industry consultancy Aaron
Allen & Associates. “How fast
something takes off can some-
times indicate how quickly it
might fall.”
IN HAWAII, poke is a classic
and ubiquitous street
food—tubs of chopped fish,
tossed with salt, seaweed, and
kukui nuts. The dish was
popularized more broadly in
the early ’90s by Hawaiian
chef Sam Choy, who literally
wrote the book on poke (Poke:
Hawaii’s Food) and created
an annual poke festival and
recipe contest. While the
basic recipe is simple, poke is
almost endlessly versatile:
You can customize the fish,
the toppings, and the base at
the bottom of the bowl.
Before this decade began,
if you wanted to buy poke in
the U.S., you had to venture
to the continental haunts of
Hawaiian natives—places
such as Takahashi Market,
originally a Japanese general
store, in San Mateo, Calif.
This changed in 2010, when
Texas-born Jason McVearry
followed his wife, Trish
Fortuna, to Los Angeles after
living in Hawaii. They’d only
discovered poke six months
earlier in Hawaii before they
decided to make and sell
poke from a walk-up counter
in Venice Beach. They named
the venture Poke-Poke and,
inevitably, made a sign from
a surfboard. “We had great
fun making big batches of
poke, but no one knew what
it was at first,” says McVearry.
“We were having to throw it
away at the end of the day.”
Nevertheless, through
word of mouth—and just as
McVearry anticipated—poke
proved the perfect food for
faddish, health-obsessed
Southern Californians. Soon,
a dozen copycat poke shacks
opened around them, and
even Poke-Poke’s landlord
evicted it so he could open
his own poke restaurant in
early 2017. By that time, the
couple had already moved
to Austin, Tex., where they’d
open two more restaurants.
“We’ve been watching it get
crazy in L.A.,” Mc Vearry says.
“Many Chinese or Korean
places are turning into
poke restaurants overnight.
Bigger, slicker operators
are getting in and planning
bigger chains.”
Indeed they are. Chicago’s
seven-outlet chain Aloha
Poke Co. is planning to open
10 restaurants—including
outlets in Florida, Den-
ver, Washington, D.C.,
Wisconsin, and Minne-
sota—courtesy of a “strong
seven-figure investment” by
Chicago-based Levy Family
Partners. And Sweetfin Poke,
a slick chain that has opened
seven locations in L.A. since
2015, recently tapped former
Shake Shack CEO David
Swinghamer as a strategic
adviser to turn its concept
into a nationwide chain.
Additionally, a handful of
regional poke restaurants are
also embarking on expansion
in the next few months, rais-
ing the competitive bar.
As with any hot new fran-
chising or food trend, com-
petitors are already staking
their territories and touting
their differentiators—even
if those differentiators aren’t
exactly game-changing. For
example: Tobi Miller, the
cofounder of Beverly Hills–
based LemonShark Poké,
134 / ENTREPRENEUR.COM / January-February 2018
→ PINK GOLD
A poke bowl fromPokéworks.
“ We’ve been watching it get
crazy in L.A.,” says an
early entrant to the market.
“Many Chinese or Korean
places are turning into poke
restaurants overnight.” PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF POKEWORKS, POKE POKE, & ALHOA POKE CO.