Gabriel Vesci opens Paris Baguette after years running McDonald’s

Former McDonald's owner-operator Gabriel Vesci opened a Paris Baguette café in Thousand Oaks on June 15, 2026. The bakery café is part of a broader West Los Angeles development plan.

Paris Baguette's June 18 announcement places the café at 650–658 N. Moorpark Road. Vesci said he had signed an agreement to develop multiple cafés across West Los Angeles, including Culver City, Brentwood, Santa Monica and West Hollywood. He described an intention to grow deliberately while emphasizing execution and the guest experience.

The distinction is between one completed café and a larger development commitment. The release does not assign opening dates to those additional markets or provide financial results from the new location.

The operating experience came before the bakery investment#

In a May 30, 2024, sponsored interview with 1851 Franchise's Morgan Wood, Vesci described about 10 years running McDonald's restaurants. That followed roughly a decade in finance and clinical operations at Stanford Hospital and clinics. He left McDonald's in 2020.

His daughter introduced him to Paris Baguette through birthday cakes she saw on TikTok. Visiting the café brought back the pastries and coffee of his Italian upbringing and prompted a closer look at the business.

Vesci considered the operations manageable after McDonald's, an assessment based on his own experience. He emphasized working alongside employees and growing without sacrificing execution. His longer-term goal included more family time.

The interview reported a four-café Los Angeles agreement, with the first opening expected in November 2024. The June 2026 release confirms the Thousand Oaks opening without reconciling that earlier plan or schedule.

His experience helps explain the format choice, but supplies no comparison of investment returns between the brands. Familiarity with restaurant operations informed his decision to enter a different business.

A local opening inside a growing support system#

Paris Baguette was also expanding its support organization before the Thousand Oaks debut. In a January 22 company update, it reported 77 café openings during 2025, 101 signed leases and nearly 300 development agreements. Fourteen of the openings occurred in December. The leases, development agreements and completed cafés describe different stages of expansion and cannot be added as a restaurant total.

The company planned 150 openings for 2026 and expected to reach its 400th North American café during the year. That target would increase the opening workload for the brand's support teams.

The same update said the company had broken ground on its first North American manufacturing facility in Burleson, Texas. It also named Zac Sulma as a late-2025 addition in the chief operating officer role, responsible for operating processes and franchisee support.

For an owner planning several cafés, manufacturing infrastructure and operating support are relevant parts of the franchise relationship. The announcement does not establish a specific supply benefit or training result for Vesci's restaurant. It does show that the brand's expansion involved support investment alongside new agreements.

Thousand Oaks gives Vesci an operating location from which to pursue his broader plan. The further West Los Angeles cafés remain a development commitment. His stated emphasis on deliberate growth leaves the next milestones tied to individual openings, rather than the size of the agreement alone.