Dig Inn: The Restaurant Chain That Is Changing the Way America Eats, One Customer at a Time

Adam Eskin, founder of restaurant chain Dig Inn, has a dream to publicize the farm-to-table movement, making fresh, delicious, and healthy foods affordable in restaurants. Based out of New York City, Dig Inn bought 185,000 pounds of carrots, 124,000 pounds of kale, 225,000 pounds of sweet potatoes, and 142,000 pounds of brussel sprouts in the year 2013. Believe it or not, they served them all. And this is exactly the point! Adam Eskin wants to change the way America eats, starting with his restaurant chain Dig Inn.

Dig Inn is the result of an extreme reinvention of The Pump Energy Food, a restaurant chain whose menu was typically geared toward gym rats, to be specific. Unfortunately, this restaurant chain faced many struggles. Eskin first became involved with The Pump while he was working for Wexford Capital. Wexford had bought The Pump Energy Food restaurant chain, believing that protein powder shakes and egg-white omelets were the future of healthy eating. It was Eskin’s job to oversee The Pump for one year to develop a turnaround plan for the business. While doing this, he began noticing that other, more sensible health-conscious trends were evolving, like simple, high-quality, natural foods that are grown and harvested straight from the earth.

Eskin left Wexford at the beginning of 2007, and since then, has turned all of his attention toward revamping the healthy-eating restaurant world. By September 2011, The Pump had officially and fully transitioned to Dig Inn, and the farm-to-table concept has been been growing steadily ever since, just as Eskin had hoped.

Dig Inn raised well over $6.5 million in its first three rounds of venture capital fundraising in 2014. The company ended the year with 20 corporate employees and over 450 restaurant workers. As of the end of 2014, Dig Inn had 9 open locations, all within New York City’s central Manhattan borough. By the middle of 2015, the company had 11 locations, and by the end of 2015, it is expected that there will be 16 locations.

To give you an idea of just how popular Dig Inn has become, you can usually expect to find a line out the door during lunch hour each day. In addition, the restaurant is relatively inexpensive, as meals generally range from $7 to $10 a piece. This is especially affordable for healthy, whole foods.

When asked about his outstanding work with Dig Inn, Eskin explained, “We felt pretty passionate and compelled about having some culinary inspiration around the type of food we serve. It’s not just about a bison burger patty, for example, which was on the old menu; but slow-cooked, braised beef that has been in the oven for eight hours, with all sorts of vegetables and spices and herbs, so that when you eat it, you know that it’s great for you. You know that it came from a great place, but it’s actually delicious, too.”