RICK WHEELER: MOVING UP AT MAD MUSHROOM

BY BRIAN HERNANDEZ

U.S. PIZZA TEAM MEMBER RICK WHEELER, co-owner of the newest Mad Mushroom location in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the company's area adviser, never had pizza ambitions. He took a job there while working his way through college, with other aspirations in mind. But something about pizza took hold of Wheeler and drew him into the deep end of our industry. Here, he talks about his humble pizza beginnings, his new path, and how Mad Mushroom attracts and retains employees.

Brian Hernandez: Tell us about yourself and Mad Mushroom.

Rick Wheeler: I have been with Mad Mushroom now for 17 years. We’re currently at the newest location, on Sagamore Parkway in West Lafayette. We have two other locations in Indiana—one residential location and one right in the middle of all the bars on the Purdue campus. We also have locations in Kentucky. I came to Purdue to study to become a technology teacher and just got a parttime job to pay the bills while I was in college. I started as a driver and slowly fell in love with the company over the years. They offered me a GM position, at which point I promptly left school and began GMing the Underwood Street location in Lafayette, then eventually the campus store, and now we’re here.

Hernandez: What has been the biggest change in your viewpoint from employee to owner?

Wheeler: Paying attention to all the little details. Waking up and checking sales, oven times and delivery times, checking reviews. That’s probably one of the biggest things: making sure the customers are happy and, if they are not, making them happy. As an employee, even as a manager, I didn’t do all of these things to the extent I do now. And we have grown this education process so that all our great managers can become better managers. Now we have scorecards with oven, delivery and cook times and are constantly grading at each location so we can help these managers become better operators. Make sure you put in the time to build your team and always keep trying to make it better.

Hernandez: How do you attract quality employees?

Wheeler: Right now, we have flexible schedules. Especially nowadays, that is key. We also have employee programs like Piece of the Pie. We developed this program during COVID-19 to help our employees. Basically, 1% to 2% of the profit earned that day is split between all the employees who worked that day. After three months you get a 1% share, but after a year it doubles to 2%. This can also help with keeping employees long-term. We also have a Pizza of the Month (PotM) program, where a pizza developed by a team member is chosen to be the PotM, and a percentage of the sales from that pie goes to that team member.

Also, anyone who comes into the company to be a part of our team, we let them know that one day they could be a manager, GM, even a co-owner….We look at any manager here as a future Mad Mushroom owner. But it also trickles down. We give our managers great attention once they reach that level. They, in turn, give that special attention to employees in their shop, creating new potential managers.

In an extended website Q&A, Rick Wheeler talks about his career path and how U.S. Pizza Team involvement has made Mad Mushroom an even better pizza company. Read it at PMQ.com/Rick-Wheeler