February 3, 2021 • 33 mins
NFL Legends, Brian Orakpo and Michael Griffin, sit down with Aeneas Williams to talk about their transition from professional athletes to the Cupcake Guys, and what they've learned about starting and running a small business. Tune in to Food Network this Saturday, February 6 at 1pm ET/PT on Food Network and streaming on Discovery+.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to the NFL Legist podcast. I'm as Williams talking
about cup kids. That's right, I said, cupcakes and the
cupcake business and how lasting bonds can create great business partners.
Let's listen to So we gotta Rack Pole the head decorate.
We got Griff the head baker, and then a third partner.
(00:27):
Is it Brian Henson? Is that the correct pronounce? That's correct?
Brian Henson and all of you guys went to ut together, correct, Yeah,
we all want to scool together. So when y'all were
the dorms, were you guys already baking stuff? I mean,
was this already? Now? You know what? Uh? I think
Rack tells it best, but I mean we were all
sitting around one day, was towards the end of my career.
(00:50):
We were talking about entrepreneurship, you know, being in the lead.
We know that the NFL does offer the opportunity to
business school and the coaching and things in that nature.
But the crazy thing is we were never hands on.
When you go talk about business, you can go to
business school, but being more hands on was the most
important thing. It was a small investment. You know. We
(01:11):
were very successful in the National Football League it was
a small investment, but the main thing was just learned
the business and and the business adventure and be hands on.
And I think the most important thing we got out
of it was as as football players being successful, it's
not easy, you know. It's that that one percent of
being able to make it to the National Football League.
(01:31):
And we understood that and with this business, we didn't
want to fail. And I think that's what helped all
three of us. And let alone, you don't want to
let your teammates down. Let alone, you don't want to
let down your friends. So that was the most important
thing is that you see a lot of guys that
getting the National Football League that starts businesses and things
with family members and things that nature. But you know,
(01:53):
we all invested our hard earned money into it and
from there we weren't gonna let this fail. And we
look at our cupcake shop as our baby being, our
pride and our joy, and you know, this is one
thing that we take so much pride into this business
and we at all costs and make sure we are
successful as we were on the National Football League. Hey, Brian,
what's the biggest difference? When did you gain the biggest
(02:14):
amount of fans from playing football after that commercial. Man,
I didn't realize that commercial was gonna put us in
another stratosphere. Honestly, you know, I feel I'm a pretty
confident guy. I felt like, you know, we're we're we're
some pretty well known football players for our time. But man,
they're commercial. I have the elderly people coming up to me.
(02:36):
You know, I'm thinking they're getting ready for an autography.
They want to you know, they called me the cupcake guy.
You know, Hey, you guys are the cupcake guys. Man,
I love your commercials and things of that nature. Mind you,
I'm still playing. They don't hear about what I did
on Sunday. They want to, you know, they want to
talk about how did we get started in the cupcake business. So, yeah,
(02:56):
it's a whole another ball game. It's a whole different
fan base saying, uh, man, it's it's a blessing because
we we literally just wanted to be entrepreneurs and have
this would be one of our babies and grow to
do other things. But it's really taking the mind of
its own for sure. So hold hold on, bron you
guys started this business. You're still playing something like is
that correct. Yeah, yeah, he was just finishing up go ahead. Yeah,
(03:20):
but here's my question. All right, you know after the
commercial the cupcake guy, how did your defensive teammates handled that?
Just starting Look, that's that's how it is. That's why
you know, you know this better than anybody respect you know.
(03:42):
I couldn't be a guy that's just on the fence
and doing cupcakes and playing at the same time. So
I kind of I kind of got a little leeway
just being who I am. Once the guys did their
little jokes here and there, then I sold him a
spreadsheet and then then like okay, yeah, now what you're doing, um,
and you know, and then you know, it's something to
(04:04):
brag about. It not really brag about, but it's something
to really be proud of, because you know, you're building
an empire outside of just a football field, you know,
and that's something that we we really wanted to take
initiative of, was doing something outside of the football field.
So yeah, we're definitely proud of it. Definitely got a
little heat, you know, but uh but it was all
(04:26):
good until you know, they really seen the business side
of it. Alright, Michael Man, you the ferocious safety have
you had an opponent when you were still playing. Once
they saw the commercial, any opponent called you cupcake. You
know what it was? It was. It was all fun
and games until you know, you talk about how much
you got paid for the commercial, and then they realized
(04:46):
how successful you are. And I think, uh, I think
the funniest thing is when you say, you know, you
got that name on the back of your jersey and
you're associated with a team, but you get associated with
as a cupcake guy whatever. I think Rack Can attested this.
I mean the day before the Super Bowl, we were
in New York. We had this film, a Good Morning
America show, and we were standing outside of a nightclub
(05:08):
and they were looking This was before Corona and everything,
and they were like looking at us, and I remember
the bouncer walked up to and said, hey, we're like,
oh man, what we do? They're like, are y'all those
cup kid guys? And it was like, y'all come on in, y'all,
come on in. And then the piggyback that we go
to l A and we're standing outside this nightclub in
(05:30):
l A. And we were down there, you know, doing
some business, and again the bouncer guy, I guess he
was the host or whatever the party whatever. He comes
up to me and he walks and says, hey, you
look familiar. And I was like, man, I'm not even
from here. And he's like, nah, like I've seen you
somewhere before. I was like, man, I'm not from here.
From Texas. He goes, hold on, wait, y'all, donm cup
kid guys because the other big dude look a little familiar.
(05:52):
But y'all, donm cup dead guy, and then he starts
doing it like the need clap thing and everything else
on the age. Just you know, calm down a little bit.
And he like, y'all, come on, man, y'all face, and
it's just this is amazing, you know, walking on the
plane and stuff. No, you play a bar very sport.
But everybody, now, you know, puts that face and they're like, hey,
those the cup kid guys like and it's a cool story.
I mean kids, and you know, we should the whole
(06:14):
birthday parties and things and and it was amazing just
to see that, you know, people look at us like,
you know, you can be whatever you want to be.
Doesn't necessarily have to be a football player and be
like a superhero. But you could do something that people
do every day and they can be just as positive.
So you have an upcoming especially on the Food Network Saturday,
February six, one pm Eastern on Food Network, streaming on
(06:37):
Discovery Plus beginning February six. Tell me about it. What
can viewers expect? Man, it's gonna see ourselves, you know,
us being ourselves. Um, you know, we we've been through
a lot, were tasted a lot of cupcakes, a lot
of sweets and things in that nature. And it's a
baking competent. If you know Austin. Uh, you know that
we're known for the food trucks. And with that being said,
(06:58):
you know, you gotta have something that's gonna you know,
drive people to your business. Uh, we're just judging it.
We know we have a few contestants that you know,
have that family recipe has probably been in the family
for years and now they want to make a business
of it because they're strongly believe in it, and we're
just showing them the ins and outs of how to
run a business. I mean, we started from the ground
(07:19):
up and we worked our way into a brick and
mortar and you know they're trying to do the same thing,
have a food truck and possibly become big enough to
have a brick and mortar. So is it's a sweet
type of baking competition that can you get it done
inside the baking truck, but at the same time, can
you you know, sell it to the public and again,
you know, it gotta be worth the while. You know,
(07:39):
you can't charge a lot of money for something that
doesn't taste so good or vice versa. You can't charge
to unless you gotta make a profit. So we're just
understanding the business aspect of running a business through a
food truck. What did you find most Brian challenging about
making a TV shoot? What's been maybe you know, I
think us professional athletes, I think we were always constantly
(08:03):
on the goal and you know we're just moving and
and and things of that nature. You know, with shows
and commercials, I mean it's in thirty minutes show or
or whatever it could be. You know, the commercial maybe
thirty seconds, but it takes a week or it takes
a bunch of different cuts, and you know, it's a
bunch of breaks when we just want to go and
(08:24):
knock stuff out, but it's a lot of you know,
cutting the film up it's a lot of stuff behind
the scenes that we just had to get used to
and uh that that's probably the most challenging for me,
at least just sitting around when we could be just
knocking stuff out. I think the most what did you
have to work on? How about? I think the most
challenging for him was he had to jump right off
(08:45):
a flight from London straight in the film. Yeah. Yeah,
oh my god, I think that commercial take. How long
did it take, by the way, I think it's like
two days to three day Uh. Yeah, he landed at
seven o'clock that morning. We was trying to find an
outfit for him to wear, and then it was all
(09:07):
day that day. Then we went to another scene, then
we went to another scene. Then he had to jump
on a plane and shoot straight back in Nashville. So
I think that might have been the most challenging for him. Yeah,
I forgot about that, Yeah, griff a good point. Yeah
it was during the bye week, so serious. Yeah, I
don't got that much. I've got that much rest, So
you know, you're trying to knock stuff out. Let's been
(09:29):
a few times, a few moments talking about the time
in the business. How did you and your partner um
decide on this particular business. How did you guys decide
this one? Why? Yeah, well we all I think Griffin
alluded to it earlier. We are we always been just
we always hang out. Everybody, all the boys were live
(09:51):
in Austin. That's our that's our spot. I mean, all
the boys in the league. That of Texas. We live
in Awesome and there's not one guy that's not lives
out here. So we all hang out. Me, Griff and
Brian the other partner to hang out majority of the time.
And every single year, we always every off season, we
always eat dinner, hanging out like with the boys, and
we're always talking about different businesses and different things that
(10:14):
we want to do. We definitely wanted to be entrepreneurs.
You know, we've been structured the whole lives with football
and we wanted to kind of step outside of the
box and start, you know, leading the charge ourselves. There.
With me coming to Nashville, I was able to get
introduced to GS Cupcakes and obviously they're originated in Nashville.
Griff was still playing in Nashville. That was kind of
(10:36):
the blessing in the skies because they were obviously huge
fans being tightened fans. So we just decided one off season, like, hey,
let's do a cupcake shop. I know, I know it's
out of the box, but it's a low risk, high reward,
you know. We know GS Cupcakes hasn't um moved up
having located, and they don't have any locations in Austin.
(10:56):
Let's bring it out into Austin and and see what happens.
The guys loved it and we ran with it. We
started making our own phone calls. We didn't have assistance
and nothing. We were literally doing everything ourselves trying to
put it together. A long story short, I mean, we
we found uh some dirt in one of the centers
and we love the area, we love the spot, putting
(11:18):
some calls and we got the thing rolling from browned
up and here we are to day. Now, what made
you sign between as entrepreneurs a franchise or doing your
own thing? What were the factors in deciding that? Well,
when you look at doing your own thing, you know
again stepping outside the box with a franchise, they already
got a platform and they already have pretty much the
(11:40):
excess and os and and how to do everything. So
I think we were to do it again on we
branch out to do other things. Though we know how
businesses operate. We know, we know the whole game plan now.
Um And with the franchise, you know, they already had
every you kind of knew how they did things and
and it's just learning. And that was the best way.
You know, it was just apply something that's already been done,
(12:03):
that's already been successful. And Gus was already success, especially
in Nashville. So we went with the franchises because they
already had everything and and and and works. So we
just knew that we just had to follow those guidelines.
But it's funny as we were doing them and as
we just watching again, like you said, it was just
clearly just dirt. Um as we watched them build our
shot from the ground up, It's like, okay, we we
(12:26):
you know, I can actually build a building right now.
It's funny now because I mean we're building the house
and you know, just talking to them and they're saying
X and those and I'm like, no, I've been just
done this before. Like I know how the plumbing and
I know how this works. I know how this works,
I know how you bid this you bid that. So
all those things now just you know, you can apply
that going forward. So I think when you go to
business school, these are the things you don't learn. You
(12:47):
just know how to run the business. But you know,
now we had to go back and do it again.
There's ways here and there that we could have actually
saved some money here and there as we was building
doing our build out. So again it was just the
act that they already had a foundation and now that's
something that we can use going forward when it comes
to doing other businesses. I know Brian has a couple
of other things going on and things that they're just
(13:09):
so it it helps us branch off and do other things.
Because we we did it from the ground up. It
wasn't like, hey, we're opening this up. Hire somebody and
we're you know, poof, we're gone and just say hey,
we own it. No, it's it's been days. It's days
that we went in there at six o'clock in the morning.
I know there was one time where you know, hey,
let's get ahead. I'm up there at twelve am, one
(13:31):
am in the morning, baking and stuff, just to get
ahead because we may have been short staff. Being a
national football League. We could probably all attest this. We've
seen guys lose money and they don't know where what
happened to it. They have no rhyme and reason. And
that was the one thing again, like we said, we
pride ourselves and being successful the National Football League, being
successful young men, black men, and we want to continue
(13:53):
to be successful. We don't want to be one of
those guys that you know, thirty for thirty shows or
whatever it is. When you see people that are we
and the words of Brian, you know, he's being real
nice right now, but he said, you pull if you
got that camera, you gotta sit on that stool. That
ain't a good story you're about to tell. Work. We
(14:16):
worked too hard. I mean, as young men, you get
so much money so quickly, and you see a lot
of people that that when they're done, they don't have
nothing to show for it. And that was the one
thing that we want to make sure. We know the ends,
We know the outs. You know, we we we have
a weekly call with our manager. You know, sometimes we
just pop up. But at the same time, we knew
as football players, you know, we we we appreciate when
(14:38):
you get throwing a little bone here and there. So
you know Saturdays, Hey, what do y'all want for lunch?
And we'll send them lunch just so to keep them
motivating things that they're just so. It's again we understand
its teamwork. You know, we all work together if if
we if we are unsuccessful, we all are successful. They're unsuccessful.
We unsuccessful. We just know how it all works hand
in hand, all works together. How important is for I
(15:00):
just anybody thinking about business? How did you guys keep
your bond and it was and your bond together U
partlating to fruitfulness in a business because sometimes guys friends
and their college classmates in dubor detriment. How will you
guys able to work together? You gotta got it has
(15:23):
to be organic. Organic has to be genuine, I think,
and this is a same ass plug. But that's why
the University of Texas we're special. We're a special group
of men. Tell me why you say that. I know
you're saying and just tell me that what I mean
by that is I say that all the time being
(15:44):
to leave me and grouping for a long time, and
everybody is always jealous on how we we we a
Texas are from present, past or the future you know,
we know the route that it takes to get to
the NFL or in life in general, and we all
consider each other brothers. When I say that, is that
(16:07):
where when you start doing talking money in business, you
gotta go into business with your brothers, with people that
you know, people that you started from the bottom with UM.
And if it ain't genuine, if it's all about me, me, me,
me me, it's not gonna work myself. Griffin Brian. Brian
obviously didn't go to the athletic route, but he was
still one of the boys. We always been close. It's
(16:27):
nothing that I can't tell them. There's nothing we can't
joke about, nothing that we can't be serious about UM.
And we just keeping one hunting with each other. I
think that's really really makes a great relationship. It's it's
actually an enviable relationship. Because as I listened to you
your bond you Michael and uh another brand, I think
(16:47):
about um Lebron James. He seemed to have developed that
bond with guys all the way from a childhood and
those bonds have parlaid in two man all of a sudden.
Now you gotta hild agent the whole collection of the
different giftings. Yeah, beneficial to the group, Yeah, definitely. I
(17:09):
mean it's it's it's a special bomb because again, you
talk about Brian Henson, you know, he's been in the
business world and and you know he's one of those
guys that you know, you know, you know, you had
that entourage back when you know, you played or whatever
it may be, and you have those guys is just
hanging onto the coattail. But again, you know, it's one
of those things with Brian Henson and having that that friendship,
(17:30):
you know, to the table with his money where this
water open. You know, uh, when we did this business,
it was like, hey, we're doing everything split right down
the middle, you know, three ways. Even though no one
saw that that that Microsoft commercial, it was split three ways.
Even when we did the show that's coming up on
February six, you know, we say, hey, we're not doing
(17:50):
this unless little Brian is in there with us. You know,
we had our ups and our downs. But the one thing,
you know, I know Rack told one of our employees,
this shouldn't lose no friendship over no cupcakes. So so
you know that that's the one thing. The end of
the day, it's cupcakes. You know. And that's the one
thing that with with family and everything else, it's it's
(18:13):
more than cupcakes. It's a family. It's a true brotherhood. Uh,
it's a true friendship. Is genuine. It wasn't like, hey,
meet meet this guy over here and meet this It's
not nothing like that. It's one of those things like hey,
can you pick me up over It doesn't matter what
time and the day, what time in the night, it
doesn't matter. If you know, if I see his wife
struggling with something, I'm gonna stop everything I'm doing to
(18:35):
go do that. He's gonna do the same thing for
my wife and my kids and everything else. It's a
real genuine friendship. Let alone. The kids call each other
uncles and things and that nature. So it's it's a
very genuine friendship. And I think that's that's one of
the things that makes this thing very special. How did
you guys end up connected with the commercial GIS cupcakes
with Microsoft? You know? They called up, Yeah, they called us.
(18:59):
They heard the story, um, and they heard the story
just like everybody else did, and they reached out the
blowing up our shop. Me and Griff, we don't really
like answering a lot of our you know, phone calls
and you get a lot of fluff. You know, everybody
knows that, so we we just blew it over. But
our manager actually is the one that took the initiative
to take it seriously. Um and then they we we
(19:21):
knew who it was and you can add on if
you want to do it, because they kept calling the
shop and somebody like wanted to come speak to us,
and I was like, you know what, I'll sit down
with him. Well, another guy that Rack knew contacted him
and was like, hey, Microsoft reached out, but we're trying
to get ahold of these guys. Rack knew him. But
(19:41):
they was trying to call the shop. Like he said,
we get calls all the time. So it was crazy
because I'm like, hey, I got this possible opportunity and
Rack was like, well I got one too. Well what
you got And it's like it's the same person trying
to reach But I'm you'd be some some of the
(20:01):
things that that come through that door and something phone
calls we get in. I mean, it was I guess
you gotta say it's a blessing the skies because I
mean we probably wouldn't even thought twice about it, but
it just it came from so many different angles. It
was like okay, and then again the hardest part was like,
all right, cool, we got a timeline. Think it was
(20:23):
like October. He was over in London. Hey, we gotta
film this now because we gotta get this commercial for playoffs.
We're like, okay, well, rack, when can you make it?
And it was it was all right, when we get here,
we're just going to shoot it. And again people don't
even believe. It's like there was no script. It was
just be yourselves, just go with it, be yourselves. So
(20:44):
there was absolutely no script when it came to that,
just be yourselves. So it's interesting in the business, it
looks like you also have to be aware of opportunities
you have, you have you got, you gotta be open.
You know a lot of times when you I tell
people this all the time and and now I've been
outside that bubble. But we all know it's professional athletes,
college athletes, you know, even high school athletes. You're you're
(21:07):
stuck in this bubble. And this bubble that you're in
is this bubble that you are around people that are
like you may not look like you may be different coach,
but we all have a common interest which is sports,
which is football. So I tell people like, you know,
it was hard. Like my neighbor, I've been living in
the same house and I've before I got out the lead,
I never spoke to my neighbor because I was in
(21:28):
this bubble. Like I get up, I go work out,
I trained, I speak to my teammates, I speak to
my coaches. And I had my wife and my kids,
other guys that went to University of Tech. That was
my bubble. We eat lunch, may hang we hang out
at night. It was our wives, our kids. But that
was the bubble I was in. But when I got
out the lead two years before I RACK, it was like, okay,
(21:50):
you know, everybody's busy. You know who do you talk to?
And then you can sitting out there in the front
yard and you're going to your kids school and somebody's like, hey,
how are you doing? Oh your Maya's father. Yeah, okay,
so you've been playing, I ain't seeing you. My name
is excellent. And then you start trying to develop and
meet new friendships and things in that nature. And even
with that, you know, more opportunities are just coming because
(22:11):
you know, it's it's you know, and that was the thing.
I think a lot of people need to take advantage that,
especially when you're playing, especially when're a high profile athlete.
You know, people are looking for opportunities. People are looking
for that next big thing, And I think that was
one of the things that maybe if we would open
our eyes up a long time ago. We always talked
about it, but maybe they probably would have been more
(22:31):
opportunities that would have presented themselves if I would have
got out of that bubble and just you know, gave
people opportunities of just you know, just speaking and just
being cordial and just having conversations. That's what each of
you guys would share with current players today, just what
you're saying right now. Most definitely, I definitely would um
because I'm I'm on the opposite side of the spectrum.
(22:53):
I hate meeting people. I mean, that's just me. I'm
not the best social person when it comes to even
people outside of my bubble, you know, But that's just
that's just come with the nature of the beach. We
get bothered with so many things. I wouldn't say bothered,
but it's it's it can be distracting when you're trying
to be you know, top of your craft, you know,
and I kind of erased that. But as you get
(23:16):
older and wiser, you start realizing that people have a
lot to offer, or maybe just a genuine friendship. You know. Overall,
I love football, Griff loves football. We all love football.
We've been doing it since when we're young. But at
the same time, you know, you can still be great
at your craft, but also you know, prepare for that afterlife,
like um, like majority of people, as we close out
(23:39):
and want to do a few rapid fires, and these
are This is advice for current players or even legends.
Here's the first thing. We have current players and legends
listening in. What would be your advice for guys in
finding their next chapter? The first question is when should
they start thinking about their next chapter? I would say, uh,
(24:00):
that's a good one because I understand that you know,
when you you know, when you go through that combine
and you're playing football, you at the top of your game.
But that offseason when you're trying to go to Cobbo
or Vegas or New York or whatever it is, you know, explore,
explore all the opportunities you know, take that time to
(24:20):
to start jotting down ideas. You see a lot of
people that leave this game unexpectingly, not on your terms.
Jot down ideas, you know, because it came never you
never know, you just never know. I've seen people that
a freak accident, you know, break a ankle or king
player cancuse. I've seen it. And again I just I
advise the younger generation, you know, jot down ideas. You know, um,
(24:46):
it's it's it's gonna be tough, you know, with this
world today. So I advise people, don't put all your
eggs in one basket. I mean I know I did,
and I would say I did it. But you know,
I tell my son every day, I tell my daughters
every day. You know, every all, even though maybe you
know my flesh and my blood, we're all different and
everybody's past is not the same. So I would say,
(25:07):
you know, jot down ideas. And if you do have ideas,
if you're interesting in something exploring, see if you can
start doing your research and and start um figuring out
different chapters in life. You know, be prepared if that
if that one door closed, no one opens, but be prepared,
be one step ahead the late great coach Paul Brown.
He made a statement and he would share with the guys,
(25:29):
find your life's work. So even in being businessmen right now,
was there ever any passion where you, guys, since this
would we would do some type of business. Maybe you
don't know what it was as far as possibility of
your life for work. Yeah, yeah, I think it was.
I think we all, I think we both share the
passion for entrepreneurship just business in general. I think we
(25:51):
got tired, Like I said, we got tired of the
structured way of life. We got I got tired of
you know, it's just a point of time where you
get older material you want to be your own boss.
That's just me personally. Um, and I felt like we
did the homework, we did the research, and we put
the same amount of effort that we were put in
(26:12):
an off season working out to being a professional athlete.
We put that same amount of effort into being entrepreneurs.
And that's you know, that's one thing you can't take
away from us as athletes. Though we were gonna work
outwork you any day of the week, there's no way
you can't out work because we and we have that
that um advantage over people more than you know it,
(26:35):
and I think we used that to our advantage to
create what we wanted to do in life. But how
did you do it? Because some players, when they finished
that level of hard work in the league, they're like
unbutting they built. They don't won't ever work that hard
at getting something else. Hence why there's probably a huge
fail you rate because guys don't want to approach you
(26:56):
with that level of of diligence as we do in
a game of football. How did you guys do it?
I think it was it's it's a motivational factor because
again when you talk about a friendship and you're talking
about a teamwork and things that made us successful. I
think the biggest thing was I wasn't gonna let Rack down.
(27:17):
You know, when we started this business, he was still playing,
and you know the one thing that we wanted to
make sure for him was listen. I've been there. I
I got up every morning and watched you. You know,
we we know what it took to to be successful
football players. And I know what you're going through. You're
in Nashville, I'm here in Austin. There's no excuses for
(27:38):
why I can't hold down the fort while you're gone.
And I think that also goes to Brian Hinton the
same way as I can't let him down the same
way he has at Hohle full full time job and
he's taking the time out of the day to do
his part of it. So I think that's what motivators was.
I'm not gonna let my teammate down. I'm not gonna
let my friend down. I ain't gonna let cut case
(28:00):
come between us, you know. And again you know, not
only do I got my money into it, but he
got his money into it too, And we know that
you know money. You know, money is the root of
all evil skin in the game, we call it, right,
So you know that was one thing is I'm not
gonna let you waste your money, but I ain't trying
to waste my money either, So I think that's another
(28:22):
motivational factor. One of the questions I had was about
how do you connect with people that you could trust.
That seems to be a challenge when when you're your
current player or even a legend. But I want to
repeat back to you, guys, because you've already answered the question.
All three of you guys including Brian Henson, had skin
in the game. Then I also heard of another wise
(28:42):
statement Brian you made you said, this investment, we didn't
put all of our money into it. This was a
small portion of each of you guys, whatever amount of
money you have. You didn't put all of your eggs
in this basket. Can you speak to that why that
was so important? Well, yeah, yeah, no, yeah, it was.
(29:05):
I mean, we we wanted to we wanted to learn first,
We wanted to learn. We wanted to kind of groom
ourselves to do bigger and better things, and that's why
we went the franchise route. It was, like I said,
it was a small, low risk, high reward type of
mentality that we initially was going to do from the start.
You know, we could have definitely done a big facility
(29:28):
that cost millions of dollars. But we have no training,
we have no knowledge. We're literally just coming out of
the game, and that is the stupidest thing to do.
You have to start off again, say it again, because
so many, for whatever reason, yeah, make those huge, huge
mistakes that you guys were able to avoid. Yeah, we
(29:51):
I mean I say it all the time. You can
you can have the nicest facility. You can have the
nicest club restaurant, whatever the case, maybe the lights. Everything
is great. But if you have no knowledge, if you
have no no whereabouts with how to run run a business,
no staff, and you will fail every single time. So
(30:13):
my best advice would be Grip's best advice would be
to start small, learn it, learn the ins and outs
of running a small efficient business. And then once you
master that small business, that was very I mean it's
almost as if you as if you got fined in
the NFL game. I mean that's that starts small for
(30:35):
that amount, and then you start learning, you know ll LLCs,
you start learning how to run your staff, you start
learning how you know inventory, payroll, everything that comes with
running the business. I mean it literally pays off because
now from speaking from myself, g g has helped me
prepare propel me to do other and bigger things. I'm
(30:55):
about to get ready to run an e sports facility.
Now I gotta restore coming with a bunch of other
things that I learned just from being hands on with
the small business I did with Griffin Bryant. I think
that the attested that and and the biggest thing exist
it's that investment part. You know. It's it's easy for somebody,
you know, these friends and things that come up to
(31:17):
you know, the player that's working his tail off, that
has the money. Hey, I could do this, I could
do that, I could do this. I got a great idea.
But how much do they have invested in that? And
I think that's the biggest thing. I think the biggest thing,
and and the and the thing I think that really
made this bond so much stronger is that we all
got the same amount invested. You know, we all we
(31:38):
all invested equally, you know. And I think that that's
the biggest thing. And you know, he keeps saying small investment.
I'm cheep that that that he they know me, I
ain't going nowhere when it comes They know how cheap
I am. It wasn't they had to come in me.
(32:00):
They still they convinced me about this house. They know
I stayed inside. I don't do all that. I'm cheap
and want Anyone who's interested in business or just want
to join a group of business people go to NFL
Legends Business directory dot com to request registration, which is
a resource for NFL Legends that own a business This
network provides elevator visibility for business opportunities within the NFL
(32:25):
it's members, clubs, and partners, and the broader NFL Legends community,
and includes network and opportunities and guidance on how to
achieve business goals. Saturday, February six, I want to get
the information out again. Saturday is February six, at one
pm Eastern on Food Network, streaming on Discovery beginning February six.
(32:49):
I can't wait to see y'all again in your peak, Aprons.
We got you, my man. We got to appreciate it.
Thanks for joining us. The best is yet to come.
This has been the NFL Legends Podcast. To provide feedback
or request a topic for discussion, email us at NFL
Legends at NFL dot com
Welcome to the NFL Legist podcast. I'm as Williams talking
about cup kids. That's right, I said, cupcakes and the
cupcake business and how lasting bonds can create great business partners.
Let's listen to So we gotta Rack Pole the head decorate.
We got Griff the head baker, and then a third partner.
(00:27):
Is it Brian Henson? Is that the correct pronounce? That's correct?
Brian Henson and all of you guys went to ut together, correct, Yeah,
we all want to scool together. So when y'all were
the dorms, were you guys already baking stuff? I mean,
was this already? Now? You know what? Uh? I think
Rack tells it best, but I mean we were all
sitting around one day, was towards the end of my career.
(00:50):
We were talking about entrepreneurship, you know, being in the lead.
We know that the NFL does offer the opportunity to
business school and the coaching and things in that nature.
But the crazy thing is we were never hands on.
When you go talk about business, you can go to
business school, but being more hands on was the most
important thing. It was a small investment. You know. We
(01:11):
were very successful in the National Football League it was
a small investment, but the main thing was just learned
the business and and the business adventure and be hands on.
And I think the most important thing we got out
of it was as as football players being successful, it's
not easy, you know. It's that that one percent of
being able to make it to the National Football League.
(01:31):
And we understood that and with this business, we didn't
want to fail. And I think that's what helped all
three of us. And let alone, you don't want to
let your teammates down. Let alone, you don't want to
let down your friends. So that was the most important
thing is that you see a lot of guys that
getting the National Football League that starts businesses and things
with family members and things that nature. But you know,
(01:53):
we all invested our hard earned money into it and
from there we weren't gonna let this fail. And we
look at our cupcake shop as our baby being, our
pride and our joy, and you know, this is one
thing that we take so much pride into this business
and we at all costs and make sure we are
successful as we were on the National Football League. Hey, Brian,
what's the biggest difference? When did you gain the biggest
(02:14):
amount of fans from playing football after that commercial. Man,
I didn't realize that commercial was gonna put us in
another stratosphere. Honestly, you know, I feel I'm a pretty
confident guy. I felt like, you know, we're we're we're
some pretty well known football players for our time. But man,
they're commercial. I have the elderly people coming up to me.
(02:36):
You know, I'm thinking they're getting ready for an autography.
They want to you know, they called me the cupcake guy.
You know, Hey, you guys are the cupcake guys. Man,
I love your commercials and things of that nature. Mind you,
I'm still playing. They don't hear about what I did
on Sunday. They want to, you know, they want to
talk about how did we get started in the cupcake business. So, yeah,
(02:56):
it's a whole another ball game. It's a whole different
fan base saying, uh, man, it's it's a blessing because
we we literally just wanted to be entrepreneurs and have
this would be one of our babies and grow to
do other things. But it's really taking the mind of
its own for sure. So hold hold on, bron you
guys started this business. You're still playing something like is
that correct. Yeah, yeah, he was just finishing up go ahead. Yeah,
(03:20):
but here's my question. All right, you know after the
commercial the cupcake guy, how did your defensive teammates handled that?
Just starting Look, that's that's how it is. That's why
you know, you know this better than anybody respect you know.
(03:42):
I couldn't be a guy that's just on the fence
and doing cupcakes and playing at the same time. So
I kind of I kind of got a little leeway
just being who I am. Once the guys did their
little jokes here and there, then I sold him a
spreadsheet and then then like okay, yeah, now what you're doing, um,
and you know, and then you know, it's something to
(04:04):
brag about. It not really brag about, but it's something
to really be proud of, because you know, you're building
an empire outside of just a football field, you know,
and that's something that we we really wanted to take
initiative of, was doing something outside of the football field.
So yeah, we're definitely proud of it. Definitely got a
little heat, you know, but uh but it was all
(04:26):
good until you know, they really seen the business side
of it. Alright, Michael Man, you the ferocious safety have
you had an opponent when you were still playing. Once
they saw the commercial, any opponent called you cupcake. You
know what it was? It was. It was all fun
and games until you know, you talk about how much
you got paid for the commercial, and then they realized
(04:46):
how successful you are. And I think, uh, I think
the funniest thing is when you say, you know, you
got that name on the back of your jersey and
you're associated with a team, but you get associated with
as a cupcake guy whatever. I think Rack Can attested this.
I mean the day before the Super Bowl, we were
in New York. We had this film, a Good Morning
America show, and we were standing outside of a nightclub
(05:08):
and they were looking This was before Corona and everything,
and they were like looking at us, and I remember
the bouncer walked up to and said, hey, we're like,
oh man, what we do? They're like, are y'all those
cup kid guys? And it was like, y'all come on in, y'all,
come on in. And then the piggyback that we go
to l A and we're standing outside this nightclub in
(05:30):
l A. And we were down there, you know, doing
some business, and again the bouncer guy, I guess he
was the host or whatever the party whatever. He comes
up to me and he walks and says, hey, you
look familiar. And I was like, man, I'm not even
from here. And he's like, nah, like I've seen you
somewhere before. I was like, man, I'm not from here.
From Texas. He goes, hold on, wait, y'all, donm cup
kid guys because the other big dude look a little familiar.
(05:52):
But y'all, donm cup dead guy, and then he starts
doing it like the need clap thing and everything else
on the age. Just you know, calm down a little bit.
And he like, y'all, come on, man, y'all face, and
it's just this is amazing, you know, walking on the
plane and stuff. No, you play a bar very sport.
But everybody, now, you know, puts that face and they're like, hey,
those the cup kid guys like and it's a cool story.
I mean kids, and you know, we should the whole
(06:14):
birthday parties and things and and it was amazing just
to see that, you know, people look at us like,
you know, you can be whatever you want to be.
Doesn't necessarily have to be a football player and be
like a superhero. But you could do something that people
do every day and they can be just as positive.
So you have an upcoming especially on the Food Network Saturday,
February six, one pm Eastern on Food Network, streaming on
(06:37):
Discovery Plus beginning February six. Tell me about it. What
can viewers expect? Man, it's gonna see ourselves, you know,
us being ourselves. Um, you know, we we've been through
a lot, were tasted a lot of cupcakes, a lot
of sweets and things in that nature. And it's a
baking competent. If you know Austin. Uh, you know that
we're known for the food trucks. And with that being said,
(06:58):
you know, you gotta have something that's gonna you know,
drive people to your business. Uh, we're just judging it.
We know we have a few contestants that you know,
have that family recipe has probably been in the family
for years and now they want to make a business
of it because they're strongly believe in it, and we're
just showing them the ins and outs of how to
run a business. I mean, we started from the ground
(07:19):
up and we worked our way into a brick and
mortar and you know they're trying to do the same thing,
have a food truck and possibly become big enough to
have a brick and mortar. So is it's a sweet
type of baking competition that can you get it done
inside the baking truck, but at the same time, can
you you know, sell it to the public and again,
you know, it gotta be worth the while. You know,
(07:39):
you can't charge a lot of money for something that
doesn't taste so good or vice versa. You can't charge
to unless you gotta make a profit. So we're just
understanding the business aspect of running a business through a
food truck. What did you find most Brian challenging about
making a TV shoot? What's been maybe you know, I
think us professional athletes, I think we were always constantly
(08:03):
on the goal and you know we're just moving and
and and things of that nature. You know, with shows
and commercials, I mean it's in thirty minutes show or
or whatever it could be. You know, the commercial maybe
thirty seconds, but it takes a week or it takes
a bunch of different cuts, and you know, it's a
bunch of breaks when we just want to go and
(08:24):
knock stuff out, but it's a lot of you know,
cutting the film up it's a lot of stuff behind
the scenes that we just had to get used to
and uh that that's probably the most challenging for me,
at least just sitting around when we could be just
knocking stuff out. I think the most what did you
have to work on? How about? I think the most
challenging for him was he had to jump right off
(08:45):
a flight from London straight in the film. Yeah. Yeah,
oh my god, I think that commercial take. How long
did it take, by the way, I think it's like
two days to three day Uh. Yeah, he landed at
seven o'clock that morning. We was trying to find an
outfit for him to wear, and then it was all
(09:07):
day that day. Then we went to another scene, then
we went to another scene. Then he had to jump
on a plane and shoot straight back in Nashville. So
I think that might have been the most challenging for him. Yeah,
I forgot about that, Yeah, griff a good point. Yeah
it was during the bye week, so serious. Yeah, I
don't got that much. I've got that much rest, So
you know, you're trying to knock stuff out. Let's been
(09:29):
a few times, a few moments talking about the time
in the business. How did you and your partner um
decide on this particular business. How did you guys decide
this one? Why? Yeah, well we all I think Griffin
alluded to it earlier. We are we always been just
we always hang out. Everybody, all the boys were live
(09:51):
in Austin. That's our that's our spot. I mean, all
the boys in the league. That of Texas. We live
in Awesome and there's not one guy that's not lives
out here. So we all hang out. Me, Griff and
Brian the other partner to hang out majority of the time.
And every single year, we always every off season, we
always eat dinner, hanging out like with the boys, and
we're always talking about different businesses and different things that
(10:14):
we want to do. We definitely wanted to be entrepreneurs.
You know, we've been structured the whole lives with football
and we wanted to kind of step outside of the
box and start, you know, leading the charge ourselves. There.
With me coming to Nashville, I was able to get
introduced to GS Cupcakes and obviously they're originated in Nashville.
Griff was still playing in Nashville. That was kind of
(10:36):
the blessing in the skies because they were obviously huge
fans being tightened fans. So we just decided one off season, like, hey,
let's do a cupcake shop. I know, I know it's
out of the box, but it's a low risk, high reward,
you know. We know GS Cupcakes hasn't um moved up
having located, and they don't have any locations in Austin.
(10:56):
Let's bring it out into Austin and and see what happens.
The guys loved it and we ran with it. We
started making our own phone calls. We didn't have assistance
and nothing. We were literally doing everything ourselves trying to
put it together. A long story short, I mean, we
we found uh some dirt in one of the centers
and we love the area, we love the spot, putting
(11:18):
some calls and we got the thing rolling from browned
up and here we are to day. Now, what made
you sign between as entrepreneurs a franchise or doing your
own thing? What were the factors in deciding that? Well,
when you look at doing your own thing, you know
again stepping outside the box with a franchise, they already
got a platform and they already have pretty much the
(11:40):
excess and os and and how to do everything. So
I think we were to do it again on we
branch out to do other things. Though we know how
businesses operate. We know, we know the whole game plan now.
Um And with the franchise, you know, they already had
every you kind of knew how they did things and
and it's just learning. And that was the best way.
You know, it was just apply something that's already been done,
(12:03):
that's already been successful. And Gus was already success, especially
in Nashville. So we went with the franchises because they
already had everything and and and and works. So we
just knew that we just had to follow those guidelines.
But it's funny as we were doing them and as
we just watching again, like you said, it was just
clearly just dirt. Um as we watched them build our
shot from the ground up, It's like, okay, we we
(12:26):
you know, I can actually build a building right now.
It's funny now because I mean we're building the house
and you know, just talking to them and they're saying
X and those and I'm like, no, I've been just
done this before. Like I know how the plumbing and
I know how this works. I know how this works,
I know how you bid this you bid that. So
all those things now just you know, you can apply
that going forward. So I think when you go to
business school, these are the things you don't learn. You
(12:47):
just know how to run the business. But you know,
now we had to go back and do it again.
There's ways here and there that we could have actually
saved some money here and there as we was building
doing our build out. So again it was just the
act that they already had a foundation and now that's
something that we can use going forward when it comes
to doing other businesses. I know Brian has a couple
of other things going on and things that they're just
(13:09):
so it it helps us branch off and do other things.
Because we we did it from the ground up. It
wasn't like, hey, we're opening this up. Hire somebody and
we're you know, poof, we're gone and just say hey,
we own it. No, it's it's been days. It's days
that we went in there at six o'clock in the morning.
I know there was one time where you know, hey,
let's get ahead. I'm up there at twelve am, one
(13:31):
am in the morning, baking and stuff, just to get
ahead because we may have been short staff. Being a
national football League. We could probably all attest this. We've
seen guys lose money and they don't know where what
happened to it. They have no rhyme and reason. And
that was the one thing again, like we said, we
pride ourselves and being successful the National Football League, being
successful young men, black men, and we want to continue
(13:53):
to be successful. We don't want to be one of
those guys that you know, thirty for thirty shows or
whatever it is. When you see people that are we
and the words of Brian, you know, he's being real
nice right now, but he said, you pull if you
got that camera, you gotta sit on that stool. That
ain't a good story you're about to tell. Work. We
(14:16):
worked too hard. I mean, as young men, you get
so much money so quickly, and you see a lot
of people that that when they're done, they don't have
nothing to show for it. And that was the one
thing that we want to make sure. We know the ends,
We know the outs. You know, we we we have
a weekly call with our manager. You know, sometimes we
just pop up. But at the same time, we knew
as football players, you know, we we we appreciate when
(14:38):
you get throwing a little bone here and there. So
you know Saturdays, Hey, what do y'all want for lunch?
And we'll send them lunch just so to keep them
motivating things that they're just so. It's again we understand
its teamwork. You know, we all work together if if
we if we are unsuccessful, we all are successful. They're unsuccessful.
We unsuccessful. We just know how it all works hand
in hand, all works together. How important is for I
(15:00):
just anybody thinking about business? How did you guys keep
your bond and it was and your bond together U
partlating to fruitfulness in a business because sometimes guys friends
and their college classmates in dubor detriment. How will you
guys able to work together? You gotta got it has
(15:23):
to be organic. Organic has to be genuine, I think,
and this is a same ass plug. But that's why
the University of Texas we're special. We're a special group
of men. Tell me why you say that. I know
you're saying and just tell me that what I mean
by that is I say that all the time being
(15:44):
to leave me and grouping for a long time, and
everybody is always jealous on how we we we a
Texas are from present, past or the future you know,
we know the route that it takes to get to
the NFL or in life in general, and we all
consider each other brothers. When I say that, is that
(16:07):
where when you start doing talking money in business, you
gotta go into business with your brothers, with people that
you know, people that you started from the bottom with UM.
And if it ain't genuine, if it's all about me, me, me,
me me, it's not gonna work myself. Griffin Brian. Brian
obviously didn't go to the athletic route, but he was
still one of the boys. We always been close. It's
(16:27):
nothing that I can't tell them. There's nothing we can't
joke about, nothing that we can't be serious about UM.
And we just keeping one hunting with each other. I
think that's really really makes a great relationship. It's it's
actually an enviable relationship. Because as I listened to you
your bond you Michael and uh another brand, I think
(16:47):
about um Lebron James. He seemed to have developed that
bond with guys all the way from a childhood and
those bonds have parlaid in two man all of a sudden.
Now you gotta hild agent the whole collection of the
different giftings. Yeah, beneficial to the group, Yeah, definitely. I
(17:09):
mean it's it's it's a special bomb because again, you
talk about Brian Henson, you know, he's been in the
business world and and you know he's one of those
guys that you know, you know, you know, you had
that entourage back when you know, you played or whatever
it may be, and you have those guys is just
hanging onto the coattail. But again, you know, it's one
of those things with Brian Henson and having that that friendship,
(17:30):
you know, to the table with his money where this
water open. You know, uh, when we did this business,
it was like, hey, we're doing everything split right down
the middle, you know, three ways. Even though no one
saw that that that Microsoft commercial, it was split three ways.
Even when we did the show that's coming up on
February six, you know, we say, hey, we're not doing
(17:50):
this unless little Brian is in there with us. You know,
we had our ups and our downs. But the one thing,
you know, I know Rack told one of our employees,
this shouldn't lose no friendship over no cupcakes. So so
you know that that's the one thing. The end of
the day, it's cupcakes. You know. And that's the one
thing that with with family and everything else, it's it's
(18:13):
more than cupcakes. It's a family. It's a true brotherhood. Uh,
it's a true friendship. Is genuine. It wasn't like, hey,
meet meet this guy over here and meet this It's
not nothing like that. It's one of those things like hey,
can you pick me up over It doesn't matter what
time and the day, what time in the night, it
doesn't matter. If you know, if I see his wife
struggling with something, I'm gonna stop everything I'm doing to
(18:35):
go do that. He's gonna do the same thing for
my wife and my kids and everything else. It's a
real genuine friendship. Let alone. The kids call each other
uncles and things and that nature. So it's it's a
very genuine friendship. And I think that's that's one of
the things that makes this thing very special. How did
you guys end up connected with the commercial GIS cupcakes
with Microsoft? You know? They called up, Yeah, they called us.
(18:59):
They heard the story, um, and they heard the story
just like everybody else did, and they reached out the
blowing up our shop. Me and Griff, we don't really
like answering a lot of our you know, phone calls
and you get a lot of fluff. You know, everybody
knows that, so we we just blew it over. But
our manager actually is the one that took the initiative
to take it seriously. Um and then they we we
(19:21):
knew who it was and you can add on if
you want to do it, because they kept calling the
shop and somebody like wanted to come speak to us,
and I was like, you know what, I'll sit down
with him. Well, another guy that Rack knew contacted him
and was like, hey, Microsoft reached out, but we're trying
to get ahold of these guys. Rack knew him. But
(19:41):
they was trying to call the shop. Like he said,
we get calls all the time. So it was crazy
because I'm like, hey, I got this possible opportunity and
Rack was like, well I got one too. Well what
you got And it's like it's the same person trying
to reach But I'm you'd be some some of the
(20:01):
things that that come through that door and something phone
calls we get in. I mean, it was I guess
you gotta say it's a blessing the skies because I
mean we probably wouldn't even thought twice about it, but
it just it came from so many different angles. It
was like okay, and then again the hardest part was like,
all right, cool, we got a timeline. Think it was
(20:23):
like October. He was over in London. Hey, we gotta
film this now because we gotta get this commercial for playoffs.
We're like, okay, well, rack, when can you make it?
And it was it was all right, when we get here,
we're just going to shoot it. And again people don't
even believe. It's like there was no script. It was
just be yourselves, just go with it, be yourselves. So
(20:44):
there was absolutely no script when it came to that,
just be yourselves. So it's interesting in the business, it
looks like you also have to be aware of opportunities
you have, you have you got, you gotta be open.
You know a lot of times when you I tell
people this all the time and and now I've been
outside that bubble. But we all know it's professional athletes,
college athletes, you know, even high school athletes. You're you're
(21:07):
stuck in this bubble. And this bubble that you're in
is this bubble that you are around people that are
like you may not look like you may be different coach,
but we all have a common interest which is sports,
which is football. So I tell people like, you know,
it was hard. Like my neighbor, I've been living in
the same house and I've before I got out the lead,
I never spoke to my neighbor because I was in
(21:28):
this bubble. Like I get up, I go work out,
I trained, I speak to my teammates, I speak to
my coaches. And I had my wife and my kids,
other guys that went to University of Tech. That was
my bubble. We eat lunch, may hang we hang out
at night. It was our wives, our kids. But that
was the bubble I was in. But when I got
out the lead two years before I RACK, it was like, okay,
(21:50):
you know, everybody's busy. You know who do you talk to?
And then you can sitting out there in the front
yard and you're going to your kids school and somebody's like, hey,
how are you doing? Oh your Maya's father. Yeah, okay,
so you've been playing, I ain't seeing you. My name
is excellent. And then you start trying to develop and
meet new friendships and things in that nature. And even
with that, you know, more opportunities are just coming because
(22:11):
you know, it's it's you know, and that was the thing.
I think a lot of people need to take advantage that,
especially when you're playing, especially when're a high profile athlete.
You know, people are looking for opportunities. People are looking
for that next big thing, And I think that was
one of the things that maybe if we would open
our eyes up a long time ago. We always talked
about it, but maybe they probably would have been more
(22:31):
opportunities that would have presented themselves if I would have
got out of that bubble and just you know, gave
people opportunities of just you know, just speaking and just
being cordial and just having conversations. That's what each of
you guys would share with current players today, just what
you're saying right now. Most definitely, I definitely would um
because I'm I'm on the opposite side of the spectrum.
(22:53):
I hate meeting people. I mean, that's just me. I'm
not the best social person when it comes to even
people outside of my bubble, you know, But that's just
that's just come with the nature of the beach. We
get bothered with so many things. I wouldn't say bothered,
but it's it's it can be distracting when you're trying
to be you know, top of your craft, you know,
and I kind of erased that. But as you get
(23:16):
older and wiser, you start realizing that people have a
lot to offer, or maybe just a genuine friendship. You know. Overall,
I love football, Griff loves football. We all love football.
We've been doing it since when we're young. But at
the same time, you know, you can still be great
at your craft, but also you know, prepare for that afterlife,
like um, like majority of people, as we close out
(23:39):
and want to do a few rapid fires, and these
are This is advice for current players or even legends.
Here's the first thing. We have current players and legends
listening in. What would be your advice for guys in
finding their next chapter? The first question is when should
they start thinking about their next chapter? I would say, uh,
(24:00):
that's a good one because I understand that you know,
when you you know, when you go through that combine
and you're playing football, you at the top of your game.
But that offseason when you're trying to go to Cobbo
or Vegas or New York or whatever it is, you know, explore,
explore all the opportunities you know, take that time to
(24:20):
to start jotting down ideas. You see a lot of
people that leave this game unexpectingly, not on your terms.
Jot down ideas, you know, because it came never you
never know, you just never know. I've seen people that
a freak accident, you know, break a ankle or king
player cancuse. I've seen it. And again I just I
advise the younger generation, you know, jot down ideas. You know, um,
(24:46):
it's it's it's gonna be tough, you know, with this
world today. So I advise people, don't put all your
eggs in one basket. I mean I know I did,
and I would say I did it. But you know,
I tell my son every day, I tell my daughters
every day. You know, every all, even though maybe you
know my flesh and my blood, we're all different and
everybody's past is not the same. So I would say,
(25:07):
you know, jot down ideas. And if you do have ideas,
if you're interesting in something exploring, see if you can
start doing your research and and start um figuring out
different chapters in life. You know, be prepared if that
if that one door closed, no one opens, but be prepared,
be one step ahead the late great coach Paul Brown.
He made a statement and he would share with the guys,
(25:29):
find your life's work. So even in being businessmen right now,
was there ever any passion where you, guys, since this
would we would do some type of business. Maybe you
don't know what it was as far as possibility of
your life for work. Yeah, yeah, I think it was.
I think we all, I think we both share the
passion for entrepreneurship just business in general. I think we
(25:51):
got tired, Like I said, we got tired of the
structured way of life. We got I got tired of
you know, it's just a point of time where you
get older material you want to be your own boss.
That's just me personally. Um, and I felt like we
did the homework, we did the research, and we put
the same amount of effort that we were put in
(26:12):
an off season working out to being a professional athlete.
We put that same amount of effort into being entrepreneurs.
And that's you know, that's one thing you can't take
away from us as athletes. Though we were gonna work
outwork you any day of the week, there's no way
you can't out work because we and we have that
that um advantage over people more than you know it,
(26:35):
and I think we used that to our advantage to
create what we wanted to do in life. But how
did you do it? Because some players, when they finished
that level of hard work in the league, they're like
unbutting they built. They don't won't ever work that hard
at getting something else. Hence why there's probably a huge
fail you rate because guys don't want to approach you
(26:56):
with that level of of diligence as we do in
a game of football. How did you guys do it?
I think it was it's it's a motivational factor because
again when you talk about a friendship and you're talking
about a teamwork and things that made us successful. I
think the biggest thing was I wasn't gonna let Rack down.
(27:17):
You know, when we started this business, he was still playing,
and you know the one thing that we wanted to
make sure for him was listen. I've been there. I
I got up every morning and watched you. You know,
we we know what it took to to be successful
football players. And I know what you're going through. You're
in Nashville, I'm here in Austin. There's no excuses for
(27:38):
why I can't hold down the fort while you're gone.
And I think that also goes to Brian Hinton the
same way as I can't let him down the same
way he has at Hohle full full time job and
he's taking the time out of the day to do
his part of it. So I think that's what motivators was.
I'm not gonna let my teammate down. I'm not gonna
let my friend down. I ain't gonna let cut case
(28:00):
come between us, you know. And again you know, not
only do I got my money into it, but he
got his money into it too, And we know that
you know money. You know, money is the root of
all evil skin in the game, we call it, right,
So you know that was one thing is I'm not
gonna let you waste your money, but I ain't trying
to waste my money either, So I think that's another
(28:22):
motivational factor. One of the questions I had was about
how do you connect with people that you could trust.
That seems to be a challenge when when you're your
current player or even a legend. But I want to
repeat back to you, guys, because you've already answered the question.
All three of you guys including Brian Henson, had skin
in the game. Then I also heard of another wise
(28:42):
statement Brian you made you said, this investment, we didn't
put all of our money into it. This was a
small portion of each of you guys, whatever amount of
money you have. You didn't put all of your eggs
in this basket. Can you speak to that why that
was so important? Well, yeah, yeah, no, yeah, it was.
(29:05):
I mean, we we wanted to we wanted to learn first,
We wanted to learn. We wanted to kind of groom
ourselves to do bigger and better things, and that's why
we went the franchise route. It was, like I said,
it was a small, low risk, high reward type of
mentality that we initially was going to do from the start.
You know, we could have definitely done a big facility
(29:28):
that cost millions of dollars. But we have no training,
we have no knowledge. We're literally just coming out of
the game, and that is the stupidest thing to do.
You have to start off again, say it again, because
so many, for whatever reason, yeah, make those huge, huge
mistakes that you guys were able to avoid. Yeah, we
(29:51):
I mean I say it all the time. You can
you can have the nicest facility. You can have the
nicest club restaurant, whatever the case, maybe the lights. Everything
is great. But if you have no knowledge, if you
have no no whereabouts with how to run run a business,
no staff, and you will fail every single time. So
(30:13):
my best advice would be Grip's best advice would be
to start small, learn it, learn the ins and outs
of running a small efficient business. And then once you
master that small business, that was very I mean it's
almost as if you as if you got fined in
the NFL game. I mean that's that starts small for
(30:35):
that amount, and then you start learning, you know ll LLCs,
you start learning how to run your staff, you start
learning how you know inventory, payroll, everything that comes with
running the business. I mean it literally pays off because
now from speaking from myself, g g has helped me
prepare propel me to do other and bigger things. I'm
(30:55):
about to get ready to run an e sports facility.
Now I gotta restore coming with a bunch of other
things that I learned just from being hands on with
the small business I did with Griffin Bryant. I think
that the attested that and and the biggest thing exist
it's that investment part. You know. It's it's easy for somebody,
you know, these friends and things that come up to
(31:17):
you know, the player that's working his tail off, that
has the money. Hey, I could do this, I could
do that, I could do this. I got a great idea.
But how much do they have invested in that? And
I think that's the biggest thing. I think the biggest thing,
and and the and the thing I think that really
made this bond so much stronger is that we all
got the same amount invested. You know, we all we
(31:38):
all invested equally, you know. And I think that that's
the biggest thing. And you know, he keeps saying small investment.
I'm cheep that that that he they know me, I
ain't going nowhere when it comes They know how cheap
I am. It wasn't they had to come in me.
(32:00):
They still they convinced me about this house. They know
I stayed inside. I don't do all that. I'm cheap
and want Anyone who's interested in business or just want
to join a group of business people go to NFL
Legends Business directory dot com to request registration, which is
a resource for NFL Legends that own a business This
network provides elevator visibility for business opportunities within the NFL
(32:25):
it's members, clubs, and partners, and the broader NFL Legends community,
and includes network and opportunities and guidance on how to
achieve business goals. Saturday, February six, I want to get
the information out again. Saturday is February six, at one
pm Eastern on Food Network, streaming on Discovery beginning February six.
(32:49):
I can't wait to see y'all again in your peak, Aprons.
We got you, my man. We got to appreciate it.
Thanks for joining us. The best is yet to come.
This has been the NFL Legends Podcast. To provide feedback
or request a topic for discussion, email us at NFL
Legends at NFL dot com
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