Chairman & CEO
Jack Baum is Chairman and CEO of Food, Friends and Company, Baum is a partner of 2M Companies, Inc., a Dallas private equity firm, and was the founding partner of Sagebrook Technology Partners, a private equity firm that merged with 2M in 2001. Before founding Sagebrook in 1998, Jack spent 18 years in the restaurant and foodservice industries, founding the Canyon Restaurant Group, Newport’s and Hampton’s restaurants, as well as Landlock Seafood.
As founder and CEO of the Canyon Restaurant Group, Baum grew multiple restaurants concepts into a successful 20-store chain. He bought a troubled concept called Sam’s Cafe in 1989 and, with his team, transformed Sam’s into the Southwestern-themed Canyon Cafe. In 1997, after rolling out 17 additional locations, Canyon Cafe was bought by a public company. Baum stayed with the new entity during the transition to insure a smooth conversion from a private entity to a $1 billion public company. In 1997, Canyon Cafe was selected as one of Nation’s Restaurant News Hot Concepts.
Baum founded and developed Hampton’s and Newport’s, both successful Dallas-based seafood restaurants. Hampton’s, a mid-priced seafood concept, opened in 1981 and operated through 1990 when he converted the concept to another Canyon Cafe location. Newport’s opened in 1984 and quickly became the most popular upscale seafood restaurant in Dallas. Baum sold Newport’s in 1996 to focus on expanding the fast-growing Canyon Cafe group. Baum founded Landlock Seafood in 1978, a Dallas- based seafood distributor that would become the largest seafood supplier in the Southwest, selling his interest to his partner in 1980.
Baum received a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Texas in Austin and completed the Young Presidents Organization Entrepreneur’s MBA program at Harvard University. Mr. Baum also teaches an MBA Entrepreneurial class at SMU Cox School of Business.
Baum serves on the board of directors of the following entities: Food, Friends and Company, Ingenient Technologies, Centego Marketing and Premier Data. He also serves on the executive committees and/or boards of The Jewish Foundation of Greater Dallas, Community Homes for Adults (CHAI) of Dallas, Greenhill School and is the President of the Jewish Community Center.
President and Chief Operating Officer
Mary Russo is President and Chief Operating Officer of Food, Friends and Company.
Mary has spent most of her professional career in the restaurant industry. Shortly after graduating from Ohio State University, she began a career that included various management positions with Bennigan’s, Ciatti’s Italian Restaurant and Chi Chi’s Mexican Restaurants.
In 1985, she joined Dallas restaurateur Jack Baum’s group of restaurants which included Nickel City Grille, Hampton’s, Newport’s, Sam’s Café and Canyon Café. During her 13-year tenure, Mary’s increasing responsibilities included controller, general manager, and regional director, where she was responsible for opening and operating seven restaurants in a three state region.
After Canyon Café was purchased by a public company, Mary again joined forces with Baum at Sagebrook Investments, Inc., a private equity firm as a research analyst.
In 2003, Mary joined Cozymel’s Management, LLC as Chief Operating Officer.
She was named President of the company in 2005.
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Advisor, Director and Investor
Morton Meyerson is Chairman and CEO of 2M Companies, Inc., a Dallas based private equity firm that invests in a variety of private & public equities and real estate. Food, Friends and Company is Meyerson’s first foray into the restaurant business, and he has been partners with Jack Baum since 2001.
Prior to 2M, Meyerson was the Chairman and CEO of Perot Systems Corporation (PSC) from 1992 to 1997. Before PSC, he held a number of management positions with Electronic Data Systems, Inc. (EDS) from 1966 through 1986, including Vice Chairman and President. During his tenure with EDS, Mr. Meyerson also served as CEO of Wall Street investment firm duPont Glore Forgan.
Mr. Meyerson currently serves on two for-profit and two public boards: Energy Services Company, International, Inc. (ENSCO), an offshore drilling company; and TeleTech Holdings, Inc., an e customer relations service firm. He also serves as an advisor to Crescent Real Estate Equities Co., Broadview Capital Advisors, Insight Capital Partner, Financial Technology Ventures, and e-One Global. His present non-profit service is directed to the Morton H. Meyerson Family Tzedakah Funds, as well as his service on the boards of the National Parks Foundation and the Dallas Symphony Association. As a private equity investor during 1987- 1991, Meyerson served as an advisor to Michael Dell of Dell Inc. and invested the initial seed capital in Broadcast.com. Meyerson was elected outstanding Chief Executive Officer three times by the Wall Street Transcript.
Chief Financial Officer and Corporate Controller
Wyatt J. Truscheit is the Chief Financial Officer and Corporate Controller for Food, Friends and Company.
Wyatt has extensive experience and recognized expertise in entrepreneurial, high growth, consumer products and consumer service companies, most notably as Group Vice President of Finance with privately-held Enterprise
Rent-A-Car.
He has held senior corporate finance positions with large publicly-held corporations including Cadbury-Schweppes and Valmont Industries. Additionally, he has served as CFO and Corporate/Board Secretary for emerging and middle market companies with primary responsibility for capital markets, treasury, finance, I/T and investor relations.
Wyatt began his financial career with the national public accounting firm, Deloitte & Touche. He earned an MBA from Baylor University, a B.S. in Business Administration with a concentration in accounting, cum laude, from the University of Missouri and a B.A. from Valparaiso University.
Director of Marketing
Marcie Frazier is the Director of Marketing for Food, Friends and Company, where she is responsible for the advertising, marketing and public relations programs for all restaurant concepts owned by the company.
Marcie began her professional marketing career shortly after graduating from the University of Texas/Arlington with a B.A. in journalism. She joined the corporate public relations staff at Neiman Marcus as the national media relations coordinator. In 1993, she joined The Great Train Store Company, a Dallas-based specialty toy retailer, as the director of marketing. Over the next four years, the company would grow from seven units to 27, and Marcie was responsible for all national and local store marketing, as well as public relations for the company. She was instrumental in the financial public relations campaign for the company’s IPO in 1995, securing local and national press placements that contributed to the company’s overall public image and successful offering. The company closed its doors in 1998.
Marcie joined the staff of Dallas-based Dimensional Marketing Group, Inc. (DMG). During her eight-year tenure at DMG, Marcie was instrumental in shaping the national and local marketing programs for more than 15 restaurant concepts and multiple retail companies. A partial list of previous restaurant clients include Canyon Cafe, Sam’s Cafe, Cozymel’s Mexican Grill, Rock Fish Seafood Grill, Texas de Brazil, Austin Grill, Kirby’s Steakhouse, Mickey Mantle’s Steakhouse, WaterStreet Seafood and Perry’s Restaurant. |
