By Gary Stern, FORBES
The four friends from the Orlando and Winter Haven, Fl. area felt that Asian street food called “hawkers” was missing from Florida. So in 2011, the quartet with the help of one of their aunts bootstrapped $80,000 to open Hawkers in Orlando, where it is headquartered. Three of them, Wayne Yung, Allen Lo, and Kin Ho (who died of leukemia in Jan. 2024) had roots in Vietnam, Malaysia and Hong Kong, and Kaleb Harrell hails from Florida.
Then to expand they raised additional funds from a contingent of about 60 friends and family as shareholders while still maintaining majority ownership and now operate 15 Hawkers locations, all company-owned, across 7 states–Fl., Ga., N.C., Tenn, Md., Va. and Tx.
But now with an investment from the private equity firm Savory Fund, which is based in Lehi, Utah, which has invested in Mo’ Bettahs, Saigon Hustle and Swig, Hawkers is ready to step up expansion.
An Alternative to Casual Dining
The quartet felt that Orlando was “the land of casual dining,” Harrell said, but needed a jolt of “Asian street food.” He adds that his family didn’t travel much so getting to taste dim sum, dumplings, or noodle dishes excited him. He and his friends opened Hawkers with “the perspective of the guests who wanted to visit an amazing place and taste its authentic food.”
At most actual hawkers in Asia, diners eat on dishes such as Singapore Mei fun, and the ingredients come from a small farm a few miles away.
An Asian-style cuisine Hawkers is proving to be an effective alternative to the many burger, taco, pizza and chicken chains, and with a private equity partner, is primed to grow.
Three Founders Drive Hawkers
Of the three remaining founders, Harrell serves as CEO, Lo as brand chef overseeing the menu, and Yung as vibe director in charge of its physical designs. Savory Fund is the majority investor, but Hawkers, Harrell points out, remains founder-led.
At Hawkers, some of the most popular dishes include roti Canai, Malaysian flatbread with curry dipping sauce, Korean twice-fried wings, and soup dumplings filled with pork and bone broth.
Diners can’t eat burger and fries, pizza and tacos all the time and Hawkers offers Chinese dumplings, BBQ pork bao and chili crisp wontons as tasty alternatives.
Take-out and delivery constitute about 25% of its overall revenue, and it partners with Uber Eats and Door Dash.
Keeping all of their 15 locations company-owned made sense, Harrell said, because “our food is complex; it’s a scratch kitchen,” not easy to replicate and therefore doesn’t lend itself easily to a franchising model.
Andrew K. Smith, a co-founder and managing director at Savory Fund, said it was attracted to invest in Hawkers because of its “passionate guest following, bold flavors and magnetic energy. It’s a dining experience unlike any other.” Its data also revealed that Asian cuisine in the U.S. was growing at 12% annually but traditional foods at 1% or 2%.
Moreover, he cites that it’s been able to attract and retain loyal customers. More than 50% of its sales stems from guests who average visiting Hawkers 8 times a year.
Harrell explains that Savory Fund and the Hawkers owners are aligned in their “values, the integrity of the brand, and what scale looks like.”
Smith says that Savory Fund thinks it can “scale without losing what makes them special like Mo’ Bettahs.” The chain was “built by founders who care deeply about the guest experience.” And Harrell points out that its investment enables it to be a “debt-free company and make it possible for us to grow in an intentional and thoughtful way, more locations, more development opportunities for our team.”
Smith expects that most of its growth will stem from the 7 states it’s currently located in, and continue to be company-owned, not from franchising. However, in the future, he’s open to considering larger metropolises such as Chicago or New York City or licensing deals overseas.
Asked the keys to the future success of Hawkers, Smith replies: 1) Keeping the cuisine simple and approachable for all customers, 2) Creating a culture in each restaurant where the guest feels at home, 3) Maintaining a disciplined approach to growth and not expanding too rapidly.
