🟥 EMPLOYERS: Separate from recruiting, I write investment‑grade recruiting briefs that walk A‑player ecommerce candidates through the real business case for your role – the market, channels, KPIs, tech stack, team, and AI issues – before they ever get on Zoom with you. I research / write it. YOU bless it. YOU own it.

RESULT: Your first‑round conversations are with 6-8 highly informed A-players who already understand where/how they can drive EBITDA. To have me write and send your posting out to this list, text Harry Joiner at (404) 281‑2025. Confidential briefs / application process are no problem. ⬇️ SEE EXAMPLE ⬇️

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TODAY’S BRIEF: Inspire Brands was formed in 2018 when Roark Capital — an Atlanta-based private equity firm — used Arby’s Restaurant Group as a platform to acquire Buffalo Wild Wings for $2.9 billion, then SONIC for $2.3 billion, then Jimmy John’s, and then in 2020, the big one: Dunkin’ Brands — Dunkin’ and Baskin-Robbins together — for $11.3 billion. That Dunkin’ deal was the largest QSR take-private in decades.

Today, Inspire’s portfolio includes Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin’, Jimmy John’s, SONIC, and Baskin-Robbins — 33,000+ restaurants, 2,800+ franchisees, approximately 650,000 team members across 60+ countries, and $33.4 billion in global system sales.

Let that land for a second. $33.4 billion.

The CEO is Paul Brown, who co-founded Inspire in 2018 after running Brands and Commercial Services at Hilton Worldwide, where he oversaw brand management, marketing, ecommerce, loyalty programs, and franchise relations globally.

Before Hilton, Mr. Brown was President of Expedia North America and Expedia’s Partner Network — and before that, a partner at McKinsey & Company and a consultant at Boston Consulting Group.

This is not a traditional QSR operator who learned loyalty in a drive-thru. Mr. Brown is a strategy-trained, hospitality-seasoned operator who models loyalty programs with financial rigor. He knows what world-class loyalty looks like. He built it at Hilton. And he’s been trying to replicate that playbook across six restaurant brands for the past eight years.

Here’s the number that defines the VP role: $11 billion+. That’s Inspire’s US digital commerce run rate — mobile app ordering, web ordering, loyalty-driven transactions, and third-party delivery marketplace revenue across all six brands.

Digital commerce now represents nearly half of domestic system sales and is the single fastest-growing channel in the portfolio.

The loyalty programs collectively have 100 million enrolled members across its portfolio. For context, McDonald’s has 210 million 90-day active loyalty users across 70+ markets, generating $40 billion in loyalty sales in 2025 alone. Starbucks has 35.5 million 90-day active US members. Chipotle has 40 million.

Inspire has 100 million members across its portfolio — which means they can theoretically do something no single-brand QSR operator can: cross-brand earn and redeem. Earn points at Dunkin’ on your morning coffee, redeem them at Jimmy John’s for lunch. That capability, if executed, would be structurally unique in the QSR industry.

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For you skeptics, consider three numbers:

First: 4.4%. That’s the average profit margin in fast food restaurants. At 33,000 franchise locations, a 50 to 100 basis point margin improvement through digital channel mix — shifting transactions from third-party delivery platforms charging 15-30% commissions to owned app and web channels — is worth hundreds of millions of dollars in franchise system economics.

This isn’t a marketing problem. It’s a structural margin problem. And the VP of Digital Commerce and Loyalty is the person who solves it.

Second: 26.7%. Chipotle, the industry’s margin benchmark at 26.7% restaurant-level operating margin, attributes its performance in part to 36.7% digital sales penetration on owned channels — a figure Inspire must approach.

Add Chipotlane drive-thru economics and menu simplicity, and you have the competitive archetype this VP will be silently measured against. The gap between 4.4% and 26.7% is the competitive white space this VP will operate in.

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Third: $646.3 billion. That’s the combined US market size of fast food restaurants ($416 billion) and chain restaurants ($230.3 billion). Both industries are mature, both are entering a revenue contraction phase (Industry forecasts -0.1% CAGR through 2031), and both face headwinds from tariff-driven food inflation, labor cost escalation, and consumer traffic declines.

In this environment, digital commerce and loyalty programs are among the only remaining organic growth levers. The VP of Ecom who owns this function at Inspire is not a tactician. They are a margin defender and customer lifetime value engineer operating at the intersection of franchise economics, digital platform strategy, and consumer behavior science.

Dunkin’ alone has 24 million DD Perks members who visit 2.5 times more often, spend 20% more per transaction, and have an 80% retention rate. Those members contribute roughly 60% of Dunkin’s revenue.

For context, at the time of the Dunkin’ acquisition in late 2020, Inspire’s combined loyalty base across all brands was approximately 25 million members. It has quadrupled in five years — which means the incoming VP is building on proven momentum, not starting from zero. That’s the power of a well-run loyalty program in QSR.

But here’s some food for thought: the other 76 million members across Arby’s, SONIC, Buffalo Wild Wings, Jimmy John’s, and Baskin-Robbins are almost certainly lightly engaged or dormant. The “100 million members” headline is as much a liability signal as it is an asset.

The real job is reactivating a massive dormant database, not just acquiring new members. The right candidate knows the first question to ask: “What’s your 90-day active member rate?” — and has a track record of answering it at scale.

The middle-income household ($50K-$100K) is the most frequency-elastic segment in QSR — they respond to value promotions, loyalty rewards, and personalized offers more than any other cohort. Lower-income households (<$50K) are the most at-risk of churn during inflationary periods — 41% reduced fast-food visits in 2024. And higher-income households ($100K+) account for 53% of industry revenue but decrease visit frequency as income rises. The VP must engineer differentiated loyalty strategies for each segment, across six brands, while managing a points-based P&L where franchisees co-fund the rewards. That's the complexity.

Why would any ecom A-player want this job? Three reasons:

One: Pre-IPO timing. Roark Capital is actively exploring a public listing — Bloomberg and Reuters reported in March 2026 that Inspire is targeting approximately $2 billion in proceeds at a ~$20 billion valuation. That IPO would return Dunkin’ to public markets and take the entire Inspire platform public for the first time. For a VP-level hire, pre-IPO equity participation could be meaningful.

The digital commerce metrics this person builds in their first 12-18 months will appear directly in the S-1 prospectus. You’re not just running a loyalty program — you’re authoring the headline slide of a $20 billion offering.

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Two: Structural competitive advantage. 100 million multi-brand loyalty members, 33,000 locations, six differentiated brands spanning morning coffee to sports bar occasions — no other QSR operator has this portfolio breadth.

McDonald’s has scale but one brand. Yum! has multi-brand but no unified loyalty ecosystem. Starbucks has engagement depth but one occasion. Inspire has the pieces to build something structurally unprecedented in QSR digital commerce. The VP we’re looking for is the person who assembles those pieces.

Three: A CEO who actually understands this function. Paul Brown isn’t a traditional QSR operator who needs loyalty explained to him. He’s a former McKinsey partner and BCG consultant who built loyalty programs at Hilton Worldwide and ran ecommerce at Expedia.

When he interviews you, he won’t ask vague questions about “digital strategy.” He’ll ask you how you modeled the points liability, how you negotiated the cost-share with franchisees, and what your active member reactivation rate looked like at 90 days. If that conversation excites you, this is your job.

🟥 JOB SEARCH GOT YOU STUCK? Book an hour with VP/CMO ecommerce recruiter, Harry Joiner, who prepared this analysis. Includes a 3-month membership to NEXTgig™

About the Role

As VP of Digital Commerce & Loyalty, you will own the P&L for Inspire Brands’ $11 billion+ digital commerce operation and 100-million-member loyalty ecosystem spanning Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin’, Jimmy John’s, and SONIC.

The defining challenge of this role is not growth — it’s reactivation. Of 100 million enrolled members, the vast majority outside Dunkin’ are lightly engaged or dormant.

Your first-order problem is converting a massive enrolled database into a massive *transacting* database — and building the reactivation infrastructure, offer logic, and measurement rigor to prove the lift.

Your mission will be to …

1.) Reactivate dormant loyalty members at scale and drive profitable digital sales growth by optimizing the channel mix between owned platforms and third-party delivery,

2.) Increase customer lifetime value through loyalty program innovation, personalized offers, and churn reduction across all brands, and

3.) Build the digital commerce metrics narrative that supports Inspire’s path to IPO. This position reports into the commercial leadership structure at Inspire’s Atlanta Support Center with an expectation of 80% on-site presence.

You will manage 5-6 direct reports and influence an organization of 25-30 across digital commerce, loyalty, CRM, personalization, and analytics functions.

🟥 JOB SEARCH GOT YOU STUCK? Book an hour with VP/CMO ecommerce recruiter, Harry Joiner, who prepared this analysis. Includes a 3-month membership to NEXTgig™

Areas of Oversight

Multi-Brand Digital Commerce Strategy & P&L Management

• Own the end-to-end digital commerce P&L across all Inspire brands, managing the revenue formula — (Retained Members + New Members) × Average Ticket × Order Frequency — at portfolio scale and at the individual brand level. Given the dormant member concentration outside Dunkin’, the retained-member variable is the single highest-ROI lever in this formula and should be treated as such.
• Lead the strategic shift of transaction mix from margin-dilutive third-party delivery platforms (15-30% commission) to owned digital channels (app, web, loyalty-driven ordering) where unit-level margins are preserved. Quantify this channel mix shift as a hard ROI line item — not a marketing initiative, but a franchise system economics lever.
• Develop and manage the promotion calendar for digital commerce channels, loyalty programs, and personalized offer programs in collaboration with Brand Marketing teams to achieve optimal sales and profit outcomes for each brand. Engineer the calendar to smooth demand seasonality — deploying personalized promotions during off-peak periods for brands with occasion-dependent traffic (Buffalo Wild Wings on non-game nights, Dunkin’ in summer dayparts, SONIC during winter months).
• Coordinate traffic generation strategy with cross-functional teams across paid and earned marketing channels to expand the database of reachable audiences. Balance acquisition of new light buyers (Byron Sharp’s penetration growth model) with retention-driven frequency lift among existing members — avoiding the trap of over-investing in heavy buyers who would have purchased anyway.
• Design the loyalty and offer infrastructure to be agent-compatible. Within the planning horizon of this role, AI assistants and autonomous purchasing agents will begin making routine QSR ordering decisions on behalf of consumers — “order my usual Dunkin’ run” or “find me a lunch deal near the office.” The VP must ensure that loyalty offers, menus, and ordering APIs are structured so that AI agents can read, evaluate, and transact against them programmatically — not just human eyeballs browsing an app. This is a near-term channel architecture decision, not a futurism exercise.
• Oversee daily operations to monitor sales metrics and business KPIs across all brands: digital channel mix percentage, app DAU/MAU ratios by brand, average ticket (app vs. non-app), loyalty-driven frequency lift, and digital commerce revenue as a percentage of system sales. Ensure accountability from the team and partners to meet financial and strategic goals.

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Loyalty Program Strategy & Points-Based P&L

• Manage the points-based loyalty P&L across all brands, ensuring competitive point costs that drive sales and customer lifetime value while maintaining profitability for franchisees. This is a shared-cost structure where the franchisor and franchisees co-fund rewards — the VP must model the economics, negotiate the cost split with franchisee advisory councils, and govern the redemption rate to prevent margin erosion.
• Refine each brand’s loyalty value proposition to reduce churn, increase visit frequency, and boost per-visit spending. Design tiered reward structures, sweepstakes mechanics, second-order incentives, and gift-with-purchase offers that drive LTV acceleration — using controlled testing (60-day and 90-day cohort windows) to measure true incremental lift rather than cannibalizing existing behavior.
• Build and execute the cross-brand loyalty ecosystem strategy — the “earn at Dunkin’, redeem at SONIC” capability that would be structurally unique in QSR. Architect the earn/redeem mechanics, the cross-brand points liability model, and the technology requirements for portfolio-level loyalty that respects each brand’s distinct positioning.
• Instrument the loyalty program as a churn-detection and win-back engine. Track app inactivity signals, order gap patterns, and redemption decay curves to trigger automated reactivation campaigns before members lapse. The 100-million-member database must be stress-tested for active engagement rate, and the VP must build the reactivation playbook for what is likely a significant dormant segment outside of Dunkin’.

CRM, Personalization & Owned Channel Management

• Manage the marketing calendar for owned communication channels — email, push notifications, SMS, and mobile app/web — to support campaigns and brand messages while personalizing guest experiences to enhance customer engagement. Own the CRM metrics that matter: open rates, click-through rates, conversion rates, email-driven revenue per subscriber, push notification opt-in rates, and engagement segmentation (active vs. dormant subscribers).
• Guide the AI-driven personalization roadmap in partnership with Product Management and Data & Analytics. This is not a single-model problem. At Inspire’s scale and brand complexity, personalization requires a multi-agent AI architecture — planning agents that select the strategy (reactivation vs. upsell vs. cross-brand introduction), worker agents that generate the offer and creative variant, and evaluation agents that score the output against brand guidelines and margin constraints before it reaches the customer. The VP must be able to spec this architecture with data science, not just approve a vendor pitch deck. Commission predictive personalization models that identify where users are in their journey (awareness, consideration, conversion, churn risk) and recommend next-best actions: show a personalized offer, suggest an upsell, trigger a win-back flow, or surface a cross-brand recommendation. Target McKinsey’s 10-15% revenue lift benchmark from effective personalization.
• Build the Customer Data Platform (CDP) strategy for cross-brand data unification — and go beyond it. The data layer (linking POS transactions to loyalty IDs, feeding app behavioral data into real-time profiles, unifying CRM data across six brands) is necessary but not sufficient. The harder problem is the comprehension layer: the AI and rules infrastructure that interprets cross-brand signals and makes them actionable. A customer who orders iced coffee at Dunkin’ every morning and wings at Buffalo Wild Wings on Saturdays is not two separate profiles — they’re one behavioral pattern with a cross-brand LTV that no single brand team can see. The VP must architect the comprehension layer that surfaces these patterns and routes them to the right offer engine, not just the data plumbing that stores them.
• Architect the lifecycle marketing engine: onboarding flows for new loyalty enrollees, replenishment/reorder triggers based on purchase decay modeling, win-back sequences for lapsed members, and VIP recognition programs for high-frequency, high-LTV customers. Every flow must be instrumented with holdout tests to establish true incremental lift vs. baseline performance.

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Franchise Ecosystem & Stakeholder Management

• Manage changes related to digital commerce and loyalty programs with proactive stakeholder alignment and transparent communication across the franchisee community. The scope of influence extends beyond Inspire’s corporate walls — 2,800+ franchisees who operate 33,000 locations must buy in to digital investment mandates, loyalty program changes, and technology rollouts. Navigate FDD (Franchise Disclosure Document) constraints that limit certain types of mandated franchisee technology spend.
• Collaborate with finance partners to set and manage capital and G&A budgets for digital commerce initiatives. Frame every investment in terms PE investors understand: EBITDA contribution, CAC payback period, contribution margin by channel, and return on invested capital. Position digital commerce not as a cost center but as an EBITDA lever.
• Influence the technology roadmap led by Product Management to enhance guest experiences in line with digital commerce and loyalty goals. Oversee the rollout and operationalization of new technologies — kiosks, AI-driven ordering, mobile wallet integrations, drive-thru digital integration — to ensure high returns on capital investment. Quantify the labor offset value of digital ordering as a hard ROI line: every loyalty member who pre-orders via app reduces front-counter labor demand during peak hours.

Analytics, Reporting & IPO-Readiness

• Guide the analytics roadmap led by Data & Analytics and Business Intelligence teams to build out critical reporting and insights for managing and growing the business. Build a metrics dashboard that tracks the KPIs investment bankers and public market investors will scrutinize: digital sales as a percentage of system sales, loyalty active member rate, digital channel mix (owned vs. third-party), app-driven ticket uplift, and loyalty-driven frequency lift.
• Establish a measurement constitution across all six brands. Today, six separately acquired brands almost certainly define “active member,” “digital transaction,” “loyalty-driven sale,” and “churn” differently — or don’t define them at all. Before any cross-brand metric can appear in an investor deck or S-1, the VP must lock KPI definitions, measurement windows, and attribution rules into a single governing framework that all six brand teams accept. This is unsexy, foundational work — and it is the prerequisite for every credible number that follows.
• Develop the digital commerce narrative for IPO-readiness. The metrics this VP builds in their first 12-18 months will appear in investor presentations and potentially the S-1 prospectus. This requires the ability to translate operational loyalty data into a financial story: how digital commerce growth drives EBITDA expansion, how loyalty-driven retention reduces customer acquisition cost, and how owned-channel mix improvement maps to franchise unit-level margin expansion.
• Introduce new best practices, operations, and capabilities to achieve better business outcomes. Standardize processes and tools across brands to improve business efficiencies — recognizing that six separately acquired brands carry significant technical and operational debt that must be remediated to support portfolio-level reporting and decision-making.

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Team Leadership & Talent Development

• Build effective teams by attracting high-performing talent, developing team members, and organizing roles and responsibilities across the digital commerce, loyalty, CRM, personalization, and analytics functions. Manage 5-6 direct reports and influence an organization of 25-30 individuals.
• De-risk key person dependence by building systems, not saviors: shared knowledge bases, standardized dashboards, documented testing frameworks, and vendor access protocols that live beyond any individual contributor. PE diligence will flag lack of SOPs or centralized IP.
• Develop succession and bench strength for each key function within the digital commerce organization. Identify and develop a #2 for each critical sub-function. Ensure the team can operate at full capacity even during leadership transitions — a non-trivial requirement in a pre-IPO environment where investor diligence scrutinizes management depth.

🟥 JOB SEARCH GOT YOU STUCK? Book an hour with VP/CMO ecommerce recruiter, Harry Joiner, who prepared this analysis. Includes a 3-month membership to NEXTgig™

Qualifications

Education & Certification

• Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Economics, or a related field; MBA or equivalent graduate degree preferred.

Functional Competencies — Skills, Knowledge & Experience

• 10+ years of experience in Digital Commerce and Loyalty programs with a proven track record of growing and managing points-based loyalty programs. Experience in restaurant, hospitality, travel, or retail industries strongly preferred.
• Points-based loyalty P&L management at franchise or partner-funded scale. You must have modeled point cost structures where partners (franchisees, hotel owners, airline partners) co-fund the rewards liability. If you’ve only managed loyalty programs where the brand funds 100% of the redemption cost, this role will be a significant step up in structural complexity.
• Digital channel mix optimization. Demonstrated ability to shift transactions from third-party or margin-dilutive channels to owned digital channels (app, web, loyalty). Candidates who have moved digital channel mix from <20% to >30% at a multi-unit or multi-brand operation are especially competitive.
• Loyalty program metrics fluency. You must be conversational in: active member rate (90-day transacting), frequency lift (members vs. non-members), average ticket uplift (app vs. non-app), churn rate by cohort, points cost as a percentage of system sales, and customer lifetime value by acquisition channel and brand. LTV:CAC ratios of 3:1 or better at scale.
• CRM and lifecycle marketing depth. Experience managing owned communication channels (email, push, SMS, in-app) at scale with measurable outcomes: open rates, conversion rates, email-driven revenue per subscriber, and reactivation rates for dormant members. Familiarity with modern CRM platforms and Customer Data Platforms (CDPs).
• AI-driven personalization capability — as an architect, not a spectator. Experience commissioning or directing multi-agent AI personalization programs — not just approving vendor proposals, but specifying the architecture: what the planning layer decides, what the execution layer generates, and what the evaluation layer catches before it reaches the customer. You should be able to explain your personalization stack the way a CFO explains a capital structure — with precision, trade-offs, and failure modes. Predictive models for next-best-action, churn-risk scoring, dynamic offer optimization, and recommendation engines are table stakes. McKinsey’s 10-15% revenue lift benchmark from effective personalization is the standard.
• Personal AI fluency. You use AI tools daily in your own workflow — not just your team’s. You’ve built prompts, tested agents, automated reporting, or prototyped personalization logic hands-on. We will ask you what AI tools you used this week, how you used them, and what you learned. Candidates who describe AI as something their team handles will not advance. This is a leadership requirement, not a technical nice-to-have.
• Multi-brand or multi-unit operational experience. You have operated inside a franchise model, multi-brand portfolio, or complex matrix organization where digital strategy must work across distinct brand identities, separate franchisee communities, and shared technology platforms.
• Financial storytelling for PE, board, or public market audiences. Experience presenting digital commerce metrics to investment bankers, PE boards, audit committees, or public market investors. Fluency in EBITDA contribution, CAC payback, contribution margin by channel, and valuation impact of digital commerce growth. If you’ve participated in an IPO, S-1 preparation, or PE exit process, say so prominently.
• Knowledge of digital commerce platforms and strategies including mobile app ordering ecosystems, third-party delivery marketplace management, and omnichannel loyalty technology. Nice-to-have: experience with restaurant-specific loyalty platforms (Paytronix, Punchh, Olo) or hospitality loyalty infrastructure (Hilton Honors, Marriott Bonvoy, airline loyalty systems).

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Leadership & Management / Behavioral Competencies

• Demonstrated ability to build and lead high-performing teams. Experience managing 5-6 direct reports and influencing an organization of 25-30 individuals across digital commerce, loyalty, CRM, personalization, and analytics functions.
• Cross-functional leadership in a matrix organization. Proven ability to plan and align across complex matrix structures — coordinating with brand marketing, product management, data & analytics, finance, and franchise relations. You must be able to drive alignment on priorities and impact without direct authority over every stakeholder.
• Franchise relationship management. Experience managing changes that impact franchisees — technology rollouts, loyalty program redesigns, promotional calendar changes — with proactive stakeholder alignment and transparent communication. Understanding of FDD constraints and franchisee advisory council dynamics preferred.
• Exceptional oral and written communication skills. Able to convey clear, tailored messages to diverse audiences — from franchisee operators and brand marketing teams to PE board members and investment bankers. Data-driven discussions that drive alignment, not presentations that generate nodding.

Personal Characteristics

• High integrity and transparency. You surface red flags before anyone asks. In a PE-backed, pre-IPO environment, trust is built through predictability and honesty — not spin.
• Entrepreneurial orientation. You think like an owner, not a caretaker. Every initiative is a mini capital project with an NPV, an IRR, and a payback period — and you model it that way without being asked.
• Self-directed and autonomous. The CEO is focused on IPO preparation. You will operate with high autonomy and present metrics independently. Waiting for direction is not an option.
• Resilient under macro pressure. You’re inheriting a hostile macro environment — tariff-driven inflation, consumer traffic declines, franchise margin pressure — not a tailwind. Candidates who have operated through downturns and delivered digital growth against industry headwinds are structurally more qualified.
• Passion for the restaurant industry with intellectual curiosity. You don’t need to come from QSR, but you need to find the franchise model, consumer behavior dynamics, and occasion-driven loyalty economics genuinely interesting — not just tolerable.
• Analytical rigor paired with strategic vision. You can zoom into a cohort-level retention curve and zoom out to a board-level digital commerce narrative in the same meeting. Both skills are required daily.
• Political dexterity. You will manage six brand presidents who each protect their brand’s autonomy. You must lead through influence, build consensus without surrendering strategic clarity, and navigate a PE-backed matrix where political savvy is as important as analytical skill.
• Willingness to be on-site 80% in Atlanta. This is non-negotiable and structural — the cross-functional dependencies in this role cannot be navigated remotely.

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🟥 EMPLOYERS: Separate from recruiting, I write investment‑grade recruiting briefs that walk A‑player ecommerce candidates through the real business case for your role – the market, channels, KPIs, tech stack, team, and AI issues – before they ever get on Zoom with you. I research / write it. YOU bless it. YOU own it.

RESULT: Your first‑round conversations are with 6-8 highly informed A-players who already understand where/how they can drive EBITDA. To have me write and send your posting out to this list, text Harry Joiner at (404) 281‑2025. Confidential briefs / application process are no problem.