WEBVTT - Cameron Mitchell Discusses the Restaurant Business (Podcast) 0:00:02.200 --> 0:00:06.800 This is Masters in Business with Barry Ridholts on Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:07.440 --> 0:00:09.920 This week on the podcast, I have a special guest. 0:00:10.200 --> 0:00:12.480 His name is Cameron Mitchell. He is the author of 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:16.120 a new book about his career in the restaurant industry, 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:19.840 and he also happens to be uh, the founder and 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:24.440 CEO and soon to be chairman of Cameron Mitchell Restaurant Group. 0:00:25.320 --> 0:00:28.760 I found our conversation quite fascinating if you're interested in 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:33.120 the restaurant industry and what it's like to develop a 0:00:33.240 --> 0:00:38.040 restaurant concept and expand it from one restaurant too many 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:42.919 across the country. Uh. They have five thousand employees and 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:46.760 their restaurants of a variety of different names, probably best 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:51.360 known as Ocean Prime Um, generate over three hundred million 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:54.320 dollars a year and revenue. Uh. You'll find this to 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:58.920 be a fascinating conversation. So, with no further ado, my 0:00:59.120 --> 0:01:07.480 conversation Cameron Mitchell. My special guest today is Cameron Mitchell. 0:01:07.720 --> 0:01:10.960 He is the founder of the Cameron Mitchell Restaurant Group, 0:01:11.480 --> 0:01:14.759 now twenty five years old and employing five thousand people 0:01:15.400 --> 0:01:19.640 in sixty restaurants across the country. Cameron Mitchell restaurant group 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:24.000 generates over three hundred million dollars in annual sales. Mr. 0:01:24.040 --> 0:01:27.559 Mitchell was named Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst and Young, 0:01:27.760 --> 0:01:30.880 as well as Small Business Person of the Year by 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:33.479 the U s. S b A. He was also named 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:37.880 to fifty New Tastemakers by the Nation's Restaurant News magazine, 0:01:38.000 --> 0:01:41.520 and he is the author, most recently of Yes Is 0:01:41.600 --> 0:01:44.080 the Answer. How faith in people and a culture of 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:49.760 hospitality built a modern American restaurant company. Cameron Mitchell, Welcome 0:01:49.800 --> 0:01:52.040 to Bloomberg. Thank you very much. Pleasure to be here. 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:56.520 So let's let's discuss a little bit about your background. 0:01:57.440 --> 0:02:00.360 You didn't seem when you were growing up like somebody 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:03.800 who was going to find his way into a chef's talk. 0:02:04.000 --> 0:02:07.400 How did you get interested in restaurants and cooking? It 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:10.160 doesn't appear this is something you were very passionate about 0:02:10.320 --> 0:02:14.000 as a child. Now, I it depends on how far 0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:16.520 back you want to go. But I had a troubled 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:19.560 childhood into troubled youth, and struggled in high school and 0:02:20.680 --> 0:02:23.200 ran away from my home and dropped out of high 0:02:23.200 --> 0:02:26.760 school when I was fifteen, and my folks were divorced 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:29.160 and my mom didn't have any money. And so when 0:02:29.160 --> 0:02:32.720 I came back would have been my junior year, I 0:02:32.760 --> 0:02:34.520 didn't have any money for lunch money, and she couldn't 0:02:34.520 --> 0:02:36.120 give me lunch money. And I needed to work. I 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:38.480 need to get a job. And so I got a 0:02:38.560 --> 0:02:42.680 job in es a local local steakhouse Washington dishes for 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:46.720 two sixty hour and did that in bus tables and 0:02:46.800 --> 0:02:49.560 prepped a little bit through my junior and senior year 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:53.080 in high school. And that's how I found my entree 0:02:53.120 --> 0:02:55.800 into the restaurant business. So, so let's talk about that, 0:02:55.840 --> 0:02:58.640 because you described in your book sort of being a 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:03.160 terrible employee, constantly being late. You were suspended, you put 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:07.560 on thirty days notice, and you describe an epiphany where 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:11.280 you realized, Hey, this restaurant thing is really interesting. What 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:14.680 explained what that moment was like and how it changed 0:03:14.680 --> 0:03:17.560 your whole life. Well, I was just turned ninety at 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:19.120 the time. I've been out in high school for about 0:03:19.120 --> 0:03:21.760 a year, and I was living at home with mom, 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:26.880 working for beer money, working for the man, not uh boy, 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:30.639 but not yet a man, and um, just really squandering 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:35.240 and UM I was working two jobs in the restaurant business, 0:03:35.320 --> 0:03:38.240 and I had trouble getting to work on time in 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:41.680 the morning, and I got put on three days suspension 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:47.080 in thirty days probation. So midway through that probationary period, 0:03:47.480 --> 0:03:48.880 and I'm just trying to fare what I want to 0:03:48.920 --> 0:03:51.080 do in my life. And then I just have been struggling, 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:52.840 and so I don't want to go right after college 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:54.360 because I don't want to go to college not knowing 0:03:54.400 --> 0:03:57.640 what I wanted to do. So UM, I have suspended 0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:00.240 for three days, put on thirty days probation. And during 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:02.400 the middle of that probationary period, it was a Friday 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:06.040 afternoon and I was during shift changed, and I was 0:04:06.160 --> 0:04:08.800 working AM cook that day and a PM host at 0:04:08.800 --> 0:04:12.360 the same restaurant. Yes, and that restaurant was a very 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:15.080 busy restaurant, would probably do a thousand people that day 0:04:15.120 --> 0:04:17.800 between lunch and dinner. And UM, four o'clock in the 0:04:17.839 --> 0:04:21.520 afternoon shift change the restaurant, the restaurant's half full, the 0:04:21.560 --> 0:04:24.680 bar is packed with happy are uh. The AM shift 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:27.120 was trying to leave, the PM shifts trying to come on. 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:29.840 The managers are barking orders, and it's kind of pandemonium 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.480 in the kitchen, and time froze. I looked across the 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:36.760 line in the kitchen and I said, I absolutely love this. 0:04:37.120 --> 0:04:38.479 This is what I'm going to do the rest of 0:04:38.480 --> 0:04:40.200 my life. I'm going to be in the restaurant business. 0:04:40.240 --> 0:04:43.800 So I worked my double shift and I went home 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:45.640 that night and I wrote out my goals. I said, 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:47.000 I was going to go to the culinary. It's two 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:49.400 of America in Hyde Park, New York. I had heard 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:52.359 about that. I'm nineteen years old, and I was gonna graduate. 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:54.359 I was gonna become executive chef by the time I 0:04:54.440 --> 0:04:58.200 was twenty three, general manager of twenty four, regional manager 0:04:58.279 --> 0:05:01.520 twenty six, vice president oper as a thirty, and president 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:03.800 of a restaurant company by the time I was thirty five. 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:07.680 Those are those are ambitious. And I woke my mom 0:05:07.760 --> 0:05:09.000 up at one in the morning, so I know what 0:05:09.040 --> 0:05:10.919 I want to do with myself the rest of my life. 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.800 And she was quite relieved, needless to say. I got 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:16.680 up the next morning and now I was working for 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:19.200 my I did a complete hundred return. I was working 0:05:19.200 --> 0:05:23.200 for myself, for my future, for my career. I had 0:05:23.240 --> 0:05:25.400 the best attitude in the kitchen. I was the hardest 0:05:25.400 --> 0:05:28.839 working guy in the kitchen, and I the day before, 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:30.880 I was the laziest guy in the kitchen, a lousy 0:05:30.960 --> 0:05:33.520 attitude and working for the man and working for beer money. 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:37.200 So now you are change, Yes, I guess so for 0:05:37.320 --> 0:05:39.840 people who may not have ever worked in the kitchen, 0:05:40.040 --> 0:05:42.040 and I was a waiter and a short order cook 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:46.839 in college, there's really especially during a rush, there's a 0:05:46.960 --> 0:05:51.240 tremendous amount of energy and sort of a controlled chaos. 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:54.120 Is that exactly? That's a that's a great way, And 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:56.760 for people who haven't experienced it, I could see how 0:05:56.960 --> 0:06:01.039 there's a tremendous lure there because it's always different every 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:04.359 day and there's so much stuff going on. What was 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:08.280 it about that moment in time that had you flipped 0:06:08.360 --> 0:06:11.880 from being the bum in the kitchen to the hardest 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:14.040 working guy in the building. Well, I just needed to 0:06:14.080 --> 0:06:16.600 find my way. I need to have my goal and 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.160 that was the key difference. That was totally the key difference. 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:21.560 And once I I've been goal warning it ever since. 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:24.239 I still have on my desk today my fourth quarter 0:06:24.279 --> 0:06:27.360 goals for my career for the next fifteen years. So 0:06:28.600 --> 0:06:30.960 I've been a goal center since day one and and 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:33.839 it's worked well for me, and I'm still doing it today. 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:38.240 So the Juvenary Institute of America is described has been 0:06:38.240 --> 0:06:41.920 described as the Harvard of food prep. You had written 0:06:42.640 --> 0:06:44.880 there are three kinds of c I A students, those 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:46.719 gonning to be chefs, those who want to be in 0:06:46.760 --> 0:06:50.960 the restaurant business, and those who were lost. How did 0:06:51.000 --> 0:06:53.080 you know that you didn't want to be a chef 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:55.240 but wanted to actually be in the restaurant Well, it 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:56.760 goes back to my goals. I knew I want to 0:06:56.760 --> 0:06:58.560 be a president of a restaurant company, and I said 0:06:58.600 --> 0:07:00.920 to myself at nineteen, Yeah, So I said, if I, 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:04.119 uh uh, if I'm any president of a a restaurant company, 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:05.840 I'd better know about food. And I was already working 0:07:05.880 --> 0:07:07.400 in the kitchen, but I didn't know anything about food. 0:07:07.440 --> 0:07:09.039 So I said, I'm going to go to the CIA 0:07:09.160 --> 0:07:11.679 and learn about foods. And you they turn you into 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:13.800 a chef even if you don't want to be a chef, 0:07:14.080 --> 0:07:16.480 and if you want to be in the management side, 0:07:17.360 --> 0:07:20.000 they still teach you how to cut. Oh, exactly exactly. 0:07:20.040 --> 0:07:23.679 Those fundamentals and those basics I still work with today 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:27.080 and have been formed the base for my knowledge to 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:30.600 build my career from. Let's discuss a little bit the 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:35.880 process you go through in quote unquote finding great people. 0:07:36.400 --> 0:07:39.120 A lot of executives say that's the most challenging thing 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:42.800 they do is hiring, and sometimes you never know who's 0:07:42.800 --> 0:07:44.760 going to turn out to be great or not. You 0:07:44.800 --> 0:07:48.680 think you came up with a solution, tell us about it. 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:53.320 The two questions I could ask thousands of times is 0:07:53.360 --> 0:07:55.240 where do you Where do you get such great people? 0:07:55.480 --> 0:07:58.480 And how do you deliver such great service? And I 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:01.320 tell people the answer to the same, to essentially both questions, 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:04.400 we get the same people everybody else gets. I actually 0:08:04.560 --> 0:08:07.200 don't think it's that hard to get great people, uh, 0:08:07.360 --> 0:08:10.760 because I think everybody operate on the premise almost everybody's great. 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:13.600 We just treat people great, and we inspire people to 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:17.320 grow and learn and uh, and we care about them tremendously, 0:08:17.360 --> 0:08:19.320 and they in turn care about us, and they want 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:21.600 to deliver great service, and they get excited about our 0:08:21.600 --> 0:08:25.119 company and they want to build their career. And it's uh, 0:08:25.320 --> 0:08:29.680 such a positive momentum that permeates the entire organization. So 0:08:30.080 --> 0:08:33.520 you don't hire great people. You hire people and allow 0:08:33.600 --> 0:08:36.120 them to become great. Correct. And that's exactly right. That 0:08:36.240 --> 0:08:38.600 seems like that's a challenge to do. How do you 0:08:38.679 --> 0:08:43.480 take a regular person in jobs that could be long, tiring, 0:08:44.160 --> 0:08:48.160 stressful and make sure that those folks always have a 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:52.640 good attitude and always are you know, uh, striving for 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.560 that the sort of greatness you describe, well, I think 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:58.840 those long, hard hours not having a great attitude is 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:02.520 a standard uh uh image of the restaurant business, if 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:05.120 you will. But in our company it's not quite the same. 0:09:05.440 --> 0:09:09.680 Our company our number one value as our associates come first. 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:12.840 I see. I tell people that our company is built 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:15.319 by its people for its people. Were not built for 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.720 our investors, were not built for me. We're built for 0:09:18.760 --> 0:09:22.160 our people. You describe in your book a book that 0:09:22.200 --> 0:09:26.920 you found very influential, which was the customer comes second, 0:09:27.200 --> 0:09:32.040 which is somewhat counterintuitive and very much not how the 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:37.280 usual management books discuss treating customers. Explain what the customer 0:09:37.360 --> 0:09:40.840 comes second actually means to your corporate culture. Well, we've 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:44.120 all heard of the customer comes first. That's preached almost everywhere, 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:46.880 and here I am, as CEO of a restaurant company. 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:50.559 I would say, our customers do not come first. Our 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:53.920 associates come first. I'm even rasien enough to say we 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:57.280 don't even have a direct relationship with our customers. We 0:09:57.360 --> 0:09:59.800 have a direct relationship with the people we work with, 0:10:00.000 --> 0:10:02.800 eight and day out. Our customers, who I call guests, 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:05.280 come to see us once a week, once a month, 0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:10.240 once a year, sometimes once never gone forbid. But uh, 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:13.319 we have the direct relationship with our people. So I look. 0:10:13.360 --> 0:10:16.240 I described it as a triangular relationship. We take care 0:10:16.240 --> 0:10:18.800 of our people, are people take care of our guests, 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:21.800 and our guests take care of our company. So that's 0:10:21.800 --> 0:10:25.120 how we do it. So obviously corporate culture is a 0:10:25.160 --> 0:10:28.920 big part of that. How do you go about building 0:10:28.920 --> 0:10:34.040 a corporate culture that encourages staff members to try to 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:37.280 get to yes? How do you ingrain that into the 0:10:37.280 --> 0:10:41.120 philosophy of a restaurant company. Well, it starts with us. 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:44.079 You know, um, we say yes to our people all 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:48.800 the time and they know that, and so, uh, yes 0:10:48.920 --> 0:10:53.000 is the answer. What's the question? Permeates every single corner 0:10:53.040 --> 0:10:56.640 of our organization And it might be as simple as 0:10:57.800 --> 0:11:00.000 a manager talking with some friends and hey, we're gonn 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:02.360 a out of town in three weeks for a long weekend. 0:11:02.360 --> 0:11:05.120 You want to go? And he doesn't say or she 0:11:05.520 --> 0:11:07.920 does not say, I have to ask my boss, they 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:10.400 say yes, I can go, no problem, and then they 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.559 go tell their boss they're gonna be away for a weekend, 0:11:12.600 --> 0:11:16.480 coming up here. And so, uh, that freedom and that 0:11:16.640 --> 0:11:19.480 belief that it's it's good for me, it's good for you, 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:23.200 and so our whole team operates on that. So my office, 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:27.480 we don't have a vacation schedule, we don't have fixed hours. 0:11:28.040 --> 0:11:30.920 We we we initially when it was just a handful 0:11:30.920 --> 0:11:33.040 of us, called it big boy rules. Hey, you know 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:35.520 what you work is, come in, do your work. If 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:37.120 you've done it three and you want to go home 0:11:37.120 --> 0:11:40.000 in three, who cares? And we assume you're not going 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:43.880 to be abusive on vacations. But one can imagine when 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:48.000 we're twenty five people, your thousands of people, how do 0:11:48.040 --> 0:11:50.480 you make sure that people aren't taking advantage of being 0:11:50.480 --> 0:11:55.280 abusive of that? Well, our culture, in many ways, UH 0:11:55.320 --> 0:11:58.120 deals with that. But in particular I've always led the 0:11:58.200 --> 0:12:03.319 organization believing we lead the organization for nine percent of 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:05.320 the people that are good, not the one or two 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:07.400 percent of the people that are bad. And so, yes, 0:12:08.120 --> 0:12:10.760 do we have people to take advantage of us? Sometimes 0:12:10.840 --> 0:12:14.280 yes we do, but we don't let that affect the 0:12:14.400 --> 0:12:17.480 positive work environment that we have in a great company 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:20.200 culture that we have for the other of our people 0:12:20.240 --> 0:12:24.000 to enjoy. And and you're one of the executives who 0:12:24.080 --> 0:12:27.320 feels that your job is to help everybody else correct 0:12:27.360 --> 0:12:30.920 do their jobs. And I'm gonna throw another quote at you. Uh, 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:34.079 instead of worrying so much about how I did my job, 0:12:34.280 --> 0:12:38.000 I switched my energy to helping other people do their jobs. 0:12:38.040 --> 0:12:42.720 This was another epiphany moment you describe. Tell us about 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:47.560 what triggered that that reversal and and how is it 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:51.840 helped you in business since then? Well, it changed my life. 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:56.559 One day as a younger general manager, I got I 0:12:56.640 --> 0:12:59.440 was working my tail off ninety hours a week, and 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:02.760 I thought how successful the restaurant would be was how 0:13:02.800 --> 0:13:05.080 well I did my job and how hard I worked. 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:08.559 And uh, my boss called me into his office and uh, 0:13:08.720 --> 0:13:11.320 so you just had a clandestine me with eight servers 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:13.800 who were gonna have mutiny on the bounty and either 0:13:13.920 --> 0:13:16.040 I go or they go. And he said, listen, he's 0:13:16.080 --> 0:13:17.640 gonna stay, but I want you to stay and let 0:13:17.679 --> 0:13:19.840 me talk to him. And so he told me about 0:13:19.880 --> 0:13:21.360 this meeting and I was shocked. I thought I was 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.480 doing a great job and but I wasn't even focused 0:13:24.480 --> 0:13:26.440 on new people. I wasn't even worried about the people. 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:28.800 I was running around, falling around the restaurant, making sure 0:13:28.840 --> 0:13:31.840 they were doing their job right, etcetera, etcetera, with a 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:35.520 fine tooth comb and driving them nuts. Basically, So I 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:38.679 UH said to him, I said, I'll change my attitude. 0:13:38.679 --> 0:13:42.000 I'll change my way. And I read several books, and 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:45.240 I thought, and I reflected, and I created, uh this 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:49.520 leadership style of working UH through the people. We're here 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:52.360 to support our people. And and then when I realized, 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:54.640 it's not how well I do my job, it's how 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:57.600 well everybody else does their job is what's important. I 0:13:57.920 --> 0:14:01.120 and all my focus was on support all of my 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:04.240 fellow associates that worked in that restaurant, and the whole 0:14:04.280 --> 0:14:07.360 thing changed on it on a time. So, how do 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:10.600 you spot talents when you're when you're looking to bring 0:14:10.679 --> 0:14:15.120 on executive chef or even even a sous chef, or 0:14:15.640 --> 0:14:18.400 or someone at the front of the restaurant, host or 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:21.640 hostess or a manager. What are you looking for in 0:14:21.680 --> 0:14:24.320 that process? What do you think you could just pretty 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.320 much take anybody and move them into that role. We 0:14:27.400 --> 0:14:30.440 pretty much believe we can take about anybody. So we 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:34.440 don't really do much outside hiring. Ninety percent of our 0:14:34.480 --> 0:14:37.480 people come in from the hourly associate ranks and prove 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.560 themselves at that point and and get promoted and grow 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:42.920 with our company. Not to say we don't outside higher 0:14:42.920 --> 0:14:45.400 but very rarely. I don't want people to work and 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:47.200 build their careers with the company and to have us 0:14:47.240 --> 0:14:50.040 outside hire someone on top of them after they worked 0:14:50.040 --> 0:14:54.160 for the company for years. So talent really identifies itself 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:58.280 through their job performance. As we move along, let's talk 0:14:58.280 --> 0:15:01.880 a little bit about the book you wrote. Yes is 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:05.280 the answer, And I have to start with the Milkshake 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:08.680 story because it's got a little bit of five easy 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:11.360 pieces to it, a little Jack Nicholson and then a 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:15.160 little twist ending you and your wife are out with 0:15:15.240 --> 0:15:19.040 the family at a restaurant and you obviously can look 0:15:19.120 --> 0:15:23.000 at all the items on the menu, and if they 0:15:23.040 --> 0:15:25.400 have bread and they have cheese, you should be able 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:29.560 to get a grilled cheese. Accept Some places say no, 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:33.880 tell us about that that moment, which I found amusing 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.440 it while we're dating ourselves that we know Jack Nicholson 0:15:36.520 --> 0:15:40.360 and five easy pieces, right, So it's the film buffs 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:43.720 who are younger will certainly know of the of the 0:15:43.760 --> 0:15:46.960 movie and the famous chicken salad scene. You can find 0:15:47.000 --> 0:15:50.040 that on YouTube if you're not familiar with the of 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:52.960 the movie. But you're at you're at the restaurant. What happened? 0:15:53.000 --> 0:15:55.000 So I wanted a grilled cheese sandwich. I had my 0:15:55.080 --> 0:15:57.280 four year old, my two year old with me, my 0:15:57.520 --> 0:16:00.120 wife and my mother and father in law, and so 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:01.880 I want to get a grilled cheese from my four 0:16:01.960 --> 0:16:04.240 year old son. And uh, the gal says, we don't 0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:06.720 have grilled cheese. I said, okay, So I end up 0:16:06.760 --> 0:16:09.760 ordering a club sandwich. Hold the turkey, hamlets, tomato, bacon. 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:11.920 So they had the bread, they had the cheese, and 0:16:11.920 --> 0:16:13.920 they had the grill. How Hard said, if you can 0:16:13.920 --> 0:16:16.800 saute this on both sides, that be fabious. So I 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:21.120 get that cheese turkey club. So then I asked her 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:25.040 for a chocolate milk shake for my son, and she was, well, 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:27.520 all we have is a Hoggandah smoke shake. It's like 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:31.400 a quart of soft whipped ice cream. It's huge. It's 0:16:31.440 --> 0:16:33.440 way too big for your son. We just can't do it. 0:16:33.800 --> 0:16:36.560 And I said, okay, I said, can I will you 0:16:36.600 --> 0:16:38.760 ask your manager. So she goes to ask her manager. 0:16:38.920 --> 0:16:41.280 I see the manager shake her head. No. She comes 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:43.920 back says, we can't do it. I said, okay, well 0:16:44.520 --> 0:16:45.920 can you have your manager come over to see me? 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:47.680 And my wife starts to kick me under the table. 0:16:47.760 --> 0:16:49.440 Don't do this, And I said, I just want to 0:16:49.440 --> 0:16:52.160 know why. Can I assume your wife has seen this 0:16:52.200 --> 0:16:55.720 movie before. I mean, this is not the first time, right, 0:16:55.880 --> 0:16:59.080 you've experienced what should be a yes and no, and 0:16:59.120 --> 0:17:01.960 you're just just miffed by the whole prod exactly, And 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:04.800 I want to know why. So uh, she comes over 0:17:04.840 --> 0:17:07.400 and she says, well, uh, the thing is, we pre 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:09.200 portion our ice cream, and we give your son a 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:10.800 little bit of ice cream. What are we gonna do 0:17:10.800 --> 0:17:13.040 with the rest? Now, I've been in the restaurant business 0:17:13.040 --> 0:17:14.760 at this point in time twenty plus years. I know 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:17.480 no one's in back pre portioning the ice cream. And 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:19.199 I say, okay, I said, well, will you can you 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:23.360 make a chocolate milk for me? She now, she's great hospitality. Absolutely, 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:25.600 I'll get your chocolate milk and starts to turn away. 0:17:26.040 --> 0:17:29.440 I said, hold on a second. She had hot, too 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:31.560 hot desserts on him menu It said a hot carrot 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:34.800 one carrot cake and chocolate. Brannon is hurtess and all 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:37.720 amode to? I said, what's all amode me? She's well, 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:39.600 that's a scoop of ice cream. I said, perfect. Can 0:17:39.600 --> 0:17:41.040 I get an order of all a mode to go 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:43.960 with my chocolate milk? And she said yes, but she 0:17:44.080 --> 0:17:47.240 chastised me. She said, this okay, sir, but it'll be expensive, 0:17:47.359 --> 0:17:49.840 and she was visibly upset with me and my wife. 0:17:49.920 --> 0:17:52.160 By the way, while you're all amoting this, hey run 0:17:52.200 --> 0:17:54.159 the whole thing through the blender, and now it's that 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:58.920 milk exactly. So I get the milkshake. And a couple 0:17:58.920 --> 0:18:02.159 of weeks later, on the keynote speaker at aison lunching 0:18:03.000 --> 0:18:05.399 for our local business magazine, I'm telling the story how 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:08.479 the answers, yes, what's the question? Or yes is the answer? 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:11.520 What's the question? However you want to phrase it? Um, 0:18:11.640 --> 0:18:14.800 And I tell the story. And so about two weeks later, 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:17.120 a gal comes up to me on the street. She said, 0:18:17.359 --> 0:18:19.399 my husband saw you speak at the Hyatt, thought she 0:18:19.440 --> 0:18:21.359 did a great job, and I want to take you 0:18:21.440 --> 0:18:23.399 up on your milkshake story. And so he went into 0:18:23.440 --> 0:18:24.960 one of your restaurants to the bar in order to 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:26.879 try to order a chocolate milkshake, and they said no. 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:29.960 And it's like she punched me right in the stomach, 0:18:30.040 --> 0:18:32.360 right there in the street. Tonight, I went into our 0:18:32.359 --> 0:18:36.760 Monday morning executive community meeting, fired up and said, you know, uh, 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:39.080 our yes is the answer. What's the question? Is not 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:42.280 permeating our organization well enough. We need to correct this. 0:18:42.440 --> 0:18:44.960 And so we started a brainstorm and we started, well, 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:47.359 let's tell that story, Let's make a video of that story, 0:18:47.440 --> 0:18:51.280 and uh, let's do milkshake pins Let's make milkshake the 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:55.040 icon of hospitality and CM are all great stuff, and 0:18:55.560 --> 0:18:59.360 people have little milkshake going on right now. And basically 0:18:59.359 --> 0:19:02.920 it says if someone asked for something a milkshake or otherwise, 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:08.560 if you could deliver it the answer exactly. So I Uh, 0:19:08.680 --> 0:19:11.119 every new associated starts the company goes through a for 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.399 our orientation into the company culture and philosophy and values 0:19:14.480 --> 0:19:17.159 and so forth, and we make every new associate that 0:19:17.160 --> 0:19:19.399 starts with the company of chocolate milkshake that day, and 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.840 we take a lot further than that. We make thousands 0:19:22.840 --> 0:19:25.760 of chocolate milk shakes every year. We start every major meeting, 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:29.840 every staff meeting with a milkshake, toast to everybody, celebrating 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:33.040 great people, delivering genuine hospitality, and yes is the answer. 0:19:33.119 --> 0:19:36.919 What's the question? So how do you how do you 0:19:37.000 --> 0:19:43.280 make sure that the customer experience is consistent across all 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:48.400 of those different locations, different suppliers, different regions, different managers, 0:19:48.440 --> 0:19:51.560 different staff members. If I walk into a camera Mitchell 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:54.760 Restaurant here, there or elsewhere, am I going to get 0:19:54.800 --> 0:19:57.960 the same hospitality in the same meal or is it 0:19:58.040 --> 0:20:02.600 going to vary widely? But you're gonna get the same 0:20:02.800 --> 0:20:05.840 We are in UH coast to coast, were as far 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:09.200 west as Beverly Hills to New York and everywhere in between. 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:12.199 And we talked about our culture and values. You know, 0:20:12.240 --> 0:20:16.439 we have the same training programs across the company, we 0:20:16.520 --> 0:20:21.160 have the same standards, etcetera. But our culture and values 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:25.639 UH is the backbone of what we do. And I 0:20:25.680 --> 0:20:28.919 look at it this way, Um, we teach our people 0:20:28.920 --> 0:20:31.960 our culture and our values. We teach them how to think, 0:20:32.000 --> 0:20:34.000 and if they know how to think, they'll know what 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:38.280 to do. And so early in our earlier years, our 0:20:38.280 --> 0:20:40.640 culture and values as we spread out of town did 0:20:40.680 --> 0:20:42.480 not resonate as well as it did out of town 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:44.720 as it does in town. Why what do you think that? 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:48.600 Because we opened our restaurants without a town people and 0:20:48.640 --> 0:20:51.720 so forth, and we uh didn't really know how to 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:54.639 transfer that culture and those vous. We didn't we brought 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:57.040 people in. We thought if we hired it outside manager, 0:20:57.080 --> 0:20:58.960 then come in for eight to twelve weeks and train 0:20:59.080 --> 0:21:01.520 and and learn. And it's just not that way. So 0:21:01.800 --> 0:21:04.960 can you change twenty years of experience in ten weeks now? 0:21:05.240 --> 0:21:08.080 Now we take usually take six months to a year 0:21:08.119 --> 0:21:10.520