Chief Executive Officer and Chairman, Sbarro
Search every verified J. Karam interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. In a June 2025 podcast interview, Sbarro CEO David Karam discussed the company's recovery following two bankruptcy filings. He stated that the "critical piece" was "reestablishing the brand positioning," which he called a "monumental moment" for the company. Karam noted that Sbarro has focused on quality improvements, including making dough fresh and shredding cheese daily, and said the company has "deleveraged the company entirely," achieving a debt-to-EBITDA ratio of less than one-to-one, compared to approximately 150-to-one when he started. Karam previously served as president of Wendy's, where he said earnings grew by $100 million over three years during a recession, and that the brand's "vitality was restored." In a 2015 talk, he cited Steve Jobs as an example of a leader who was "willing to cut against the grain" and make "huge bets" because he "wasn't a slave to making money." Karam also expressed the view that "if you make it a financial objective, you're far less likely to succeed."
“I think it's all the above. If I were to say what was the one critical piece, it was the brand positioning. Reestablishing the brand positioning was uh you know it was just a monumental moment for us as a brand uh both on the company and the franchise side.”
“I'm proud to tell you that we basically have deleveraged the company entirely. We have a debt to Ebida ratio of less than one year, one to one, you know, and when I started it was probably 150 to1. So, you know, shedding a lot of that debt through bankruptcy was helpful, very, very helpful.”
“if you make it a financial objective, you're far less likely to succeed. Everybody's talked a lot about apple and Steve Jobs... what shocked me, what really impressed me about Jobs was his willingness to cut against the grain and make huge, huge bets with his company because he wasn't a slave to the economics. He wasn'...”
“Wendy's earning grew by one-hundred million dollars in that three year period despite being in a terrible recession. Which was about... we went from 240 to 340 million dollars of even Dow. But more importantly - the vitality of the brand was restored. Second best sales performance in the industry - second only to McDon...”
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