Ruby Tuesday Inc. and NRD Capital, an Atlanta-based private equity firm that specializes in franchised and multi-unit business investments, announced that Ray Blanchette, a seasoned restaurant executive and turnaround expert with over 25 years of industry experience, has been named as the company’s Chief Executive Officer. Blanchette is the permanent successor to the company’s former CEO and president, Jim Hyatt, and succeeds NRD’s founder and managing partner Aziz Hashim, who had served in the role of interim CEO since the Firm acquired Ruby Tuesday in a go-private transaction on December 21, 2017.
Blanchette joins Ruby Tuesday from Au Bon Pain, where he served as the company’s President and CEO since June 2016, including through the acquisition of the company by Panera Bread in December 2017. Prior to ABP, from 2007-2015, he served as President, CEO and a member of the Board of Directors of Ignite Restaurant Group Inc., the parent company of the Joe’s Crab Shack and Brick House Tap & Tavern brands. Blanchette is credited with the historic turnaround of the Joe’s Crab Shack brand, the successful launch of the Brick House Tap & Tavern concept and bundling the brands into IRG, which he eventually took public through a successful initial public offering on NASDAQ in 2012.