Local restaurateur Troy Guard thinks he might have the next Chipotle or McDonald’s on his hands.
The owner of TAG Restaurant Group (Los Chingones, Hashtag, Bubu, Guard and Grace) has teamed up with NHL Hall-of-Famer and former Colorado Avalanche player Peter Forsberg and the founders of Eggs Inc., a fast-casual concept in Sweden, to bring the brand’s first U.S. location to Denver.
“If Chipotle has 2,500 stores, I think we can do at least 10,000 or more,” Guard said.
Elisabet and Glen Eriksson created Eggs Inc., which has an all-day menu centered around eggs, in Stockholm, Sweden, in 2019. The couple had sold their apartment and were living in a temporary space without a kitchen, struggling to find quick meals high in protein and quality without going to an expensive, sit-down restaurant. “We thought there was something missing in the market if you don’t want to eat a hamburger,” Elisabet said.
Eggs Inc. has one restaurant in Stockholm, and the Erikssons want to make eggs an all-day meal with popular menu items, including egg-based pizza, sandwiches, egg bites and Benedicts. “The same people behind McDonald’s and Burger King built the kitchen, so it’s extremely efficient,” Elisabet said. “If we have a line of 180 people, the longest wait time is six minutes.”
Forsberg, who was inducted into the NHL Hall of Fame in 2014 and played for the Colorado Avalanche between 1995 and 2004, is a native of Sweden and was impressed by the brand on a trip home. He wanted to bring the concept to the U.S. and connected with Guard, who he’d personally met through meals at Guard and Grace, to help spearhead the expansion.
The Erikssons said they had offers to located in other cities around the world, but thanks to Forsberg’s connection to the U.S., particularly Denver, they felt confident in the partnership. “The U.S. is a bigger market and it’s more mature when it comes to fast-casual food,” Glenn said.
“There’s no chain like this,” Elisabet added. “There are some small ones like Eggslut, which is more chef-driven, but no one else is doing the same all-day, protein-focused menu.”
The team has also brought on Larimer Square co-developers Jeff Hermanson and John Zakhem, owner of Denver’s Zakhem Real Estate Group, as investors. The group hopes to open five locations in metro Denver in the next year and a half and are currently on the hunt for brick-and-mortar locations. Guard said they are in the midst of signing leases and will have two Eggs Inc. locations open in Denver by mid-summer or early fall this year.
The restaurant is streamlined so guests can order and pay through an app, on a kiosk or with a cashier. It uses proprietary machinery (no range hoods necessary) that’s easy enough to use without chef experience. Multeral, the Swedish supplier for McDonald’s and Burger King’s kitchen machines and improvements, helped Eggs Inc. develop their own efficient machinery.
“I could have my nine-year-old go in there and put something together because the recipes are so dialed in, and the equipment is so high-end that it cooks everything perfectly,” Guard said. “You can’t mess it up.”
Elisabet is no stranger to growing chains. In 1996, she founded the Espresso House coffee chain, known as the “Swedish Starbucks.” It started as a small venture in Lund, Sweden, but grew quickly with over 450 units across Europe.
“We want to do 10,000 in 10 years,” Guard said. “That sounds kind of crazy, but it’s doable with this concept. The goal is to get all over the world, and there really is no limit.”
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