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Margaritas names Hugo Marin president, begins franchise pushMargaritas names Hugo Marin president, begins franchise push

Bret Thorn, Senior Food Editor

September 13, 2011

2 Min Read
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Bret Thorn

Editor's note: This story has been updated to reflect the number of units in a franchise agreement in New Jersey and initial unit start-up costs.

Margaritas Mexican Restaurant, a 23-unit casual-dining chain based in Portsmouth, N.H., has named Hugo Marin president as it begins a franchising push.

“I’m still in the acclimating phase,” Marin said of his new job, and added that the company’s focus was to franchise more restaurants.

The first franchise opened in Livingston, N.J., in June, as part of an agreement to open four restaurants in that state.

Marin said they were in the process of finalizing another five-unit franchise deal for Philadelphia and Delaware, with the first unit in that region to open in the second or third quarter of 2012.

Five other franchisees are somewhere in the processs of coming on board, he said.

RELATED: New menu items at Margaritas Mexican Restaurant

Although franchising would be Margaritas’ focus for the next year, Marin said they planned to continue growing on the corporate side in 2013.

“I think the founders have done an incredible job with Margaritas for the past 25 years, and I think it’s an incredible venue for people who want to invest in a solid enterprise,” he said, adding that Mexican food’s popularity continues to grow in the United States.

A native of Venezuela who grew up in Tulsa, Okla., Marin most recently was chief operating officer of Al Copeland Investments in New Orleans, parent company of the 15 company-owned and 11 franchised Copelands, Copeland’s Express and Cheesecake Bistro by Copeland’s restaurants.

Before that, he was vice president of operations for Ted’s Montana Grill, and also held management positions at The Cheesecake Factory and Romano’s Macaroni Grill.

The initial investment to open a Margaritas unit is $1.5 million to $2.5 million, he said.

Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected].
Follow him on Twitter: @foodwriterdiary

About the Author

Bret Thorn

Senior Food Editor, Nation's Restaurant News

Senior Food & Beverage Editor

Bret Thorn is senior food & beverage editor for Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality for Informa’s Restaurants and Food Group, with responsibility for spotting and reporting on food and beverage trends across the country for both publications as well as guiding overall F&B coverage. 

He is the host of a podcast, In the Kitchen with Bret Thorn, which features interviews with chefs, food & beverage authorities and other experts in foodservice operations.

From 2005 to 2008 he also wrote the Kitchen Dish column for The New York Sun, covering restaurant openings and chefs’ career moves in New York City.

He joined Nation’s Restaurant News in 1999 after spending about five years in Thailand, where he wrote articles about business, banking and finance as well as restaurant reviews and food columns for Manager magazine and Asia Times newspaper. He joined Restaurant Hospitality’s staff in 2016 while retaining his position at NRN. 

A magna cum laude graduate of Tufts University in Medford, Mass., with a bachelor’s degree in history, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Thorn also studied traditional French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine in Paris. He spent his junior year of college in China, studying Chinese language, history and culture for a semester each at Nanjing University and Beijing University. While in Beijing, he also worked for ABC News during the protests and ultimate crackdown in and around Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Thorn’s monthly column in Nation’s Restaurant News won the 2006 Jesse H. Neal National Business Journalism Award for best staff-written editorial or opinion column.

He served as president of the International Foodservice Editorial Council, or IFEC, in 2005.

Thorn wrote the entry on comfort food in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, 2nd edition, published in 2012. He also wrote a history of plated desserts for the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, published in 2015.

He was inducted into the Disciples d’Escoffier in 2014.

A Colorado native originally from Denver, Thorn lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Bret Thorn’s areas of expertise include food and beverage trends in restaurants, French cuisine, the cuisines of Asia in general and Thailand in particular, restaurant operations and service trends. 

Bret Thorn’s Experience: 

Nation’s Restaurant News, food & beverage editor, 1999-Present
New York Sun, columnist, 2005-2008 
Asia Times, sub editor, 1995-1997
Manager magazine, senior editor and restaurant critic, 1992-1997
ABC News, runner, May-July, 1989

Education:
Tufts University, BA in history, 1990
Peking University, studied Chinese language, spring, 1989
Nanjing University, studied Chinese language and culture, fall, 1988 
Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine, Cértificat Elémentaire, 1986

Email: [email protected]

Social Media:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bret-thorn-468b663/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bret.thorn.52
Twitter: @foodwriterdiary
Instagram: @foodwriterdiary

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