Freddy's Frozen Custard & Steakburgers has promoted Rick Petralia to Executive Chef and Vice President of Training & Innovation, folding culinary strategy and franchisee support resources under one senior leadership position at the Wichita-based fast-casual chain.
The New Role
Petralia steps into the expanded title after serving as Director of Menu Strategy & Innovation since 2022. In the new position, he will oversee Freddy's flagship training teams and media resource operations while continuing to drive menu development — including core offerings and limited-time offers. The dual mandate reflects a broader fast-casual trend of tying culinary R&D directly to crew training infrastructure, particularly in franchise systems where menu execution consistency is a competitive differentiator.
Petralia brings 25 years of restaurant-industry experience to the role, holds an MBA from Hult International Business School, and carries a certified executive chef credential. Before joining Freddy's, he led culinary innovation for a fast-casual Italian chain with more than 200 locations, giving him direct exposure to the franchisee-facing operational pressures that define multi-unit menu rollouts.
What It Means for Franchisees
For the roughly 580-unit Freddy's system, the reorganization signals a push toward tighter alignment between what gets developed in the kitchen and how it gets taught at the unit level — a pressure point that operators across the fast-casual and foodservice-at-cstore segment know well. CEO Chris Dull emphasized that Petralia's background in operations gives him credibility with franchisees: "His extensive experience in operations and his focus on profitable menu solutions mean he understands the challenges franchisees face and is dedicated to providing the training and resources needed to best equip our restaurant teams."
That framing — profitable menu solutions — is notable. Fast-casual chains competing in the current cost environment, where food and labor inflation have squeezed franchisee margins, increasingly require that new menu items pencil out before they ever reach a training manual. Embedding culinary leadership inside the training function is one way to enforce that discipline at scale.
System Footprint and Rankings
Founded in Wichita in 2002, Freddy's has grown to more than 580 locations across the United States and Canada, built around cooked-to-order steakburgers, all-beef hot dogs, shoestring fries, and freshly churned frozen custard. The brand ranked No. 6 on Fast Casual's Top 100 Movers + Shakers, No. 85 on Entrepreneur's Franchise 500, and No. 60 on Technomic's Top 500 — a standing that puts it squarely in the competitive tier of emerging fast-casual chains with growing franchise-development ambitions. For convenience-channel operators benchmarking QSR-at-forecourt concepts, Freddy's trajectory in the Midwest and Sun Belt markets is worth tracking as the brand scales.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
