Company: FWRG
Filing Date: 2025-03-11
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0001789940-25-000010
Chunk: 16

Company: First Watch Restaurant Group, Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-03-11
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1
Chunk 16
---
 from within our restaurants and ensure we are delivering a best-in-class training experience to all new hires. 

•Regional “Come Grow With Us” events provide hourly employees who are interested in leadership the chance to learn about growth and development and get on the fast track to management.

•Established in 2018, our First Watch Academy of Restaurant Management immerses new restaurant managers in our You First culture and leverages Company subject matter experts to educate these leaders on a variety of essential topics, including leadership behaviors. To date, nearly 1,000 high-potential leaders have attended the week-long sessions that take place throughout the year.

We prioritize personal and professional growth because it’s simply the right thing to do and it’s part of our culture. However, it also makes our aggressive growth plans possible. With over 100 new restaurants in our real estate development pipeline, we need a robust GM-ready talent bench. Our ongoing career growth opportunities, along with our culture and hours, are a key component to our employee value proposition, which fuels our ability to both attract and retain great talent.

9

Retaining Our Employees

All of these aspects, and many more, contribute to our award-winning culture and employee retention. Our turnover sits well below the industry average and has improved sequentially over the last two years for both managers and hourly team members, enabling us to provide consistent and memorable dining experiences for our customers.

Experienced, Passionate Leadership Team and Deep Bench of Talent 

Our team is led by passionate executives who have an extensive mix of experience in our brand and with other leading national restaurant concepts and consumer facing businesses. We have a deep bench of talent throughout the organization. Our executives and key employees average more than 15 years of industry experience and our directors of operations have an average tenure at First Watch of approximately 10 years. In addition, our restaurant staff includes hundreds of fully-trained, tested, high-performing managers throughout our system who are poised to step into the general manager role as we execute our growth strategy and open new restaurants. 

Government Regulation

We are subject to extensive federal, state and local government laws and regulations, including those relating to, among others, public health and safety, zoning and fire codes, alcoholic beverage control and franchising. 

In addition, we are also subject to the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, the Americans with Disabilities Act and various federal and state laws governing such matters as minimum wages, exempt versus non-exempt, overtime, unemployment tax rates, workers