Zack Bezunartea, the owner of FAT VEGAN, which is a small restaurant in Mexico, is also the creator of new ideas in the world of veganism. Zack came from New York to Mexico to make his idea a huge success, and it turned out amazing! At present, has more than 21,000 followers on Instagram. FAT VEGAN’s menu is curated in such a way that it would be difficult to comprehend that it is part of a vegan restaurant. FAT VEGAN is an American FAST FOOD vegan restaurant that also offers a selection of vegan ice cream, burgers, and more.
In Conversation With Zack Bezunartea, Founder, Fat Vegan
In an exclusive conversation with The Restaurant Times, Zack Bezunartea, Founder of FAT VEGAN discusses the underlying impact of veganism and how online delivery boosted the sales of Fat Vegan during the pandemic.
TRT:- According to a survey, only 20% of the population living there consider themselves vegan or even vegetarian. What gave you the inspiration to think of this idea? Who gave you the idea to open a vegan restaurant in Mexico?
Zack Bezunartea:- I think that 20% is a big number; it’s a lot. And when you look for information, for example in Forbes magazine, it says that Mexico is the third country with the most vegetarians and vegans in the world. So there is a perception that in Mexico people only eat meat, grilled meat, and street tacos. On the other hand, you have to consider that Mexico’s pre-colonial diet was largely based on plants, beans, tomatoes, and corn,( as the main ingredients). I moved to Mexico three years ago and I was looking for vegan restaurants in my neighborhood. There were options for plant-based street tacos, vegan pizzas, and more but what I couldn’t find was a vegan burger place. That was when I saw a pretty big market for vegan food but I didn’t see many options to cater to the demand. That was when I thought I’d set something up.
TRT:- I have read your article published in Vegan News which states that all ingredients are sourced locally in Mexico and that it is easy to source all ingredients especially the vegan ones in Mexico.
Zack Bezunartea:- First, I would like to clarify that not all the ingredients are from Mexico. We do bring some little things, but what we tried to do from the beginning is to create our own recipes because thousands of markets have implemented a lot of food options. For me, it’s great that we have so many options and that it’s changing the market. But if we really want to distinguish ourselves from others, I think we also have to have our own products.
So we’re looking at how to make a vegan burger using mainly Mexican products. Since we use local products, it’s not difficult to do that, because we don’t look for something that wasn’t there, we look at some markets, we see at was in abundance and that’s what we use. For example, there is a native Mexican bean called ayocote Morado (brown bean). I love it because it has a superior texture suitable for hamburgers. We use ayocote. The pitacoche, which is a very Mexican product and has many flavors like corn fungus, is a main ingredient for the recipe as well. The good thing about Mexico is that here you eat vegetables and plants. It’s one of the best countries to be in because it has a great variety of vegetables and incredible fruits.
TRT:- And did the pandemic affect FAT VEGAN’s sales? If so, what were your strategies to overcome the pandemic?
Zack Bezunartea:- Of course it did. Considering that we opened in December 2020, we were only open for three months when the pandemic started. When we started, we opened in a 20-square-meter, super-small space where we were doing production in the mornings and opening to the public at one o’clock in the afternoon.
We had a great time since the beginning, but the problem we had was related to the space. Where are we going to put so many people, how are we going to do production? The space was really small for need. But, when the pandemic started and we had to close operations and only offer home delivery, sales dropped by 80%. Just when we opened we did not have many resources for the restaurant, so we had to turn around and adapt to a different solution. We launched an application of FAT VEGAN for home-order services. We worked with the platforms for online delivery, looked for ways to make it sustainable, and by the end of 2020 we had recovered all the sales that were lost. It was much more difficult for some charities because you are paying a lot of commissions, but little by little we were going to change the business model and find out how they work. We started our business in the pandemic with six employees in a place of 20 square meters and now we have 16 employees. So, now, we have made an expansion; we have a place five times bigger than where we started, and we are launching a Dark Kitchen concept called Tacones lejanos from Falafel. And before the end of the year, we are going to launch some more concepts.
TRT:- Having more than 21k Followers on Instagram, What was your strategy to increase your social media content and presence and make it loved by people?
Zack Bezunartea:- The truth is, we didn’t have any strategy. For me, FAT VEGAN started as a passion project. I had worked in many other places, and I had a long career in restaurants. So, when it came to FAT VEGAN, what I saw at first was I can do what I want to, and if I want to do something, I’m going to do it and I don’t have to follow the rules.
There is no as such marketing plan of when we are going to publish. It’s somehow living in a restaurant, we take photos, we talk about the things we like and we post, we try to make the brand a reflection of our tastes and our ideas and I think it’s authentic.
TRT:- Nobody can think of how to eat a vegan burger or a vegan smoothie, what gave you the idea to include them on your menu?
Zack Bezunartea:- Well, that was the whole concept behind FAT VEGAN. I had visited places in the United States that served vegan food and I always loved them. And what I was saying at the beginning was that it’s also the food that I missed. It’s like when you have this craving like ‘I want to eat a burger, but I don’t want to eat a bean burger’ or something like that.
TRT:- In the last three years, there has been a 60% increase in people identifying as vegan in the U.S. What is your view on the gradual path to increasing the percentage of vegans in the world?
Zack Bezunartea:- I think veganism is a very important thing in all aspects because we have a system that abuses other living beings too much.
Also, in the process. We are exploiting the planet, so much talk about the packaging we are going to use or putting a packaging or not putting a packing on a drink while the product inside the container has much more impact on the environment than the product itself. What we should be doing instead is changing this system that relies so heavily on dairy and meat. It’s like we want to live in the past or in the future and what future are we going to leave for other generations? For me, it’s amazing; I think if there’s one thing that came out of the pandemic is that people at the moment changed a little bit. Not only some people are doing that but the big companies, big brands, restaurants, businesses, and the system itself is changing. And that’s like something that generates a little bit of hope.
TRT:- How many years have you been vegan?
Zack Bezunartea:- I have eaten 95% vegan food for a long time. The thing is that I work in restaurants all the time and sometimes I have to try food. But really when I was moving to Mexico and left my last job, I saw that I finally had the freedom and space to live the way I want and dedicate myself to this.
The truth is that the success of FAT VEGAN from the beginning only makes me want to live a healthy life and help others do the same and I always look for ways to put more options on the table.
I see a little bit of what I’m going to be with the experience I have. After working 25-years in the industry, I’ve learned a lot, so it was a sacrifice to leave this career where you can do a lot of things, you can make a lot of money, selling meat and putting up all kinds of restaurants. So, I kind of locked myself into a bit of a vegan path, but we as entrepreneurs, have responsibilities. Whatever industry it is, where we work as entrepreneurs with experience and having learned something from there, we can do more than just make money and work. We can apply this experience to something that can make the world a little bit better.
TRT:- What were the main challenges you faced when opening FAT VEGAN in Mexico?
Zack Bezunartea:- Actually, FAT VEGAN has been in some ways the most successful project. It is a project in which I have participated in the issue of people’s reactions. In this aspect, we have been very successful. But at the same time, it has been the most difficult project of my life because, first, the pandemic after three months of launching and having to change everything once the virus was in. Actually, after working in restaurants for so many years, I have never seen a change so drastic;
I mean, the industry totally changed in the pandemic! So you have to relearn everything you learned in your life, change everything, be totally open to change and that happened everywhere. And, here in Mexico what was very difficult for me was to arrive as a foreigner.
The financial system, the imposed system, and the administration is much more difficult here in Mexico. The working hours or the human hours to run an administration to manage a business are ten times more than what is spent in the United States.
So, I think that in this aspect I felt very comfortable, and being in business administration in the United States, I understood the labor laws, the financial laws of Mexico.
TRT:- As an expert in the market, what advice would you give to new restaurateurs? How to start a restaurant business?
Zack Bezunartea:- I use to sell tamales in my restaurant. We made the dough in the morning and cook the tamales and sell them, even if it’s a small business. If you’re going to open, you have to be an expert in marketing, in public relations. You have to handle technology or social media or platforms like a pro, you have to write copy for Instagram. I advise you to always seek help and ask for help. And more than anything, it’s like finding the right people for your business, like a good chef, a good manager, a good team and always putting people first and treating your team well, and trying to create a culture at work. Working in a restaurant is hard. Understand that your team is what is going to make your restaurant successful and if you want to grow your business, then growth is going to depend on those people.
