August 26, 2025 • 47 mins
I have been hanging around the South Bay beaches since my youth. Maybe you caught my Instagram posts about how that happened. As a family, we spent much of our time in Hermosa Beach; I love the SoCal beach culture.
There is an established group of restaurants under the moniker of Chef David Slay. He is a bit of an anomoly in that he has been a chef since his 20's (so well established in that sense), but at the same time, a rising star (usually an accolade for chefs just starting their career).
Our conversation was fluid and full of insights.
I have to say, sitting down with Chef David Slay for this episode of Wine Talks was a real eye-opener—and honestly, a relief in a business that’s changing faster than most of us care to admit. We met up down in Hermosa Beach, a little outside my usual zone, which always seems to lend itself to looser conversation. There’s no pretense with David; what you see is what you get, and that made for an episode full of straight talk.
We kicked things off on common ground—hot yoga, of all things. You’d think two guys from the food and wine world would bond over Burgundy or beef carpaccio, but no, it’s sweating it out in the same studio, talking about how houses and restaurants are being remodeled and how somehow, hot yoga becomes as much therapy as exercise. There’s something grounding about that, and it set the tone for the rest of our conversation.
What I appreciate about David is his clear-eyed view of the industry. He doesn’t look at the shift in wine preferences or restaurant trends with nostalgia or bitterness. Instead, he recognizes that consumer tastes have changed, and he’s made it a point to adjust right along with them. “I make wine for what the consumer wants, not for what my taste is,” he says—and you can tell he means it. That’s rare. For some in the business, adapting is an insult to tradition. For David, it’s just good sense. He describes older guests coming in with big Italians and Bordeauxs, while younger tables are ordering orange wine and lower-alcohol options. Rather than resist, he’s leaned in, updating his own winemaking and keeping his wine lists relevant.
David also spoke candidly about the business realities—shrinking wine lists, higher prices, and changing buying habits. The days of bragging about a 350-bottle inventory are gone; he’s pared it down to 150 because that’s what works now. What isn’t moving gets cut, and what sells gets the spotlight. He’s refreshingly honest about costs, average bottle prices, and even how certain cult wines just don’t have the cachet with younger drinkers anymore.
Running restaurants, building a wine brand, and surviving the post-COVID landscape takes more than passion. David’s approach—focus on quality, pay your people right, and stay involved every day—seems to be the formula. I especially respect how he talks about his crew; he’d rather pay a dishwasher above the norm and keep staff long-term than deal with constant turnover. It’s practical, but it’s also the right thing to do.
When we talked about food and wine, he’s got the same data-driven but thoughtful outlook. He doesn’t buy into the old dogma about pairings; instead, he sees the restaurant as a place where anything goes, as long as the customer has a good experience.
Honestly, it was one of those episodes that reminded me what I like about this business—the moments where you drop the sales pitch and get real about what’s working, what’s not, and what it means to stay relevant without selling out. David Slay is exactly the kind of guest that keeps me hungry for the next conversation.
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Arthur J
Website: https://thearthurj.com/ -
Slay Restaurants (Slay Steak & Fish House, Slay Italian Kitchen, Slay Hermosa, Fête French Bistro)
Website: https://slayrestaurants.com/ -
Dragonette Cellars (mentioned as a Pinot Noir and Chardonnay producer)
Website: https://www.dragonettecellars.com/ -
Daou Vineyards (DAOU Family Estates)
Website: https://daouvineyards.com/ -
Caymus Vineyards (Wagner Family of Wine)
Website: https://www.caymus.com/ -
Silver Oak Cellars
Website: https://www.silveroak.com/ -
Phelps Insignia (J
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I could quit drinking a vodka all day long or a whiskey, but wine to
me, is. What you just said. It's the story. It's the taste. It's the.
I mean, each wine you have is so different. Vodka to me. Yeah.
Is Chopin different than Belvedere or than Smirnoff?
Yes. But when you're drinking a nice bottle of wine and you taste
the nuances of the earth and things like that,
(00:22):
the grapes are so different from one to the other. I mean, that's what intrigues
me about drinking wine. Sit back and grab a glass.
It's Wine talks with Paul K.
Hey, welcome to Wine talks with Paul Kay. And we are at away game today
way down in Manhattan at Hermitosa beach, about to have a conversation with David
Slay. Chef David Slay, a crazy good career in the wine
(00:45):
and food business. Welcome to the show. Thank you for having
me. This is. You know, we crossed paths. Easy for me to
say in hot yoga. We do. And I saw your shirt one day and I
go, you know, I wonder if that's Chef Slay. It was. And it's taken a
little while to get together, but I'm so happy to have a chance to sit
with you. Yeah. When I got your email to say you were in town and
(01:05):
get together, was looking forward to it. You'll. You'll see more of us.
Yeah. Hot yoga. You know, this. This summer, we
have spent more time at the house in. On 18th street than we
have prior summers. And we're about to
knock it down and put three stories up and have a place
(01:26):
because it's old. It was like 1945, and have
a place to. I think we land here forever.
Well, this summer was a little bit deceiving. There was not much
May gray, very little June gloom. I don't think we were over 80
until the last week or so. So it was a perfect summer. It was amazing.
Yeah. The last week was amazing. Yeah. Now we were. We were talking a little
(01:47):
bit before we started here about wine,
and I just had a conversation with a guy named Tim Hanai, who's a master
of wine, and he completely blows the lid off
and thinks wine food pairing is a hoax
and a falsehood in the world of food and culinary
experience. But you said something important just before we got on, and that was
(02:10):
adapting the consumer, how you're
vintnering, how you're making your wines, and
what's driving that. Well, I don't believe he's completely off. I wouldn't say
it's a hoax, but I think as before we started,
consumers, tastes have changed. I mean, 30 years
ago or 40 years ago, you wouldn't have red wine with fish.
(02:33):
You wouldn't be drinking a Chablis with the New York steak. I mean, that was.
And I think kind of what he may be referring to today,
anything goes, you know, it's what you want to drink. And especially the
younger consumer that is more into the varietals and the
Rhone blends and things like that. So I think it changed
with the consumer. And I see it in the restaurant when I see it.
(02:56):
Group of guys come in and they're in their 60s and 70s, they're bringing in
big Bordeaux, big Italians, big cabs. And then when you see
the younger kids coming in, it's a screw top, it's an orange wine. So
it, it has changed quite a bit. And it's interesting to see. That is interesting
because, yeah, I would do that. I would bring it up. In fact, I brought
a bunch down here. We have a big party on Saturday at the house and
(03:16):
I brought a bunch of big wines. And I'm interested to hear that the.
I don't know if it's millennials or Gen Zs, I have three millennials myself,
they tend to drink what I drink. Maybe that's because of dad, but it's interesting
to hear that they bring in orange wines, low elk, that kind of
stuff. Yeah, it's low elk. And we've adapted at the
vineyard ourselves. I make wine for what the
(03:38):
consumer wants, not for what my taste is. And
I've seen the changes over the years to where lower alcohol is important,
a little bit lighter. So we shift with it. I mean, I'm
not thick headed enough to say this is what I want,
this is what I drink and this is what I'm making. I make wine to
sell it, and I make it as a business. So I adapt pretty
(04:01):
easy. That's an interesting
direction here because they talk about innovation,
wine business, and there's sort of a balance there. And it sounds like
you're making it work. And that is there's a much certainly amount of
traditionalism in this trade. And if you do have a big Bordeaux or
you go to Bordeaux, you're going to experience that in a pretty, you know,
(04:22):
involved way. Yeah. But at the same time, it's consumer driven.
We need to sell stuff. Yeah. That's what our job is. The problem is,
is a new study came out today. Alcohol
consumption is probably at the lowest it's been since the 50s. Yeah. And we see
it in the restaurant it's very, it's, it's noticeable. The
younger generation. And I was at yoga today talking to guys our age
(04:45):
and all three of us were saying about how much even they have
cut back. They're not drinking as much as they were. Hard
liquor and beer is really taking a hit. Wine still is
doing good, but it's dropped quite a bit. Okay. So
a friend of mine owns a restaurant in Silver Lake,
bottle sales off 40% without a
(05:08):
commensurate increase in cocktails.
I don't, hopefully you haven't seen a 40% drop. Haven't seen a 40%
drop here in Manhattan. Manhattan beach is a different customer
too. So
it's dropped. Considerate to where we have cut our wine list
(05:28):
down at all four restaurants. We at one time I think
we probably had 350 bottles on our list here. We're probably at
150 now. Wow. So it's dropped quite a bit still. That's
an interesting perspective because you go to Arthur J. And they still have this mile
long list. Yeah, they got a great list and. It'S a great list. But and
I, you know Nick, obviously Patrick, you know,
(05:49):
Patrick Q is one. Yeah, Patrick's a good guy. He's a good friend and he
wrote a great book too. Yes, the Haute Cuisine. Yeah. And another one, I
think how to be a Restaurant Tourist. That was pretty recent.
Well, you take a list like that, you take Modern Consumption. And I'm going to
move on from the subject, but it's important to understand because that was an
important thing to have this mile long list with all the
(06:11):
choices. Wine educated people come in,
they look at the list, they wow, this is a great list. But it's expensive
to carry that list. And some of that stuff doesn't move. You know, who
knows? I mean, you have Petrus on your list, that can't be moving every day.
I'll tell you what it. No, exactly the price point. And
I just had a Napa winery contact me for a tasty next
(06:33):
week. I said send me all the information for one bottle at
dessert, wholesale price, $680 a bottle.
350 and 95. What? I answered back. I
said that price point just isn't selling today. No, I mean our average bottle
of wine is about $165, which is still on the high side
on our reds. For our whites, it's in the 90 to 120.
(06:56):
So and of our wine list, it's still the 8020 rule.
There's still that pocket of wine that is always selling and the others sit
on a shelf. How about the Caymus? Is the Silver Oaks the standard?
You know Dow, Dow has done such a
marketing job that you know, Dow is a probably.
It's a wonderful story. They only sell for a billion dollars. Yeah. And
(07:19):
their president's a good friend and customer, Manhattan beach guy Ned Lukic.
So they know him and that makes a difference.
It gets out. The public know it. But the Silver Oaks and
those, and the Phelps insignia, those drop way down.
I'm shocked. It's really interesting to know. I don't think I was looking at a
report this morning as well that sales dollars in
(07:42):
America has actually up. Now that could be the price point of the
average bottle price, but consumption is considerably down. It's.
Well, it's down what they say the average price is. They did. They just said
that they went from so many billion to so many billion. Oh yeah, it was
4% increase in dollars but 10%
decrease in volume which when you consider like the
(08:03):
total volume, It's. Yeah, it's 10% be a substantial
percentage. But they're still drinking, you know, quite a bit. I put a
60 bottle of wine on our list. We don't sell it. Really? Yeah.
That's amazing because. And it'll be. I won't put a
bad wine on it on the list. It's just. No, right here.
Manhattan beach is again different. They just jump right to the
(08:27):
$100 range. 150 range. But 60
not. We can't. You know it's interesting and I see the slave brand and now
that I know the pedigree of the, of the wine. Santa Rita Hills and then
fabricated at Dragonet, which is one of my favorite Pinot Noir
Chardonnay makers, period. And
sometimes branded wines or self branded wines have a
(08:49):
moniker about them. You know, if you particularly celebrity based wines that aren't
participate where the celebs not participating. You have that, that, I
mean is the volume of slay wines in your restaurant good? And there's a mystique
around the idea that it's slay that works. Positive or negative? No, it's 100%
positive. I mean we built a brand over the years. I'm not new to this.
We're involved in the community. Our service staff and our wines
(09:12):
are, you know, high quality. I mean I, I'll put our Pinot and Chardonnay up
against anybody. So you know, quality is important. And
if you know we bring in a boutique winery that someone's not familiar
with, you know, we try to get the guests to try it. Enjoy it.
A friend of ours from here, the Carpenters, they opened
their. Their vineyard and their first release was to us this
(09:34):
year. And they're local and it's. It's moving well, it's. And.
But it's like anything, you got to sell it. How many years now with
Slaybrand? Eight years now. It's interesting. This is
interesting. And I just. My memory.
My father's shop was in Malibu, Cove palace for his wines and spirits pals free
liquor when he bought it. And back then
(09:54):
1969-70, he closed it. He sold it in
85. The Barrett's lived nearby.
The Wetzels who owned Alexander Valley Vintage used to come into
the shop. There's a lot of history and
wine promotion because of the executives of El Segundo's
aerospace business and the personalities. This is
(10:17):
what fascinates me. The personalities of Redondo, Hermosa and
Manhattan really haven't changed as the clientele have. Have you
seen a change or do you see a difference between since your restaurants kind of
spread out? It's funny, so many people tell me people from
PV don't come down to Manhattan Beach. People from Hermosa don't come to
Manhattan Beach. Yeah, we don't come down. Manhattan doesn't go to Hermosa.
(10:40):
I'm in our restaurants every day. If I'm not at the vineyard, I'm here every
day and I work the tables. And I've met so many wonderful people from all
of the South Bay. I see a lot of people from everywhere.
And Hermosa, which is. Most people say they don't go to Hermosa. We get
a lot of customers from Manhattan Beach, a lot of pv. So I see it
differently. But there are people who believe that. Well, it's the
(11:02):
personality, which I think is a good thing. Like for instance, Hermosa just
declined that Giant. Not Giant, but It was a 150 room hotel that was going
to be a pier in the Strand and it had all these bars. And that
would be typical of the Hermosa beach citizen to reject the
idea of a development. Too bad. I agree with that.
I spent eight years on the planning commission, so I'm for pro development. But
(11:26):
Manhattan might have entertained that and it would have if they had the space and
existed. So I find that interesting that the personality is
kind of maintained. I will say I love Slay Hermosa.
I like the style. I like the fact. I mean, that's kind of a risky
deal. You took over El Gringo, this institution of
lousy Mexican food. It's funny how many people said they would not
(11:48):
go to the restaurant for us taking that over. Oh, really? So that was kind
of the backlash in the beginning. But slayermosa, it's
a wonderful restaurant, a great patio upstairs, but it's too small. We're
looking for a bigger space for it. We would like to have a bar and
actually more space. So we're actively looking forward space. My
father, when he had a pharmacy as well in Malaga Cove and
(12:11):
there was a counter and a Greek guy had a burger joint. And my father
was a very sort of proper, was raised in an English environment,
being from Cairo. And so the first thing he did when the really start out
is get rid of the burger guy because he didn't like burger smells. And he
said Peavey never forgave him for that. Right. You know, like El Gringo. You never
get forgiven for removing El Gringo from. From their location. I was there
(12:32):
when I lived here in the 80s. It was, you know, they were there. So
I can't tell how many people come in. I don't know what soup they used
to have that they were known for. Yeah, their chicken soup, the soccer. Everyone
always asks, why don't you bring the soup back? At least I don't know what
it was. And we make Sochi at our house all the time because of that
restaurant. So. But this, this is all contemporary
history for you. You have how many restaurants in the area now? We have four
(12:56):
restaurants. You have Fet Fet, which is French
Bistro, Slay Steak and Fish, where we are now,
Slay Italian Kitchen and Slay Hermosa, which is our most casual restaurant.
And that's the most recent. I think
we're on three years at fat mostly. Pretty
brave in this economy and era of restaurant
(13:19):
touring, which is the expenses, the permitting, all that's come through the road.
I'll tell you, we're over 200 employees.
That's amazing. For four different leases. Yeah,
it's a high overhead business. Restaurant business is very high
overhead. Insurance is through the roof. Yeah, insurance,
commodities are through the roof with everything,
(13:41):
with anything that's being transported with gas, even though
it's come down, but it's still been a factor with deliveries and charges and
things like that. So it's a tough business. I noticed on my last
Southern bill there was a delivery charge because there's only like three cases and
they start charging me. That really made me mad. But that wasn't always the
case. This is a family legacy here.
(14:05):
It looks like you're more than just one generation of chefs? Yeah, no.
Myself, my father and then my grandparents started. They immigrated
from Lebanon in the early 1900s, and they end up
getting in the restaurant business in the late 40s, 50s, and
I got really into it early on in LA, in
(14:25):
St. Louis. My wife and I are both from St. Louis. Wow, you speak Farsi
as well, or you speak Arabic or anything that's interesting. My father's from
Cairo. I heard his. All those languages, but I cook it. But.
Yeah, right, that's great. But did you go to the Habos Cafe when you're. No.
Used to be on pch because you. You're French
trained. I looked at your. Your resume and you. You went to France to.
(14:47):
To learn how to cook. And I think that's, you know, like I mentioned, my
daughter did, too. Do you think that's a necessary
step for a young chef to travel the world? 40 years ago?
Yeah. Today, French chefs are sending their kids to
the States. I mean, the restaurants here. 40 years ago,
I was 20s. I was in my 20s, and it was
(15:10):
a totally different restaurant scene, was totally different. Paul
Bocus sent his son to the United States. Really? Piero
Antonori sent his son to the United States. Really? We've got some of the best
chefs in the world. I mean, you can't talk about food without
thinking the United States isn't up there. It is. I had an
interesting conversation with a guy named Vahed Kashgari, and he's a winemaker in Armenia.
(15:32):
He makes a great value sparkling wine. And the
oldest wineries in the world as far as. Well, if you ask them, if you
ask the Georgians. Right. But he. He was telling
me that he owned a restaurant. I met him years and years ago when he
owned a restaurant in Berkeley called La Ligne, where Alice Waters
would go when she didn't want to sit at Chez
(15:53):
Panisse. It also was the founding location of the Roan
Rangers, Randall Graham and Robert Haas and those guys that got together
and started. I go, what an interesting connection. Now he's got the call in
to go to Armenia and make sparkling wine. The reason I brought that up is.
Does it matter too? Do you think of the historical viewpoint
of cuisine like you just mentioned? These famous people are bringing their
(16:15):
kids to America to learn the craft. Do you think? But
understanding the history of food and the history of wine is an important piece
of. I mean, to our generation. Yes, to the generation today.
No, it's, you know, there's. They. And what I
tell anyone, anybody that Comes to work for us, I believe you can
go to. Which is one of the great things. You can go to any restaurant
(16:38):
in the world on your phone and you can look at the table
setting, you can look at the florals, you can look at the uniforms, the aprons.
You can learn so much and be inspired by that. Obviously the menu,
pictures of the food all over. That's interesting. I
can't emphasize enough to our staff to do that. And I've got a couple young
cooks in the kitchen. That's all they do. And it makes me really happy that
(17:00):
they're inspired by. It can be Armenia, Spain,
Italy, France, Japan. And that they
get interested in learning the cuisine and the styles from different
countries. That must feel good to inspire
somebody because somebody. When my daughter was looking for a cooking school
because she went to pastry school in France,
(17:22):
Lyon, and then went to
savory school in New York. And I bring that up because we went
to. What's the one in Napa,
you know, the big. At the Brainstone. Greystone. Yeah, Greystone.
And the guy pitched that school like an
alternative to college. And you're gonna come out of here
(17:45):
and you're gonna be a food star. And it was kind of like the wrong
message, in my opinion. It wasn't one of my daughter respected. She wanted to learn
how to cook. She wasn't interested in being a, you know, be on the food
channel or anything. She wanted to learn how to do. How to do the business.
And I thought kind of a weak. Kind of a weak
reason. And here you have these kids that come in. Are they
(18:06):
trained at all this? Jeff was a
dishwasher, but really got so inspired by being around
what we were doing. He runs our whole kitchen here now. That's amazing.
That's got. What bothers me about the schools is when not one
kid coming out of there. I don't believe I shouldn't say one
kid. That's a pretty broad statement. Most of them can't figure
(18:28):
out an excel sheet. They can't figure out quickbooks. They can't
figure out anything like that that is important to being
a chef or being a cook. And you have to know the numbers of everything.
It's a business, right? It's just not go cook and have fun. It's a business.
And it's all just sounds pretty
however you want to take it. It's all about money. If you don't have the
(18:49):
money, you can't pay the. Can't pay the cooks, can't pay the rent. So you
have to make money to succeed in the business. And it's a hard
lesson to learn. I've had my ups and downs, but I've learned from every one
of them that didn't work. It's very important to know the money part of
a restaurant. It's different than anything else. Are we in a different
part of the timeline of a restaurant
(19:11):
where I was telling my wife this morning, this is almost like New York in
some cases. We just spent $60 on breakfast with a tip at the Good
Stuff. You know, it was probably 20 bucks, you know,
not even five years ago, maybe. Yeah, it's. I just saw
something online about someone going out to dinner
and just saying, it's just so expensive. It is. Yeah. It's so expensive
(19:33):
to operate a restaurant. It's so expensive. The rents are, you know,
we have one of our locations that they're waiting for a lease to go up
so they can increase the rent. It's, you know,
food. I tell our managers and the chefs that they have to look at every
invoice that's going into our food cost
calculations and our inventory sheets. I mean, I live and die by a P and
(19:55):
L. Yeah. And we have to keep that accurate because it changes that
much that often. And it's not going down much. No, it's not going down.
Red meat's probably, again, the highest that's been in a long time. I didn't. I
did not focus on. But I just see your Southern invoices there. I just happen
to recognize the color. And no, it's. And that hasn't helped
either. The consolidation. How is the consolidation of all the wholesales?
(20:17):
Has it made it easier? Because you write one check for some of the same
brands. Makes it harder. Makes it harder because. Because they have
consolidated and they feel they have a lock on everything that you possibly want. So
therefore. I'm so glad you said that. So therefore, if you've got
this particular liquor and you weren't buying this one ever,
now you got to buy this if you want to get this. It's. They block.
(20:40):
Good. Block booking. So it's illegal in the film business. Well, we,
we. Anyone that plays that game, I tell them, no problem. Here's
what you do. Anything that we have from you right now, it will be on
the bar. Tomorrow, pick it up and take it out of here. And I've done
that with two purveyors and I made them get out. Because it
seems to me that the having, like, I think part of it, when
(21:00):
you had 350 wines in your list, you probably wrote a lot more checks because
there were a lot of small distributors back then. Yeah. And a lot of them
have gone to self distributed. Oh, really? Yeah. You know, they cut out
that, you know, whatever they're giving the Southerns or the wine warehouse or
breakthrough, whatever they are now, because they, you know, that's a lot of money that
they're given, giving up. And it's hard. Wine business is tough. I
(21:21):
mean, it's really tough. It's tough. And the. When you have a. I
keep going back to Southern, them, they're coming in there, the door and saying, hey,
chef, I need a favor, I need a placement. Can you put this on our
list? On your list? I need it bad. And you work a rapport with the
salespeople and, you know, sometimes you say, okay, I can help you out. Then two
weeks later they say, oh, I got this. Now can you get this? Which one
do you want? Can't put all because there's 12 of you
(21:45):
doing the same thing. You know, I have a similar story in
that Southern was my ace in the
hole. But. But I'm talking 1990 something. That guy went to
bat for me and we were buying almost a thousand cases, maybe even
1200 cases of red a month and almost the same white. So we were buying
a lot. And so they would. To get that one purchase, you know, they
(22:07):
would do you some favors. Right. That's the business. But the ABCs tried desperately to
keep favors out of the. Out of the equation, but that's just the way it
goes. Right. And then the rep changed. And the next
guy named Mike Bartley did a great job too. I was doing
a half a million a year with them. You know, just the one vendor,
next guy comes in, I dropped down to like $10,000
(22:28):
a year. And the next time I ordered, I was on cod.
And I think to myself, all that credit I built up with you guys is
nothing. And then Youngst took over from that position of being my friend and going
to bat for me. And literally the day she retired, March 31,
2023, which is when I retired from my business,
all that's dried up again because the relationships were over. It's still
(22:50):
driven by that. Yeah, it's funny, the shuffle. In all
the companies, it's all about relationships. And
the management is putting it all on the salespeople now. They've
eliminated so many upper management positions that were the ones that can make things
happen. And they put the salespeople in a bad position because they
just beat them to get out there and sell and sell and get
(23:13):
this product out and. And then get the super well, and. Next week it's the
next one. So they leverage the well against the wine, and the wine is their.
Their thing. So why did you go to Paris? Going back to
that well? You said that was important back then. Yeah,
back then. I mean, I was young. It was right
after my father passed away, and it was just a time I
(23:36):
needed to get away and, you know, focus on cooking and getting my
head in a different place. So that's. That's why I ended up going there. Because,
you know, Patrick Q worked in Paris as a chef.
He. He won't call himself chef, but, you know, he's. He's a
wonderful person. He's a great guy. So. But I think it's. This is the part
that's interesting and I don't. We didn't discuss your. If you have kids or not,
(23:56):
but there's something to me about
Ferdinand Point, the Trois Gros Brothers, you know,
the Ducasse,
and the evolution of food in
Europe with this legacy. And we don't seem to
(24:18):
have that as much in America. My wife's
cousin owns a restaurant. Pasadena, has been there 35 years. That's probably the
longest standing restaurant tour I know. Well,
which way do you mean? Well, so I guess
the question is more like, is that influence moving forward
an important part, or is American cuisine
(24:40):
really. That's part of the DNA, which is we're going to build a restaurant, we're
going to make the money we want to make. Let's just take. I think
California cuisine changed the world. Everything.
Italy, France, Spain. I mean, vegetables
were never front and center in anything. Freshness of, you know,
ingredients. It was always, you know, use a tomato no matter where you were. Paris,
(25:02):
Italy, use a tomato year round. Until
Alice Waters, Wolfgang, Jeremiah Tower,
guys like that. That started changing how food was served. I
believe that that changed everywhere. I saw it when I worked in France, how
it started evolving and then start traveling there. It made a huge.
California, made a huge footprint on cuisine that year.
(25:24):
Sort of the 80s where Alice's. And then
what's her name, the one owns Moza?
She's. I'm a friend of her boyfriend and I can't remember her name now. She's
supposed to come on the. Nancy. Nancy Silver. Yes.
Well, the reason I bring that up is because I think the
(25:48):
story is as important. I mean, wine is about the story now. I
think when it comes to wine, selling wine, that this story is
really what's happening there's so many brands you're talking about. The Gen Z
is not drinking the old classics. They're bringing in things like Whiny Baby and
these other brands and the White Claw and all those competitive
beverages to wine. And I'm thinking that wine
(26:10):
only has besides that ethereal value of a
good glass of wine, which I think every generation comes to once,
finally. But. But up until that point, it's about the story.
It's like, what can we tell somebody? All right, so this guy told me today
that he pretty much quit drinking booze.
You know the trend. You know, he's just. To me, yeah, I could quit
(26:33):
drinking a vodka all day long or a whiskey, but wine, to me, is.
What you just said. It's the story. It's the taste. It's the. I
mean, each wine you have is so different. Vodka to me. Yeah. Is
Chopin different than Belvedere or the Smirnoff? Yes. But when
you're drinking a nice bottle of wine and you taste the nuances of
the earth and things like that, the grapes are so different from
(26:56):
one to the other. I mean, that's what intrigues me about drinking wine. It.
It does connect. Yeah. It is an expression. I don't think
that the Gen Z wines, like the. Like the orange wines, are necessarily
depart from that. What bothered me about them in the beginning was they all
tasted like kombucha, and they were just an excuse not to make good wine.
Because you can make good orange wine, you can filter it, and you can have
(27:17):
a quality wine. There's nothing wrong with that. But I just thought. I think that
eventually. And my kids now I have. She's 35,
32, and 29 or something. You know, they get
it. You know, they don't. They don't go to the cheap
glass of wine they want to sell. That's gonna. That's gonna make them feel good.
And we send them back because sometimes the bottles have been open too long.
(27:40):
Let's do that. Do you have a song? Do you have psalms here? We don't.
Someone needs somebody. They usually. I mean, our staff is pretty well
trained at all the restaurants. How do you do it? Just
experience. Experience. I mean, we hire experience. I mean, we don't hire
anyone that's not experienced as. As a server. They have to have wine knowledge.
They have to have liquor knowledge, and obviously service knowledge. So
(28:05):
anyone that needs something, they usually get me. So there's a.
This is one of the expressions. You've probably heard it. We need to change the
language of wine. I Kind of beat this dead horse.
But I still have to do it because we went to a restaurant the other
day in Hermosa and the wine list was sorted by
style. In my life, my wife likes Bordeaux
(28:27):
varietals as much as I try to stump her with Syrahs and things like that.
It's like Pinot Noir as well, but I kind of
look through bold and vivacious, light and
airy. And I had to look through every category to make sure I wasn't missing
something that was categorized for things because. A Pinot could be in all three of
those categories. So kind of a cat, but so does she. So
(28:50):
what's your thought on that? And is there any value
to dumbing, not dumbing it down? I don't think that's the right word, but to
changing the way people explain or talk about it. I think that's
exactly what people are trying to do, change the way. Get a. Get a
hook into someone that's different than the traditional.
I mean, that's part of what I see going in the restaurant business in general.
(29:11):
Everyone's trying to figure a new way to get the customer.
Because bottom line, we're all restaurants and
it depends on what you want to eat. Do you want steak? Do you want
Italian? Do you want fish? Do you want whatever it may be. So
when there's so many choices, people
are trying to find a way of distinguishing what makes you want to go
(29:33):
there than here. Well, you covered all the bases. You've got the casual restaurant
most. You've got the steakhouse in Manhattan, you've got Italian place in Manhattan and you
have a French place in. So back to our original conversation
earlier. Why did I do it if I wasn't going to do an Italian someone
else? I wasn't going to put a French piece while someone else would. Was it
fun opening Fet because it's French and you. Yeah, no, Fet
(29:55):
was a lot of fun. It's a, you know, great looking restaurant.
It's got so many. The open windows are wonderful, especially
this time of year. We got a beautiful bar. So yeah, it's a fun
restaurant. I just had dinner. Well, actually we went
to dinner the other night to the new Italian place on Pier
Avenue. Stecca. Oh, yeah, yeah, Steca. And
(30:19):
more importantly, I took a young intern.
This is kind of going back to your dishwasher. And I'm very proud of this.
She was my intern and she wrote all the talking points for this show
before AI and I had
her in the first summer when she was writing the talking points when I had
a female winemaker on being a hot subject in the wine trade right now.
(30:42):
And she ended up going to enology school in
Cornell. She's going into her third year this year and she,
we got her a internship at Chateau Bailly in
Pasaglion. And she. The
glee, the inspiration she drew from
doing this, this, this internship, the stagier
(31:06):
was really quite heartwarming for me.
Quite accomplished. I feel like I accomplished something by just getting
one person interested in the trade and
what we do. And you had the chance to do it to a lot of,
a lot of people. Yeah, I've been fortunate. I've had a lot of
kids that worked under me that are very successful either with their own
(31:29):
restaurants or chefing or whatever it may be. But yeah,
I'm proud of that. And it's. I just came back from St. Louis for
a family trip and so many of the restaurants I went to see these
kids that had worked for me and now they're adults and have their own business.
It's pleasing. I enjoy that part of it. Do you, what, what
do you try to instill? I mean you, I know you try to inspire them
(31:51):
and you, and you can only, you can't force feed them
the inspiration. And so when they leave here, you know, what do you hope?
What lesson do you think they hope? I hope
they see my dedication
to what I do. I don't cut
corners on anything. We repaint the restaurant three
(32:13):
times a year completely to keep it fresh, keep the carpets clean,
little things like that. Redo our flowers, you know, twice a week
and just instill a work ethic and be committed. Because if
you're just doing it for a year or two, you're wasting the restaurant's time and
you're wasting your own time. But it's, it's a business. You
really have to be committed to. The passion which is in the wine business. Dude.
(32:36):
Yeah, absolutely. If you don't have the passion, I. Believe any business, you have to
have the passion. And but the restaurant business, the grind of the restaurant
business and that's changed a lot. I mean, I do believe the 40 hour week
is pretty normal in our business. At least in our company it is.
And that's in the case all the time. 60 hour
weeks. 60. That still, that was part time.
(33:00):
I mean, that's an interesting distinction. You know, the French have what, a
35 hour week? Maybe they're fighting for 30 now. And
how about this? No tip, no tax on tips. How does that feel to your
staff? It's my understanding it's on your first $25,000 of
earnings and then after that. You'Re taxed total earnings or
total tax tipped earnings. Tipped earnings. You still are
(33:23):
taxed on your hourly. Yeah. And then whatever tips you make, up
to 25,000 is the way we understand it. But did that
feel good to a restaurateur to at least show that
relief to your staff or non issue, you
know? Well, it's, it's too early to tell. Yeah.
I'll be curious to see how the staff, you know, if they really see the
(33:46):
difference on their check. Any pool tips here? We do, and some
goes to the back house. We just started the full pull
two weeks ago. First of the month here. And so that's. No, isn't part of
your regular DNA prior to that, pay well.
Pay well. Pay well. Pay well. I mean, I had a restaurant tour
(34:06):
after we opened here seven, eight years ago. Call me up. He says,
can I talk to you? Can you meet me? I want to talk to you.
I says, yo, what's going on? He said, rumor has it now this is
eight years ago, you're paying your dishwashers 18 bucks an hour. Minimum
wage was 1450 or something like that. I says, yeah. He said,
what are you thinking? I said, I don't want turnover. I said, if they're doing
(34:28):
a good job, I'll keep paying them more. Yeah, right. And sure enough, eight
years later, the dishwasher is still here, our cleaning crew
is still here. It just, it's not worth it. That's too hard. If I
made an extra $40,000 a year, a restaurant, it's
not going to change my life. If they can make that extra money, I'm happy
for them to make it. Well, how about the
(34:50):
cost of retraining somebody and starting? Absolutely. I, I can't stand
turnover. It's really hard. Yeah, it's the most, it's,
it's so costly. Yeah. You want to
retire into the wine trade. No.
That couldn't be the worst business right now, other than the restaurant business.
Yeah. I just see whatever all these wineries are going through right now, it
(35:13):
is so tough. Yeah. And just for everything we talked about less
drinking, less bottles of wine on a list.
It's just, it's so tough. I, I, there are wines which I won't
mention that 10 years ago they would never discount. They would never
today buy two cases and you're going to get it, you know, 25%
off or get six bottles of X. It's, it's A bloodbath out there in
(35:35):
the line business, you know, during COVID What happened here during COVID
Open, close, open, closed. We were closed mostly. That's when they had the
outdoor seating. 20. 20, right? Yeah, yeah, we had outdoor
seating up until whatever, two years ago, three years ago.
So at the Wine of the Month club we had
during COVID Cayman showed up and Silver Oak showed up. They would have never come
(35:58):
because they didn't need me. They had all on premise. They didn't need the guy,
you know, even though. And I was selling 1
liter Caymus bottles for 140, and
I couldn't keep it in stock. Oh, sure. And my allocation was 18 bottles a
week. Oh, until they ran out. Now I have like nine
cases still in a stock because the moment Covid was over, it
(36:19):
stopped. And now you can buy it for 79. Oh, yeah, they're very aggressive
with Caymus now. So it's interesting that
the. The. The. I think part of this. The palette and I think part of
it's just the consumption level. But the point I was going to make
was they wanted nothing to do with me as a online
restaurant, you know, wine vendor. And. And, you know, even though
(36:42):
I was established and 50 years. The company was 50 years old at the time,
they wanted nothing to do with it. And so it was strictly who can sell
the wine? And then all of a sudden, they come crawling back and I said,
I'll buy it, but you got to make sure you stick with me after this
is over. But then after it was over, I couldn't sell it.
Saved my life. As you know, the Wagner family is probably some of the best
marketers in. The wine world, and they are talking about block booking. Sure.
(37:06):
I had to buy. Was Csun.
Csun Pinot or something. I had to buy so many cases to get access to
something out. I was out. It was crazy. So what's
next? You got another restaurant coming up? You know,
we're kicking around trying to get Orange county back open. And that's two restaurants
there. What was that down there? Park Avenue and Hill
(37:29):
Garage on in Stanton. Oh, yeah, we opened those in
2005 and we've been closed since COVID
And I was doing that commute back and forth for 20 years from
here to Orange County. It was 45 minutes to an hour back and
forth each way. So we're kicking that around about
reopening. We've been talking to the city. The city wants it open pretty
(37:52):
bad. It's, you know, our. It was a true destination
location. And we drew from everywhere. But the neighborhood has really
changed and grown and crime is way down there and
populations increased and the average income family has
increased. So it's, it's a pretty good area and it's a very unique
restaurant. It's two restaurants. One would be similar to sliced taken
(38:14):
chop and the other was similar to slay Italian. On the same property
was an old dairy farm. We had a beautiful private park. Very cool. Did weddings
and caterings and a garden in the back that we grew a lot of our
vegetables there. But it's, you know, the area I think could take care
of it now. When Covid hit, we didn't, we didn't think we would stand a
chance. Avail is still available. It's your property. I have a partner there and he
(38:35):
owns the property for 100 years. Yeah. So my dad
when we lived in PV and his main shop was in Pals Verdes and
the wine shop was there. But he also had a pharmacy in
Inglewood, Linwood and two in Montebello. And when
he handed the car off to me, finally, just like
a son, I'm moving and you take the car. It had 330,000 miles on
(38:58):
it. Do you have a routine just leaving? Just locally,
you know, I had a. Prius, so I'd
fill it up once a week and I had a set. But just the routine
of visiting each restaurant, making sure everybody's doing it right. So it's interesting. Yes.
That a lot of people do on my phone I have open table.
Yeah. And I see, you know, I look at that 100 times a
(39:20):
day. Each restaurant, who's going in, you know, before, in the
morning, in the afternoon and then before service, I'll see who's at which
restaurant and what timing. And I make it to all the restaurants. I go around
all of them. How important are those
reviews? Yelp, Rezi, Foursquare, all those reviews.
I have friends that rely on them exclusively. I don't rely on them
(39:43):
except I do like Michelin Guide because it, it's a, it's a focus
group of people that do the, that have some kind of standard. I mean, I
don't know if some guy comes here, doesn't like their steak or does or loves
it. I don't know who that person is. I, I, I don't follow. You
don't manage it? I don't, I don't ask my staff to. I
believe we give 110% effort. That's the best we can do.
(40:05):
We serve thousands of people a week. Are we Going to please everybody. We
will sure try, but I know we won't. But I
don't have enough complaints from customers to where I need to rethink what we're
doing. But will we fall short sometimes? Yes. And it really
bothers me. And we'll go out of our way to win the guest over. Whether
we invite them back as our guest or comp their check or whatever it is.
(40:27):
I don't like complaints. And I don't ever doubt a customer and sit and
argue with them over, you know, is that medium rare or not? They don't,
you know, redo it. Because in the wine trades, the
same thing. And I. It's very funny. My mother, when she was selling the
wine of the month club with my dad, she would. She would just
not tell people that you could cancel any time, which is a function of the
(40:50):
club. And I was like, no, mom, you got to tell them you can cancel
anytime, because that keep. Makes them motivated and that you will fix their
problems. You'll make them right. You'll make it right. I can't please
all the pallets all the time with the stuff I bought and sold like
a pic pool de penne. I mean, who's going to know what that is? But
it's a great wine. I should expose them. But then if it's a problem,
(41:10):
fix it. And that usually earns. In fact, one of the. One of the
original functions of social networking, Facebook in particular,
was the ability to publicly fix a complaint.
So if somebody complains online, you have the opportunity to
respond and show everybody that reads that complaint
that you're involved and you're participating in the fix. And I think that's really
(41:34):
important to this industry. Yeah, you know,
customer has a lot of choices, especially at our price point at all our
restaurants. So I put faith in
what their belief. They have a complaint. I, you know, I attack
it if they're correct. You know, one of the things that we
noticed and because we're a little tuned to the industry of my
(41:55):
daughter and wine, of course, is, you know, you can.
You can tell rather in short order when you walk into a
restaurant and taste maybe the appetizer or taste the food, that
it's fresh, that it's from quality ingredients.
To highlight the exception to that, my daughter was living in
Potsdam, New York. Okay. It's not the edge of the world, but right across
(42:18):
the street, you can see it. There's nothing there
that's from. Which is kind of bizarre because the restaurants,
they're terrible. But as a mother, my
Daughter would go to the farm to buy her vegetables. They're all seasonal. She would
go to the dairy to get her raw milk for her babies. And you
go to the orchard and pick your apples. So I'm trying to
(42:40):
figure out why the restaurants don't do that. Because you really can't
eat the food at most of the restaurants there. It's really, you know, it's. I
was just up in, when I was up the vineyard last week or earlier this
week, and we grow a lot of our own food
and right now we're in the peak of tomato season because June and July up
there were pretty chilly. So we just started with tomatoes maybe three weeks
(43:02):
ago. And I'm at a restaurant up there that's saying
all fresh seasonal vegetables. It came out
the most underripe tomato,
horrible looking lettuce. I'm thinking, what are they thinking? They've got salad or
the salad. Yeah. And you know, it could be, you know, people, I mean, when
(43:22):
tomatoes are done for the season, we're done with them. Yeah. When squash blossoms are
done for the season, we're done with them. And so I've always cooked like that
though. I mean, ever, even going back when I started in my 20s in St.
Louis. Always cook seasonal, always cook fresh. I, I think it's, you know,
especially younger people today, that's what they want. And that is very French,
though, to do that. Yeah. Or very Italian as well. I mean, you go to
(43:43):
any, a lot of the outskirts or in Chianti or
Montepulciano, I mean, it's so refreshing to see a little
restaurant with a garden in the back and they're bringing tomatoes in for your lunch
or dinner. But I want to go back to what you said about wine clubs.
And you're saying your wife. Yes. That has seen the biggest drop in the wine
industry. People aren't committing $400 a
(44:05):
month or $200 a month to get their wine. And they're,
they're realizing that sometimes they're getting wine they don't even want. It's not
curated by, you know, someone that knows what they're doing. They're getting a mix of
wines that are all over, but that has seen a huge drop. I
didn't sell it because I was making too much money.
And, and, and I, I'll say honestly for the listeners
(44:28):
too, the premise of that club in
1972 for my father at the wine shop was
he tasted so much wine to pick the best two wines he felt for that
month put them on display for a Month and then rotated. People
left Palos Verdes, particularly the aerospace guys, went to
Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and said, send us wines
(44:50):
because we like your selections. When it got larger, and
I'll just tell you briefly, history. 1984, we moved it to a little bungalow in
King harbor and would pack for a week and then bill for a week and
then leave. You know, when I bought it and moved to Arcadia in
1988, it was really founded on
the Trader Joe's formula at the time, which was finding odd lots of good
(45:13):
wines that were properly made, branded for that sale, branded
to represent the winery and the people that made it. And what was happening toward
the end here were these 50 cent a liter,
20,000 liter bladders coming in from Spain of just crap being
bottled under a bunch of brands. And the wine clubs that were buying them up
at 250 or $3 a bottle and putting them out there, 15.
(45:34):
How long can you fool the customer like that? Unfortunately, that's
what you see in so many restaurants today. And it really pisses me off when
I see that. And I know what some of these wines that they're running on
a special that are five and seven dollars that are on a list for 85
or 110, and there's, you know, I see it, and it just really
bothers me. We were at a restaurant, Pasadena, Italian places, a couple of years ago,
(45:56):
and the bottle came to get where maitre d
recommended it, and it was corked. And
he came to me. He goes, no, it's not, sir. I go, no, it is.
It's cork. I mean, smell it. He goes, that's not wrong with it. So
he wouldn't even offer anything. So then the table next door
had a glass of it. They just opened a fresh bottle. I said, bring that
(46:18):
bottle over. Let's pour it against this one. And so he poured a little taste.
I said, they're different. He goes, no, they're not. They're the same. And he said,
but I'll give you the rest of this bottle, okay? I got on my phone
because I have all my notes from all the things I tasted. I just tasted
that particular brand. And they offered to me for
$7. No, I see it all the time. And they're charging 45.
(46:38):
Even if the guy gave me a fresh bottle, it's only 14 in it. But
that's not even. The supplier
takes it back. Yeah, right. That's any bad bottle that no
question asked. So, you know, when a customer says, you know, I hate to do
this, don't hate to do it, doesn't I send it back to them and get
re. You know, they'll replace it. You're right. You're absolutely right.
(47:01):
I don't go to the restaurant anymore. Well, I wouldn't either. You know, we've had.
We've already been 45, 50 minutes. Oh, my gosh. This has been a
pleasure to talk shop with you. Time kind of went fast.
Hope to see you in hot yoga soon. Get in there and
eat and drink more. I have to, but I've got to ride so I can
be in the triathlon next year. I gotta run, which I haven't done for a
(47:22):
long time. So it's gonna be a balance of riding,
running and yoga. But what you'll find
out, the more hot yoga you do, those become easier.
Yes, because that's so hard. You're right. There's, you know, it's interesting. There's a cardio
component to it. Oh, yeah. Because you like the sweat and sculpt thing. Yeah. Yeah.
Right. Which is my favorite too, because I can't get into
(47:44):
some of those yoga positions. Well, anyway, it's been a pleasure.
Cheers. Likewise. Congratulation and thanks for having me. See
you soon.
I could quit drinking a vodka all day long or a whiskey, but wine to
me, is. What you just said. It's the story. It's the taste. It's the.
I mean, each wine you have is so different. Vodka to me. Yeah.
Is Chopin different than Belvedere or than Smirnoff?
Yes. But when you're drinking a nice bottle of wine and you taste
the nuances of the earth and things like that,
(00:22):
the grapes are so different from one to the other. I mean, that's what intrigues
me about drinking wine. Sit back and grab a glass.
It's Wine talks with Paul K.
Hey, welcome to Wine talks with Paul Kay. And we are at away game today
way down in Manhattan at Hermitosa beach, about to have a conversation with David
Slay. Chef David Slay, a crazy good career in the wine
(00:45):
and food business. Welcome to the show. Thank you for having
me. This is. You know, we crossed paths. Easy for me to
say in hot yoga. We do. And I saw your shirt one day and I
go, you know, I wonder if that's Chef Slay. It was. And it's taken a
little while to get together, but I'm so happy to have a chance to sit
with you. Yeah. When I got your email to say you were in town and
(01:05):
get together, was looking forward to it. You'll. You'll see more of us.
Yeah. Hot yoga. You know, this. This summer, we
have spent more time at the house in. On 18th street than we
have prior summers. And we're about to
knock it down and put three stories up and have a place
(01:26):
because it's old. It was like 1945, and have
a place to. I think we land here forever.
Well, this summer was a little bit deceiving. There was not much
May gray, very little June gloom. I don't think we were over 80
until the last week or so. So it was a perfect summer. It was amazing.
Yeah. The last week was amazing. Yeah. Now we were. We were talking a little
(01:47):
bit before we started here about wine,
and I just had a conversation with a guy named Tim Hanai, who's a master
of wine, and he completely blows the lid off
and thinks wine food pairing is a hoax
and a falsehood in the world of food and culinary
experience. But you said something important just before we got on, and that was
(02:10):
adapting the consumer, how you're
vintnering, how you're making your wines, and
what's driving that. Well, I don't believe he's completely off. I wouldn't say
it's a hoax, but I think as before we started,
consumers, tastes have changed. I mean, 30 years
ago or 40 years ago, you wouldn't have red wine with fish.
(02:33):
You wouldn't be drinking a Chablis with the New York steak. I mean, that was.
And I think kind of what he may be referring to today,
anything goes, you know, it's what you want to drink. And especially the
younger consumer that is more into the varietals and the
Rhone blends and things like that. So I think it changed
with the consumer. And I see it in the restaurant when I see it.
(02:56):
Group of guys come in and they're in their 60s and 70s, they're bringing in
big Bordeaux, big Italians, big cabs. And then when you see
the younger kids coming in, it's a screw top, it's an orange wine. So
it, it has changed quite a bit. And it's interesting to see. That is interesting
because, yeah, I would do that. I would bring it up. In fact, I brought
a bunch down here. We have a big party on Saturday at the house and
(03:16):
I brought a bunch of big wines. And I'm interested to hear that the.
I don't know if it's millennials or Gen Zs, I have three millennials myself,
they tend to drink what I drink. Maybe that's because of dad, but it's interesting
to hear that they bring in orange wines, low elk, that kind of
stuff. Yeah, it's low elk. And we've adapted at the
vineyard ourselves. I make wine for what the
(03:38):
consumer wants, not for what my taste is. And
I've seen the changes over the years to where lower alcohol is important,
a little bit lighter. So we shift with it. I mean, I'm
not thick headed enough to say this is what I want,
this is what I drink and this is what I'm making. I make wine to
sell it, and I make it as a business. So I adapt pretty
(04:01):
easy. That's an interesting
direction here because they talk about innovation,
wine business, and there's sort of a balance there. And it sounds like
you're making it work. And that is there's a much certainly amount of
traditionalism in this trade. And if you do have a big Bordeaux or
you go to Bordeaux, you're going to experience that in a pretty, you know,
(04:22):
involved way. Yeah. But at the same time, it's consumer driven.
We need to sell stuff. Yeah. That's what our job is. The problem is,
is a new study came out today. Alcohol
consumption is probably at the lowest it's been since the 50s. Yeah. And we see
it in the restaurant it's very, it's, it's noticeable. The
younger generation. And I was at yoga today talking to guys our age
(04:45):
and all three of us were saying about how much even they have
cut back. They're not drinking as much as they were. Hard
liquor and beer is really taking a hit. Wine still is
doing good, but it's dropped quite a bit. Okay. So
a friend of mine owns a restaurant in Silver Lake,
bottle sales off 40% without a
(05:08):
commensurate increase in cocktails.
I don't, hopefully you haven't seen a 40% drop. Haven't seen a 40%
drop here in Manhattan. Manhattan beach is a different customer
too. So
it's dropped. Considerate to where we have cut our wine list
(05:28):
down at all four restaurants. We at one time I think
we probably had 350 bottles on our list here. We're probably at
150 now. Wow. So it's dropped quite a bit still. That's
an interesting perspective because you go to Arthur J. And they still have this mile
long list. Yeah, they got a great list and. It'S a great list. But and
I, you know Nick, obviously Patrick, you know,
(05:49):
Patrick Q is one. Yeah, Patrick's a good guy. He's a good friend and he
wrote a great book too. Yes, the Haute Cuisine. Yeah. And another one, I
think how to be a Restaurant Tourist. That was pretty recent.
Well, you take a list like that, you take Modern Consumption. And I'm going to
move on from the subject, but it's important to understand because that was an
important thing to have this mile long list with all the
(06:11):
choices. Wine educated people come in,
they look at the list, they wow, this is a great list. But it's expensive
to carry that list. And some of that stuff doesn't move. You know, who
knows? I mean, you have Petrus on your list, that can't be moving every day.
I'll tell you what it. No, exactly the price point. And
I just had a Napa winery contact me for a tasty next
(06:33):
week. I said send me all the information for one bottle at
dessert, wholesale price, $680 a bottle.
350 and 95. What? I answered back. I
said that price point just isn't selling today. No, I mean our average bottle
of wine is about $165, which is still on the high side
on our reds. For our whites, it's in the 90 to 120.
(06:56):
So and of our wine list, it's still the 8020 rule.
There's still that pocket of wine that is always selling and the others sit
on a shelf. How about the Caymus? Is the Silver Oaks the standard?
You know Dow, Dow has done such a
marketing job that you know, Dow is a probably.
It's a wonderful story. They only sell for a billion dollars. Yeah. And
(07:19):
their president's a good friend and customer, Manhattan beach guy Ned Lukic.
So they know him and that makes a difference.
It gets out. The public know it. But the Silver Oaks and
those, and the Phelps insignia, those drop way down.
I'm shocked. It's really interesting to know. I don't think I was looking at a
report this morning as well that sales dollars in
(07:42):
America has actually up. Now that could be the price point of the
average bottle price, but consumption is considerably down. It's.
Well, it's down what they say the average price is. They did. They just said
that they went from so many billion to so many billion. Oh yeah, it was
4% increase in dollars but 10%
decrease in volume which when you consider like the
(08:03):
total volume, It's. Yeah, it's 10% be a substantial
percentage. But they're still drinking, you know, quite a bit. I put a
60 bottle of wine on our list. We don't sell it. Really? Yeah.
That's amazing because. And it'll be. I won't put a
bad wine on it on the list. It's just. No, right here.
Manhattan beach is again different. They just jump right to the
(08:27):
$100 range. 150 range. But 60
not. We can't. You know it's interesting and I see the slave brand and now
that I know the pedigree of the, of the wine. Santa Rita Hills and then
fabricated at Dragonet, which is one of my favorite Pinot Noir
Chardonnay makers, period. And
sometimes branded wines or self branded wines have a
(08:49):
moniker about them. You know, if you particularly celebrity based wines that aren't
participate where the celebs not participating. You have that, that, I
mean is the volume of slay wines in your restaurant good? And there's a mystique
around the idea that it's slay that works. Positive or negative? No, it's 100%
positive. I mean we built a brand over the years. I'm not new to this.
We're involved in the community. Our service staff and our wines
(09:12):
are, you know, high quality. I mean I, I'll put our Pinot and Chardonnay up
against anybody. So you know, quality is important. And
if you know we bring in a boutique winery that someone's not familiar
with, you know, we try to get the guests to try it. Enjoy it.
A friend of ours from here, the Carpenters, they opened
their. Their vineyard and their first release was to us this
(09:34):
year. And they're local and it's. It's moving well, it's. And.
But it's like anything, you got to sell it. How many years now with
Slaybrand? Eight years now. It's interesting. This is
interesting. And I just. My memory.
My father's shop was in Malibu, Cove palace for his wines and spirits pals free
liquor when he bought it. And back then
(09:54):
1969-70, he closed it. He sold it in
85. The Barrett's lived nearby.
The Wetzels who owned Alexander Valley Vintage used to come into
the shop. There's a lot of history and
wine promotion because of the executives of El Segundo's
aerospace business and the personalities. This is
(10:17):
what fascinates me. The personalities of Redondo, Hermosa and
Manhattan really haven't changed as the clientele have. Have you
seen a change or do you see a difference between since your restaurants kind of
spread out? It's funny, so many people tell me people from
PV don't come down to Manhattan Beach. People from Hermosa don't come to
Manhattan Beach. Yeah, we don't come down. Manhattan doesn't go to Hermosa.
(10:40):
I'm in our restaurants every day. If I'm not at the vineyard, I'm here every
day and I work the tables. And I've met so many wonderful people from all
of the South Bay. I see a lot of people from everywhere.
And Hermosa, which is. Most people say they don't go to Hermosa. We get
a lot of customers from Manhattan Beach, a lot of pv. So I see it
differently. But there are people who believe that. Well, it's the
(11:02):
personality, which I think is a good thing. Like for instance, Hermosa just
declined that Giant. Not Giant, but It was a 150 room hotel that was going
to be a pier in the Strand and it had all these bars. And that
would be typical of the Hermosa beach citizen to reject the
idea of a development. Too bad. I agree with that.
I spent eight years on the planning commission, so I'm for pro development. But
(11:26):
Manhattan might have entertained that and it would have if they had the space and
existed. So I find that interesting that the personality is
kind of maintained. I will say I love Slay Hermosa.
I like the style. I like the fact. I mean, that's kind of a risky
deal. You took over El Gringo, this institution of
lousy Mexican food. It's funny how many people said they would not
(11:48):
go to the restaurant for us taking that over. Oh, really? So that was kind
of the backlash in the beginning. But slayermosa, it's
a wonderful restaurant, a great patio upstairs, but it's too small. We're
looking for a bigger space for it. We would like to have a bar and
actually more space. So we're actively looking forward space. My
father, when he had a pharmacy as well in Malaga Cove and
(12:11):
there was a counter and a Greek guy had a burger joint. And my father
was a very sort of proper, was raised in an English environment,
being from Cairo. And so the first thing he did when the really start out
is get rid of the burger guy because he didn't like burger smells. And he
said Peavey never forgave him for that. Right. You know, like El Gringo. You never
get forgiven for removing El Gringo from. From their location. I was there
(12:32):
when I lived here in the 80s. It was, you know, they were there. So
I can't tell how many people come in. I don't know what soup they used
to have that they were known for. Yeah, their chicken soup, the soccer. Everyone
always asks, why don't you bring the soup back? At least I don't know what
it was. And we make Sochi at our house all the time because of that
restaurant. So. But this, this is all contemporary
history for you. You have how many restaurants in the area now? We have four
(12:56):
restaurants. You have Fet Fet, which is French
Bistro, Slay Steak and Fish, where we are now,
Slay Italian Kitchen and Slay Hermosa, which is our most casual restaurant.
And that's the most recent. I think
we're on three years at fat mostly. Pretty
brave in this economy and era of restaurant
(13:19):
touring, which is the expenses, the permitting, all that's come through the road.
I'll tell you, we're over 200 employees.
That's amazing. For four different leases. Yeah,
it's a high overhead business. Restaurant business is very high
overhead. Insurance is through the roof. Yeah, insurance,
commodities are through the roof with everything,
(13:41):
with anything that's being transported with gas, even though
it's come down, but it's still been a factor with deliveries and charges and
things like that. So it's a tough business. I noticed on my last
Southern bill there was a delivery charge because there's only like three cases and
they start charging me. That really made me mad. But that wasn't always the
case. This is a family legacy here.
(14:05):
It looks like you're more than just one generation of chefs? Yeah, no.
Myself, my father and then my grandparents started. They immigrated
from Lebanon in the early 1900s, and they end up
getting in the restaurant business in the late 40s, 50s, and
I got really into it early on in LA, in
(14:25):
St. Louis. My wife and I are both from St. Louis. Wow, you speak Farsi
as well, or you speak Arabic or anything that's interesting. My father's from
Cairo. I heard his. All those languages, but I cook it. But.
Yeah, right, that's great. But did you go to the Habos Cafe when you're. No.
Used to be on pch because you. You're French
trained. I looked at your. Your resume and you. You went to France to.
(14:47):
To learn how to cook. And I think that's, you know, like I mentioned, my
daughter did, too. Do you think that's a necessary
step for a young chef to travel the world? 40 years ago?
Yeah. Today, French chefs are sending their kids to
the States. I mean, the restaurants here. 40 years ago,
I was 20s. I was in my 20s, and it was
(15:10):
a totally different restaurant scene, was totally different. Paul
Bocus sent his son to the United States. Really? Piero
Antonori sent his son to the United States. Really? We've got some of the best
chefs in the world. I mean, you can't talk about food without
thinking the United States isn't up there. It is. I had an
interesting conversation with a guy named Vahed Kashgari, and he's a winemaker in Armenia.
(15:32):
He makes a great value sparkling wine. And the
oldest wineries in the world as far as. Well, if you ask them, if you
ask the Georgians. Right. But he. He was telling
me that he owned a restaurant. I met him years and years ago when he
owned a restaurant in Berkeley called La Ligne, where Alice Waters
would go when she didn't want to sit at Chez
(15:53):
Panisse. It also was the founding location of the Roan
Rangers, Randall Graham and Robert Haas and those guys that got together
and started. I go, what an interesting connection. Now he's got the call in
to go to Armenia and make sparkling wine. The reason I brought that up is.
Does it matter too? Do you think of the historical viewpoint
of cuisine like you just mentioned? These famous people are bringing their
(16:15):
kids to America to learn the craft. Do you think? But
understanding the history of food and the history of wine is an important piece
of. I mean, to our generation. Yes, to the generation today.
No, it's, you know, there's. They. And what I
tell anyone, anybody that Comes to work for us, I believe you can
go to. Which is one of the great things. You can go to any restaurant
(16:38):
in the world on your phone and you can look at the table
setting, you can look at the florals, you can look at the uniforms, the aprons.
You can learn so much and be inspired by that. Obviously the menu,
pictures of the food all over. That's interesting. I
can't emphasize enough to our staff to do that. And I've got a couple young
cooks in the kitchen. That's all they do. And it makes me really happy that
(17:00):
they're inspired by. It can be Armenia, Spain,
Italy, France, Japan. And that they
get interested in learning the cuisine and the styles from different
countries. That must feel good to inspire
somebody because somebody. When my daughter was looking for a cooking school
because she went to pastry school in France,
(17:22):
Lyon, and then went to
savory school in New York. And I bring that up because we went
to. What's the one in Napa,
you know, the big. At the Brainstone. Greystone. Yeah, Greystone.
And the guy pitched that school like an
alternative to college. And you're gonna come out of here
(17:45):
and you're gonna be a food star. And it was kind of like the wrong
message, in my opinion. It wasn't one of my daughter respected. She wanted to learn
how to cook. She wasn't interested in being a, you know, be on the food
channel or anything. She wanted to learn how to do. How to do the business.
And I thought kind of a weak. Kind of a weak
reason. And here you have these kids that come in. Are they
(18:06):
trained at all this? Jeff was a
dishwasher, but really got so inspired by being around
what we were doing. He runs our whole kitchen here now. That's amazing.
That's got. What bothers me about the schools is when not one
kid coming out of there. I don't believe I shouldn't say one
kid. That's a pretty broad statement. Most of them can't figure
(18:28):
out an excel sheet. They can't figure out quickbooks. They can't
figure out anything like that that is important to being
a chef or being a cook. And you have to know the numbers of everything.
It's a business, right? It's just not go cook and have fun. It's a business.
And it's all just sounds pretty
however you want to take it. It's all about money. If you don't have the
(18:49):
money, you can't pay the. Can't pay the cooks, can't pay the rent. So you
have to make money to succeed in the business. And it's a hard
lesson to learn. I've had my ups and downs, but I've learned from every one
of them that didn't work. It's very important to know the money part of
a restaurant. It's different than anything else. Are we in a different
part of the timeline of a restaurant
(19:11):
where I was telling my wife this morning, this is almost like New York in
some cases. We just spent $60 on breakfast with a tip at the Good
Stuff. You know, it was probably 20 bucks, you know,
not even five years ago, maybe. Yeah, it's. I just saw
something online about someone going out to dinner
and just saying, it's just so expensive. It is. Yeah. It's so expensive
(19:33):
to operate a restaurant. It's so expensive. The rents are, you know,
we have one of our locations that they're waiting for a lease to go up
so they can increase the rent. It's, you know,
food. I tell our managers and the chefs that they have to look at every
invoice that's going into our food cost
calculations and our inventory sheets. I mean, I live and die by a P and
(19:55):
L. Yeah. And we have to keep that accurate because it changes that
much that often. And it's not going down much. No, it's not going down.
Red meat's probably, again, the highest that's been in a long time. I didn't. I
did not focus on. But I just see your Southern invoices there. I just happen
to recognize the color. And no, it's. And that hasn't helped
either. The consolidation. How is the consolidation of all the wholesales?
(20:17):
Has it made it easier? Because you write one check for some of the same
brands. Makes it harder. Makes it harder because. Because they have
consolidated and they feel they have a lock on everything that you possibly want. So
therefore. I'm so glad you said that. So therefore, if you've got
this particular liquor and you weren't buying this one ever,
now you got to buy this if you want to get this. It's. They block.
(20:40):
Good. Block booking. So it's illegal in the film business. Well, we,
we. Anyone that plays that game, I tell them, no problem. Here's
what you do. Anything that we have from you right now, it will be on
the bar. Tomorrow, pick it up and take it out of here. And I've done
that with two purveyors and I made them get out. Because it
seems to me that the having, like, I think part of it, when
(21:00):
you had 350 wines in your list, you probably wrote a lot more checks because
there were a lot of small distributors back then. Yeah. And a lot of them
have gone to self distributed. Oh, really? Yeah. You know, they cut out
that, you know, whatever they're giving the Southerns or the wine warehouse or
breakthrough, whatever they are now, because they, you know, that's a lot of money that
they're given, giving up. And it's hard. Wine business is tough. I
(21:21):
mean, it's really tough. It's tough. And the. When you have a. I
keep going back to Southern, them, they're coming in there, the door and saying, hey,
chef, I need a favor, I need a placement. Can you put this on our
list? On your list? I need it bad. And you work a rapport with the
salespeople and, you know, sometimes you say, okay, I can help you out. Then two
weeks later they say, oh, I got this. Now can you get this? Which one
do you want? Can't put all because there's 12 of you
(21:45):
doing the same thing. You know, I have a similar story in
that Southern was my ace in the
hole. But. But I'm talking 1990 something. That guy went to
bat for me and we were buying almost a thousand cases, maybe even
1200 cases of red a month and almost the same white. So we were buying
a lot. And so they would. To get that one purchase, you know, they
(22:07):
would do you some favors. Right. That's the business. But the ABCs tried desperately to
keep favors out of the. Out of the equation, but that's just the way it
goes. Right. And then the rep changed. And the next
guy named Mike Bartley did a great job too. I was doing
a half a million a year with them. You know, just the one vendor,
next guy comes in, I dropped down to like $10,000
(22:28):
a year. And the next time I ordered, I was on cod.
And I think to myself, all that credit I built up with you guys is
nothing. And then Youngst took over from that position of being my friend and going
to bat for me. And literally the day she retired, March 31,
2023, which is when I retired from my business,
all that's dried up again because the relationships were over. It's still
(22:50):
driven by that. Yeah, it's funny, the shuffle. In all
the companies, it's all about relationships. And
the management is putting it all on the salespeople now. They've
eliminated so many upper management positions that were the ones that can make things
happen. And they put the salespeople in a bad position because they
just beat them to get out there and sell and sell and get
(23:13):
this product out and. And then get the super well, and. Next week it's the
next one. So they leverage the well against the wine, and the wine is their.
Their thing. So why did you go to Paris? Going back to
that well? You said that was important back then. Yeah,
back then. I mean, I was young. It was right
after my father passed away, and it was just a time I
(23:36):
needed to get away and, you know, focus on cooking and getting my
head in a different place. So that's. That's why I ended up going there. Because,
you know, Patrick Q worked in Paris as a chef.
He. He won't call himself chef, but, you know, he's. He's a
wonderful person. He's a great guy. So. But I think it's. This is the part
that's interesting and I don't. We didn't discuss your. If you have kids or not,
(23:56):
but there's something to me about
Ferdinand Point, the Trois Gros Brothers, you know,
the Ducasse,
and the evolution of food in
Europe with this legacy. And we don't seem to
(24:18):
have that as much in America. My wife's
cousin owns a restaurant. Pasadena, has been there 35 years. That's probably the
longest standing restaurant tour I know. Well,
which way do you mean? Well, so I guess
the question is more like, is that influence moving forward
an important part, or is American cuisine
(24:40):
really. That's part of the DNA, which is we're going to build a restaurant, we're
going to make the money we want to make. Let's just take. I think
California cuisine changed the world. Everything.
Italy, France, Spain. I mean, vegetables
were never front and center in anything. Freshness of, you know,
ingredients. It was always, you know, use a tomato no matter where you were. Paris,
(25:02):
Italy, use a tomato year round. Until
Alice Waters, Wolfgang, Jeremiah Tower,
guys like that. That started changing how food was served. I
believe that that changed everywhere. I saw it when I worked in France, how
it started evolving and then start traveling there. It made a huge.
California, made a huge footprint on cuisine that year.
(25:24):
Sort of the 80s where Alice's. And then
what's her name, the one owns Moza?
She's. I'm a friend of her boyfriend and I can't remember her name now. She's
supposed to come on the. Nancy. Nancy Silver. Yes.
Well, the reason I bring that up is because I think the
(25:48):
story is as important. I mean, wine is about the story now. I
think when it comes to wine, selling wine, that this story is
really what's happening there's so many brands you're talking about. The Gen Z
is not drinking the old classics. They're bringing in things like Whiny Baby and
these other brands and the White Claw and all those competitive
beverages to wine. And I'm thinking that wine
(26:10):
only has besides that ethereal value of a
good glass of wine, which I think every generation comes to once,
finally. But. But up until that point, it's about the story.
It's like, what can we tell somebody? All right, so this guy told me today
that he pretty much quit drinking booze.
You know the trend. You know, he's just. To me, yeah, I could quit
(26:33):
drinking a vodka all day long or a whiskey, but wine, to me, is.
What you just said. It's the story. It's the taste. It's the. I
mean, each wine you have is so different. Vodka to me. Yeah. Is
Chopin different than Belvedere or the Smirnoff? Yes. But when
you're drinking a nice bottle of wine and you taste the nuances of
the earth and things like that, the grapes are so different from
(26:56):
one to the other. I mean, that's what intrigues me about drinking wine. It.
It does connect. Yeah. It is an expression. I don't think
that the Gen Z wines, like the. Like the orange wines, are necessarily
depart from that. What bothered me about them in the beginning was they all
tasted like kombucha, and they were just an excuse not to make good wine.
Because you can make good orange wine, you can filter it, and you can have
(27:17):
a quality wine. There's nothing wrong with that. But I just thought. I think that
eventually. And my kids now I have. She's 35,
32, and 29 or something. You know, they get
it. You know, they don't. They don't go to the cheap
glass of wine they want to sell. That's gonna. That's gonna make them feel good.
And we send them back because sometimes the bottles have been open too long.
(27:40):
Let's do that. Do you have a song? Do you have psalms here? We don't.
Someone needs somebody. They usually. I mean, our staff is pretty well
trained at all the restaurants. How do you do it? Just
experience. Experience. I mean, we hire experience. I mean, we don't hire
anyone that's not experienced as. As a server. They have to have wine knowledge.
They have to have liquor knowledge, and obviously service knowledge. So
(28:05):
anyone that needs something, they usually get me. So there's a.
This is one of the expressions. You've probably heard it. We need to change the
language of wine. I Kind of beat this dead horse.
But I still have to do it because we went to a restaurant the other
day in Hermosa and the wine list was sorted by
style. In my life, my wife likes Bordeaux
(28:27):
varietals as much as I try to stump her with Syrahs and things like that.
It's like Pinot Noir as well, but I kind of
look through bold and vivacious, light and
airy. And I had to look through every category to make sure I wasn't missing
something that was categorized for things because. A Pinot could be in all three of
those categories. So kind of a cat, but so does she. So
(28:50):
what's your thought on that? And is there any value
to dumbing, not dumbing it down? I don't think that's the right word, but to
changing the way people explain or talk about it. I think that's
exactly what people are trying to do, change the way. Get a. Get a
hook into someone that's different than the traditional.
I mean, that's part of what I see going in the restaurant business in general.
(29:11):
Everyone's trying to figure a new way to get the customer.
Because bottom line, we're all restaurants and
it depends on what you want to eat. Do you want steak? Do you want
Italian? Do you want fish? Do you want whatever it may be. So
when there's so many choices, people
are trying to find a way of distinguishing what makes you want to go
(29:33):
there than here. Well, you covered all the bases. You've got the casual restaurant
most. You've got the steakhouse in Manhattan, you've got Italian place in Manhattan and you
have a French place in. So back to our original conversation
earlier. Why did I do it if I wasn't going to do an Italian someone
else? I wasn't going to put a French piece while someone else would. Was it
fun opening Fet because it's French and you. Yeah, no, Fet
(29:55):
was a lot of fun. It's a, you know, great looking restaurant.
It's got so many. The open windows are wonderful, especially
this time of year. We got a beautiful bar. So yeah, it's a fun
restaurant. I just had dinner. Well, actually we went
to dinner the other night to the new Italian place on Pier
Avenue. Stecca. Oh, yeah, yeah, Steca. And
(30:19):
more importantly, I took a young intern.
This is kind of going back to your dishwasher. And I'm very proud of this.
She was my intern and she wrote all the talking points for this show
before AI and I had
her in the first summer when she was writing the talking points when I had
a female winemaker on being a hot subject in the wine trade right now.
(30:42):
And she ended up going to enology school in
Cornell. She's going into her third year this year and she,
we got her a internship at Chateau Bailly in
Pasaglion. And she. The
glee, the inspiration she drew from
doing this, this, this internship, the stagier
(31:06):
was really quite heartwarming for me.
Quite accomplished. I feel like I accomplished something by just getting
one person interested in the trade and
what we do. And you had the chance to do it to a lot of,
a lot of people. Yeah, I've been fortunate. I've had a lot of
kids that worked under me that are very successful either with their own
(31:29):
restaurants or chefing or whatever it may be. But yeah,
I'm proud of that. And it's. I just came back from St. Louis for
a family trip and so many of the restaurants I went to see these
kids that had worked for me and now they're adults and have their own business.
It's pleasing. I enjoy that part of it. Do you, what, what
do you try to instill? I mean you, I know you try to inspire them
(31:51):
and you, and you can only, you can't force feed them
the inspiration. And so when they leave here, you know, what do you hope?
What lesson do you think they hope? I hope
they see my dedication
to what I do. I don't cut
corners on anything. We repaint the restaurant three
(32:13):
times a year completely to keep it fresh, keep the carpets clean,
little things like that. Redo our flowers, you know, twice a week
and just instill a work ethic and be committed. Because if
you're just doing it for a year or two, you're wasting the restaurant's time and
you're wasting your own time. But it's, it's a business. You
really have to be committed to. The passion which is in the wine business. Dude.
(32:36):
Yeah, absolutely. If you don't have the passion, I. Believe any business, you have to
have the passion. And but the restaurant business, the grind of the restaurant
business and that's changed a lot. I mean, I do believe the 40 hour week
is pretty normal in our business. At least in our company it is.
And that's in the case all the time. 60 hour
weeks. 60. That still, that was part time.
(33:00):
I mean, that's an interesting distinction. You know, the French have what, a
35 hour week? Maybe they're fighting for 30 now. And
how about this? No tip, no tax on tips. How does that feel to your
staff? It's my understanding it's on your first $25,000 of
earnings and then after that. You'Re taxed total earnings or
total tax tipped earnings. Tipped earnings. You still are
(33:23):
taxed on your hourly. Yeah. And then whatever tips you make, up
to 25,000 is the way we understand it. But did that
feel good to a restaurateur to at least show that
relief to your staff or non issue, you
know? Well, it's, it's too early to tell. Yeah.
I'll be curious to see how the staff, you know, if they really see the
(33:46):
difference on their check. Any pool tips here? We do, and some
goes to the back house. We just started the full pull
two weeks ago. First of the month here. And so that's. No, isn't part of
your regular DNA prior to that, pay well.
Pay well. Pay well. Pay well. I mean, I had a restaurant tour
(34:06):
after we opened here seven, eight years ago. Call me up. He says,
can I talk to you? Can you meet me? I want to talk to you.
I says, yo, what's going on? He said, rumor has it now this is
eight years ago, you're paying your dishwashers 18 bucks an hour. Minimum
wage was 1450 or something like that. I says, yeah. He said,
what are you thinking? I said, I don't want turnover. I said, if they're doing
(34:28):
a good job, I'll keep paying them more. Yeah, right. And sure enough, eight
years later, the dishwasher is still here, our cleaning crew
is still here. It just, it's not worth it. That's too hard. If I
made an extra $40,000 a year, a restaurant, it's
not going to change my life. If they can make that extra money, I'm happy
for them to make it. Well, how about the
(34:50):
cost of retraining somebody and starting? Absolutely. I, I can't stand
turnover. It's really hard. Yeah, it's the most, it's,
it's so costly. Yeah. You want to
retire into the wine trade. No.
That couldn't be the worst business right now, other than the restaurant business.
Yeah. I just see whatever all these wineries are going through right now, it
(35:13):
is so tough. Yeah. And just for everything we talked about less
drinking, less bottles of wine on a list.
It's just, it's so tough. I, I, there are wines which I won't
mention that 10 years ago they would never discount. They would never
today buy two cases and you're going to get it, you know, 25%
off or get six bottles of X. It's, it's A bloodbath out there in
(35:35):
the line business, you know, during COVID What happened here during COVID
Open, close, open, closed. We were closed mostly. That's when they had the
outdoor seating. 20. 20, right? Yeah, yeah, we had outdoor
seating up until whatever, two years ago, three years ago.
So at the Wine of the Month club we had
during COVID Cayman showed up and Silver Oak showed up. They would have never come
(35:58):
because they didn't need me. They had all on premise. They didn't need the guy,
you know, even though. And I was selling 1
liter Caymus bottles for 140, and
I couldn't keep it in stock. Oh, sure. And my allocation was 18 bottles a
week. Oh, until they ran out. Now I have like nine
cases still in a stock because the moment Covid was over, it
(36:19):
stopped. And now you can buy it for 79. Oh, yeah, they're very aggressive
with Caymus now. So it's interesting that
the. The. The. I think part of this. The palette and I think part of
it's just the consumption level. But the point I was going to make
was they wanted nothing to do with me as a online
restaurant, you know, wine vendor. And. And, you know, even though
(36:42):
I was established and 50 years. The company was 50 years old at the time,
they wanted nothing to do with it. And so it was strictly who can sell
the wine? And then all of a sudden, they come crawling back and I said,
I'll buy it, but you got to make sure you stick with me after this
is over. But then after it was over, I couldn't sell it.
Saved my life. As you know, the Wagner family is probably some of the best
marketers in. The wine world, and they are talking about block booking. Sure.
(37:06):
I had to buy. Was Csun.
Csun Pinot or something. I had to buy so many cases to get access to
something out. I was out. It was crazy. So what's
next? You got another restaurant coming up? You know,
we're kicking around trying to get Orange county back open. And that's two restaurants
there. What was that down there? Park Avenue and Hill
(37:29):
Garage on in Stanton. Oh, yeah, we opened those in
2005 and we've been closed since COVID
And I was doing that commute back and forth for 20 years from
here to Orange County. It was 45 minutes to an hour back and
forth each way. So we're kicking that around about
reopening. We've been talking to the city. The city wants it open pretty
(37:52):
bad. It's, you know, our. It was a true destination
location. And we drew from everywhere. But the neighborhood has really
changed and grown and crime is way down there and
populations increased and the average income family has
increased. So it's, it's a pretty good area and it's a very unique
restaurant. It's two restaurants. One would be similar to sliced taken
(38:14):
chop and the other was similar to slay Italian. On the same property
was an old dairy farm. We had a beautiful private park. Very cool. Did weddings
and caterings and a garden in the back that we grew a lot of our
vegetables there. But it's, you know, the area I think could take care
of it now. When Covid hit, we didn't, we didn't think we would stand a
chance. Avail is still available. It's your property. I have a partner there and he
(38:35):
owns the property for 100 years. Yeah. So my dad
when we lived in PV and his main shop was in Pals Verdes and
the wine shop was there. But he also had a pharmacy in
Inglewood, Linwood and two in Montebello. And when
he handed the car off to me, finally, just like
a son, I'm moving and you take the car. It had 330,000 miles on
(38:58):
it. Do you have a routine just leaving? Just locally,
you know, I had a. Prius, so I'd
fill it up once a week and I had a set. But just the routine
of visiting each restaurant, making sure everybody's doing it right. So it's interesting. Yes.
That a lot of people do on my phone I have open table.
Yeah. And I see, you know, I look at that 100 times a
(39:20):
day. Each restaurant, who's going in, you know, before, in the
morning, in the afternoon and then before service, I'll see who's at which
restaurant and what timing. And I make it to all the restaurants. I go around
all of them. How important are those
reviews? Yelp, Rezi, Foursquare, all those reviews.
I have friends that rely on them exclusively. I don't rely on them
(39:43):
except I do like Michelin Guide because it, it's a, it's a focus
group of people that do the, that have some kind of standard. I mean, I
don't know if some guy comes here, doesn't like their steak or does or loves
it. I don't know who that person is. I, I, I don't follow. You
don't manage it? I don't, I don't ask my staff to. I
believe we give 110% effort. That's the best we can do.
(40:05):
We serve thousands of people a week. Are we Going to please everybody. We
will sure try, but I know we won't. But I
don't have enough complaints from customers to where I need to rethink what we're
doing. But will we fall short sometimes? Yes. And it really
bothers me. And we'll go out of our way to win the guest over. Whether
we invite them back as our guest or comp their check or whatever it is.
(40:27):
I don't like complaints. And I don't ever doubt a customer and sit and
argue with them over, you know, is that medium rare or not? They don't,
you know, redo it. Because in the wine trades, the
same thing. And I. It's very funny. My mother, when she was selling the
wine of the month club with my dad, she would. She would just
not tell people that you could cancel any time, which is a function of the
(40:50):
club. And I was like, no, mom, you got to tell them you can cancel
anytime, because that keep. Makes them motivated and that you will fix their
problems. You'll make them right. You'll make it right. I can't please
all the pallets all the time with the stuff I bought and sold like
a pic pool de penne. I mean, who's going to know what that is? But
it's a great wine. I should expose them. But then if it's a problem,
(41:10):
fix it. And that usually earns. In fact, one of the. One of the
original functions of social networking, Facebook in particular,
was the ability to publicly fix a complaint.
So if somebody complains online, you have the opportunity to
respond and show everybody that reads that complaint
that you're involved and you're participating in the fix. And I think that's really
(41:34):
important to this industry. Yeah, you know,
customer has a lot of choices, especially at our price point at all our
restaurants. So I put faith in
what their belief. They have a complaint. I, you know, I attack
it if they're correct. You know, one of the things that we
noticed and because we're a little tuned to the industry of my
(41:55):
daughter and wine, of course, is, you know, you can.
You can tell rather in short order when you walk into a
restaurant and taste maybe the appetizer or taste the food, that
it's fresh, that it's from quality ingredients.
To highlight the exception to that, my daughter was living in
Potsdam, New York. Okay. It's not the edge of the world, but right across
(42:18):
the street, you can see it. There's nothing there
that's from. Which is kind of bizarre because the restaurants,
they're terrible. But as a mother, my
Daughter would go to the farm to buy her vegetables. They're all seasonal. She would
go to the dairy to get her raw milk for her babies. And you
go to the orchard and pick your apples. So I'm trying to
(42:40):
figure out why the restaurants don't do that. Because you really can't
eat the food at most of the restaurants there. It's really, you know, it's. I
was just up in, when I was up the vineyard last week or earlier this
week, and we grow a lot of our own food
and right now we're in the peak of tomato season because June and July up
there were pretty chilly. So we just started with tomatoes maybe three weeks
(43:02):
ago. And I'm at a restaurant up there that's saying
all fresh seasonal vegetables. It came out
the most underripe tomato,
horrible looking lettuce. I'm thinking, what are they thinking? They've got salad or
the salad. Yeah. And you know, it could be, you know, people, I mean, when
(43:22):
tomatoes are done for the season, we're done with them. Yeah. When squash blossoms are
done for the season, we're done with them. And so I've always cooked like that
though. I mean, ever, even going back when I started in my 20s in St.
Louis. Always cook seasonal, always cook fresh. I, I think it's, you know,
especially younger people today, that's what they want. And that is very French,
though, to do that. Yeah. Or very Italian as well. I mean, you go to
(43:43):
any, a lot of the outskirts or in Chianti or
Montepulciano, I mean, it's so refreshing to see a little
restaurant with a garden in the back and they're bringing tomatoes in for your lunch
or dinner. But I want to go back to what you said about wine clubs.
And you're saying your wife. Yes. That has seen the biggest drop in the wine
industry. People aren't committing $400 a
(44:05):
month or $200 a month to get their wine. And they're,
they're realizing that sometimes they're getting wine they don't even want. It's not
curated by, you know, someone that knows what they're doing. They're getting a mix of
wines that are all over, but that has seen a huge drop. I
didn't sell it because I was making too much money.
And, and, and I, I'll say honestly for the listeners
(44:28):
too, the premise of that club in
1972 for my father at the wine shop was
he tasted so much wine to pick the best two wines he felt for that
month put them on display for a Month and then rotated. People
left Palos Verdes, particularly the aerospace guys, went to
Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and said, send us wines
(44:50):
because we like your selections. When it got larger, and
I'll just tell you briefly, history. 1984, we moved it to a little bungalow in
King harbor and would pack for a week and then bill for a week and
then leave. You know, when I bought it and moved to Arcadia in
1988, it was really founded on
the Trader Joe's formula at the time, which was finding odd lots of good
(45:13):
wines that were properly made, branded for that sale, branded
to represent the winery and the people that made it. And what was happening toward
the end here were these 50 cent a liter,
20,000 liter bladders coming in from Spain of just crap being
bottled under a bunch of brands. And the wine clubs that were buying them up
at 250 or $3 a bottle and putting them out there, 15.
(45:34):
How long can you fool the customer like that? Unfortunately, that's
what you see in so many restaurants today. And it really pisses me off when
I see that. And I know what some of these wines that they're running on
a special that are five and seven dollars that are on a list for 85
or 110, and there's, you know, I see it, and it just really
bothers me. We were at a restaurant, Pasadena, Italian places, a couple of years ago,
(45:56):
and the bottle came to get where maitre d
recommended it, and it was corked. And
he came to me. He goes, no, it's not, sir. I go, no, it is.
It's cork. I mean, smell it. He goes, that's not wrong with it. So
he wouldn't even offer anything. So then the table next door
had a glass of it. They just opened a fresh bottle. I said, bring that
(46:18):
bottle over. Let's pour it against this one. And so he poured a little taste.
I said, they're different. He goes, no, they're not. They're the same. And he said,
but I'll give you the rest of this bottle, okay? I got on my phone
because I have all my notes from all the things I tasted. I just tasted
that particular brand. And they offered to me for
$7. No, I see it all the time. And they're charging 45.
(46:38):
Even if the guy gave me a fresh bottle, it's only 14 in it. But
that's not even. The supplier
takes it back. Yeah, right. That's any bad bottle that no
question asked. So, you know, when a customer says, you know, I hate to do
this, don't hate to do it, doesn't I send it back to them and get
re. You know, they'll replace it. You're right. You're absolutely right.
(47:01):
I don't go to the restaurant anymore. Well, I wouldn't either. You know, we've had.
We've already been 45, 50 minutes. Oh, my gosh. This has been a
pleasure to talk shop with you. Time kind of went fast.
Hope to see you in hot yoga soon. Get in there and
eat and drink more. I have to, but I've got to ride so I can
be in the triathlon next year. I gotta run, which I haven't done for a
(47:22):
long time. So it's gonna be a balance of riding,
running and yoga. But what you'll find
out, the more hot yoga you do, those become easier.
Yes, because that's so hard. You're right. There's, you know, it's interesting. There's a cardio
component to it. Oh, yeah. Because you like the sweat and sculpt thing. Yeah. Yeah.
Right. Which is my favorite too, because I can't get into
(47:44):
some of those yoga positions. Well, anyway, it's been a pleasure.
Cheers. Likewise. Congratulation and thanks for having me. See
you soon.
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