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One of the founders of California Pizza Kitchen says that if he were to open the once-hot gourmet chain today, he would choose Florida over California.
While it is uncertain whether Florida Pizza Kitchen would have had the same global appeal, CPK co-founder Rick Rosenfield said in an interview this week that it has become too difficult to set up shop in the Golden State.
“If it were me today, I would open in Florida before I would open it in California,” Rosenfield told Fox News Sunday. “California is less business-friendly today, and they make it apparent.”
For over 40 years, the pizza chain has operated out of California, where it became best known for its barbecue chicken pizza. Today, there are roughly 185 California Pizza Kitchen locations in the United States, and roughly 40% of them are in California.
A decade ago, California was “the greatest place to do business,” Rosenfield said.
That changed after the COVID-19 pandemic, he said, as the state became more expensive and rising taxes for businesses forced them to increase prices.
During the pandemic, California Pizza Kitchen, like many restaurants, struggled while people stayed home during the lockdown. With mounting debt, the company filed for bankruptcy protections in 2020, closed 46 locations and received $30 million in emergency financing.
In 2024, Rosenfield made his own move to Florida.
“Florida is quite friendly,” he told Fox News. “There’s less bureaucracy in Florida and there’s more bureaucracy [in] California.”
Rosenfield and fellow attorney Larry Flax opened California Pizza Kitchen in Beverly Hills in 1945. They hired Ed Ladou, the former pizza chef of Wolfgang Puck’s Beverly Hills restaurant Spago, to create California-style pizza.
Rosenfield’s thoughts on California’s business climate tracks with the departure of some businesses and billionaires from California.
Last year, a fellow California restaurant chain chief executive, Lynsi Snyder of In-N-Out, left California for Tennessee. Tech companies Tesla and Oracle and car manufacturers Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors also have left the state to move east. Most recently, Paramount Skydance is considering a move from its Hollywood headquarters to Tennessee.
A campaign for a new tax on billionaires has convinced some ultra-rich residents to move to other states, and businesses often complain that high property and energy costs and an anti-business regulatory regime make it too tough to turn a profit in the state.
Still, California has become a booming hub for the artificial intelligence industry, attracting more than 10 times as much private equity as any other state this year. Southern California has emerged as a go-to address for fast-growing space and defense tech companies.
The state’s economy grew 5% last year to a record $4.25 trillion, making it larger than every country other than the U.S., China and Germany.
Some food chains are ready to deal with any barriers to growth because there are so many consumers in the state.
Burger chain Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers recently announced plans to open 60 new outlet stores across the country, with one of its focus regions being Northern California. Despite having a burger on the menu called the “California style double,” none of the Kansas-based chain’s 580 stores are in California.
Rosenfield said California makes it expensive to expand.
In 2024, state law made it so that all eligible fast-food employees would receive a minimum wage of $20 an hour. Florida law will raise the minimum wage for all non-tipped employees to $15 later this year.
“The mantra is ‘we’re going to tax businesses, we’re going to make the businesses pay more,’” he said. “But it isn’t just the businesses that pay more. It’s the customer that pays more.”
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
