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Name: Andy Cabral
Title: CEO
Company: Vigario Management
No. of units: 25 Dunkin’, 9 Baskin-Robbins
Age: 43
Family: Wife Heidy and 3 children, Nicholas, Alexander, and Hailey. Business partners with mother, Marylou Vigario, and brother, David Cabral
Years in franchising: 25
Years in current position: 25
As a high school senior, Andy Cabral carried a 4.0 grade point average and considered becoming a lawyer or a surgeon. But he didn’t have the patience to sit through the many years of school needed to attain a degree in either field. He wanted to start immediately, and franchising became his pathway.
A year after graduation, Cabral received an ownership stake in a Dunkin’ store in Manassas, Virginia, through a family partnership with his mother, Marylou Vigario, and brother, David. Twenty-five years later, the three remain in business together, operating 25 Dunkin’ and nine Baskin-Robbins locations in Northern Virginia. More units and brands are in development.
Entrepreneurship runs deep in Cabral’s family. His mother owned a delivery truck company in Rhode Island when Cabral was a boy, and he and his brother worked to load the trucks for their routes. Operating the business often meant long hours and modest pay for his divorced mother. In those days, Cabral spent many days and evenings at his grandparents’ home. Those experiences created a deep appreciation for the sacrifices his parents and grandparents made when moving their family to the U.S. from Portugal a few years before he was born.
Cabral’s mother eventually sold the trucking company and moved the family to Maryland, where Cabral’s aunt and uncle owned three Dunkin’ stores. That association with the brand led Cabral’s family to purchase their first Dunkin’ location in 1999. They created their company, Vigario Management Corp, into an umbrella corporation that also operates vertical construction, manufacturing, and commercial real estate businesses.
Having those divisions of the company has made a direct impact on the operations and growth of their franchise businesses. The manufacturing company produces all the donuts for Cabral’s locations and other Dunkin’ stores in the region. The company recently outgrew its current plant and is in the process of moving into a new 30,000-square-foot facility.
The group has built all its restaurants since becoming officially licensed in 2009 and owns the real estate for nearly all its Dunkin’ and Baskin-Robbins stores.
“The vertical integration with those divisions definitely helped us grow the business,” Cabral says. “We initially took those projects in-house to save money, but I do attribute a portion of the success we have today to those parts of the business. It sometimes comes with more headaches, but it gives us greater control in many areas, including construction timelines for new store openings.”
Those divisions of the company will continue to play a major role in the group’s growth. The family plans to open six Dunkin’ locations this year and four in 2027. Cabral recently signed a 12-unit agreement with Slim Chickens and will open restaurants in Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware over the next five to seven years. He welcomes the return to the chicken segment. He operated three Pollo Campero restaurants for 11 years before selling them three years ago.
When the Cabrals discussed options to return to the chicken business, their broker told them he went to school with a Slim Chickens’ franchisee in Bowie, Maryland. They jumped in the car on a Friday afternoon to make the two-hour trip to the restaurant and sampled the full menu.
“Everything we ordered came out within five minutes, and I fell in love with the food,” Cabral says. “I needed a brand that resonated with me, and that was Slim Chickens. David went to discovery day and told me that the menu and processes were simple. We said, ‘Let’s do this.’”
As Cabral looks ahead, the family’s vertically integrated structure, once a cost-saving necessity, has become a powerful engine for expansion. He and his family have the rare ability to control every step of development from dough production to store construction. What began with a teenager taking a modest stake in a single Dunkin’ has grown into a multi-brand enterprise. With the next chapter already underway, the Cabral family’s drive to build, adapt, and grow remains very much alive.
First job: I started working for my family trucking company, V&L Delivery, when I was 10 years old. I arranged the trucks for routes each day.
Formative influences/events: Coming from a very modest household and being the first generation born in the U.S., I appreciated the risk my grandparents and parents took in 1975 when they immigrated from the small island of São Miguel, Portugal. Trying to imagine what they hoped for in the new world pushes me to make them proud of the accomplishments I can create after their humble journey.
Key accomplishments: My family, first and foremost, and growing the business to the size it is today. My mother, brother, and I went into business together and faced long odds with limited money and experience, but we went on to form a successful company.
Biggest current challenge: Completing two of the largest projects in our company’s history. We outgrew our manufacturing facility and are moving into a new 30,000-square-foot facility.
Next big goal: Getting to 50 locations and again doubling our real estate holdings. We hope to accomplish both in the next five to seven years.
First turning point in your career: Expanding our business with vertical integration. Having manufacturing, construction, and real estate divisions unlocked many opportunities and helped us grow.
Best business decision: Doubling down on expanding our real estate portfolio. It has unlocked so many other opportunities for capital.
Hardest lesson learned: Never take things for granted. You need to always work hard for the things you admire the most. When business is doing well, if you don’t stay on top of it, tomorrow will start to disappear. You can’t take for granted that tomorrow will be successful. You need to keep working at it.
Work week: I try to keep it to five days as much as possible, but that sixth day sneaks in sometimes. I try to reserve the seventh day for worship.
Exercise/workout: I try to get in 10,000 steps per day. I enjoy long walks with my wife.
Best advice you ever got: Never take no for an answer. That is something I learned from my grandparents, who showed us a lot of examples of ways to do things in life. If you receive a no, figure out how to make it a yes.
What’s your passion in business? I love to see the business and people grow. In the beginning, my brother and I would be happy to have one or two locations each. Now it is not about a number, but how we can provide for others and watch the people flourish with the business.
How do you balance life and work? Sometimes, it means just putting the work down. The business often demands more from you than your personal life allows. You just have to be able to say that it has been enough today and spend that time on life. Those emergencies were there before you and will be there after you’re gone, so dedicating time to family is the top priority.
Guilty pleasure: Snacking on anything with the family during movie night.
Favorite book: Time to Make the Donuts by Dunkin’ founder William Rosenberg.
Favorite movie: That is a hard one. Probably the original “Back to the Future” and “Fast and Furious” movies.
What do most people not know about you? How much I love to cook.
Pet peeve: Disorganization and when things are not in their place.
What did you want to be when you grew up? A surgeon or an attorney, but I could not stand going to school for that long.
Last vacation: I spent time with the entire family in São Miguel, Azores, in Portugal in July 2025. Unwinding on the peaceful island was great.
Person you’d most like to have lunch with: My grandfather. Growing up, I admired the way he kept the family close and instilled the importance of respect toward those around him and the value of hard work.
Business philosophy: Business is like most hard things in life because everyone wants a manual to follow. I look to treat everyone fairly and provide the best product I possibly can in the cleanest environment while adhering to the highest standards.
Management method or style: I look at myself as a person who leads by example. We set the standards very high, and I know if I don’t try to seek perfection, those around me would not either.
Greatest challenge: How to outdo my last accomplishment. This road of life has so many intersections and turns that it is sometimes hard to navigate. I want to keep pushing myself to see how far I can take it.
How do others describe you? Driven and not afraid to push the envelope to the next step.
Have you ever been in a mentor-mentee relationship? What did you learn? Yes. I learned from Mike Sanders, our good friend and legal counsel, to be patient and wait for those things you want most. Pushing hard on something you don’t need is often a waste of time. Never be afraid to ask a question. I try to learn something new every day.
One thing you’re looking to do better: I would say my top thing is consistent time management. I often change my focus as business needs change. It is not a horrible trait, but those pet projects are sometimes just as important as others.
How you give your team room to innovate and experiment: I allow my team to follow their gut, and if I see they are getting off track a bit, I will help them get on track with a little nudge. I found that allowing them to trust in themselves to make the call often leads to a stronger team able to handle tough decisions almost the way I would have done myself. Hiring from within and keeping the culture alive helps a lot with this.
How close are you to operations? Operations is at the core of my daily tasks. Every task I do affects operations, and so I need to be close to it to be able to be effective in the decisions I make to push the company forward. It is impossible to be part of every level of operations, but I try to get involved as much as possible.
What are the two most important things you rely on from your franchisor? Brand protection and support. The franchisor needs to be there to protect the brand that every franchisee signs up for. Protecting it from competition and supporting franchisees when they need help to keep the brand to the standard it deserves.
What you need from vendors: Simple: Offer their products and services at a price that is relative to the market without causing me any undue hardship by using them. I find lately that we need to increasingly follow up with our vendors about products and services not meeting the original standards. I should not have to send reminders to vendors of what the terms of our agreements are.
Have you changed your marketing strategy in response to the economy? How? Our marketing strategy is guided by the franchisor, and they have done a great job balancing the strategy with the economy. Lately, they have launched a lot of value deals. They are very mindful of the effect rising costs of groceries and gas have on our customers.
How is social media affecting your business? If technology is the engine of our business, then social media is the exterior of the car driving our business. We need to make sure it’s kept clean, polished, and looking its best as it’s our forward-facing appearance of who we are. We often share announcements about new locations or internal promotions. We also use it for employee recruitment by highlighting our company culture, which shows who we are as a company.
In what ways are you using technology (like AI) to manage your business? Technology is at the core of our business these days, and we can’t operate without it. From our POS to the AI that forecasts our orders, we need technology to survive.
How do you hire and fire? We use Paycom for all our HR tasks. When we don’t hire from within, we use that platform to push out to all the major online hiring firms to post ads. We also rely heavily on referrals from our current team members. As far as firing, we adhere to our written polices and document any issues that arise and hold our team to those standards.
How do you train and retain? We have a network trainer who oversees the process of all our new employees and new product launches. The training process is dependent on the position that the person was hired for, and it also includes any promotion. Having a great training program and a company culture that motivates the team are key to retaining the best employees.
How do you deal with problem employees? I listen to them first and ask them why there is an issue. If I can’t get to a resolution that makes both parties satisfied with the outcome, then we have to part ways. When someone shows they have no interest in staying on a team, there is no reason to keep that train going just for the sake of turning the wheels.
Fastest way into your doghouse: Not owning up to your mistakes and pushing a narrative that points the blame onto others.
Goals over the next year: Expand our reach of restaurants into other states and double our manufacturing and real estate divisions. We have a lot of development happening in the next nine to 12 months, and we want to secure new business accounts.
Growth meter: How do you measure your growth? Growth for me is measured by the growth of my team. That comes from pushing them beyond what they thought was possible by obtaining personal and business goals.
Vision meter: Where do you want to be in five years? 10 years? In five years, I see our business almost doubling in size. In 10 years, I see us expanding into different types of businesses to help support or complement our main business.
Do you have brands in different segments? Why/why not? Yes. Our market is diverse, and as such, we took advantage of the fact and got into different brands to thrive in those different segments. This narrows our operational net, which allows us to have great efficiency with our team.
How is the economy in your region(s) affecting you, your employees, your customers? The past few years have been a roller coaster, and everyone is seeking some stability. We have tried to look at our costs and find ways to not increase menu prices unless it is absolutely necessary.
Are you experiencing economic growth in your market? Most of our locations are within a stone’s throw of Washington, D.C. This area continues to grow by leaps and bounds since the first day I arrived in 1997. That is the main reason why so many businesses seek to move to this area.
How do changes in the economy affect the way you do business? As a business owner, I feel this is something you do constantly. Those who do not change with the times, including the ups and downs of the economy, get left behind in relevancy and profitability. Any change must be met with a solution to offset the effects of that change. Some of those changes are hard to make and sometimes not obvious. Our team needs to think outside the box.
How do you forecast for your business? I establish our budgets every six months. With the current environment, setting budgets yearly opens the door to many unknowns. That also leaves people wondering how to fix problems when the year is almost over instead of focusing on the current trajectory with a shorter window to make things happen. With technology moving everything at a much faster pace, we also need to be able to react a lot quicker.
What are the best sources for capital expansion? We fund our projects in-house and pull in debt when it is needed for projects that bring in higher returns than we normally see. For our real estate, we tend to leverage that sector as the cost of real estate is very high in the D.C. metro area.
Experience with private equity, local banks, national banks, other institutions? Why/why not? We have a great relationship with both local and national banks. Private equity has knocked on our doors, but we have not had the reason to open them.
What are you doing to take care of your employees? We often host events to celebrate the team’s accomplishments, birthdays, or anniversaries. We try to promote from within the team as much as possible. When we open a new location, we first look to the current team to fill key roles before we go out to the market.
How are you handling rising employee costs (payroll, minimum wage, healthcare, etc.)? When we look at our pricing, the first question is about the team. How will this benefit the team, and what can we also do to help retain the team longer than our current average? We offer insurance to our employees, and we look at bonuses and other incentives for employees to stay. Raising menu prices should be a last resort.
What laws and regulations are affecting your business, and how are you dealing with them? Lately, it seems there is a new law or potential bill that could be the worst thing for our industry every week. In our case, the most recent government shutdown affected the day-to-day business in the D.C. market. Sales are affected negatively due to the number of government employees in the area.
How do you reward/recognize top-performing employees? In our internal team message boards, we constantly recognize the folks who are going above and beyond to make their locations successful. At our year-end party, we celebrate the success we have accomplished together.
What kind of exit strategy do you have in place? My brother and I have a strong family and see our kids taking the reins of the business once we decide it is time to hand them over. We would likely play a role that is more toned down, but I don’t see us slowing down any time soon.