When Lyle Tick was hired as president and chief concept officer at BJ’s Restaurants Inc. in 2024, he hatched a plan to return the casual-dining chain to growth by embracing its roots and simplifying in-store operations.
The board, in search of a new chief executive after Greg Levin stepped down, liked what they saw. Ten months later, they named him the top boss.
Tick told the Business Journal that his mission remains the same—“to get back to being a category-defining growth brand.”
“We need to deliver consistent growth and consistent margin expansion,” said the chief executive. “And the way we’re going about doing that is building stronger foundations of great restaurant operations, building great value for our guests and now we’re moving on to the exciting product and experience.”
No Public Company Experience
Despite having no experience running a publicly traded company, the board, which includes heavyweights in the restaurant chain industry, took a chance on Tick.
He learned the nuances of a public company as chief concept officer, implementing a plan to “unlock” the brand’s full potential by “taking it from good to great,” he told the Business Journal.
“The thing that jumped out for me for BJ’s was I started to understand it felt like it had all of the ingredients to really be a category-defining, growth brand in full-service,” Tick said about visiting restaurants when he first started.
“It probably needs a little more definition from a brand perspective, and that’s an area that I think I can help with.”
Since Tick joined 16 months ago, the stock has risen about 66% to $39.42. However, since his promotion to CEO in June, the shares are down about 10% with a market cap of $880 million (Nasdaq: BJRI).
The Advertising Side
Tick started in advertising before he found his way to full-service restaurants.
His early career put him in touch with several food and beverage firms, such as brewing company AB InBev and spirits maker Moët Hennessy. He had a nine-month stint as the worldwide chief growth officer for J. Walter Thompson Company, one of the world’s best known advertising agencies.
“Over my career, I became really curious about consumers and brands, and it shaped perspectives on how brands work and how you go about either revitalizing, re-energizing or unlocking the full potential of brands,” Tick said.
He worked three years at the liquor giant Bacardi, where he rose to VP category director, Vodka, North America. He also was managing director of Walgreens Boots Alliance.
He shifted to the restaurant industry when he became president of Buffalo Wild Wings, where he led initiatives that helped the chain win back its core customers over four years.
“Buffalo had strayed from its essence of being a sports bar as it chased down trying to compete with family dining and instead of going after it in a way that was really authentic to them, they tried to be like family dining,” Tick said. “So, we went back to say, ‘How do we rediscover that power of a sports bar?’”
Tick was lured to BJ’s after working less than a year as CEO of On the Border Mexican Grill & Cantina.
The last two decades have taught him “an amalgamation of lessons,” he said.
Back to Basics
At BJ’s, Tick spent the past year refocusing on what he called “table stakes,” or doing the restaurant basics well.
“Part of it is making it easier for our team members. We spent a lot of time talking to our team members about what’s getting in the way of them doing that.”
One recent strategy was to simplify the order-taking process on servers’ digital handhelds when they enter orders to reduce food and beverage comps—free drinks given to customers to make up for order mistakes.
“Because a third of our food and beverage comps are what you call rung in wrong or prepared wrong. Now, none of my team members are trying to ring something in wrong or prepare it wrong. So if that’s happening, it’s because something’s getting in the way.”
Tick said these updates have brought the company’s food and beverage comps down by double digits.
“Trying to keep it as simple as possible and focused as possible is what we’re doing.”
Renovating Pizza
Tick said that a big part of BJ’s turnaround has been rediscovering BJ’s “DNA from a menu point of view.”
“BJ’s was founded with pizza and then beer and bringing people together,” he said. “But it had clear foundational products that people knew about and navigated by, and I think over the years, it became almost more known for variety and a “no veto” vote,” he said.
Tick thinks the company can be more focused on those original core products.
“How do you do that without sacrificing what we call “turf,” which is that coverage you have so that most people can find something within your walls, but you have to do that in a way where you don’t sacrifice being known for certain things.”
The latest project was reconstructing BJ’s signature dish, the deep-dish pizza—a menu staple that had gained low guest satisfaction scores.
“It had lost a level of consistency over the years, especially with the dough,” he said.
The new recipe—which included re-engineering the dough, adding fresh tomato sauce with olive oil, using 100% whole-milk mozzarella cheese and finding new kinds of pepperoni and sausage—was placed into several test markets last year, including Irvine. It rolled out to all restaurants in November.
Tick knew he was making inroads when he got a surprise letter from BJ’s co-founder, Paul Motenko, who had visited the Irvine location a few months ago and tried the new pizza.
“He wrote me a really nice note about how great it was and how it reminded him of some of what made it great at the beginning,” Tick said.
The Recipe to Unlocking BJ’s Next Chapter
Lyle Tick has a formula when it comes to dissecting how to drive a company back to growth.
One—go listen to people on the front lines, the chief executive for BJ’s Restaurants Inc. told the Business Journal.
“Whether that’s your salespeople at Bacardi or your employees in the restaurants,” he said, referring to his previous employers such as the spirits maker and Buffalo Wild Wings.
Tick said that the dedication and tenure among the BJ’s team at its headquarters and in the field was what jumped out to him when he first joined the company.
“When you have that, that is the foundation of everything,” he said. “With a little bit of direction and shaping and people feeling like they’re being heard, you can really channel that kind of energy.”
Two—listen as much as you can to the consumers.
Three—go back to the beginning of the brand.
“If you can talk to founders, talk to founders. Understand what was the purpose and DNA that made it work,” he said, adding that this is how you’ll find the way “to unlock the next chapter.”
Tick noted that he took these steps at Buffalo Wild Wings, or “B-Dubs” as he called it.
“Because what had happened is that brands either drifted from their DNA or the cultural context evolved around them and they didn’t evolve how they delivered their DNA,” Tick said.
At BJ’s, he said he’s working to rediscover the brand’s DNA from a menu standpoint. During his start as BJ’s chief concept officer, Tick began with the chain’s founding dish, the deep-dish pepperoni pizza.
He and the culinary team reconstructed the recipe and after testing select markets including Irvine, the redesigned pizza debuted in restaurants this winter.
“I believe that growth is the oxygen that business breath,” Tick said.
How Activists Triggered Leadership Changes at BJ’s
For the last two years, a business turnaround has been the hot topic among shareholders of BJ’s Restaurants Inc. Then-CEO Greg Levin had entered into agreements with two activist funds in early 2024.
Pleasant Lake Partners revealed in February 2024 that it had a 10% stake and urged BJ’s to sell itself before it was allowed to add Brad Richmond, former CFO of Darden Restaurants, to the board.
In March 2024, PW Partners, which owns more than 5.7% of BJ’s common stock, said it would provide cost structure recommendations to the restaurant chain and its board as part of a six-month cooperation agreement.
When Levin suddenly stepped down in August 2024, Richmond took over as the interim CEO. A few months later, in January of this year, BJ’s signed a cooperation agreement with Ronald Shaich’s Act III Holdings LLC. Act III became a minority investor and currently holds a 5.6% stake, according to BJ’s 2025 proxy statement. Noah Elbogen, a CFO at Act III, is on BJ’s board of directors.
Lyle Tick, then the chief concept officer, told the Business Journal that he learned everything he needed to know about publicly traded companies from Richmond during his first 10 months. By the time he was named CEO in June, Tick had won the board over.
“As president and chief concept officer, Lyle has quickly re-focused the company’s core sales and profit-driving initiatives to further differentiate our concept while capturing opportunities to reduce operational complexity,” Board Chair Lea Anne S. Ottinger said when Tick was named CEO.
No less a restaurant expert than Shaich, founder of Panera Bread and chairman of Cava, praised Tick.
“After engaging with BJ’s board and management, we are … impressed by Mr. Tick’s vision and strategy for unlocking the full potential of the BJ’s brand,” Shaich said in a January statement.
