GoTo Foods CEO Jim Holthouser is stepping down after six years at the helm of the multi-brand company.
In a LinkedIn post, Holthouser said Tuesday would be his last day at Atlanta-based GoTo Foods, which is parent to seven brands with more than 6,700 units: Cinnabon, Auntie Anne’s, Carvel, McAlister’s Deli, Schlotzsky’s, Moe’s Southwest Grill and Jamba.
Holthouser implied he was moving to another leadership role, but he did not disclose his plans. The company declined comment.
“We’ve had such a great ride, but, after spending 40 years—including six at the helm of GoTo Foods—building leadership skills, it’s time to put them to use in some new ways,” he wrote in the post.
Holthouser led the Roark Capital-owned platform, previously known as Focus Brands, through a name change and multi-year unification effort that aligned the various brands with shared systems and technologies.
The goal was to leverage the scale of a shared portfolio to improve franchise growth, both in the U.S. and internationally, as well as encouraging co-branding.
Brands like Auntie Anne’s, Jamba, Cinnabon and Carvel have been combining forces, allowing the brands to move to more streetside locations. Last year, GoTo Foods signed a record 1,177 franchise agreements, and, of those, 353 were co-branding deals.
The company has also developed some new variations of its brands, including a Cinnabon/Carvel combination dubbed Cinnabon Swirl, as well as Moe’s Casa Mexicana, a reimagining of Moe’s Southwest Grill developed with master franchisee Unify Foodworks, which is bringing the brand to India.
Before joining GoTo Foods, Holthouser spent two decades with Hilton Worldwide, where he served most recently as executive vice president, global brands, marketing and loyalty and was responsible for more than 5,000 hotels under 13 brands in 105 countries.
Jim Holthouser | Photo courtesy of GoTo Foods.
He is also an accomplished pianist who wove music into his presentations with franchisees.
In his LinkedIn post, Holthouser wrote of walking into a new industry with a “healthy respect for how much I didn’t know,” saying that being CEO is one of the most humbling jobs you can have.
“A CEO can come in, pinpoint a company’s North Star, and provide a clear vision and blueprint to get there—but without great people standing shoulder to shoulder with you, even strong leaders will see their visions fall flat,” he wrote. “It takes talented teammates, consistently inspired to be their best, to bring visions from concept to reality. And once you’ve built that great team, you don’t have to know everything there is to know; you just have to be smart enough to know what questions to ask of the experts around you.”
To the new CEO stepping in, he wrote, “I wish you and the entire team every success. This place is full of extraordinary people. Take good care of them, and they’ll take good care of the business.”
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