The town of Tenafly has endless opportunities for businesses to start anew. Every business requires passion, patience, and a strategic approach to achieve success, but few have gained attention as much as Chick and Roll. The bakery, filled with refreshing bubble teas, flavorful mochi donuts, and savory chicken bowls, has all the ingredients for a business to thrive and it couldn’t have gotten this far without the creative and unique ideas of its owner, the mind behind Chick and Roll: Jung Kim.
Kim grew up in California before making the decision to move to New York City in 2011. He worked on Wall Street for about fifteen years before suddenly getting laid off in 2018. During his time in finance, he and his wife moved with their three children to the suburbs in New Jersey, and the family now resides in Oradell.
“The thought of going back to Wall Street was repugnant to me,” Kim said. “I guess the inspiration for Chick and Roll was that I was blessed with the option of trying something, believe it or not.”
Surprisingly, Kim had no background in retail or small business before deciding to try something new. His path towards success actually started with his passion for Korean hot dogs. One day, when he was heading to HMart in Paramus, he saw a Korean couple eating a Korean Hot Dog together next to it. He went inside and saw the store that sold it, Mochinut. Kim thought that it sold solely Korean Hot Dogs, but up close, he realized that it sold much more. Bubble tea, donuts—it made so much sense to offer other options besides hot dogs. So, finding it reasonable, Kim looked into the possibilities of licensing it, and that’s how Mochinut arrived in Tenafly.
In the beginning, Mochinut was spectacularly successful. It was during the COVID time that it opened, and many were looking forward to something new. But once the enthusiasm began to wane, patterns began to emerge. There would always be an absence of customers about two hours around lunchtime, and two hours around dinner time, and with Chick and Roll in general working 10-hour days, four hours was a significant amount of downtime. So, Kim took another step forward, introducing full meals. Adding these options made Chick and Roll what it is today, and all the food added from that day onward had been based on the same theme of Asian, street-food-inspired comfort food. Besides such problems, there have been other challenges Kim has needed to overcome.
“Tenafly is a great, affluent town, and that means a significant portion of this town, especially with young kids, are going on vacation,” he said. “My business is particularly leveraged to that demographic, and so the seasonality was something that I did not anticipate.”
With so many holidays in the town of Tenafly already, there will also be many off-days. As Tenafly is already an expensive place to live, it is expected that many citizens have the ability to take vacations in different countries whenever there is an opportunity to do so. Though most people wouldn’t realize it, it affects businesses in Tenafly greatly. Fewer customers mean there will be fewer earnings, which can affect the financial state of the business. To solve this problem, owners need to figure out a way to work around it, as Kim does now.
Aside from issues with seasonality, Kim also faced an important realization when starting: the physicality of the work. Frankly, he believed that as he had worked in investment banking, he was ready for all sorts of conflicts, no matter how hard business got, when in reality, even with such experience and beliefs, he could still expect himself to be physically tired from juggling orders, handling customers, and monitoring daily operations to make sure everything is going well. It was a learning experience, and now he had worked beyond that.
“So, it hasn’t been a runaway success,” Kim said. “It’s a good business, and I think I count my blessings and successes in terms of the people here rather than the financials; they’re amazing.”
Despite Kim’s ambition to grow his business into a major chain, he finds all his accomplishments within the group of employees that has grown within the company. His staff has been with him since the beginning, and with them working together, he hasd noticed the changes in them as people mature and head off to college. He continues to celebrate his staff’s successes, feeling beyond grateful for their talents and work in his business. One of his staff members actually created the logo for the store, and helped with the creation of the current name, Chick and Roll, and it’s something that he will always remember and be proud of. For Kim, it may be rationalizing, but he will continue to count his success in terms of the people, be it his staff or customers.
Adding new menu items to Chick and Roll is something that Kim does continuously. With his main base in Asian street food, most of it centers on the prevailing idea of comfort. Besides this inspiration, he also gets many ideas from his customers. One of the current menu items, Sufganiyot, came from a Jewish customer who had once mentioned that it would be a great addition to the menu. Kim decided he could make it work, and so it was added to the menu. All of his new additions stay to the theme, making sure that as the menu expands, the theme of Chick and Roll remains the same.
“Sometimes it’s just something that, you know, is introduced by customers,.” Kim said., “But sometimes, it’s something that just kind of seems like very easy to do and similar to what I already do.”
Now, Jung Kim continues with work at his business. It can be to accomplish long-term goals, such as growing into a large business chain, or simply for the pride of being surrounded by so many sweet customers and talented co-workers. After everything he has done to get this far, he finds that he’s become so successful thanks to the lessons he has learned along the way. After all, he said, “Have humility to learn, have the perseverance to stick to your vision, and above all else, try to be a good person while doing it.”
