Claudia San Pedro does not stop moving. The president of Sonic is always doing something, whether it’s playing tennis or hiking or managing the country’s 11th-largest restaurant chain.
One time she took her family on a bicycling trip through cold, rainy and narrow highways in Ireland, a trip her teenagers have yet to quite forget. Another time, during an industry conference in Sun Valley, she convinced a group to go mountain biking. It began snowing, they got lost, and nobody had jackets.
But here’s the thing: In each of these cases, San Pedro kept things positive and led through it. “Her positive attitude and the fact that she made a difficult event fun is something I’ll never forget,” said Kate Jaspon, the Inspire Brands chief financial officer who was on that mountain biking trip at San Pedro’s invitation.
San Pedro’s ability to lead through challenges and solve problems have won her respect throughout the industry, but particularly inside Sonic and the broader Inspire Brands group. She’s used those skills to help guide Sonic through one challenge after the next, from steering through a difficult technology integration to guiding the company’s response to the pandemic.
Sonic was one of the industry’s strongest performers in 2020 and followed that up with even more growth in 2021. And it earned San Pedro the 2022 Restaurant Leader of the Year title, the first woman to win that award.
“There’s no impediment to getting to her goal,” longtime friend Komal Dhall said. “Nothing is a problem. It’s just something you need to work through. So if it’s raining, wear a coat. If it’s cold, get a coat. That’s what you do when you’re with Claudia. You just solve the problem and you move forward.”
Learning English
San Pedro’s family came to the U.S. from Mexico when she was two years old. Her father was the family visionary, the person who always told her to dream big. A cardiologist, he took young San Pedro with him on Saturdays to meet with his patients and sometimes invited them over for holidays when they had nowhere else to go. “My dad, how he treated people, he got to know the whole person,” she said. “How is their family, did they have kids, how did that impact the healing process?”
Her mother was the practical one. While her father would dream big, her mother wanted to know how to pay for the dream. She was a devout Catholic, with a strict moral code. But she was also tolerant and stood up for others. “I admire her courage, which I did not get for a long time,” San Pedro said. “She was always sticking up for people in situations where she didn’t feel they were treated well.”
They came to the U.S. so San Pedro’s father could attend a summer program while he was in medical school. He then did his residency Baltimore. The family then moved to Oklahoma City so he could study to be a cardiologist.
But the plan had always been to go back to Mexico. And so it was that, by the time she was in first grade, San Pedro knew little English.
Her first-grade teacher was stern and believed in corporal punishment. So imagine a 6-year-old girl, watching kids get paddled. with little idea why because she couldn’t understand the language. “I was so nervous,” she said. “After recess, there were always kids lined up, getting paddled, and I didn’t know what they were doing. I told my mom that I wish they’d tell me so I wouldn’t do that.”
But that was also the year that she met Mrs. Green, a teacher at San Pedro’s school. A Catholic herself, Mrs. Green found San Pedro at school one day and offered to give her English lessons and teach her how to read.
Mrs. Green spent hours of her own time tutoring the young girl. By the middle of her first-grade year, San Pedro was adept enough that she moved to an advanced reading level. The family moved to Norman, Okla., where her father took up private practice and the family opted to remain in the U.S.
But they remained close with Mrs. Green and her husband, who became part of the family’s support network. Mrs. Green taught young San Pedro to make Thousand Island dressing and cinnamon toast.
“I would not be where I am today without that,” San Pedro said. “I couldn’t read, and my dad was working, he was trying to get his specialty. My mom was learning English and taking care of my younger brother. Without her taking the time, two to three times a week to sit with me for an hour, I wouldn’t have that foundation, of being able to read.”
San Pedro rattled off the names of each one of her teachers during an interview. Education is important to her, a trait she gets from her family. Today, she is a member of several boards, particularly those focused on education such as the Oklahoma City Schools Foundation. She is also a trustee at Smith College, her alma mater.
“So my dad really instilled in me the value of education,” she said. “People can take a lot of things away. They can take your job, take your house. They can take away your country, in some cases. But no one can ever take your education. It’s your biggest asset and something you can take with you wherever you go.”
Restaurant Leader of the Year video
The receptionist
San Pedro has always had a natural energy, even back in middle school. “She’s always looking for the next thing to do,” Dhall said. “She’s not the type of person that’s going to hit the snooze button.”
But she is also the person her friends call when they are facing their own problems. “I know every time I have a challenge, I call Claudia, because I know she’s going to make me feel good about the situation, I know she’s going to give me a practical answer, and she’s going to be empathetic,” Dhall said.
At the same time, San Pedro is driven to succeed, a drive that comes in part from her parents. That drive, and her positive attitude, has helped her navigate some early career challenges.
San Pedro received her degree in economics from Smith, which she called a “transformational experience.” “To go to Smith, it was an incredible place,” she said. “We were taught to think critically. They encouraged you to ask questions, to not just look inwardly but outwardly, and how that impacts decisions.”
San Pedro took that back with her to Oklahoma City after graduation, and then she couldn’t find a job.
For two years, San Pedro went from low-wage job to low-wage job, none of which required the degree she had just earned. She worked in a toy store, a clothing retailer and a restaurant. And then she got her “big break,” a job at the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education. As a receptionist.
“I was so proud,” San Pedro said. “I came back and told my mom I got a 401(k), I’ve got healthcare now. My mom, God love her, ‘We paid four years of college and you’re a receptionist.’ I was like, ‘Mom, I’m just starting. It’s the beginning of the story. It’s not the end.”
Indeed, it’s a story she told to argue for the opportunities in the restaurant industry. Much of the focus is on the pay at the bottom. But it’s an industry where people can move quickly into management jobs, becoming managers or district managers where salaries can reach well into the six-figures. “Last time I checked, that’s still pretty good,” she said. “Why aren’t we talking about that?”
“In the restaurant business, you start off at minimum,” she said. “But that’s just the beginning.”
And San Pedro did not stay in that receptionist job for long.
“She is like the extrovert of all times, with so much enthusiasm that for people like me, you get worn out. But she is always moving, always having a good time, has a remarkable sense of humor.” -San Pedro's husband, Paul Sund
Working for the state
San Pedro’s real break came in 1994. At the time, she carpooled to work with two women, one of whom said there was a job opening for a fiscal analyst with the State Senate and convinced her to apply.
At the time, the Senate was looking for talented people from different educational backgrounds, so San Pedro was hired to work alongside someone with an urban planning degree and another one who was a sociologist. “They were looking for people who think critically and understand different perspectives,” she said.
There, she met the state Senate’s communications director, Paul Sund. They were both part of a singles' group, and Sund worked up the nerve to ask San Pedro on a date, to see the movie “Trial by Jury.” “It was a horrible movie,” he said. “I’m not even sure if this is a date or not. It wasn’t a date in Claudia’s mind. So that kind of didn’t go anywhere.”
But they became friends, and a few months later they went on an official date, to see the movie “Waterworld.” Unlike the 1995 Kevin Costner flick, however, their relationship would turn out to be a success. They got married a year later and have been married for 25 years. They have two kids, both teenagers.
“She is like the extrovert of all times, with so much enthusiasm that for people like me, you get worn out,” Sund said. “But she is always moving, always having a good time, has a remarkable sense of humor.”
While working for the state Senate, San Pedro was eager and driven, Sund said. She was well-respected at the state, dedicated to the job and eager to provide whatever budget numbers or appropriations information that was needed. She got along with the state’s politicians, which is not always easy.
Eight years into the position, she was asked to become the director of state finance. That move was a big deal, Sund said. She was also the first woman and Hispanic person to take the position.
“We couldn’t believe it was happening,” Sund said. “But it was a great honor for her and she really looked forward to it.”
She would work as the state’s finance director for several years. But, as noted, Claudia San Pedro doesn’t stop moving. “I think she probably didn’t imagine herself as someone who’s going to be breaking all these different records or boundaries or whatever, but it really has been remarkable,” Sund said. “She may cross one finish line and get the award, but as soon as she’s got that, she’s looking for the next barrier to crash through.”
And then Sonic came calling.
“Claudia as a boss is a lot of fun. And you know what? You’re going to work hard, because she has high standards. But because of who she is, you always want to meet and exceed those standards.” -Tanisha Beacham, Sonic’s SVP of franchise operations.
The burger chain
Troy Smith found an abandoned root beer stand in Shawnee, Okla., in 1953 and opened a restaurant specializing in burgers and hot dogs called Top Hat. He later added intercoms for drive-in customers and renamed the brand Sonic. By 2006, when San Pedro was recruited to become the chain’s treasurer and VP of investor relations, it was beginning to make noise on a national scale.
Gary Kinslow, a Sonic franchisee, met San Pedro shortly after she started. “It was very apparent to me in the first couple of visits that Claudia was something very special,” he said. “She had a long runway and her future was very broad.”
San Pedro was named chief financial officer by 2015 and company president in 2018. “Claudia as a boss is a lot of fun,” said Tanisha Beacham, Sonic’s SVP of franchise operations. “And you know what? You’re going to work hard, because she has high standards. But because of who she is, you always want to meet and exceed those standards.”
San Pedro’s history working with politicians would also prove handy. Sonic is currently the country’s 11th-largest restaurant chain and the fourth-largest that specializes in burgers. But 90% of its 3,500 restaurants are owned by franchisees.
Executives of public franchise brands must deal with multiple constituencies and often big egos. It can take considerable patience and a good ear to deal with them.
She is “very caring, she’s very passionate, she’s also very data-driven,” franchisee James Junkin said. “But the most important one is she is a listener. She listens to other people to help form those opinions.”
Her ability to listen would prove crucial throughout her tenure. She would first help the company deal with a difficult and complex integration of a new point-of-sale system. That system would prove beneficial, enabling order-ahead technology that would give Sonic a key advantage during the pandemic. But getting it to that point was a challenge.
Sonic also dealt with sales challenges, problems largely brought about by complexities in operations as well as technology. “We were killing our operators,” she said.
And then, in 2017, the company put itself up for sale at the request of an activist investor. That sale would take place the next year, to the newly created Inspire Brands. Paul Brown, the cofounder of the multi-brand operator that now owns Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin’ and Jimmy John’s in addition to Sonic, said it didn’t take him long to decide that San Pedro would continue to be the brand president after the acquisition.
“I do remember my first time going to the office and meeting with her, and I was having to make the decision of who was going to run the Sonic brand,” he said. “I just came away from that meeting saying, ‘Wow, this is an amazing leader who really has such a great rasp of the business. Not just the Sonic business. But the restaurant business, and has such a passion for the brand.
“It took me about two seconds to say Claudia is the one who’s going to run the brand.”
San Pedro worked on the transition into Inspire. And then the pandemic hit.
Sonic sales
Source: Technomic Top 500 Chain Restaurant Report
The pandemic and its aftermath
San Pedro’s response to the pandemic won a lot of fans within the chain among its franchisees, even if the company’s challenges were different from others. While its sales initially dipped, they returned quickly in early April 2020. The company’s drive-ins would prove vital for many consumers during the pandemic, when they couldn’t go out.
Sonic added another $1 billion in system sales in 2020, and then added even more in 2021. But along with that kind of growth came supply chain issues that would make it difficult to get basic products, often forcing the chain to shift from one LTO to another marketing idea.
San Pedro in those early times began meeting weekly with the company’s top franchisees to go over strategies and increase communication. Those meetings continue to this day, and they’ve proven vital. “It says to me that she cares,” Junkin said. “She’s totally engaged and she’s there to help solve problems.”
Yet San Pedro’s listening ear extends to the operators themselves. “I’ll never forget the first Sunday where COVID really had everything locked down,” Junkin said. “Then I get a call on my cell phone and it’s Claudia. What’s she doing calling on a Sunday? And she called me and her first comment was, how’s your family? How’s your team? How’s everyone holding up?
“There was nothing that she called for other than to check and see how my family was doing and how my team’s family was doing. That means a lot.”
These days, San Pedro oversees Inspire Brands’ quick-service brands, including Jimmy John’s and Arby’s, though she continues to work out of Sonic’s Oklahoma City headquarters.
That brand has a bright future, franchisees say. The order-ahead sales helped carry the brand through the pandemic and give it another avenue for growth. It is considering new strategies, such as a drive-thru only location. It is also eyeing international growth. Sonic is the country’s largest brand without an international unit. Inspire is intent on changing that, though how an international Sonic looks is up in the air.
“It’s the only really true omni-channel experience in the restaurant industry,” Brown said. Customers can order ahead. Or they can get their food in the drive-in, or a drive-thru. San Pedro has other ideas, long-term ideas, such as the order screen popping up in a customer’s car, on their Internet-enabled dashboard.
“We experienced a rebirth during the pandemic,” San Pedro said. “We’re in a different place now. Sonic has always been about the experience, and how we drive that experience incorporating the best in human connection with the best in technology with the best in food and drink. I think we can do that like no one else can.
“We have a concept that’s flexible enough that it can fit in people’s lifestyle.”
Perspective
There are few women chief executives in the restaurant industry and not many more brand presidents. San Pedro is the first to win the Restaurant Leader of the Year award, but her success to this point has already made her an example to many.
“She’s very much into making sure that the next generation of female leaders are being prepared for that next step,” Beacham said. “So seeing someone in her role makes you know that, ‘Hey, you know what, I could do that. I can be the president of a brand.’ And not only as a female, but as a woman of color. You see someone in that role that looks like you, comes from a similar background as you, and you feel like, ‘You know what? I can do it, too.’”
Lori Abou Habib, Sonic’s chief marketing officer, said that watching San Pedro become president of Sonic and then thrive in the position has been “empowering” for other women. “It feels like a moment in time when we have made a ton of progress,” she said. “It’s just very empowering and creates a lot of hope for me for the future.”
As for San Pedro, she remains heavily involved in women’s issues. She has called it both “kind of sad” and “humbling” to have been such a groundbreaker. When asked at the Restaurant Leadership Conference her advice to other women in the industry, her response was to remind them that they won’t always be perfect. “There are some days you’re going to be a better employee than you are a mother. There are some days you’re going to be a better mother than an employee. And that’s OK.”
Yet maybe San Pedro’s best piece of advice is good for anyone, regardless of gender or color or background: “The word I would use is perspective,” she said.
Remember: Claudia San Pedro is the daughter of parents who grew up poor in Mexico, worked hard to get through school and moved to the U.S. and worked harder still. Even then, they taught San Pedro to remain grounded, to remember those who couldn’t get that far.
For all her hard work to get as far as she has, she considers herself fortunate to be where she is.
“Whenever we are going through a hard time, you just look around and think to yourself, ‘I’m incredibly lucky, even on the worst day, at Sonic,’” she said. “I thank bout everything my parents went through, the circumstances everybody went through, and think that we’re so lucky. How lucky are we to be here?”
And this is the attitude she brings to whatever role she is playing that day, whether it’s the mom of frustrated teenagers on a rainy bike ride or overseeing a major brand with international aspirations. No problem is too difficult to solve. Fix it and keep moving.
To read more about Claudia San Pedro, check out our earlier profile.