for your Birthday
- Medical, Dental, Vision benefits
- 401K Retirement Plan
- Paid time off, paid Holidays
- High Performance Culture