Brian Luczak

Experience

1. Chief Financial Officer

   Blue Plate

   Jan 2023 — Present · Chicago, IL, US

   Blue Plate Catering is the leading premier caterer in the Chicago area providing service to major venues throughout the City. Blue Plate also provides delivery services and workplace dining solutions to major local corporate clients.• Leadership of the Finance, Human Resources, and Information Technology functions of the organization.• Lead the strategic and financial planning functions of the firm including annual budgeting and periodic forecasting.• Member of the Senior Leadership Team, reporting to the CEO and ownership.• Implemented the entrepreneurial operating system (EOS) methodology that focuses on providing organizational structure, clarity of goals, short term plans, and establishing the cadence to interactions that hold team members accountable.• Act as a key driver toward growth objectives, focusing on building out the senior management team.• Restructured debt accumulated due to pandemic related issues. Worked with banks and individual investors to adjust terms and eliminate a troublesome creditor. Refinanced building debt.• Established a new entity to oversee a major new business unit. Built the forecasting model and worked with the leadership team to establish the operation.• Lead the restructuring of the balance sheet and eliminate a significant portion of outstanding debt and improve cost of capital. • Instituted cash management policies to ensure smooth cash projections both short and long term.• Established forecasting model to provide timely updates to budget and cash flow.• Enacted major departmental changes to ensure staffing skills and capabilities are adequate for the roles in place.• Revitalized the finance functions to ensure timely corporate and departmental level reporting.• Developing a comprehensive IT plan to move all functions to cloud based systems to improve security and reliability.

Education

• Northwestern University - Kellogg School of Management

  MBA, Marketing/Org Behavior

  1992 — 1994

• Northern Illinois University

  BS, Finance

  1985 — 1989

Skills

• Project Management
• Business Intelligence
• Forecasting
• Dashboard
• Direct Marketing
• Payroll
• Business Objects
• Employee Benefits
• Business Analysis
• Budgets
• Finance
• Management
• Strategic Planning
• Accounting
• Data Warehousing
• Customer Service
• New Business Development
• Budgeting
• Sales
• Start-Ups