Jon Rolph
Board of Advocates
Jon Rolph is President and CEO of Thrive Restaurant Group, headquartered in Wichita, KS, which owns and operates 80 Applebee’s restaurants, 16 Carlos O’Kelly’s Mexican restaurants, three HomeGrown restaurants in the breakfast/lunch space, and an emerging pie concept, Peace, Love & Pie. The restaurants are located in 12 states across the Midwest and Virginia.
After graduating from Baylor University, Jon worked for the National Student Leadership Forum in Washington, D.C. He returned to Kansas in 2002 to work in the family-owned businesses started by his father and his uncle, David and Darrel Rolph. Jon has held a number of key positions in the company, including restaurant-level operations, V.P. of Administration and Marketing, and as COO of Carlos O’Kelly’s, eventually succeeding his father as President of Sasnak Management, which was rebranded in early 2019 to Thrive Restaurant Group.
Jon has served on the boards of several local and national organizations, including the Wichita Children’s Home, YMCA, and United Way of the Plains. His current board memberships and affiliations include Board of Directors of Intrust Bank, Greater Wichita Partnership Co-Chair, and Applebee’s Franchise Business Council Chairman. Jon also serves as Vice-Chair on the Kansas Board of Regents.
Jon and his wife, Lauren, have been married for 15 years. They have been blessed with six children, ages one to 12.