Beth Ewen Illustration by Jonathan Hankin
Could the root cause of growing rancor at I Heart Mac & Cheese be that customers donât heart the cheese sauce?
Genevieve Prieto thinks so. She was the second franchisee to sign on, in late 2017, and said she was told by Michael Blom, the chef that helped create the brand, that sales at the flagship store in Florida were $700,000 a year. The actual figure was $262,054, a document shows.
She closed her store in December 2018, only eight months after opening, after sales dropped from $31,000 the first week to $5,000 the last, she said, and then sued the brand for illegal financial performance representations, among other allegations, and subsequently filed for personal bankruptcy.