February 19, 2025 • 43 mins
In this episode of Restaurant Catering Smarts, Michael Attias welcomes Butch Scott, Owner/Operator of Taylor Grocery Special Events Catering in Taylor, Mississippi. With over two decades in the restaurant and catering industry, Butch has built a multi-million-dollar catering business rooted in southern hospitality, consistency, and customer relationships.
Butch shares his journey from running Abbeville Catfish to scaling Taylor Grocery’s catering operations to nearly $4 million in annual sales—all in a town of just 50,000 people. He dives into:
✅ The power of a well-maintained customer database and how it fueled a 10x revenue increase
✅ The importance of menu packaging to simplify sales and operations
✅ Why relationships & word-of-mouth marketing still outperform traditional advertising
✅ How technology & AI are shaping the future of catering sales and marketing
From corporate drop-offs to high-end weddings, Butch has seen it all and shares his best strategies for scaling a catering business while maintaining quality and service. Whether you’re just starting out or looking to take your catering sales to the next level, this episode is packed with insights you can apply today!
Restaurant Catering Smarts is sponsored by CaterZen Catering Software.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:28):
Hello again, I'm Michael Attias, your host of Restaurant Catering Smarts and today's guestis Butch Scott, owner and operator of Taylor Grocery Special Events Catering, a renowned
catering company based in Taylor, Mississippi.
With over two decades of experience in the food and event planning industry, Butch hasbuilt a reputation for delivering exceptional culinary experiences for weddings, corporate
(00:51):
events, and private parties.
Known for his attention to detail, creativity, and commitment to quality, Butch'sexpertise
extends beyond just great food.
He's also a trusted partner and helping clients bring their event visions to life.
As a passionate advocate for local ingredients and southern hospitality, Butch continuesto lead his team with innovation and a dedication to exceeding client expectations.
(01:14):
And we're thrilled to have him on the show today.
But before we get into asking Butch a bunch of questions, let's take a minute to recognizeour sponsor.
This episode is brought to you by CaterZen Catering Software, the industry leader inhelping restaurants turn their
catering chaos in the calm.
Discover why top independent and enterprise restaurants trust CaterZen to save them timeand increase their catering sales.
(01:36):
Go to www.caterzen.com and sign up for a walkthrough of the software or a free 30 daytrial.
Now let's dive into this episode of Restaurant Catering Smarts.
Welcome, Butch, how are you doing today?
No, the pleasure is all mine and we'll get into our history in a minute.
(01:57):
But I like to start everybody off with an icebreaker question.
And that is, give me a number between one and 300.
I got this magic question machine.
Let's see, let's go with 24.
That's my lucky number.
Let's see how lucky it is.
If you suddenly lost two hours every day, a 22 hour day, what would you cut out of yourcurrent schedule to culminate for the lost time?
(02:23):
That's tough because I really don't do anything but work and sleep.
So I guess I'd probably cut some sleep out.
I think at our age, it's sleep.
That's about the only thing.
We're not sleeping anyway.
I'm not.
That's true.
You know, we've known each other- I think we were catering out of chuck wagons when wemet.
(02:44):
That's how long we've known each other.
So before you had Taylor, you had Abbeville Catfish right?
So why don't you tell everybody how you got started in the restaurant business, how youended up with Abbeville, how you ended up with Taylor Grocery.
OK, I'll be glad to.
(03:05):
Back in the 90s, I started working for a guy that had a fresh and wholesale seafood marketin Oxford, Mississippi.
We did a lot of seafood, so almost all the restaurants are seafood in Oxford.
Had a little unique business plan and from there I decided I want to get into therestaurant business, buy the local restaurant.
(03:25):
The owners were ready to retire.
It was named Abbeville Catfish.
It was one of those all you could eat seafood buffet restaurants.
So we served a lot of different things there.
Probably about five or six years into that, I added catering.
We started catering, did that for a few years, got really burnt out on the restaurant,woke up one day and said, I've had enough of the restaurant business.
(03:49):
I'm going to do a little catering.
That lasted for about three years.
I had some family members that were working with me.
They burned out.
Next thing I knew, it was Butch by himself again.
So I had the opportunity to get rid of my catering equipment.
Sold that to a gentleman that owns a Taylor Grocery restaurant, his name was Lynn Hewlett.
That was in December of 2005, January of 2006.
(04:13):
He said, "Hey man, we've done a little drop off stuff, but nothing like you've ever done.
Would you come help me for a few months?" and a few months turned into several years.
Pretty much built a catering business that was associated with Taylor Grocery restaurant.
Kobe came along.
Family dynamics caused some issues.
(04:34):
We both agreed that the end of my time with Taylor Grocery would be at the end of 2020.
That was about January that year.
About November, he wanted to know what I was going to do.
We talked about it and opportunity.
He made the opportunity available to buy the catering side of this business, so we have apartner that worked for me at that time.
(04:54):
We took over Taylor Grocery Catering in January of 2021.
Very cool.
Well, I have friends that went to Ole Miss and when I tell them one of my clients isTaylor Grocery, they've been to your events, you know, tailgates and what.
So you've got a phenomenal reputation.
And, unfortunately, I don't get to know all my clients as well as I'd like to.
(05:18):
I think there's just.
There's only so many hours in the day, but you're about as old school as they come.
So for those who don't know, before I started CaterZen, there was Restaurant CateringSystems.
Before that, I don't know what it was called, The Results Group or something.
I sold The Catering Magic System
And you were one of my first clients probably in 2003.
(05:41):
If I go back far enough, how did you find me and what precipitated you looking for me?
Well, I was looking for a better way on the marketing side.
We were full blast in the restaurant business.
I think we were connected to a guy that had a marketing program by name of Rory Bass.
Yep.
(06:02):
And that's where we got to know each other.
I liked your catering magic.
You called yourself the catering evangelist.
No, I was the barbecue evangelist at Corky's.
That's right.
back we go and I was interested in what you were doing.
We were just getting started doing some catering and so I subscribed to your programLearned a lot about marketing, grew the business a little bit, or quite a bit, and so
(06:31):
that's sort of where we got started at together
Yeah, and you know, what I tell people is...
you know, when you try to help people do things, it's like personal training.
You know, you go to the gym, 5 % do things, 95 % make excuses.
And you know, I always love the fact that you would gravitate towards things, make themhappen.
(06:53):
So you get a sense of pride seeing that, you know, what I did in my restaurant wasn't justa one off, you know, flashing the pan, seeing other guys like you.
has made a huge difference.
What would you say, you know, working out of Taylor and I'm assuming they sit still, areyou working out of their property?
(07:16):
Yes, we're in a separate location than the restaurant.
Lynn did not want to this property, so we have a long-term lease on the property here.
The lease is probably longer than I'll live.
Well, I hope you live to be 120 for starters.
Well, if I live to be 120, I probably won't still come into coming to work every day.
(07:39):
Yeah, well you'll have too many grandkids by then they'll be running it.
You got five, you just had a grandson.
That's exciting.
it is.
It is.
We're excited to have grandson number three.
Wow, yeah, would you say girls catch up?
You got two granddaughters?
up.
Two granddaughters and three grandsons.
Yeah, I'm in no hurry to be a grandfather.
(08:01):
I think I'm too young, so I will just call myself an uncle if I become a grandfather.
Well, I'll have to share this with you.
One of my the mother of my fifth grandson, my youngest daughter, Molly Kate When she wasborn, she came along later in life was 12 years difference, I believe, between her and her
older sister.
(08:22):
And I used to walk around with her as a toddler at the restaurant and people used tocongratulate me on my granddaughter.
So that tells you how bad that was.
So.
Wow, that's crazy.
That is crazy.
Yeah, so at Taylor, are y'all doing drop off events and full service events?
(08:44):
What's the mix of what you're doing?
We, you know, Michael, really we do a little bit of everything.
We started out the Taylor Grocery was known for catfish as well as Abbeville Catfish wedid a lot of catfish and through the years as people have asked, we've expanded.
So now we call ourselves a full service caterer.
We do everything from corporate drop off orders, to grand gala banquets and everything inbetween.
(09:09):
We have menus
for every meal period and everything in between.
Awesome.
What makes you stand out in your market?
Because obviously, Oxford's a big college town.
I grew up up the road in Memphis.
I know that game day weekends, it's busy.
What makes you stand out in the marketplace?
Do you consider you have competition?
We all have competition.
(09:30):
You can go to the grocery store, you can make it yourself.
But what makes you stand out?
Why are people coming to you over and over again?
And people are reporting back to me in Nashville, what a good job you
do.
You know, I think part of it is we do put a lot of love into our food is what I tellpeople and we treat people the way we want to be treated.
(09:51):
I think I heard on your last podcast something - 'fess up to the mistake or something likethat.
If we're not.
That's that's it.
That's not when you mess up.
Yeah, I'm gonna copy that and put it up on the wall here, but.
know, you know what I say is don't get caught.
(10:11):
That's you know, you know my brother and sister got busted for everything and and I said Idid the same thing.
I was just smart enough not to get caught.
Well, you know, we had that discussion with my family over Christmas.
My brother and sister got busted with everything and I didn't.
So like you said, I was just smarter.
(10:33):
You know, it's funny.
Now that my kids are young adults and, you know, starting off in their life, you get thereal stories when they were growing up.
And like, I had no idea some of the stuff they did.
It was nothing that would get them, you know, nothing major, but it's like, interesting.
So even if you think your kids are angels, they got a little devil stuff going on.
(10:54):
Exactly.
Exactly.
What percentage of your business is spent creating custom menus versus you've got setmenus?
Because I know a lot of people in the restaurant business, they're working off more setmenus.
Do you have a philosophy about menus?
My philosophy is we try to develop packages that people want and enjoy and then if youwant something customized, we'll customize it for you.
(11:25):
Percentage wise, probably 80 to 85 % of what we do is already published menus and about 15% is customized.
Yeah, I think a lot of people...
they underestimate the value of packages.
Because at the end of the day, you could put most things in a package.
If you take the fanciest wedding in the world, You know, do you want appetizers?
(11:48):
Okay, which appetizers do you want?
Do you want a chocolate fountain?
Do you want this?
How many entrees do you want?
You want plated?
You want buffet?
It can all be put and then you add an upsell for the more premium sides.
And I think what that does is I think what gave us an advantage in the early
days of Corky's is we created these packages and it made it easy for the customer tounderstand like you know in simple terms we had different names you want a one meat a two
(12:17):
meat a three meat everybody knows you're gonna pay more for ribs than you're gonna pay forpork you can pay more for fillet than you can pay for car roast beef right and so it just
makes it easy that you don't have to be a culinary genius or no food math to put thesepackages together anybody can
and look at a list and say which package you want, what options do you want, this is whatI recommend and you move on.
(12:44):
You know, that's true.
We copied a lot of what you did when I was developing menus for our catering business andwe built packages.
We have our Taylor fish fry, which starts out with fried catfish, chicken tenders and hushpuppies.
And then we allow the customers to customize it from the standpoint that they get to picktheir sides.
They have a list of about 20 sides.
(13:07):
They get to pick three of those.
We have a list of about 12 desserts.
They get to pick their dessert and everything's
one package dinnerware.
They can choose whether they want the standard upgraded plastic or if they want to go toChina, we can do that as well.
And you know that that type of menu probably fits 90 % of our customers and it makes iteasy for them.
(13:31):
It's easy for us because my kitchen is used to preparing it and you know you talk aboutweddings and stuff and everybody wants to upscale it.
Well, if you look at our wedding menus.
Most of our wedding menus are the same things that we serve every day.
And I tell brides that, we take good Southern food that you and your families used toeating and we add a touch of elegance to it for your wedding.
(13:57):
Yeah, I mean, it's amazing how just sprucing it up makes a difference, right?
It is, you know, an example I talked about the Taylor fish fry, our most popular weddingpackage, we call it the high cotton package and it starts with catfish and fried chicken
tenders.
Man, I'm starving right now.
I haven't had fried catfish in so long.
(14:18):
I'm down in Costa Rica.
They don't have fried catfish down here ,and Hush Puppies.
But I did make, just as an aside, there's a local restaurant.
The woman is incredible.
She's a Costa Rican.
Their family owns like a little motel and she runs the restaurant.
They make their hamburger buns from scratch every day.
They do a barbecue brisket over coffee wood, phenomenal brisket.
(14:40):
I went in there one afternoon.
I made her Nashville hot chicken for her and her crew.
said, can I come in one afternoon and make you some Nashville hot chicken?
So that was a lot of fun.
They enjoyed it and it was fun for me.
I got my Nashville hot chicken fix without having to go home.
There you go, that's the way to do it.
Maybe we need to send you some catfish so you can take on your next trip to Costa Rica.
(15:01):
I don't know that it would get through security, but maybe I could find some fish and it'sthe cornmeal that makes it.
It's all about, I like the cornmeal, the crunch.
And we used to do a Cajun tartar sauce with ours.
So let's talk about sales and marketing.
You know, I have found just like everything in life.
(15:24):
It's not who has the best product, it's who's the best sales and marketer.
If you have both, that helps you even more.
What has been your philosophy to sales and marketing and how have you grown over theyears, your two catering businesses?
Sales and marketing, guess in a nutshell would be we follow the wheel that's already beencreated instead of trying to create something new.
(15:50):
And simply meaning we have taken success such as your success in the catering business andtried to copy what you do.
The one thing that you taught me that's the most important thing that you taught me is nomatter what, protect your database, build that database.
This building could burn down.
(16:11):
and let's hope it doesn't, knocking on wood.
But within two days I could be back in business with my same customers because I have adatabase of those customers.
I have a database of everything they've ordered and their preferences.
And so, you know, that's important.
Build that database and then we market to the database.
(16:32):
Why do you think as a general rule people are, I don't want to call them lazy, but I'lluse the word lazy.
They're lazy when it comes to keeping a database of their customers.
You go into a lot of places and you know, they're using paper and pen or, and some peopleare using software, but why do you think they're lazy with keeping up with their database
and also marketing their database?
(16:55):
You know, think part of that is not that they're lazy.
They're just so busy putting out the media fire that they don't prepare for the future.
You know, you think about that.
You know, like I said, we take our database and do anything we want.
We sent one email out probably around the end of July, the first of August for tailgating.
(17:15):
And we literally had hundreds of customers that booked orders for the whole footballseason for tailgating.
Wow.
used to, we picked up the phone and called, or we sat on the phone and would hope thosepeople called us.
So, you know, we reach out to our customers, Thanksgiving orders are the same one.
(17:36):
We smoke anywhere and fry four to 500 turkeys a year, plus all the sides and everything togo along with it.
And a simple email starts every bit of that.
Yeah.
You know, I tell people if you do nothing else but email your database once a month justto let them know whether it's something a season's coming up.
You got a special menu that season like Super Bowl, you know, is coming up.
(18:01):
It's the holidays, Fourth of July.
There's there's there's always a reason that you can be in front of everybody once a monthwith something.
You don't have to bombard them.
Catering customers don't want to be bombarded.
They just need that gentle nudge.
Now, you know, I put together
this podcast to help people in the industry but obviously it's also a shameless plug forKader's end so I'm not gonna deny that but you would appreciate where we're headed I mean
(18:28):
you've seen us from the beginning you know we started from nothing we're working on a listselection tool with the CRM where you can pick up anything about a customer you know the
tax exempt what group they're in you know anything you want to know about them but also
anything about event types or order history.
(18:51):
So if you want to know everybody booked a holiday party, you could do an email, a phonecall, a task, eventually a sequence.
Same thing, you if you want to, like what you did before, you probably sent out a massemail.
It'd be really nice to say, hey, just the people who booked tailgates last year, let mesend them something in July and say, hey, we're going up on prices, but if you book by the
(19:15):
end of July, we'll lock you in.
on this or we'll do this for you.
Now you got this business, you know, locked in.
Same thing with the people who book turkeys.
Hey, last year we sold 400 turkeys, we've got 500 on order, we know we're gonna sell outof the 500.
If you want in, get in.
So now you're not worrying about promoting.
(19:37):
You've got that business locked in for the holidays, right?
no doubt and you know a couple years ago turkeys were very short and they were very veryexpensive and we were able to pre book some turkeys at a great price and We told folks
we've got I think it was 420 something turkeys that we've been able to secure when they'regone to go folks And I mean the orders came in like you wouldn't So that's that's great
(20:08):
been able to do that
market to a certain segment of your customers is something that is very important for us.
You we used to try to do that with a piece of paper and an old Rellodex on the desk withthe person's name and their company and man, you changed catering for me when you started.
(20:31):
I'm so old, we had to hire Pony Express to send out my messages.
Now, I mean, now I'm gonna tell you how damn old I am.
Even though I look like Dick Clark, I don't age.
But I had to lick stamps and peel off labels watching TV at night sending out mailers.
(20:54):
That's how long, you know, I go back.
And you know, another thing that we're doing, and again, this speaks like you do weddingswhere I don't know if you have a catering inquiry form on your website that fits, feeds in
our system.
Okay.
into this list selection tool.
You can say, hey, all the brides that are getting married in September or later, we wantto do a promotion to them.
(21:20):
So if they filled out the wedding catering inquiry form, and you'll have a QR code thatyou can take to trade shows, and they could fill it out on their phone to enter a drawing,
and you can put them in a sequence.
So we're really thinking very strategically.
Do you have anybody on your team that does the marketing or are you the only guy you trustto do that?
(21:44):
We recently hired probably a couple years ago a young lady to help us with our socialmedia marketing.
She takes care of that and then she also writes a lot of the emails and stuff for us butshe is a independent contractor.
She's not actually on payroll.
So she does a good job for us.
(22:06):
I think I saw first year we hired her to do a better job of managing our marketing, oursales.
about 35%.
Wow, and what did she do?
Like, what do feel that she was doing that, you know, my guess is like, I envision you outon a Saturday morning, you're making sure the food's cooked, the trucks are loaded, you
(22:29):
know, you're chicken with the head cut off, right?
And the marketing gets done when you finally could sit down at eight o'clock at night, eata plate of food.
you know, grab a beer and get around to it.
Hopefully if you don't pass out, what is what was she doing that you didn't have the timeto do?
Because I know you have the knowledge, right?
(22:51):
We go back a long way like you could teach the class, right?
So what was she doing that you weren't doing to get that sales increase?
She was doing it consistently and professionally.
You you talked about chicken with a head cut off at one time.
(23:11):
I went to every event we did.
I can remember one Saturday, I went to five different weddings in five different towns.
And so you're right.
I had very little time and most of my marketing emails was on Monday morning when it was,crap, I should have sent this out last week.
Let me send an email out real quick.
And it was, was for lack of a better word, most of time it was sloppy.
(23:36):
And then she came in and added a level of professional appearance to our emails that areworded well, has a call of action.
And then she promotes it also around our social media.
And we sat down usually around December or sometime the first couple of months of theyear, we talk about here's what we want to market and when we want it to go out.
(24:00):
So, you know, it's just being consistent and on time with stuff that she's really added inme.
You know, Michael, I'm fixing to be 64 years old.
Sure, I have Facebook, but I'm not going to learn how to mark that on Facebook.
got off my space?
Yeah man, I got off my space.
I never did do much on my space.
(24:22):
don't think.
I had one friend, his name was Tom.
Yeah, I think I had a, I think I got a Facebook account.
It's probably seven, eight years ago.
So that tells you how far behind I am.
I don't even know anymore.
And I will tell you, because I know in the restaurant business, we all have limitedresources, right?
(24:42):
It's not like Silicon Valley, Bill Gates, he's got more money to spend on marketing thanGod.
So with the world being literally international, you can get on Upwork, you could findsomebody.
We have somebody in South Africa who
produces this podcast, you know.
Mikhaila probably reached out to you.
(25:02):
She coordinated everything so I just have to show up and I don't have to do much, right?
And then she promotes it afterwards.
She edits the clips.
She does everything.
We have people in the Philippines that can manage databases, so even if you don't have abig budget the world is literally at your fingertips.
And I don't know are y'all using AI much to write any of your marketing, you know, she's
(25:25):
doing any of that.
Not yet.
She's becoming familiar with it before she starts using it.
We talked about it.
I gave her a project.
back during the holidays that she's working on where...
She's producing a video so that when someone places an online order, part of theacknowledgement that they'll get back, of course, the order confirmation that they catered
(25:45):
in.
And then we're going to create a way for a video to go out that is basically showing ourstaff getting prepped and getting everything out the door to show them that we're getting
ready to do their order.
And so she's putting that together.
We've talked about that.
And I have an idea.
She has the knowledge how to put it together.
(26:06):
Well, you need worker bees idea bees, you know, I don't I'm the last guy you want to workbecause I'm too scattered.
I like to come up with a vision that that fires me up and, you know, try to figure outwhat's next.
And the stuff in my head, but I can't even get it done quick enough.
(26:27):
Not enough hours in the day.
So we're talking about her, the marketing, AI.
You know, we're starting to use AI in our company for everything from training tooperations manuals to sales and marketing.
I had a referral source.
(26:47):
This guy calls me up because I have a chain interested in your software, but they'relooking at three other catering software companies and they're all different.
What's the difference?
Well, how long do you think it would take me to write?
I don't keep up with my competitors and some people aren't true competitors.
just they're in the, they do something in catering software, right?
(27:09):
I literally, while I was having my coffee this morning, I said, create a table with acomparison of this, this, this, and this.
It spit it out.
60 seconds.
I sent it to him and he goes, wow, that's awesome.
So glad to see the differences and I appreciate you getting it to me quickly.
It's just like, it's like an unfair advantage.
(27:30):
You remember the bionic man Lee majors?
know.
sure.
like we are bionic business people.
We have the superpower to create stuff and where it's going to go.
I don't you know, I'm sure in the early 1900s when somebody saw an automobile go down thestreet, they said shit.
That's a hell of a lot faster than a horse.
(27:50):
Who knows?
where it's going to go and think about where the automobile has done to change thelandscape of America.
Just like the cell phone.
When I was in college, you had a disk drive.
Now you got more computing power and more knowledge in your hand than anybody does.
(28:13):
very true.
So, you know, a lot of people would ask you and you know, this is at your age, you know,you should be winding down.
Why did you decide to buy the catering company and not just either go retire or say, hey,I'll, I'll work with, you know, the next guy who comes in and buys it and just be the
(28:36):
grandfather of the company as opposed to the father in there slugging it out every day.
You know that's that's really a good question, because I looked at all the options.
I wasn't ready to retire.
I don't know that I will ever truly retire and go sit on the front porch.
I do enjoy traveling.
(28:57):
I'm slowing down some, but I had a young man that was working for me.
It was pretty sharp.
And I had been struggling to keep him from the simple fact he was wanting to do somethingon his own.
And when opportunity came up to buy Taylor Grocery.
catering.
I was up front with all my employees that hey guys, y'all want to start looking, startlooking.
(29:21):
It's over with me.
end of the year, I'm sure Lynn is going to continue to cater if you want to work for himfine.
But I you all to know where we are because I treat all my employees like a family.
I consider them as family.
And so he came to me and said, Hey man,
I hear that maybe you can buy this business and I said, well, yeah, I'm considering it,but you know, I'm old.
(29:45):
said, I'm not.
Let's do it.
And so we sat down and, uh, you know, past four years, three years, I've been teaching himthe business and, uh, I turned more and more over to him every day.
Uh, I wanted the business to continue, you know, uh, not pat myself on the back, but in2006, let's see in 2005, they did.
(30:08):
$30,000 in catering sales at Taylor Grocery Restaurant.
In 2006, we did $300 and something thousand dollars in sales.
Whoa, wait, you 10x, whoa, wait.
This is like everybody gives me all the good stuff at the end.
10x, what did you do to 10x business?
I kept that database when I that from my personal catering business and I started reachingout to those people letting them know where I was.
(30:34):
I mean, that was pretty much it.
I think I had that database in a.
Some type of spreadsheet and I just started reaching out saying hey, this is Butch I justwant to let you guys know that I'm back in business.
I know we used to do this and this for you would love an opportunity to do it again.
(30:55):
That's how I built the catering business.
You know, we went from 300,000 to 600,000 the next year to over a the following year.
Where, if you feel comfortable sharing your sales or sales range, where are you now?
We were within five figures of hitting four million this year.
(31:17):
$4 million out of Oxford, Mississippi.
And how many people live in Oxford?
Well, you know, that's a little deceiving.
We've got about 23, 24,000 residents and then nine months of the year you have another 22to 23,000.
You have 50,000 people and you're doing that kind of volume.
(31:38):
That speaks, you know, when I used to consult people that go, you know, I live in a smalltown.
I'm like, well, do people get married?
Do they die?
Do they graduate high school?
Do they have factories?
You know, and people are just so myopic and they rather make excuses and sales.
It's crazy.
Man.
(31:58):
it's just, you know, go out something interesting.
I'll share with you and the folks that are listening here.
In 2007, a lot of our catering revolved around the University of Mississippi.
And in 2007, the on-campus food service provider, catering manager, started dating theSecretary of the Provost.
(32:27):
And overnight,
They shut outside catering off at the University of Mississippi.
And that was probably about 80 % of what we were doing.
And so I fought the battle and we won back on campus.
But in the meantime, we about starved to death.
So we had to start doing some stuff different.
I've gotten comfortable.
(32:47):
So I went back to marketing again.
And one of the first things we started looking at, you know, I sat down one day and Isaid, what's something that no matter what happens is going to continue to happen?
And that was folks are going to get married.
And that's when I started doing wedding catering.
Yeah, you know, that's what I call the evergreen crowd.
People are going to never stop getting married.
(33:09):
They're not going to stop having kids that graduate from high school and having birthdayparties.
know, every year they're not going to stop dying, you know, so you have a built in.
renewable source of business, if you will.
(33:30):
So that's, think that's why I like you so much is because people who get shit done.
I you know, and are scrappy and don't make excuses because look, we all have something wecan complain about, right?
You know, you know, I've talked to my kids about entitlement.
(33:51):
I go, you know, or privilege.
I go, I came here from France.
There was no privilege.
They didn't open up the gates and say you get a drive a Cadillac.
You know, my parents were poor, relatively speaking, and my kids are better shaped than Iwas.
And it's like you got to hustle.
It's all about
hustling.
Nobody's giving you anything.
(34:11):
And honestly, I don't want anybody to give me anything because I don't want to owe anybodyanything.
I don't, I don't do well owing people stuff.
That's, that doesn't really work well with me.
Yeah, those flavors always get called back during the most.
the worst time when somebody wants you to pay them back that debt that you have with themas far as women.
(34:35):
know what?
What's funny is I had a friend who went bankrupt and he called me up and asked me for aloan and I gave him a pretty big check and I said, it's a gift.
said, we're friends.
I don't want to be your banker.
One condition, just pay it forward when you can and he's back on his feet and he's makingdonations to help people out.
(34:55):
I don't call favors back.
It's just my friends.
We don't keep score.
We just are there for each other.
So that's just sort of way I like to live.
You know, as we sort of wrap up and get towards the end of our time.
If you had to start all over again, right?
Started from scratch.
What are three sales marketing techniques you would, what are the first three things thatyou would do to build up a catering business out of a restaurant?
(35:25):
without my database.
I don't know, you can answer.
Yeah, let's just assume you didn't have a database because you came to Nashville and youhad to start all over.
You don't know anybody.
First thing I do is establish a database from the customers that were visiting therestaurant.
The second thing I would do was I would look for opportunities within the community to getmy name out by providing some free food to people such as the Chamber of Commerce.
(35:53):
Most Chamber of Commerce's do some type of monthly event and they're looking for sponsorsand so we always did a sponsorship with the in-kind trade for
providing the food for those events that gives you an opportunity to get in front of themovers and shakers in the community most of the time.
(36:14):
And the third thing I would do is as I built that database is I would market the heck outto those people.
I would look for opportunities to get in front of them, you know.
Awesome.
Is there anything else you want to share that you're doing, cutting edge or different,whether it's food-wise, marketing, sales-wise, before we wrap up?
(36:36):
You know, I don't know that there's anything I'm doing cutting edge.
I'm not a inventor, but I'm a heck of a copycat.
And so I like to look at things that have been done in the past.
If I see somebody doing something that's successful, then I try to dig into it.
And you know, why is this successful?
Why is this working for?
(36:57):
You know, I'm not going to try to reinvent the wheel.
You've already invented the wheel.
said many times if it ever comes to point that I do not have catering available to use,I'm quitting.
You know, I've used some other software, but you have created the most complete softwarepackage for catering that I've ever seen.
(37:24):
And I've seen several of them.
I've looked at several of them.
I don't know how many years I've been a catering customer.
It used to be what, restaurant marketing systems?
restaurant catering systems.
You know, it's funny as I pulled up some old promo videos from the early days, man, it wasold school.
(37:45):
But you know what, that old school worked.
It worked.
what you did was through the years, you stayed ahead of the technology advancements andstuff, and you created a system that's modern day that's still using old school marketing
tactics.
Gorilla marketing is what I call it.
(38:07):
When you see the stuff that we're working on, we're talking to some people about AI voiceand stuff, it's gonna, you know.
I just I can't even when I talk to my team, I sound like I'm schizophrenic because I'm allover the board like a pinball lost in a pinball machine.
But it's exciting to invent these things.
(38:31):
And having been in the shoes, right, we understand, you know, when a customer prospect,actually some of our best ideas come from prospects.
So we're working on, know, you know, we have proposal reminders, which, you know, thefortunes and
the follow up, we're actually going to create something you send out a proposal, thecustomer can accept the proposal, pay for it and get reminders about it, right?
(38:56):
So they don't, you don't even, if you got a lazy operator, he is not going to lose thesesales opportunities.
And if they decline it, they can put why they declined it.
And now you have a database of why did I lose all this business at Christmas?
So you could, you can make, make modifications.
Well, Butch, it is always a pleasure.
(39:17):
You're one of my favorite clients, and I think you're probably one of the first guys tobuy the catering magic system.
You know, so definitely have a place near and dear in my heart and cater's ends heart.
And I wish you success with your business and your partner.
Hopefully he takes over more and more and you can just sit and enjoy those grandkids andwhatever you enjoy doing and, you know, do the fun stuff.
(39:44):
No doubt that's what I'm looking forward to and you make some catering magic.
I still have on my shelf back here catering magic material.
No way.
Yeah.
How about that?
Okay, throw it back.
Wow.
Wow, that is the restaurant success system.
That was like one of my first things.
(40:06):
That's crazy.
Yeah, Rory fat used a lot of my marketing material and his stuff we worked out.
Yeah, but he has my stuff in there.
Yep.
my god, that is well wait, move it over a little to your left, I think.
Me and the suspenders.
(40:26):
Yeah, it was called the results group.
That is crazy.
I don't even think I have a copy.
The barbecue evangelist restaurant and catering marketing success system.
And it absolutely was.
Hey, you have aged a little bit, buddy.
(40:47):
I'm at your picture.
You've aged a little bit, but not much.
I look better.
I'm like George Clooney.
I look better.
That's right, that's right.
But you know, I still pull those out from time to time and brainstorm some of yourmarketing ideas and tweak them to fit what we do.
Man, I love that, I love that.
Anyway.
(41:07):
man, I really appreciate what you do, what you do, what you've done.
Michael, you have a, don't know.
I definitely know we wouldn't be where we are today without the marketing techniques andthe experience that you shared that I was able to apply into this business.
you know, every day it seems like there are a couple of times a month we'll get a emailand you tell us what you're working on.
(41:35):
And I'm certainly wondering.
I wonder how much this is going to add to the monthly subscription, and I do not know allthe time that you've added a feature that you added it added to the cost of the system.
Well...
I can't say that always can be true because what we're doing with this data, the CRM isgoing to be just revolutionary for our space.
(41:57):
But we try to keep adding as much value as possible because we know it's a tough business.
The margins are thin.
And so I just take a lot of great pride that this is an idea I had back in college thatI've finally been able to bring to fruition after a gazillion years.
(42:18):
So I'm very
I've been able to do it and people have enjoyed it.
Yeah, it has been a life changing venture for us.
There's no way we could do the volume that we do today without having something likecaters in to help us stay organized, send us the reminders.
(42:38):
You know, it was last week I had somebody call said, hey man, I hadn't talked to you in awhile.
You did some stuff for us a couple of years ago.
Any chance you would remember it?
I said, well, give me just a second.
And you know, a few clicks and I had his orders from
two years ago and I was able to say, yeah, man, we did this for you on this day.
It was for this many people.
(42:59):
The year before that we did this.
That's not possible without a system like the catering and the one you created.
And that guy was like, you've got to be the most organized guy I've ever dealt with.
And if he could have seen my desk, he would have realized that was a lie.
Well, you know, it's all about perception.
(43:19):
So that's awesome.
OK, I hope you have a great weekend, Butch.
Thanks for taking time.
Thank you, sir.
Hello again, I'm Michael Attias, your host of Restaurant Catering Smarts and today's guestis Butch Scott, owner and operator of Taylor Grocery Special Events Catering, a renowned
catering company based in Taylor, Mississippi.
With over two decades of experience in the food and event planning industry, Butch hasbuilt a reputation for delivering exceptional culinary experiences for weddings, corporate
(00:51):
events, and private parties.
Known for his attention to detail, creativity, and commitment to quality, Butch'sexpertise
extends beyond just great food.
He's also a trusted partner and helping clients bring their event visions to life.
As a passionate advocate for local ingredients and southern hospitality, Butch continuesto lead his team with innovation and a dedication to exceeding client expectations.
(01:14):
And we're thrilled to have him on the show today.
But before we get into asking Butch a bunch of questions, let's take a minute to recognizeour sponsor.
This episode is brought to you by CaterZen Catering Software, the industry leader inhelping restaurants turn their
catering chaos in the calm.
Discover why top independent and enterprise restaurants trust CaterZen to save them timeand increase their catering sales.
(01:36):
Go to www.caterzen.com and sign up for a walkthrough of the software or a free 30 daytrial.
Now let's dive into this episode of Restaurant Catering Smarts.
Welcome, Butch, how are you doing today?
No, the pleasure is all mine and we'll get into our history in a minute.
(01:57):
But I like to start everybody off with an icebreaker question.
And that is, give me a number between one and 300.
I got this magic question machine.
Let's see, let's go with 24.
That's my lucky number.
Let's see how lucky it is.
If you suddenly lost two hours every day, a 22 hour day, what would you cut out of yourcurrent schedule to culminate for the lost time?
(02:23):
That's tough because I really don't do anything but work and sleep.
So I guess I'd probably cut some sleep out.
I think at our age, it's sleep.
That's about the only thing.
We're not sleeping anyway.
I'm not.
That's true.
You know, we've known each other- I think we were catering out of chuck wagons when wemet.
(02:44):
That's how long we've known each other.
So before you had Taylor, you had Abbeville Catfish right?
So why don't you tell everybody how you got started in the restaurant business, how youended up with Abbeville, how you ended up with Taylor Grocery.
OK, I'll be glad to.
(03:05):
Back in the 90s, I started working for a guy that had a fresh and wholesale seafood marketin Oxford, Mississippi.
We did a lot of seafood, so almost all the restaurants are seafood in Oxford.
Had a little unique business plan and from there I decided I want to get into therestaurant business, buy the local restaurant.
(03:25):
The owners were ready to retire.
It was named Abbeville Catfish.
It was one of those all you could eat seafood buffet restaurants.
So we served a lot of different things there.
Probably about five or six years into that, I added catering.
We started catering, did that for a few years, got really burnt out on the restaurant,woke up one day and said, I've had enough of the restaurant business.
(03:49):
I'm going to do a little catering.
That lasted for about three years.
I had some family members that were working with me.
They burned out.
Next thing I knew, it was Butch by himself again.
So I had the opportunity to get rid of my catering equipment.
Sold that to a gentleman that owns a Taylor Grocery restaurant, his name was Lynn Hewlett.
That was in December of 2005, January of 2006.
(04:13):
He said, "Hey man, we've done a little drop off stuff, but nothing like you've ever done.
Would you come help me for a few months?" and a few months turned into several years.
Pretty much built a catering business that was associated with Taylor Grocery restaurant.
Kobe came along.
Family dynamics caused some issues.
(04:34):
We both agreed that the end of my time with Taylor Grocery would be at the end of 2020.
That was about January that year.
About November, he wanted to know what I was going to do.
We talked about it and opportunity.
He made the opportunity available to buy the catering side of this business, so we have apartner that worked for me at that time.
(04:54):
We took over Taylor Grocery Catering in January of 2021.
Very cool.
Well, I have friends that went to Ole Miss and when I tell them one of my clients isTaylor Grocery, they've been to your events, you know, tailgates and what.
So you've got a phenomenal reputation.
And, unfortunately, I don't get to know all my clients as well as I'd like to.
(05:18):
I think there's just.
There's only so many hours in the day, but you're about as old school as they come.
So for those who don't know, before I started CaterZen, there was Restaurant CateringSystems.
Before that, I don't know what it was called, The Results Group or something.
I sold The Catering Magic System
And you were one of my first clients probably in 2003.
(05:41):
If I go back far enough, how did you find me and what precipitated you looking for me?
Well, I was looking for a better way on the marketing side.
We were full blast in the restaurant business.
I think we were connected to a guy that had a marketing program by name of Rory Bass.
Yep.
(06:02):
And that's where we got to know each other.
I liked your catering magic.
You called yourself the catering evangelist.
No, I was the barbecue evangelist at Corky's.
That's right.
back we go and I was interested in what you were doing.
We were just getting started doing some catering and so I subscribed to your programLearned a lot about marketing, grew the business a little bit, or quite a bit, and so
(06:31):
that's sort of where we got started at together
Yeah, and you know, what I tell people is...
you know, when you try to help people do things, it's like personal training.
You know, you go to the gym, 5 % do things, 95 % make excuses.
And you know, I always love the fact that you would gravitate towards things, make themhappen.
(06:53):
So you get a sense of pride seeing that, you know, what I did in my restaurant wasn't justa one off, you know, flashing the pan, seeing other guys like you.
has made a huge difference.
What would you say, you know, working out of Taylor and I'm assuming they sit still, areyou working out of their property?
(07:16):
Yes, we're in a separate location than the restaurant.
Lynn did not want to this property, so we have a long-term lease on the property here.
The lease is probably longer than I'll live.
Well, I hope you live to be 120 for starters.
Well, if I live to be 120, I probably won't still come into coming to work every day.
(07:39):
Yeah, well you'll have too many grandkids by then they'll be running it.
You got five, you just had a grandson.
That's exciting.
it is.
It is.
We're excited to have grandson number three.
Wow, yeah, would you say girls catch up?
You got two granddaughters?
up.
Two granddaughters and three grandsons.
Yeah, I'm in no hurry to be a grandfather.
(08:01):
I think I'm too young, so I will just call myself an uncle if I become a grandfather.
Well, I'll have to share this with you.
One of my the mother of my fifth grandson, my youngest daughter, Molly Kate When she wasborn, she came along later in life was 12 years difference, I believe, between her and her
older sister.
(08:22):
And I used to walk around with her as a toddler at the restaurant and people used tocongratulate me on my granddaughter.
So that tells you how bad that was.
So.
Wow, that's crazy.
That is crazy.
Yeah, so at Taylor, are y'all doing drop off events and full service events?
(08:44):
What's the mix of what you're doing?
We, you know, Michael, really we do a little bit of everything.
We started out the Taylor Grocery was known for catfish as well as Abbeville Catfish wedid a lot of catfish and through the years as people have asked, we've expanded.
So now we call ourselves a full service caterer.
We do everything from corporate drop off orders, to grand gala banquets and everything inbetween.
(09:09):
We have menus
for every meal period and everything in between.
Awesome.
What makes you stand out in your market?
Because obviously, Oxford's a big college town.
I grew up up the road in Memphis.
I know that game day weekends, it's busy.
What makes you stand out in the marketplace?
Do you consider you have competition?
We all have competition.
(09:30):
You can go to the grocery store, you can make it yourself.
But what makes you stand out?
Why are people coming to you over and over again?
And people are reporting back to me in Nashville, what a good job you
do.
You know, I think part of it is we do put a lot of love into our food is what I tellpeople and we treat people the way we want to be treated.
(09:51):
I think I heard on your last podcast something - 'fess up to the mistake or something likethat.
If we're not.
That's that's it.
That's not when you mess up.
Yeah, I'm gonna copy that and put it up on the wall here, but.
know, you know what I say is don't get caught.
(10:11):
That's you know, you know my brother and sister got busted for everything and and I said Idid the same thing.
I was just smart enough not to get caught.
Well, you know, we had that discussion with my family over Christmas.
My brother and sister got busted with everything and I didn't.
So like you said, I was just smarter.
(10:33):
You know, it's funny.
Now that my kids are young adults and, you know, starting off in their life, you get thereal stories when they were growing up.
And like, I had no idea some of the stuff they did.
It was nothing that would get them, you know, nothing major, but it's like, interesting.
So even if you think your kids are angels, they got a little devil stuff going on.
(10:54):
Exactly.
Exactly.
What percentage of your business is spent creating custom menus versus you've got setmenus?
Because I know a lot of people in the restaurant business, they're working off more setmenus.
Do you have a philosophy about menus?
My philosophy is we try to develop packages that people want and enjoy and then if youwant something customized, we'll customize it for you.
(11:25):
Percentage wise, probably 80 to 85 % of what we do is already published menus and about 15% is customized.
Yeah, I think a lot of people...
they underestimate the value of packages.
Because at the end of the day, you could put most things in a package.
If you take the fanciest wedding in the world, You know, do you want appetizers?
(11:48):
Okay, which appetizers do you want?
Do you want a chocolate fountain?
Do you want this?
How many entrees do you want?
You want plated?
You want buffet?
It can all be put and then you add an upsell for the more premium sides.
And I think what that does is I think what gave us an advantage in the early
days of Corky's is we created these packages and it made it easy for the customer tounderstand like you know in simple terms we had different names you want a one meat a two
(12:17):
meat a three meat everybody knows you're gonna pay more for ribs than you're gonna pay forpork you can pay more for fillet than you can pay for car roast beef right and so it just
makes it easy that you don't have to be a culinary genius or no food math to put thesepackages together anybody can
and look at a list and say which package you want, what options do you want, this is whatI recommend and you move on.
(12:44):
You know, that's true.
We copied a lot of what you did when I was developing menus for our catering business andwe built packages.
We have our Taylor fish fry, which starts out with fried catfish, chicken tenders and hushpuppies.
And then we allow the customers to customize it from the standpoint that they get to picktheir sides.
They have a list of about 20 sides.
(13:07):
They get to pick three of those.
We have a list of about 12 desserts.
They get to pick their dessert and everything's
one package dinnerware.
They can choose whether they want the standard upgraded plastic or if they want to go toChina, we can do that as well.
And you know that that type of menu probably fits 90 % of our customers and it makes iteasy for them.
(13:31):
It's easy for us because my kitchen is used to preparing it and you know you talk aboutweddings and stuff and everybody wants to upscale it.
Well, if you look at our wedding menus.
Most of our wedding menus are the same things that we serve every day.
And I tell brides that, we take good Southern food that you and your families used toeating and we add a touch of elegance to it for your wedding.
(13:57):
Yeah, I mean, it's amazing how just sprucing it up makes a difference, right?
It is, you know, an example I talked about the Taylor fish fry, our most popular weddingpackage, we call it the high cotton package and it starts with catfish and fried chicken
tenders.
Man, I'm starving right now.
I haven't had fried catfish in so long.
(14:18):
I'm down in Costa Rica.
They don't have fried catfish down here ,and Hush Puppies.
But I did make, just as an aside, there's a local restaurant.
The woman is incredible.
She's a Costa Rican.
Their family owns like a little motel and she runs the restaurant.
They make their hamburger buns from scratch every day.
They do a barbecue brisket over coffee wood, phenomenal brisket.
(14:40):
I went in there one afternoon.
I made her Nashville hot chicken for her and her crew.
said, can I come in one afternoon and make you some Nashville hot chicken?
So that was a lot of fun.
They enjoyed it and it was fun for me.
I got my Nashville hot chicken fix without having to go home.
There you go, that's the way to do it.
Maybe we need to send you some catfish so you can take on your next trip to Costa Rica.
(15:01):
I don't know that it would get through security, but maybe I could find some fish and it'sthe cornmeal that makes it.
It's all about, I like the cornmeal, the crunch.
And we used to do a Cajun tartar sauce with ours.
So let's talk about sales and marketing.
You know, I have found just like everything in life.
(15:24):
It's not who has the best product, it's who's the best sales and marketer.
If you have both, that helps you even more.
What has been your philosophy to sales and marketing and how have you grown over theyears, your two catering businesses?
Sales and marketing, guess in a nutshell would be we follow the wheel that's already beencreated instead of trying to create something new.
(15:50):
And simply meaning we have taken success such as your success in the catering business andtried to copy what you do.
The one thing that you taught me that's the most important thing that you taught me is nomatter what, protect your database, build that database.
This building could burn down.
(16:11):
and let's hope it doesn't, knocking on wood.
But within two days I could be back in business with my same customers because I have adatabase of those customers.
I have a database of everything they've ordered and their preferences.
And so, you know, that's important.
Build that database and then we market to the database.
(16:32):
Why do you think as a general rule people are, I don't want to call them lazy, but I'lluse the word lazy.
They're lazy when it comes to keeping a database of their customers.
You go into a lot of places and you know, they're using paper and pen or, and some peopleare using software, but why do you think they're lazy with keeping up with their database
and also marketing their database?
(16:55):
You know, think part of that is not that they're lazy.
They're just so busy putting out the media fire that they don't prepare for the future.
You know, you think about that.
You know, like I said, we take our database and do anything we want.
We sent one email out probably around the end of July, the first of August for tailgating.
(17:15):
And we literally had hundreds of customers that booked orders for the whole footballseason for tailgating.
Wow.
used to, we picked up the phone and called, or we sat on the phone and would hope thosepeople called us.
So, you know, we reach out to our customers, Thanksgiving orders are the same one.
(17:36):
We smoke anywhere and fry four to 500 turkeys a year, plus all the sides and everything togo along with it.
And a simple email starts every bit of that.
Yeah.
You know, I tell people if you do nothing else but email your database once a month justto let them know whether it's something a season's coming up.
You got a special menu that season like Super Bowl, you know, is coming up.
(18:01):
It's the holidays, Fourth of July.
There's there's there's always a reason that you can be in front of everybody once a monthwith something.
You don't have to bombard them.
Catering customers don't want to be bombarded.
They just need that gentle nudge.
Now, you know, I put together
this podcast to help people in the industry but obviously it's also a shameless plug forKader's end so I'm not gonna deny that but you would appreciate where we're headed I mean
(18:28):
you've seen us from the beginning you know we started from nothing we're working on a listselection tool with the CRM where you can pick up anything about a customer you know the
tax exempt what group they're in you know anything you want to know about them but also
anything about event types or order history.
(18:51):
So if you want to know everybody booked a holiday party, you could do an email, a phonecall, a task, eventually a sequence.
Same thing, you if you want to, like what you did before, you probably sent out a massemail.
It'd be really nice to say, hey, just the people who booked tailgates last year, let mesend them something in July and say, hey, we're going up on prices, but if you book by the
(19:15):
end of July, we'll lock you in.
on this or we'll do this for you.
Now you got this business, you know, locked in.
Same thing with the people who book turkeys.
Hey, last year we sold 400 turkeys, we've got 500 on order, we know we're gonna sell outof the 500.
If you want in, get in.
So now you're not worrying about promoting.
(19:37):
You've got that business locked in for the holidays, right?
no doubt and you know a couple years ago turkeys were very short and they were very veryexpensive and we were able to pre book some turkeys at a great price and We told folks
we've got I think it was 420 something turkeys that we've been able to secure when they'regone to go folks And I mean the orders came in like you wouldn't So that's that's great
(20:08):
been able to do that
market to a certain segment of your customers is something that is very important for us.
You we used to try to do that with a piece of paper and an old Rellodex on the desk withthe person's name and their company and man, you changed catering for me when you started.
(20:31):
I'm so old, we had to hire Pony Express to send out my messages.
Now, I mean, now I'm gonna tell you how damn old I am.
Even though I look like Dick Clark, I don't age.
But I had to lick stamps and peel off labels watching TV at night sending out mailers.
(20:54):
That's how long, you know, I go back.
And you know, another thing that we're doing, and again, this speaks like you do weddingswhere I don't know if you have a catering inquiry form on your website that fits, feeds in
our system.
Okay.
into this list selection tool.
You can say, hey, all the brides that are getting married in September or later, we wantto do a promotion to them.
(21:20):
So if they filled out the wedding catering inquiry form, and you'll have a QR code thatyou can take to trade shows, and they could fill it out on their phone to enter a drawing,
and you can put them in a sequence.
So we're really thinking very strategically.
Do you have anybody on your team that does the marketing or are you the only guy you trustto do that?
(21:44):
We recently hired probably a couple years ago a young lady to help us with our socialmedia marketing.
She takes care of that and then she also writes a lot of the emails and stuff for us butshe is a independent contractor.
She's not actually on payroll.
So she does a good job for us.
(22:06):
I think I saw first year we hired her to do a better job of managing our marketing, oursales.
about 35%.
Wow, and what did she do?
Like, what do feel that she was doing that, you know, my guess is like, I envision you outon a Saturday morning, you're making sure the food's cooked, the trucks are loaded, you
(22:29):
know, you're chicken with the head cut off, right?
And the marketing gets done when you finally could sit down at eight o'clock at night, eata plate of food.
you know, grab a beer and get around to it.
Hopefully if you don't pass out, what is what was she doing that you didn't have the timeto do?
Because I know you have the knowledge, right?
(22:51):
We go back a long way like you could teach the class, right?
So what was she doing that you weren't doing to get that sales increase?
She was doing it consistently and professionally.
You you talked about chicken with a head cut off at one time.
(23:11):
I went to every event we did.
I can remember one Saturday, I went to five different weddings in five different towns.
And so you're right.
I had very little time and most of my marketing emails was on Monday morning when it was,crap, I should have sent this out last week.
Let me send an email out real quick.
And it was, was for lack of a better word, most of time it was sloppy.
(23:36):
And then she came in and added a level of professional appearance to our emails that areworded well, has a call of action.
And then she promotes it also around our social media.
And we sat down usually around December or sometime the first couple of months of theyear, we talk about here's what we want to market and when we want it to go out.
(24:00):
So, you know, it's just being consistent and on time with stuff that she's really added inme.
You know, Michael, I'm fixing to be 64 years old.
Sure, I have Facebook, but I'm not going to learn how to mark that on Facebook.
got off my space?
Yeah man, I got off my space.
I never did do much on my space.
(24:22):
don't think.
I had one friend, his name was Tom.
Yeah, I think I had a, I think I got a Facebook account.
It's probably seven, eight years ago.
So that tells you how far behind I am.
I don't even know anymore.
And I will tell you, because I know in the restaurant business, we all have limitedresources, right?
(24:42):
It's not like Silicon Valley, Bill Gates, he's got more money to spend on marketing thanGod.
So with the world being literally international, you can get on Upwork, you could findsomebody.
We have somebody in South Africa who
produces this podcast, you know.
Mikhaila probably reached out to you.
(25:02):
She coordinated everything so I just have to show up and I don't have to do much, right?
And then she promotes it afterwards.
She edits the clips.
She does everything.
We have people in the Philippines that can manage databases, so even if you don't have abig budget the world is literally at your fingertips.
And I don't know are y'all using AI much to write any of your marketing, you know, she's
(25:25):
doing any of that.
Not yet.
She's becoming familiar with it before she starts using it.
We talked about it.
I gave her a project.
back during the holidays that she's working on where...
She's producing a video so that when someone places an online order, part of theacknowledgement that they'll get back, of course, the order confirmation that they catered
(25:45):
in.
And then we're going to create a way for a video to go out that is basically showing ourstaff getting prepped and getting everything out the door to show them that we're getting
ready to do their order.
And so she's putting that together.
We've talked about that.
And I have an idea.
She has the knowledge how to put it together.
(26:06):
Well, you need worker bees idea bees, you know, I don't I'm the last guy you want to workbecause I'm too scattered.
I like to come up with a vision that that fires me up and, you know, try to figure outwhat's next.
And the stuff in my head, but I can't even get it done quick enough.
(26:27):
Not enough hours in the day.
So we're talking about her, the marketing, AI.
You know, we're starting to use AI in our company for everything from training tooperations manuals to sales and marketing.
I had a referral source.
(26:47):
This guy calls me up because I have a chain interested in your software, but they'relooking at three other catering software companies and they're all different.
What's the difference?
Well, how long do you think it would take me to write?
I don't keep up with my competitors and some people aren't true competitors.
just they're in the, they do something in catering software, right?
(27:09):
I literally, while I was having my coffee this morning, I said, create a table with acomparison of this, this, this, and this.
It spit it out.
60 seconds.
I sent it to him and he goes, wow, that's awesome.
So glad to see the differences and I appreciate you getting it to me quickly.
It's just like, it's like an unfair advantage.
(27:30):
You remember the bionic man Lee majors?
know.
sure.
like we are bionic business people.
We have the superpower to create stuff and where it's going to go.
I don't you know, I'm sure in the early 1900s when somebody saw an automobile go down thestreet, they said shit.
That's a hell of a lot faster than a horse.
(27:50):
Who knows?
where it's going to go and think about where the automobile has done to change thelandscape of America.
Just like the cell phone.
When I was in college, you had a disk drive.
Now you got more computing power and more knowledge in your hand than anybody does.
(28:13):
very true.
So, you know, a lot of people would ask you and you know, this is at your age, you know,you should be winding down.
Why did you decide to buy the catering company and not just either go retire or say, hey,I'll, I'll work with, you know, the next guy who comes in and buys it and just be the
(28:36):
grandfather of the company as opposed to the father in there slugging it out every day.
You know that's that's really a good question, because I looked at all the options.
I wasn't ready to retire.
I don't know that I will ever truly retire and go sit on the front porch.
I do enjoy traveling.
(28:57):
I'm slowing down some, but I had a young man that was working for me.
It was pretty sharp.
And I had been struggling to keep him from the simple fact he was wanting to do somethingon his own.
And when opportunity came up to buy Taylor Grocery.
catering.
I was up front with all my employees that hey guys, y'all want to start looking, startlooking.
(29:21):
It's over with me.
end of the year, I'm sure Lynn is going to continue to cater if you want to work for himfine.
But I you all to know where we are because I treat all my employees like a family.
I consider them as family.
And so he came to me and said, Hey man,
I hear that maybe you can buy this business and I said, well, yeah, I'm considering it,but you know, I'm old.
(29:45):
said, I'm not.
Let's do it.
And so we sat down and, uh, you know, past four years, three years, I've been teaching himthe business and, uh, I turned more and more over to him every day.
Uh, I wanted the business to continue, you know, uh, not pat myself on the back, but in2006, let's see in 2005, they did.
(30:08):
$30,000 in catering sales at Taylor Grocery Restaurant.
In 2006, we did $300 and something thousand dollars in sales.
Whoa, wait, you 10x, whoa, wait.
This is like everybody gives me all the good stuff at the end.
10x, what did you do to 10x business?
I kept that database when I that from my personal catering business and I started reachingout to those people letting them know where I was.
(30:34):
I mean, that was pretty much it.
I think I had that database in a.
Some type of spreadsheet and I just started reaching out saying hey, this is Butch I justwant to let you guys know that I'm back in business.
I know we used to do this and this for you would love an opportunity to do it again.
(30:55):
That's how I built the catering business.
You know, we went from 300,000 to 600,000 the next year to over a the following year.
Where, if you feel comfortable sharing your sales or sales range, where are you now?
We were within five figures of hitting four million this year.
(31:17):
$4 million out of Oxford, Mississippi.
And how many people live in Oxford?
Well, you know, that's a little deceiving.
We've got about 23, 24,000 residents and then nine months of the year you have another 22to 23,000.
You have 50,000 people and you're doing that kind of volume.
(31:38):
That speaks, you know, when I used to consult people that go, you know, I live in a smalltown.
I'm like, well, do people get married?
Do they die?
Do they graduate high school?
Do they have factories?
You know, and people are just so myopic and they rather make excuses and sales.
It's crazy.
Man.
(31:58):
it's just, you know, go out something interesting.
I'll share with you and the folks that are listening here.
In 2007, a lot of our catering revolved around the University of Mississippi.
And in 2007, the on-campus food service provider, catering manager, started dating theSecretary of the Provost.
(32:27):
And overnight,
They shut outside catering off at the University of Mississippi.
And that was probably about 80 % of what we were doing.
And so I fought the battle and we won back on campus.
But in the meantime, we about starved to death.
So we had to start doing some stuff different.
I've gotten comfortable.
(32:47):
So I went back to marketing again.
And one of the first things we started looking at, you know, I sat down one day and Isaid, what's something that no matter what happens is going to continue to happen?
And that was folks are going to get married.
And that's when I started doing wedding catering.
Yeah, you know, that's what I call the evergreen crowd.
People are going to never stop getting married.
(33:09):
They're not going to stop having kids that graduate from high school and having birthdayparties.
know, every year they're not going to stop dying, you know, so you have a built in.
renewable source of business, if you will.
(33:30):
So that's, think that's why I like you so much is because people who get shit done.
I you know, and are scrappy and don't make excuses because look, we all have something wecan complain about, right?
You know, you know, I've talked to my kids about entitlement.
(33:51):
I go, you know, or privilege.
I go, I came here from France.
There was no privilege.
They didn't open up the gates and say you get a drive a Cadillac.
You know, my parents were poor, relatively speaking, and my kids are better shaped than Iwas.
And it's like you got to hustle.
It's all about
hustling.
Nobody's giving you anything.
(34:11):
And honestly, I don't want anybody to give me anything because I don't want to owe anybodyanything.
I don't, I don't do well owing people stuff.
That's, that doesn't really work well with me.
Yeah, those flavors always get called back during the most.
the worst time when somebody wants you to pay them back that debt that you have with themas far as women.
(34:35):
know what?
What's funny is I had a friend who went bankrupt and he called me up and asked me for aloan and I gave him a pretty big check and I said, it's a gift.
said, we're friends.
I don't want to be your banker.
One condition, just pay it forward when you can and he's back on his feet and he's makingdonations to help people out.
(34:55):
I don't call favors back.
It's just my friends.
We don't keep score.
We just are there for each other.
So that's just sort of way I like to live.
You know, as we sort of wrap up and get towards the end of our time.
If you had to start all over again, right?
Started from scratch.
What are three sales marketing techniques you would, what are the first three things thatyou would do to build up a catering business out of a restaurant?
(35:25):
without my database.
I don't know, you can answer.
Yeah, let's just assume you didn't have a database because you came to Nashville and youhad to start all over.
You don't know anybody.
First thing I do is establish a database from the customers that were visiting therestaurant.
The second thing I would do was I would look for opportunities within the community to getmy name out by providing some free food to people such as the Chamber of Commerce.
(35:53):
Most Chamber of Commerce's do some type of monthly event and they're looking for sponsorsand so we always did a sponsorship with the in-kind trade for
providing the food for those events that gives you an opportunity to get in front of themovers and shakers in the community most of the time.
(36:14):
And the third thing I would do is as I built that database is I would market the heck outto those people.
I would look for opportunities to get in front of them, you know.
Awesome.
Is there anything else you want to share that you're doing, cutting edge or different,whether it's food-wise, marketing, sales-wise, before we wrap up?
(36:36):
You know, I don't know that there's anything I'm doing cutting edge.
I'm not a inventor, but I'm a heck of a copycat.
And so I like to look at things that have been done in the past.
If I see somebody doing something that's successful, then I try to dig into it.
And you know, why is this successful?
Why is this working for?
(36:57):
You know, I'm not going to try to reinvent the wheel.
You've already invented the wheel.
said many times if it ever comes to point that I do not have catering available to use,I'm quitting.
You know, I've used some other software, but you have created the most complete softwarepackage for catering that I've ever seen.
(37:24):
And I've seen several of them.
I've looked at several of them.
I don't know how many years I've been a catering customer.
It used to be what, restaurant marketing systems?
restaurant catering systems.
You know, it's funny as I pulled up some old promo videos from the early days, man, it wasold school.
(37:45):
But you know what, that old school worked.
It worked.
what you did was through the years, you stayed ahead of the technology advancements andstuff, and you created a system that's modern day that's still using old school marketing
tactics.
Gorilla marketing is what I call it.
(38:07):
When you see the stuff that we're working on, we're talking to some people about AI voiceand stuff, it's gonna, you know.
I just I can't even when I talk to my team, I sound like I'm schizophrenic because I'm allover the board like a pinball lost in a pinball machine.
But it's exciting to invent these things.
(38:31):
And having been in the shoes, right, we understand, you know, when a customer prospect,actually some of our best ideas come from prospects.
So we're working on, know, you know, we have proposal reminders, which, you know, thefortunes and
the follow up, we're actually going to create something you send out a proposal, thecustomer can accept the proposal, pay for it and get reminders about it, right?
(38:56):
So they don't, you don't even, if you got a lazy operator, he is not going to lose thesesales opportunities.
And if they decline it, they can put why they declined it.
And now you have a database of why did I lose all this business at Christmas?
So you could, you can make, make modifications.
Well, Butch, it is always a pleasure.
(39:17):
You're one of my favorite clients, and I think you're probably one of the first guys tobuy the catering magic system.
You know, so definitely have a place near and dear in my heart and cater's ends heart.
And I wish you success with your business and your partner.
Hopefully he takes over more and more and you can just sit and enjoy those grandkids andwhatever you enjoy doing and, you know, do the fun stuff.
(39:44):
No doubt that's what I'm looking forward to and you make some catering magic.
I still have on my shelf back here catering magic material.
No way.
Yeah.
How about that?
Okay, throw it back.
Wow.
Wow, that is the restaurant success system.
That was like one of my first things.
(40:06):
That's crazy.
Yeah, Rory fat used a lot of my marketing material and his stuff we worked out.
Yeah, but he has my stuff in there.
Yep.
my god, that is well wait, move it over a little to your left, I think.
Me and the suspenders.
(40:26):
Yeah, it was called the results group.
That is crazy.
I don't even think I have a copy.
The barbecue evangelist restaurant and catering marketing success system.
And it absolutely was.
Hey, you have aged a little bit, buddy.
(40:47):
I'm at your picture.
You've aged a little bit, but not much.
I look better.
I'm like George Clooney.
I look better.
That's right, that's right.
But you know, I still pull those out from time to time and brainstorm some of yourmarketing ideas and tweak them to fit what we do.
Man, I love that, I love that.
Anyway.
(41:07):
man, I really appreciate what you do, what you do, what you've done.
Michael, you have a, don't know.
I definitely know we wouldn't be where we are today without the marketing techniques andthe experience that you shared that I was able to apply into this business.
you know, every day it seems like there are a couple of times a month we'll get a emailand you tell us what you're working on.
(41:35):
And I'm certainly wondering.
I wonder how much this is going to add to the monthly subscription, and I do not know allthe time that you've added a feature that you added it added to the cost of the system.
Well...
I can't say that always can be true because what we're doing with this data, the CRM isgoing to be just revolutionary for our space.
(41:57):
But we try to keep adding as much value as possible because we know it's a tough business.
The margins are thin.
And so I just take a lot of great pride that this is an idea I had back in college thatI've finally been able to bring to fruition after a gazillion years.
(42:18):
So I'm very
I've been able to do it and people have enjoyed it.
Yeah, it has been a life changing venture for us.
There's no way we could do the volume that we do today without having something likecaters in to help us stay organized, send us the reminders.
(42:38):
You know, it was last week I had somebody call said, hey man, I hadn't talked to you in awhile.
You did some stuff for us a couple of years ago.
Any chance you would remember it?
I said, well, give me just a second.
And you know, a few clicks and I had his orders from
two years ago and I was able to say, yeah, man, we did this for you on this day.
It was for this many people.
(42:59):
The year before that we did this.
That's not possible without a system like the catering and the one you created.
And that guy was like, you've got to be the most organized guy I've ever dealt with.
And if he could have seen my desk, he would have realized that was a lie.
Well, you know, it's all about perception.
(43:19):
So that's awesome.
OK, I hope you have a great weekend, Butch.
Thanks for taking time.
Thank you, sir.
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