Wingstop: Antonio Swad. A Brilliant Idea — And a Nail-Biting Exit
How I Built This with Guy Raz
- Published
- April 6, 2026
- Duration
- 1h 18m
- Summary source
- description
- Last updated
- Jul 5, 2026
Discusses A lot of founders spend their lives chasing one big idea.Antonio Swad had two.The first? Migrating c…
Summary
A lot of founders spend their lives chasing one big idea.Antonio Swad had two.The first? Migrating chicken wings from the Happy Hour buffet to the center of the plate.The second? Building a pizza business that catered to a very specific demographic: Latinos.That first idea became Wingstop, a deep-fried wing concept that grew to 3,000 stores.The second bec…
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Show notes
A lot of founders spend their lives chasing one big idea.Antonio Swad had two.The first? Migrating chicken wings from the Happy Hour buffet to the center of the plate.The second? Building a pizza business that catered to a very specific demographic: Latinos.That first idea became Wingstop, a deep-fried wing concept that grew to 3,000 stores.The second became Pizza Patron, a franchise that rewarded customers for ordering in Spanish, and let them pay in pesos.This is the story of how Antonio got t