How do you modernize a 50-plus-year-old institution without losing the qualities that made people loyal to it in the first place?  

Our highest priority is maintaining our commitment to the best ingredients and traditional water-bagel methods—that has always been the cornerstone of our success. We use unbromated/unbleached flour, fully kettle-boil all our bagels in NYC water, crack fresh eggs for every sandwich and hand-slice whole avocados to order. We serve only premium cold-smoked Nova salmon and thick-cut nitrate-free bacon at all our locations nationwide.

The in-store experience, streamlined menu and online ecosystem are where we have made modernizations. Our in-store line model allows customers to follow their bagel sandwich as it is prepared and make adjustments in real time, substantially reducing errors. We completely streamlined our menu to focus on the best sellers, which has substantially reduced waste at all our locations. And we are committed to meeting our customers where they are, both online and on our app. We have an incredibly generous loyalty program (H&H Rewards) that lets our customers cash out points for free coffee, sandwiches and bagels by the dozen.

Moving from a New York institution to a national franchise brand requires a different kind of leadership. What was the biggest adjustment for you as you began trusting franchise partners to represent H&H, and how do you ensure consistency across locations?

 We have focused on bringing real H&H brand lovers on board as franchise owners. The large majority of our franchise owners are ex-New Yorkers who loved H&H while they lived in NYC, and have since moved to other parts of the country. They are passionate about sharing New York bagels with their communities, and many franchise owners are behind the register day in and day out, making sandwiches and interacting with customers. We are incredibly focused on streamlined, repeatable operations at all our locations nationwide. We offer an enormous amount of training before any new location is opened to make sure they can provide an authentic H&H Bagels experience anywhere in the country. For every opening, we bring our corporate training team on-location to teach every new employee every facet of the business. This includes training on baking, sandwich prep, griddle work, point-of-sale and customer interaction.

With H&H’s history so closely tied to your family, how do you balance the emotional attachment to a legacy business with the need to make difficult decisions about its future? 

It’s a balancing act for sure. There are certain non-negotiables when it comes to our bagels–our 50-year-old recipe, the use of unbromated and unbleached flour and fully kettle-boiling every single bagel, to name a few. Fortunately, I have a great team around me that makes these decisions a lot easier. The baking team is all about legacy and tradition, including our bakery manager who has been with us 25 years, bakers who have been with us over 30 years and multiple store managers who have been with H&H for over 30 years. The corporate team is all about innovation, with leadership talent from Tavern on the Green, By Chloe and Apple. Those two groups marry the past, present, and future of H&H in a way that keeps us on the cutting edge while not losing track of what got us here in the first place.

Wednesday’s newsletter: Your sales are up. Your guest count isn't.
The most recent Q&A: A steakhouse classic that never feels dated
Check out the archive: Every lesson from 2026