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As Bubbakoo's Burritos grows - Chris Ives turns to Atmosphere to scale the guest experience. In This Episode Interview takeaways. * Brand Experience Must Scale With Growth - Chris Ives believes expanding from 140 to 300 restaurants is about more than opening new locations. Every restaurant has to deliver the same energy, hospitality, and personality that made Bubbakoo's Burritos successful in the first place, even as the franchise grows. * Atmosphere Reinforces the Brand Story - Rather than treating televisions as background entertainment, Bubbakoo's uses Atmosphere to create a custom in-store channel that reflects its Jersey Shore roots and "Create Something Different" philosophy. The result is a consistent guest experience that extends beyond the food. * Technology Should Strengthen Hospitality - Ives sees AI and technology as tools to simplify operations, improve decision-making, and free managers to spend more time with guests. His philosophy is that the best technology works behind the scenes while people remain at the center of the hospitality experience. Most restaurant operators think televisions are simply there to entertain guests. As CEO of Bubbakoo's Burritos, Ives is leading the fast-casual brand through its next phase of growth. With 140 locations and plans to reach 300 over the next five years, maintaining a consistent guest experience across every restaurant has become one of the company's biggest priorities. One way Bubbakoo's is doing that is through its partnership with Atmosphere, turning every television into another expression of the brand. More than a television screen. Founded in 2008 along the Jersey Shore, Bubbakoo's Burritos was built around one simple idea: create something different. The founders wanted more than another burrito concept. They wanted every restaurant to reflect the laid-back energy and personality that inspired the brand. That philosophy extends beyond the menu. Rather than showing cable news or sports, every Bubbakoo's restaurant features its own branded television channel through Atmosphere. Guests watch surfing, skateboarding, snow sports, and other action sports that reinforce the company's Jersey Shore roots and "Create Something Different" mindset. "We don't have cable in our shops," Ives said. "It's Bubbakoo's TV delivering on our 'Create Something Different' mantra." From USB drives to a national brand. The partnership didn't start with custom programming. Before working with Atmosphere, Bubbakoo's restaurants relied on USB drives loaded with YouTube videos featuring surfing, skating, and other action sports. As the company expanded, that approach became increasingly difficult to manage across dozens of locations. Atmosphere eventually approached the company with an idea: instead of simply providing content, why not build an entire Bubbakoo's television channel? The result gave every restaurant a consistent look and feel while allowing programming to adapt to local markets. Mountain communities might feature snow sports, while coastal locations continue highlighting surfing and other action sports that fit the brand's personality. Protecting the culture. For Ives, creating a consistent experience becomes more difficult with every new restaurant. "You unfortunately get a little bit of that dilution of our core genuine hospitality standards," he said. "Every day I wake up thinking about how we can deliver better service and hospitality across all of our stores." That's why every part of the restaurant matters. The food, the hospitality, the conversations between employees and guests, and even what's playing on the televisions all contribute to how customers experience the brand. Technology Should support hospitality. Ives believes technology should remove friction for restaurant teams, not replace them. Behind the scenes, Bubbakoo's uses AI and data tools to help operators understand guest behavior, improve forecasting, and identify operational opportunities faster. Inside the restaurant, however, managers are expected to focus on serving guests rather than staring at dashboards. "We try to pull out all the tech from the general managers," Ives said. "Most importantly, they're working the shifts and delivering on the guest experience." Atmosphere fits naturally into that philosophy. Instead of giving operators another task to manage, it helps deliver a consistent brand experience automatically across every location. Scaling the experience. As Bubbakoo's works toward 300 restaurants, Ives knows consistency can't come from operations manuals alone. It comes from creating an environment that feels unmistakably like Bubbakoo's every time someone walks through the door. For the company, Atmosphere has become more than an entertainment platform. It's another tool for telling the brand's story, reinforcing its personality, and creating the kind of guest experience that can scale alongside the business. For restaurant operators, it's a reminder that the right technology shouldn't distract from hospitality. It should make it even stronger. Episode links. Listen to This Episode. Watch on YouTube. About Cali BBQ Media. Digital Hospitality is an interview-based video podcast hosted by business owner Shawn P. Walchef (@shawnpwalchef) and produced by his Cali BBQ Media company. The weekly digital series explores the ways successful businesses and entrepreneurs have merged old and new with innovative digital strategies that harness the power of the Internet and social media. Shawn is the founder of Cali BBQ Media and creator of the Restaurant Influencers podcast on Entrepreneur Media. Follow digital hospitality. Follow Restaurant Influencers.

The Atmosphere TV advantage. March 23, 2026 Winning the "Third Space": new research proves Atmosphere TV captures the attention linear TV misses. If you've ever sat in a busy bar or gym, you know the drill: banks of TV screens playing muted cable news or talk shows. It's "background noise" - an afterthought for viewers and a missed opportunity for advertisers. At Atmosphere, Atmosphere News knew TV in the "Third Space" - the venues where life happens outside the living room - was fundamentally broken. So, Atmosphere News set out to fix it by reimagining TV entertainment specifically for these shared viewing environments. Atmosphere is engineered for these specific moments of viewership - TV for your eyes, visually arresting, and audio-optional. To prove that Atmosphere TV is more entertaining for viewers - and is a powerful platform for brands to reach consumers - Atmosphere News partnered with MediaScience to put its platform to the test using eye-tracking technology in real-world environments. The goal? To see how Atmosphere stacks up against linear TV when it comes to the only currency that matters: Attention. The attention advantage. The study found that despite the distractions of a public space, Atmosphere content garnered 12% more visual attention than linear TV. When Atmosphere News went head-to-head with the heavyweights, the results were even more staggering: viewers spent 53% more time watching Atmosphere TV segments compared to SportsCenter. Why? Atmosphere TV is engineered to be audio-optional and visually arresting. Viewers perceived its experience as more creative (by 16%) and more original (by 18%) than linear TV. Most important, they perceived Atmosphere TV as having fewer ads (by 25%), creating a low-clutter environment where your brand breaks through, building awareness and influencing purchase decisions in the real world. Memory that sticks. Capturing eyes is just the first step. The research revealed that brand recall is 25% higher on Atmosphere TV than on linear. And, importantly, adding Atmosphere TV to a linear campaign boosts total brand recall by 41%. Even better (+62%!) for advertisers using its Custom Ad Units. The bottom line. Atmosphere News has created a platform where brands don't just appear - they're remembered. Whether it's reaching linear viewers in more relevant environments or reaching the viewers who've ditched linear TV altogether, Atmosphere News deliver proven engagement and ROI. Discover how Atmosphere TV can drive tangible outcomes for your brand.

VIOOH partners with Atmosphere TV to unlock programmatic access to largest streaming TV platform for businesses. Today (15th January, 2026), VIOOH, the leading premium global digital out-of-home (DOOH) supply-side platform, announced a strategic partnership with Atmosphere TV, the world's largest streaming TV platform built for businesses, expanding access to premium place-based video inventory in the UK, North America, and Australia. The partnership delivers access to over 60,000 venues generating more than 1 billion monthly impressions across restaurants, bars, gyms, airports, hotels, and other high-traffic business locations. Atmosphere TV reaches over 150 million monthly viewers with more than 30 channels of audio-optional, brand-safe content. With over 85% market share in North America's place-based streaming sector, Atmosphere TV's network spans restaurants, bars, gyms, airports, hotels, offices buildings, and other high-traffic, high-dwell-time locations. The platform delivers a compelling value proposition for advertisers seeking to reach consumers in high-dwell time environments, with average viewing times at 40 minutes. Atmosphere TV-enabled venues experience a 40% increase in visits during major sporting events, demonstrating the platform's ability to capture audiences during premium viewing moments. "Atmosphere TV opens up a completely new advertising opportunity - reaching audiences in the moments when they're relaxed, engaged and spending quality time in venues they've actively chosen to visit," said Gavin Wilson, global chief commercial officer at VIOOH. "With 40+ minute average dwell times and 100% viewable, non-skippable inventory, advertisers can connect with genuinely attentive consumers. The programmatic capabilities we're bringing to this partnership mean brands can target by venue type, location and even activate around live sporting events - it's place-based advertising at its most sophisticated." "Partnering with VIOOH brings a new level of programmatic sophistication to our offering," said Ryan Spicer, chief revenue officer at Atmosphere TV. "Our platform already delivers exceptional reach and engagement for advertisers. Now, through VIOOH's technology and global marketplace, brands can access our inventory with the flexibility and precision that VIOOH programmatic enables, from preferred deals to programmatic guaranteed. This makes it easier than ever for advertisers to reach active consumers who are already out and primed to spend." Through programmatic buying via VIOOH's supply-side platform, 100% of Atmosphere TV inventory is now available with comprehensive targeting capabilities, including content, audience, geo, context and business type, tentpole events and live sports with radius targeting, and first and third-party data integration. The platform accepts video with durations from six to 90 seconds, and offers flexible buying options including preferred evergreen deals, first-look private auctions and programmatic guaranteed.