July 31, 2025 • 32 mins
What if your favorite beach day came with incredible food, good wine, and a purpose? This week on Locales Only, we’re riding along the Southern California coast with Alicia Cox, the founder and CEO of Prjkt Restaurant Group.
From her early days in hospitality to running multiple oceanfront restaurants, Alicia has carved out a unique niche—elevated beachfront dining with heart. We talk about her latest concept, Sahara’s Sandbar & Pizza, named after her daughter and built on a giveback model that supports families facing homelessness.
We’ll also get into the power of representation in business, what it means to create space for others, and how a career in food and hospitality can become something much bigger than just what’s on the plate.
From her early days in hospitality to running multiple oceanfront restaurants, Alicia has carved out a unique niche—elevated beachfront dining with heart. We talk about her latest concept, Sahara’s Sandbar & Pizza, named after her daughter and built on a giveback model that supports families facing homelessness.
We’ll also get into the power of representation in business, what it means to create space for others, and how a career in food and hospitality can become something much bigger than just what’s on the plate.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, Hi, Alicia, It's Eric from Locals Only. How are
you good?
Speaker 2 (00:05):
How are you? Eric?
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hey? Good?
Speaker 3 (00:06):
I'm gonna be pulling out outside your office and a
white Mercedes.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
I'll see you in just a few seconds.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Awesome, see you then.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Okay, bye bye, Hey. Welcome to Locals Only.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
I'm Eric Hale, and if you don't know me, I'm
the guy that founded Local magazine fourteen years ago in
my garage.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
It's been my job for all.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Those years to tell you the coolest places to eat
in all the southern California, fun things to do. So
you have date nights that aren't boring, and we've talked
to some really interesting people. Now we have a podcast,
and we're lucky enough to call this Mercedes Benz EQE
all Electric Sedan courtesy of Fletcher Jones Motor Cars in
Newport Beach, our mobile podcast dud So sit back, buckle up,
(00:48):
and enjoy the conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Welcome to Locals Only. Hello, Eric, how are you jumping?
Good to see you too.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
All right, I brought you some gifts here, Eric, you
love that We got you a Sea Legs at the
Beach hat and an Orange Country hat.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I think this one looks good on me.
Speaker 4 (01:18):
Yeah, Orange Country for seesaw, and then I got you,
brought you a cookbuck.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Oh my gosh, I love for you, forking spoon it
is right there.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Well, we're gonna get a chance to talk about all
this stuff. So excited to have you.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Thank you for having me on here.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Does it fit my big head? I have a very
big head.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Well, it works, the works Orange Country.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I'm gonna put those aside just for a second, okay,
and we're off. So uh for those of you that
don't know Alicia, we're going to talk. I think about
a lot of different things today.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
There's a lot of things to talk about.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
She owns Project Group, which just picked her up in
front of her office, and but she's had a she
came from some place else.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
This is new. This is a new direction, almost like
a reinvention kind of. Yeah, you've been a lot of
different stages in your career.
Speaker 4 (02:09):
Yeah, everything has been stepping stones to get to hear Yeah. Well, gosh,
you and I have known each.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Other for a long time, A long time.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
I used to be the marketing director for OC Weekley
and you had just starting Locale magazine.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Yeah, we were almost like competitors a little bit.
Speaker 4 (02:22):
Kind of because it was like the entertainment space is
what we were talking about. Yeah, then I I left
to go work in Las Vegas and work for the
Fertidas for three years. Actually lived in a hotel room
for three years, and a casino. I lived in the
Red Rock, the Red Rock, yeah, pretty much the Red Rock,
Green Valley Ranch, a couple of other ones that they
had in Vegas, and I did all.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Their night like you live in a hotel, yeah, in
the casino.
Speaker 4 (02:44):
Yeah, they were going to send me there for three
days a week to work for them, and three days
a week. My first day was forty five days and
my second day was thirty five days. The next thing
I know, I was living in the hotel doing all
their entertainment and night life marketing.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Oh that's great.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Yeah that I came home and I got pregnant with Sahara,
my daughter, and I came home and I really I
learned a lot while.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
I was in Vegas. I mean, Vegas was like a
boot camp.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
On in hospitality, especially living in a casino, Like what
a perspective to get? And so I just started journaling,
and journaling turned into a business plan called Sea Legs
and Sea Legs was the idea of everything I learned
in Vegas, which.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
And by the way, we're on pch and Huntington Beach,
Blue Skies, Palm Trees, beautiful day just past Beach Boulevard,
and the restaurant you were about to tell us about
was right here on Beach Buletwardystranta.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, so I was thirty one when I wrote the
plan for that one and opened it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
And uh, how.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Long did you journal for? Like what was that process?
You said you were just you were just like writing ideas,
sketching out idea. Yeah, and you'd never had a restaurant.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
No, But when I was in Las Vegas, we stopped.
We started doing events, and then events turned into venues.
And when I was starting to work on venues in Vegas,
there's actually a job in venue development, and I thought, oh,
this is what I want to do with my life.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
And anyways, I learned so much.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
As we open up some venues in Las Vegas, I'm like,
this is you know, a Vegas builds everything for women
because then the men will come. That's kind of their strategy.
And then their everything is built upon celebrations, so nobody
celebrates a birthday alone, right, And so that thought of
birthday showers or birthday bridal showers, parties, weddings, like everything
is in grabbing bulk people. So when I was journaling
(04:18):
my plan for Sea Legs, it was really the strategy of, like,
how can I take what Vegas taught me and create
a venue that would speak to Orange County and Huntington Beach,
per se with all those things. So Sea Legs was
this idea of what would women want, and being a woman,
it was easy, we want wine, we want.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Something that.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
Idea, Yes, So I was trying to figure out a
game plan of what to name Sea leg or name
this wine bar by the sea that was going to
be catering to women. And I was, you know, trying
to going through the creative process. And then I saw
a book that said Sea Legs.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
On it and I went, oh my god, love it that.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
I mean, what a great play. Because legs are on
a glass of wine. You know, I don't know, you
know that if you spend the glass, legs that's what
comes down. Yeah, the higher sugar content that the deeper
the legs that come on a glass of wine.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
And the more wine you.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Drink, the more sea legs you would have, and so
it was kind of a funny.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Like drinks at sea legs and left with sea legs. Yeah,
I love with either at the original restaurant for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
And so yeah, that's right, because remember you guys when
you were dating when you come in Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Gosh, years ago. Yeah yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
So that iteration that restaurant, what were the highs? What
were the lows of that? How long did it? You know,
it's it's not there today, So what was the progression?
Obviously there had to be amazing highs opening it, lots
of hard work and loads. Maybe you walk us through
some of those.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, gosh, I mean it was.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
I was thirty one, I had no money and a
baby strapped to my chest, and I was living on
the fumes of a dream. And I really understood a
lot about marketing and you know, creating concepts, but I
didn't understand a lot about business.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
So and restaurants in particular, completely different.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
They run on slim margins, margins, personnel cost insane.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Yeah, fluctuating costs constantly in ways.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
There's so many different things to learn, even.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
Things of just like structuring a business and business partners
and things like that. Like, there's a lot of painful
lessons I.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Had to learn.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
The mistakes getting into business.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
I always tell people like fall in your face one
hundred times, but get up one hundred and one.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Just don't ever quit.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
And wanted to quit and wanted to give up and
and didn't and as but and then all of a sudden,
as I felt like I was failing, I would win
an award and then I'd be like, this is so
weird because I feel like I.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Don't deserve this award.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
You know, they with Golden Foodies at the time were
like a big deal, and I was winning these Golden
Foodies and I thought, I feel like I don't deserve
this because I felt like I want to win the
war for.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Like golden cash register, not golden food.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
Yeah, like I was, I was so broke, and I
was so just like working one hundred hours a week
and just you know, I mean just doing all the things.
And but then all you know, then we were getting
all this attention and recognition, and so as time went on,
I ended up becoming like the sole owner of Sea leg.
This had ended up really driving that concept and got
(07:05):
kind of pasted the cumbersome really difficult time, and then
it started like floating through and my landlord came to
me and said, you know, you should open up a
concept in the shopping center something else because you have
so many people here.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
They need more seats. And it was true.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
What we were billowing restaurant one hundred seats and we
had that brunch that I remember.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
The Sea Legs brunch was just I mean people women.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
It was like a line, like a nightclub at nine
am in the morning.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
But that even with the great ideation and and the
working hard and all of that, it just wasn't making
it for you.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
It started doing good.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
I think the hardest part was learning the lessons of business.
But once I figured it out, it started making sense.
The big what happened was I grew right and I
ended up opening up Sea Salt, which was my seahouse
was kind of like mirroring Sea Legs. And then I
got an opportunity to put Sea Legs inside at Lax
Airport and that was a whole new ITEA three. And
(08:07):
I've got a five year four year old, right, and
so I'm still juggling so many things, and but I'm
doing it right. I'm in construction at Sea Salt. I've
got I won the bid. And when I say won
the big because I'll kind of go into what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
At the beach.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
You basically do an RFP process and you put your
concept together and you you basically are trying to bid
against other people who want the lease for this location.
And we did that at LAX with a group with
a airport restaurant group, and we won the bid and
we got Sea Legs in the end of Terminal two
at LAX. That was a big deal at the time,
and that was a twenty five year deal and I
(08:40):
was able to just license my brand and it didn't
have to actually run it.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
That was somebody else runs it. If you're at a
stadium or an airport, a lot of people don't know.
You might have the name of the restaurant on the business,
but it's the company that has the contract.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
For the concessions the concessions that run restaurants.
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Not knowing when we bid on LAX and we were
with the group of the concessions company, I had no
idea that my career was going this direction. But at
the time I was just focusing on my two restaurants
there on that town, Sea Legs and Seasal. And then
I had somebody come to me from the city of
Huntington and say they wanted to endorse me on this
this project the California State Parks was going to be
(09:19):
putting out to bid, and I understood the terminology but
didn't I had never done the bid myself, but I thought,
you know what, I'm just going to go look because
it's kind of interesting, you know. And they said that
Bulls at Chica State Beach, that the California State Parks
had wanted to take these four buildings that were restaurants
and turn them into something else and revitalize that beach.
(09:40):
And they were looking for a partner who would come
up with something creative to do on that beach.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
And this is about where we're driving where we're going
to start.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Now we're getting towards the end of Huntington Beach, kind
of where BULLSA starts. And yeah, and this is so
this is the first thing they came to you. So
just to put a timeline together. Yep, you've done your
four years of a restaurant college, right, you're a senior,
and now you have three locations. Yep, that's all going great,
and then somebody's like, oh, let's add more to your plate.
Let's add four more locations to your plate. And you said, well,
(10:10):
let's take a look at it, because they were I
guess the reason they're coming up.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
For a bit is they all were kind of underperforming
for the state as a tax.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
They were for like twenty.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Years just sitting there. They weren't you could even get snacks.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
They were empty homeless encampments. They were pigeon dens. They
were where skateboarders would use the ledges to skate. They
were just not being used.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
You know, they were not being used, and they were
just but you're sitting on some of the most beautiful
real estate in California or on the West Coast.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
I mean, if people haven't been there, just to describe
these four locations even though they look beautiful. Now, these
four locations are on this boardwalk that runs through Bolsa, Chika,
where all the people ride their bikes and take walks,
and it's on the sand. It's literally you've touched the
sands and you're a you know, a few one hundred
meters from the from the ocean, so you're like the
(10:58):
best views the best place could possibly have a location.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Yeah, probably around the world.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
These buildings that you know, the California had put major
budgets into and had never been used because the exteriors
were so kind of, you know, terrible looking, but once
I opened the doors inside.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
They're like brand new kitchens.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
They were.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
So like the you know, California's state parks had put
these buildings together and they just were not being used.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
So they're like preserved because they hadn't been used.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Because nobody had really run them, and.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
The infrastructure was there, so you didn't have to It
wasn't just like taking blocks and.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
No, I didn't have to put the right yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Right.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
So there were four locations at FULSA, and there were
a lot of people actually looking at the bids for this,
and I thought, God, there's no way I could do this.
I mean, I've got sea legs and sea salt and
now lax and my daughter's only four or five years old. Like,
I don't even know what I'm thinking, But as soon
as I listened to the presentation, it was hard not
to see.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
It's funny because they were passing.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Every Now we're driving by one of them, which is
now ful PC if you took off the black paid
the red aunings, and it.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
Would just look like that bathroom building, just like.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
About like a state building, like any stale park.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Yeah, And so I decided I was going to bid,
and I thought, even if I just win the worst one,
I know what I'm capable of, because I'm really.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Going to each one individual.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
That's how they were set up.
Speaker 4 (12:12):
Originally, there were all four of them on this beach,
and I thought, gosh, I'm gonna I'm going to try
to figure out which one I'm going to bid on,
and if maybe I choose the worst one, because no
one will bid on that one, and I know what
I'm capable of as far as the marketing side of things.
And then I thought, well, why don't I Why shoot
myself on the foot. Maybe I should bid on the
best one, right, And so thence I talked to a
friend of mine who goes, well, why wouldn't you bid
(12:32):
on all four and hope you win one?
Speaker 2 (12:35):
And I was like, that's a great idea. I should
bid on all four.
Speaker 4 (12:37):
And then I mean, it's it's four times the amount
of work, but you're already kind of writing the plan.
And I had never done an RFP by myself before,
and it is so much work I can't even be.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Get too because yeah, it kind of sifts out anybody
that's not truly interested.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Those exactly people that are most interested are going to
actually make the EPP.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Yeah, it's exactly that. So and that's exact.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
And so basically they'll ask you all of these questions
and you need to put together a plan that.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Shows your vision.
Speaker 4 (13:05):
It shows how you were going to interpret the beach.
It shows how you're going to handle your environment, it
shows public safety, recycling, how you're going to be marketing.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
I mean, it is so robust. By the time you're done,
it's like five hundred pages.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
So I bid on all four, hoping i'd win one.
Speaker 4 (13:20):
And what happened was I had a sea legs, so
it was easy to plug in sea legs, and then.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
They just.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Same aesthetic because I.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
Had a concept that already like I could I could
lean back on. Then there was sea salt. I had
a sea salt. So had sea salt, and then I
created two concepts and then I bid and I will
never forget I was thirty six, sitting at my office,
sitting in my restaurant at oc ort S weekly at
Sea Legs Wine Bar, and they called me up and said,
you just won.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
The bid on all four?
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Whoa?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
And I went, oh my god, how many?
Speaker 1 (13:52):
And when do I starty?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Wait a minute. I was on my plan.
Speaker 4 (13:56):
I didn't think I'd ever win the bid on all four.
I was just hoping up my odds and getting one. Yeah,
And so you know, I kind of just went, I'll
just I'll just do it. What are you gonna do?
You gotta do it. And so I borrowed money. I
didn't take on any partners. I borrowed money. I borrowed
one point six million.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Dollars, which was so a lot of money.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
Yeah, at thirty six and twenty sixteen, that's probably the
equivalent of like eight million dollars.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Now, I mean that's a huge that's a huge. Love
was like, if you fail, you lose everything.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Yeah, I'm betting on myself, which is scary, right, And
so I borrowed one point six million dollars and I
did it myself, and I I created did all of
the updates to the building and got them all done,
and created all the concepts that opened them all up.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
And I was by the time they were all open.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
I was like thirty six thirty seven Sea Legs Sea
Salt Beach City Provisions. At the time, it was Pacific Kitchen,
and Sea Legs instantly took off, Like holy crap.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
I didn't I expect it.
Speaker 4 (14:51):
I didn't expect that because you know, I didn't have
anybody I could turn to and be like, how did
you open your beach club, concession, music venue, restaurant?
Speaker 3 (14:59):
Was it his bus as we might see now because
I've been recently and you might see thousands of people there,
it feels like they're just like overflowing of them.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Yeah, there really is.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
You know, it gradually built in the beginning, but but
seel like's like, actually, right off the bat was pretty busy.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
I didn't expect that.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
I was used to seeing maybe one hundred customers in
a day at my restaurant, and that was like a
busy day.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:21):
And I went from like one hundred customers to like
a thousand customers in a day.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
And do you think that.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Because I mean, you definitely saw the vision. The state
saw some of the vision. They were like they're putting
it out to bid. Yeah, but you saw a vision
because really, if you go through Orange County concessions on
the beach.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
I think of one down in Big Corona.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Yeah, Data Point Point, Yes.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sant Clamenty.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
But they're just small, tiny, little concessions and that's it
for like, yeah, the entirety of Orange County Newport Beach
doesn't have anything.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
And probably like all of you know, California.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
And California, maybe all of California a lot.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Of concessions and America.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
Really Yeah, And because I did this, I think and
I wasn't a concession era prior to this. It was
just having this vision that was unique and different, and
now I think it's opened up a lot of eyes
to hey, wait a minute, I don't have to just
be a walk up.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Window that sells tacos.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
I could add live music out of your fence line,
create an environment that people want to take photos next to,
and then increase my sales that way. I just, you know,
it was the only thing I could think of, because
they're only all it is is a kitchen, and then
you have your exterior. So I just tried to maximize
kind of the exterior experience.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
And so I think that you're going.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
To see a lot of people changing the way they
do them, and I've been approached by a lot of
people actually to do more.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Yeah, well to do more or to help them.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
I mean I've flown to Miami in Chicago and worked
on helping kind of consulting with other concessions groups about
like how they can maximize their space. And it's just
a little bit of a tweaking and thinking outside the box.
A lot of people sometimes just setting their ways is like,
I don't understand how we can make this different.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
I feel like I see you evolving even in that,
and I feel like any good entrepreneur is like constantly evolving.
And that's what we've been talking about. Everything seems so
easy for those listening, but this is a lot of
hours behind them.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
It's funny because I have no voice right now and
I'm so run down.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
July fourth, Yeah, fourth.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Of July weekend, So excuse me? Is that keep like
in the microphone? But yeah, people so much.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
I've seen it evolve, and it seems like even even
this year, like Pacific Kitchen, maybe that concept didn't go off.
So you went to pch Tacos and now you have,
you know, these great tacos and Borgarita's and the DJ
on the beach, which is a whole new crowd that
can enjoy that. But Sea Legs is, like you said,
it's its own beast, but like you just redid yeah,
Sea Salt made it a honky tonk, which I think
(17:42):
that what's kind of cool about that is you can
catch trends with these because without you know, if five
years the country music trend in southern California is is hot, yeah,
you could do something maybe different. And that's what's nice
about having a long term lease, but having these locations
where people expect something.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
I think the key thing there being seasonal.
Speaker 4 (18:01):
So I shut off every year, and because I shut off,
I can shut off, shut down, tell my you know,
tell all of my audience thank you so much for
coming out for the season, and we'll see you next season.
And then in those few months of its winter, I
just sit and I write a plan, and I go
through every single venue. I think about what work, what did,
and how we can improve. I book all my talent,
I book all I create all my promotions. I figure
(18:23):
out what I'm gonna do to make esthetically different, more
or exciting for the consumer, and I literally reopen them
every year, so almost like new businesses every years, a
new vibe as a business owner.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
I promise you every person that listens this and owns
a business, yeah, would be like, oh my god, I
wish I had the opportunity to close down, close.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Down for three months.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yeah. Do you write a marketing plan every year and
kind of a game plan for locale? You know what?
Speaker 3 (18:49):
I probably should. I run local very much by the
seat of my plans. I'm I try to be as
responsive as absolutely possible to everything.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
So it's just yeah, I'm I'm not as good as you.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
No, not at all, but not at all I.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Need to be, and I'm learning. I'm learning the same
way are listening.
Speaker 4 (19:06):
I tell a lot of people who come and ask
me for advice, I said, if you can just stop
every year, stop every year, even if you're giving yourself
like a week window to just sit and think about
how you can improve and grow your business every year
and then write a plan like literally put that on
a deck.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
I usually hit the end of the year and I'm
so exhausted, I just totally don't talk to me.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Don't talk to me for three weeks.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
Most people do, and trust me, I Ei there's times
where I'm like, God, I don't want to do this.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
I don't want to write this plan.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
And let me tell you, I call it my project playbook.
By the time I write the plan every year, by
the way, it's about one hundred maybe plus pages.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Well wo.
Speaker 4 (19:42):
And then I bind it and I give it to
my entire team. I give it to Californy's state parks.
I give to the city Huntington Beach. I make sure
that everybody knows what's going on in my.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Head, but it is.
Speaker 4 (19:50):
I think the one secret to helping me be like,
helping me be successful is being able to look back,
think about how I can improve, put a plan together,
showcase plan, and then book everything a year out and
then give it to everybody so we're all on the
same page. And that's just like one big key detail
to I think keeping these all fresh, and keeping the
concepts fresh all the way from the art installations to
(20:13):
the food, to the entertainment, the promotion. So that sounds
like some secret sauce, right, it's some secret sauce.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
There's a lot of work. I'm a special kind of psychopath.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
I guess, well, let's talk about that, because we've already
talked about having all these restaurants and locations and working
all the time, and then I showed you this when
we got in the car. But then you're like, well,
let's go ahead and on top of all of that,
make a cookbook. So why don't you tell me about
California forkinsman? It's something I have in my kitchen. I've
actually I can't remember what I tried. I have tried one,
(20:43):
but I'm not like a you know, not a culinary expert.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
I get asked all the time like how did you
you know? How did you get here? How did you
do this?
Speaker 2 (20:51):
What you know?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
And and there is a long story which we're kind
of talking about right now, and I wanted to tell
that story, but I wanted to do it through the
eyes of food. I've been cooking Huntington Beach all these years,
and I say, I, myself, my team, my chef's what
we've been feeding the community all these years. So basically,
it's a it's a culinary storytale of from sea legs
to sea salt, to all the things that we peeked
(21:14):
out on in food. Because we are a food I'm
a food beverage company. We are you know, we are
addicted to the industry, and so there are things from
like pizza to cocktails to brunch where we decide. We
took such deep dives into trying to figure out what
was cool, what people are doing, putting together ingredients, and
then creating our programming. And so with that, I basically
(21:35):
laid this out in a way that it took all
the different sections and it told the story of all the.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Food that we've been feeding Huntington Beach all these years.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
That basically indirectly tells the story of you know, how
I got to where I'm at right now.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
And I think with the California name, I mean a
lot of the people that visit are from out of town.
I'm sure a lot of locals are there, but there's
a lot of out of town ors and it gives
them a way to take a little piece of California
home with them and recreate that.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
Some of it. That's awesome.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Well, the last concession I'm opening, which is still in construction, let's.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Talk about those because now we're going to the other
end of the beach. So there's a different story here.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Yeah, there is a different story now.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
We worked with that.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
We got the bulls of cheek and we got the four,
but now we're driving by a whole new bunch of them,
one of them named after your daughter.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
Yes, okay, So now we're at Huntington State Beach, and
so you're obviously right. There's Bolsa, Chica State Beach with
its own entity, and then you've got Huntington State Beach. So,
as this opportunity came up to bid on Huntington State Beach,
and as I learned what my customers wanted, I learned
how to be like being a partner at California State
Parks and what that meant, I definitely felt like this
(22:38):
was my next quest and was to bid on this beach.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Take out Huntington Beach House.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
We're passing right now. Sorry I interrupt you, but that's
one of them right there, the heart of Huntington.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
G Huntington Beach.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:49):
And so I put a bid together knowing that these
have become available, and I was prepared. First time I
did it, I had no idea what I was doing.
Second time, I was prepared. So I was when the
bid came out, I heard my concepts together, my renderings,
like I'm going to win all of these.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
I was determined how many were available this.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
Time three here, but then I asked to place a
fourth one, which is my sandbox, and it's like a
little kiosk store at the beach because there's just a
need for being able to sell firewood and cold beverages
and sunscreen to the beach goers.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
So now there's four, but.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
The last one and Unhoused burned our bathroom building down
and so the last one is delayed. And the last
one the state Parks had to demo the bathroom building
and then they had to then redo all the concrete
around the concession, which was a lot of engineering, and
now they're having to reput the new bathroom building up.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
It's taken four years.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Wow, and so four years to build a bathtub, and.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
So it's going to be called California Fork and Spoon.
So that's how the cookbook ties it all into this
and find at the final location, the recipes from the
cookbook will be offered there, a handful of the recipes.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
And then also that location is going to be I
think for the brides out there, they're probably interested in
and people throwing events, probably one of the coolest places
to get married in California.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Right, that's our goal.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
We're going to turn this into a wedding and special
events venue on the water here, right on the corner
of you know, Huntington and Newport.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Are you taking reservations yet?
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Not yet.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
I want to make sure we're a little bit closer
on the construction because you don't get there.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
Brides are always playing in advance, and if they find
out they get married on the beach, that might change things.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
We have so many people who have asked already if
they can start getting planning for weddings there.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
If you don't realize we're driving back and forth through
Huntington Beach on we're going by Sahara. Now Sahara like
the Desert Pizza place, which is named.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
After your my daughter.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
To have your daughter named after her, how cool is
that to get to name something after your daughter and
put her I mean she has to feel really special.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
You know, so funny. I'm glad that we actually get
a touch on this. So she was seven when I
broke the bid for that, and I will.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
She was on your chest when this all started.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Yeah, she's got a very interesting perspective.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Now she's fourteen, and I only imagine what she's going
to do with her life, because she's just rode this
whole thing with me.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
But I was sitting there talking to.
Speaker 4 (25:00):
Her, and when I was thinking about what I was
going to call these and what I was going to
create a concepts for, and I was really stumped. I
didn't know what to call that one particular. And just
so you know, that location is actually the best place
to put a festival on in Huntington. It's the whitest
gap of sand in the Western Hemisphere as far as
where the boardwalk goes to the ocean, there's about a
mile about out to the ocean, so it's perfect to
(25:21):
put the stage towards the ocean, and so you can
get you know, twenty thirty thousand beach goers out there
they do in which they do. Yeah, And so I
was really trying to think of something cool to be
on the back side of where the festivals should be.
And then I was talking to my daughter and I
and she was talking about volleyball, which she plays, talking
about going to the beach, and I just thought to myself,
wait a minute, Sahara. I named you after the most
(25:41):
mysterious body.
Speaker 3 (25:42):
Of landand that's about the size of the Sahara that
beach because it is a hike to.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Get to the water.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
For me, it is a hike together the water. And
so once I saw that, I went, oh, my gosh,
how perfect Sahara. But then what an opportunity to then
incorporate her into this, which she deserves because no one
has taken more the bathroom building going.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
Oh, yeah, there's the back. Yeah. Four years later they
got half of the blocks.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Of yeah, we're there.
Speaker 4 (26:06):
So uh so, I, you know, it was really important
for me once I saw the vision ning name it
after her, then what am I going to do with that?
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Right?
Speaker 4 (26:13):
And she deserves it because no one has taken more
of a sacrifice than my daughter, you know, with when
I've had to work late nights or early mornings, so
she has to be quiet while she's playing, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
One, especially.
Speaker 4 (26:28):
It's hard for your mom's frustrated or mom's you know this, yes,
and so so it.
Speaker 2 (26:34):
Was kind of like my homage to her.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
But with that, I wanted to make this like a
learning moment for her because if her name is.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Worth something, what do you do with it?
Speaker 1 (26:43):
Right?
Speaker 4 (26:43):
And so I've been really working with her and at
a young age, trying to teach her the word advocacy
and what that means. And if your name has some
has waight to it, what do you do with that?
So we I got involved with a company called Families Forward,
which is out of Irvine. They help families that are
on the verge of homelessness. And these are families who
just can't make ends meet. These are not people who
(27:04):
are you know, drug addicts and people who just don't care.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
These are people who are.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Working really hard, but the cost of living is getting
so high they can't they can't make up that difference.
And so Families Forward helps jump in, give them food,
help pay bills if they need to help, give their
kids backpacks or whatnot. So I put my daughter in
the front of that and made her become an advocate
for Families Forward. And with Sahara Sandbar, we give a
dollar back from every pizza oh too Families Forward's coat
(27:30):
and I personally make Sahara herself actually deliver pizzas.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Here to Huntington in Huntington Beach to families that are
in need.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
And it's a great opportunity for her to be able
to see what a you know, a diverse audience that
we have out there and how lucky that we are
and to be able to give back to our community
and to people who are you know, underthanked and under
you know, will Is call it privilege if that's the
right word, but and be able to say, hey, thank you,
here's a warm meal from us, and open up our
heart for that. So with her name on there, we
(27:59):
don't really talk about it a lot because that's not
what we were. You know, I'm not We're not doing
this to boast that we're giving back.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
But with that between.
Speaker 4 (28:06):
Me and her, I want her to walk away as
she gets to be an older, you know, an adult,
and realize when she has an opportunity to do good,
do it. Yeah. And so her name wasn't here to
be popular or cool. Her name was here to be
able to do something and make a difference in this world.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
So I love that.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
Yeah, that's yeah, deep, A little deeper there, Sarah.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
She's fourteen, and she's like, I hate the word advocacy.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Stop talking about me.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I know, she really.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Well, I think we've got a chance to cover a
lot of your story.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
We're kind of heading back towards the office, but awesome,
this is.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
A good chance to tell people maybe like what they
can expect this summer, what they might expect coming up,
some of the things you're excited about, like maybe maybe
the barbecue, you know, some of the things you've had.
I mean, for sure, you got some pretty good barbecue
at the beach, and maybe some bands coming up. I
think maybe there's a good chance to sell a little.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
Bit the I had a ten year I've been at
Bolsa Chica for ten years. So I had to redo
the bid for Bolsa Chika to be able to extend
my lease.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
That was last year.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
It was very scary because at this point now I've
really built something and there's a lot of people who
would love to come get it. And so I had
to bid against the public and do a public bidding
process to keep my lease. And I spent three months
writing again once again and put together a plan of
how I could then and keep you know, making Bolsa
Chica in you know, a great place to visit. And
(29:31):
so changing Sea Salt to the honky Tonk, changing Pacific
Kitchen to pH Talk wasn't really talking to my Latin
audience that's here at the beach. Anyways, we I won
that bid, thankful, and grateful that I won that bid
and I can still stay out.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Here and serve my community.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
And so with that being said, that is why people
are seeing all these changes at Bolsa Chica. I've put
a lot of money back into Bolsa Chica to enhance
that beach. And so if you haven't been out to
the honky Tonk.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yet, line dance lessons so cool.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Yeah, redneck Rodeo residency.
Speaker 4 (30:05):
Barbecue, I mean, gosh, the honkey talk is so cool.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
It is, it is so fun.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
And then pH Tacos is so cool to I got
these like shaboomis. They're like these luffing pieces of material
covers float. Yeah, they kind of float, and it's so
pretty when you're going to Bolsa Chicai. I have a
dozen of them floating in the wind and those are
like sun covers.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
And then we are doing free salted dance lessons at
pH Tacos.
Speaker 4 (30:30):
We have got a really great Mexican menu that's there
from Agwao Chiles to Agua Frescas to a Agua Fresca
cocktail bar Maurisco's, and so trying to bring in like
a Cabo Vibe sea legs the beach is still.
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Just an institution.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
I mean, we just had an incredible week of Long
Beach dub All Stars, and we've got so much more
to go. Moto Beach is coming up, Jeep Fascists coming up,
the air Show is coming up. I mean, Huntington Beach
just keeps getting better, and I feel like we're enhancing
all those other great events that come to Huntington, and
then more events keep coming to Huntington with my partnership
with California State Parks and this vision between my superintendent
(31:06):
at California State Parks and California State Parks and Sacramento
to really revitalize our coastline with this concessions experience. What
each one has a different vibe and a different look
and a different feel and a different menu and speaks
to different audiences culturally. You know, I think that we're
really kind of starting to find who we are Southern Californians.
And this is truly where the culture of Southern California's
(31:28):
laze is really starting to be here in Huntington, at
our on our coastline. And so yeah, I guess that's
that's my spiel. But I'm really proud to be leading
that movement.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Well, I'm gonna I'm gonna lead with proud and I said,
I think Huntington Beach should be proud of what you've
built here. Thank you personally, proud, Thank you to see
your growth from where we met to where you are now.
It's just a pleasure and you're just the nicest person
to deal with and for that, my family visits quite often.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
And I just want to thank everybody also for joining
us on this episode of Locals Only and we'll see.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
You next time.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Awesome, thank you.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
I want to thank everyone on the straw Hut Media team,
and as always, a big thank you to Fletcher Jones
Motor Cars in Newport Beach for providing this beautiful Mercedes
Benz EQE to be our rolling podcast studio. Join us
next time on Locals Only, where you can buckle up
and go for a ride in our mobile podcast studio
(32:32):
with some of the coolest people in Southern California.
Hello, Hi, Alicia, It's Eric from Locals Only. How are
you good?
Speaker 2 (00:05):
How are you? Eric?
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hey? Good?
Speaker 3 (00:06):
I'm gonna be pulling out outside your office and a
white Mercedes.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
I'll see you in just a few seconds.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Awesome, see you then.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Okay, bye bye, Hey. Welcome to Locals Only.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
I'm Eric Hale, and if you don't know me, I'm
the guy that founded Local magazine fourteen years ago in
my garage.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
It's been my job for all.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Those years to tell you the coolest places to eat
in all the southern California, fun things to do. So
you have date nights that aren't boring, and we've talked
to some really interesting people. Now we have a podcast,
and we're lucky enough to call this Mercedes Benz EQE
all Electric Sedan courtesy of Fletcher Jones Motor Cars in
Newport Beach, our mobile podcast dud So sit back, buckle up,
(00:48):
and enjoy the conversation.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Welcome to Locals Only. Hello, Eric, how are you jumping?
Good to see you too.
Speaker 4 (01:08):
All right, I brought you some gifts here, Eric, you
love that We got you a Sea Legs at the
Beach hat and an Orange Country hat.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I think this one looks good on me.
Speaker 4 (01:18):
Yeah, Orange Country for seesaw, and then I got you,
brought you a cookbuck.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Oh my gosh, I love for you, forking spoon it
is right there.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Well, we're gonna get a chance to talk about all
this stuff. So excited to have you.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Thank you for having me on here.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Does it fit my big head? I have a very
big head.
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Well, it works, the works Orange Country.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I'm gonna put those aside just for a second, okay,
and we're off. So uh for those of you that
don't know Alicia, we're going to talk. I think about
a lot of different things today.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
There's a lot of things to talk about.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
She owns Project Group, which just picked her up in
front of her office, and but she's had a she
came from some place else.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
This is new. This is a new direction, almost like
a reinvention kind of. Yeah, you've been a lot of
different stages in your career.
Speaker 4 (02:09):
Yeah, everything has been stepping stones to get to hear Yeah. Well, gosh,
you and I have known each.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Other for a long time, A long time.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
I used to be the marketing director for OC Weekley
and you had just starting Locale magazine.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Yeah, we were almost like competitors a little bit.
Speaker 4 (02:22):
Kind of because it was like the entertainment space is
what we were talking about. Yeah, then I I left
to go work in Las Vegas and work for the
Fertidas for three years. Actually lived in a hotel room
for three years, and a casino. I lived in the
Red Rock, the Red Rock, yeah, pretty much the Red Rock,
Green Valley Ranch, a couple of other ones that they
had in Vegas, and I did all.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Their night like you live in a hotel, yeah, in
the casino.
Speaker 4 (02:44):
Yeah, they were going to send me there for three
days a week to work for them, and three days
a week. My first day was forty five days and
my second day was thirty five days. The next thing
I know, I was living in the hotel doing all
their entertainment and night life marketing.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Oh that's great.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Yeah that I came home and I got pregnant with Sahara,
my daughter, and I came home and I really I
learned a lot while.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
I was in Vegas. I mean, Vegas was like a
boot camp.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
On in hospitality, especially living in a casino, Like what
a perspective to get? And so I just started journaling,
and journaling turned into a business plan called Sea Legs
and Sea Legs was the idea of everything I learned
in Vegas, which.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
And by the way, we're on pch and Huntington Beach,
Blue Skies, Palm Trees, beautiful day just past Beach Boulevard,
and the restaurant you were about to tell us about
was right here on Beach Buletwardystranta.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, so I was thirty one when I wrote the
plan for that one and opened it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
And uh, how.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Long did you journal for? Like what was that process?
You said you were just you were just like writing ideas,
sketching out idea. Yeah, and you'd never had a restaurant.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
No, But when I was in Las Vegas, we stopped.
We started doing events, and then events turned into venues.
And when I was starting to work on venues in Vegas,
there's actually a job in venue development, and I thought, oh,
this is what I want to do with my life.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
And anyways, I learned so much.
Speaker 4 (03:56):
As we open up some venues in Las Vegas, I'm like,
this is you know, a Vegas builds everything for women
because then the men will come. That's kind of their strategy.
And then their everything is built upon celebrations, so nobody
celebrates a birthday alone, right, And so that thought of
birthday showers or birthday bridal showers, parties, weddings, like everything
is in grabbing bulk people. So when I was journaling
(04:18):
my plan for Sea Legs, it was really the strategy of, like,
how can I take what Vegas taught me and create
a venue that would speak to Orange County and Huntington Beach,
per se with all those things. So Sea Legs was
this idea of what would women want, and being a woman,
it was easy, we want wine, we want.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Something that.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
Idea, Yes, So I was trying to figure out a
game plan of what to name Sea leg or name
this wine bar by the sea that was going to
be catering to women. And I was, you know, trying
to going through the creative process. And then I saw
a book that said Sea Legs.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
On it and I went, oh my god, love it that.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
I mean, what a great play. Because legs are on
a glass of wine. You know, I don't know, you
know that if you spend the glass, legs that's what
comes down. Yeah, the higher sugar content that the deeper
the legs that come on a glass of wine.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
And the more wine you.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
Drink, the more sea legs you would have, and so
it was kind of a funny.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Like drinks at sea legs and left with sea legs. Yeah,
I love with either at the original restaurant for sure.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (05:18):
And so yeah, that's right, because remember you guys when
you were dating when you come in Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Gosh, years ago. Yeah yeah, wow.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
So that iteration that restaurant, what were the highs? What
were the lows of that? How long did it? You know,
it's it's not there today, So what was the progression?
Obviously there had to be amazing highs opening it, lots
of hard work and loads. Maybe you walk us through
some of those.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, gosh, I mean it was.
Speaker 4 (05:41):
I was thirty one, I had no money and a
baby strapped to my chest, and I was living on
the fumes of a dream. And I really understood a
lot about marketing and you know, creating concepts, but I
didn't understand a lot about business.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
So and restaurants in particular, completely different.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
They run on slim margins, margins, personnel cost insane.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Yeah, fluctuating costs constantly in ways.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
There's so many different things to learn, even.
Speaker 4 (06:05):
Things of just like structuring a business and business partners
and things like that. Like, there's a lot of painful
lessons I.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
Had to learn.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
The mistakes getting into business.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
I always tell people like fall in your face one
hundred times, but get up one hundred and one.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Just don't ever quit.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
And wanted to quit and wanted to give up and
and didn't and as but and then all of a sudden,
as I felt like I was failing, I would win
an award and then I'd be like, this is so
weird because I feel like I.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Don't deserve this award.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
You know, they with Golden Foodies at the time were
like a big deal, and I was winning these Golden
Foodies and I thought, I feel like I don't deserve
this because I felt like I want to win the
war for.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Like golden cash register, not golden food.
Speaker 4 (06:44):
Yeah, like I was, I was so broke, and I
was so just like working one hundred hours a week
and just you know, I mean just doing all the things.
And but then all you know, then we were getting
all this attention and recognition, and so as time went on,
I ended up becoming like the sole owner of Sea leg.
This had ended up really driving that concept and got
(07:05):
kind of pasted the cumbersome really difficult time, and then
it started like floating through and my landlord came to
me and said, you know, you should open up a
concept in the shopping center something else because you have
so many people here.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
They need more seats. And it was true.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
What we were billowing restaurant one hundred seats and we
had that brunch that I remember.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
The Sea Legs brunch was just I mean people women.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
It was like a line, like a nightclub at nine
am in the morning.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
But that even with the great ideation and and the
working hard and all of that, it just wasn't making
it for you.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
It started doing good.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4 (07:44):
I think the hardest part was learning the lessons of business.
But once I figured it out, it started making sense.
The big what happened was I grew right and I
ended up opening up Sea Salt, which was my seahouse
was kind of like mirroring Sea Legs. And then I
got an opportunity to put Sea Legs inside at Lax
Airport and that was a whole new ITEA three. And
(08:07):
I've got a five year four year old, right, and
so I'm still juggling so many things, and but I'm
doing it right. I'm in construction at Sea Salt. I've
got I won the bid. And when I say won
the big because I'll kind of go into what I'm doing.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
At the beach.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
You basically do an RFP process and you put your
concept together and you you basically are trying to bid
against other people who want the lease for this location.
And we did that at LAX with a group with
a airport restaurant group, and we won the bid and
we got Sea Legs in the end of Terminal two
at LAX. That was a big deal at the time,
and that was a twenty five year deal and I
(08:40):
was able to just license my brand and it didn't
have to actually run it.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
That was somebody else runs it. If you're at a
stadium or an airport, a lot of people don't know.
You might have the name of the restaurant on the business,
but it's the company that has the contract.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
For the concessions the concessions that run restaurants.
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Not knowing when we bid on LAX and we were
with the group of the concessions company, I had no
idea that my career was going this direction. But at
the time I was just focusing on my two restaurants
there on that town, Sea Legs and Seasal. And then
I had somebody come to me from the city of
Huntington and say they wanted to endorse me on this
this project the California State Parks was going to be
(09:19):
putting out to bid, and I understood the terminology but
didn't I had never done the bid myself, but I thought,
you know what, I'm just going to go look because
it's kind of interesting, you know. And they said that
Bulls at Chica State Beach, that the California State Parks
had wanted to take these four buildings that were restaurants
and turn them into something else and revitalize that beach.
(09:40):
And they were looking for a partner who would come
up with something creative to do on that beach.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
And this is about where we're driving where we're going
to start.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Now we're getting towards the end of Huntington Beach, kind
of where BULLSA starts. And yeah, and this is so
this is the first thing they came to you. So
just to put a timeline together. Yep, you've done your
four years of a restaurant college, right, you're a senior,
and now you have three locations. Yep, that's all going great,
and then somebody's like, oh, let's add more to your plate.
Let's add four more locations to your plate. And you said, well,
(10:10):
let's take a look at it, because they were I
guess the reason they're coming up.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
For a bit is they all were kind of underperforming
for the state as a tax.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
They were for like twenty.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Years just sitting there. They weren't you could even get snacks.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
They were empty homeless encampments. They were pigeon dens. They
were where skateboarders would use the ledges to skate. They
were just not being used.
Speaker 4 (10:30):
You know, they were not being used, and they were
just but you're sitting on some of the most beautiful
real estate in California or on the West Coast.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
I mean, if people haven't been there, just to describe
these four locations even though they look beautiful. Now, these
four locations are on this boardwalk that runs through Bolsa, Chika,
where all the people ride their bikes and take walks,
and it's on the sand. It's literally you've touched the
sands and you're a you know, a few one hundred
meters from the from the ocean, so you're like the
(10:58):
best views the best place could possibly have a location.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Yeah, probably around the world.
Speaker 4 (11:02):
These buildings that you know, the California had put major
budgets into and had never been used because the exteriors
were so kind of, you know, terrible looking, but once
I opened the doors inside.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
They're like brand new kitchens.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
They were.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
So like the you know, California's state parks had put
these buildings together and they just were not being used.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
So they're like preserved because they hadn't been used.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Because nobody had really run them, and.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
The infrastructure was there, so you didn't have to It
wasn't just like taking blocks and.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
No, I didn't have to put the right yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Right.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
So there were four locations at FULSA, and there were
a lot of people actually looking at the bids for this,
and I thought, God, there's no way I could do this.
I mean, I've got sea legs and sea salt and
now lax and my daughter's only four or five years old. Like,
I don't even know what I'm thinking, But as soon
as I listened to the presentation, it was hard not
to see.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
It's funny because they were passing.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
Every Now we're driving by one of them, which is
now ful PC if you took off the black paid
the red aunings, and it.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
Would just look like that bathroom building, just like.
Speaker 1 (11:59):
About like a state building, like any stale park.
Speaker 4 (12:01):
Yeah, And so I decided I was going to bid,
and I thought, even if I just win the worst one,
I know what I'm capable of, because I'm really.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Going to each one individual.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
That's how they were set up.
Speaker 4 (12:12):
Originally, there were all four of them on this beach,
and I thought, gosh, I'm gonna I'm going to try
to figure out which one I'm going to bid on,
and if maybe I choose the worst one, because no
one will bid on that one, and I know what
I'm capable of as far as the marketing side of things.
And then I thought, well, why don't I Why shoot
myself on the foot. Maybe I should bid on the
best one, right, And so thence I talked to a
friend of mine who goes, well, why wouldn't you bid
(12:32):
on all four and hope you win one?
Speaker 2 (12:35):
And I was like, that's a great idea. I should
bid on all four.
Speaker 4 (12:37):
And then I mean, it's it's four times the amount
of work, but you're already kind of writing the plan.
And I had never done an RFP by myself before,
and it is so much work I can't even be.
Speaker 3 (12:47):
Get too because yeah, it kind of sifts out anybody
that's not truly interested.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
Those exactly people that are most interested are going to
actually make the EPP.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
Yeah, it's exactly that. So and that's exact.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
And so basically they'll ask you all of these questions
and you need to put together a plan that.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Shows your vision.
Speaker 4 (13:05):
It shows how you were going to interpret the beach.
It shows how you're going to handle your environment, it
shows public safety, recycling, how you're going to be marketing.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
I mean, it is so robust. By the time you're done,
it's like five hundred pages.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
So I bid on all four, hoping i'd win one.
Speaker 4 (13:20):
And what happened was I had a sea legs, so
it was easy to plug in sea legs, and then.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
They just.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Same aesthetic because I.
Speaker 4 (13:27):
Had a concept that already like I could I could
lean back on. Then there was sea salt. I had
a sea salt. So had sea salt, and then I
created two concepts and then I bid and I will
never forget I was thirty six, sitting at my office,
sitting in my restaurant at oc ort S weekly at
Sea Legs Wine Bar, and they called me up and said,
you just won.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
The bid on all four?
Speaker 1 (13:47):
Whoa?
Speaker 2 (13:48):
And I went, oh my god, how many?
Speaker 1 (13:52):
And when do I starty?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Wait a minute. I was on my plan.
Speaker 4 (13:56):
I didn't think I'd ever win the bid on all four.
I was just hoping up my odds and getting one. Yeah,
And so you know, I kind of just went, I'll
just I'll just do it. What are you gonna do?
You gotta do it. And so I borrowed money. I
didn't take on any partners. I borrowed money. I borrowed
one point six million.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Dollars, which was so a lot of money.
Speaker 4 (14:15):
Yeah, at thirty six and twenty sixteen, that's probably the
equivalent of like eight million dollars.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Now, I mean that's a huge that's a huge. Love
was like, if you fail, you lose everything.
Speaker 4 (14:25):
Yeah, I'm betting on myself, which is scary, right, And
so I borrowed one point six million dollars and I
did it myself, and I I created did all of
the updates to the building and got them all done,
and created all the concepts that opened them all up.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
And I was by the time they were all open.
Speaker 4 (14:41):
I was like thirty six thirty seven Sea Legs Sea
Salt Beach City Provisions. At the time, it was Pacific Kitchen,
and Sea Legs instantly took off, Like holy crap.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
I didn't I expect it.
Speaker 4 (14:51):
I didn't expect that because you know, I didn't have
anybody I could turn to and be like, how did
you open your beach club, concession, music venue, restaurant?
Speaker 3 (14:59):
Was it his bus as we might see now because
I've been recently and you might see thousands of people there,
it feels like they're just like overflowing of them.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Yeah, there really is.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
You know, it gradually built in the beginning, but but
seel like's like, actually, right off the bat was pretty busy.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
I didn't expect that.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
I was used to seeing maybe one hundred customers in
a day at my restaurant, and that was like a
busy day.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:21):
And I went from like one hundred customers to like
a thousand customers in a day.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
And do you think that.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Because I mean, you definitely saw the vision. The state
saw some of the vision. They were like they're putting
it out to bid. Yeah, but you saw a vision
because really, if you go through Orange County concessions on
the beach.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
I think of one down in Big Corona.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Yeah, Data Point Point, Yes.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Sant Clamenty.
Speaker 3 (15:45):
But they're just small, tiny, little concessions and that's it
for like, yeah, the entirety of Orange County Newport Beach
doesn't have anything.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
And probably like all of you know, California.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
And California, maybe all of California a lot.
Speaker 2 (15:59):
Of concessions and America.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
Really Yeah, And because I did this, I think and
I wasn't a concession era prior to this. It was
just having this vision that was unique and different, and
now I think it's opened up a lot of eyes
to hey, wait a minute, I don't have to just
be a walk up.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Window that sells tacos.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
I could add live music out of your fence line,
create an environment that people want to take photos next to,
and then increase my sales that way. I just, you know,
it was the only thing I could think of, because
they're only all it is is a kitchen, and then
you have your exterior. So I just tried to maximize
kind of the exterior experience.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
And so I think that you're going.
Speaker 4 (16:33):
To see a lot of people changing the way they
do them, and I've been approached by a lot of
people actually to do more.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Yeah, well to do more or to help them.
Speaker 4 (16:40):
I mean I've flown to Miami in Chicago and worked
on helping kind of consulting with other concessions groups about
like how they can maximize their space. And it's just
a little bit of a tweaking and thinking outside the box.
A lot of people sometimes just setting their ways is like,
I don't understand how we can make this different.
Speaker 3 (16:58):
I feel like I see you evolving even in that,
and I feel like any good entrepreneur is like constantly evolving.
And that's what we've been talking about. Everything seems so
easy for those listening, but this is a lot of
hours behind them.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
It's funny because I have no voice right now and
I'm so run down.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
July fourth, Yeah, fourth.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
Of July weekend, So excuse me? Is that keep like
in the microphone? But yeah, people so much.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
I've seen it evolve, and it seems like even even
this year, like Pacific Kitchen, maybe that concept didn't go off.
So you went to pch Tacos and now you have,
you know, these great tacos and Borgarita's and the DJ
on the beach, which is a whole new crowd that
can enjoy that. But Sea Legs is, like you said,
it's its own beast, but like you just redid yeah,
Sea Salt made it a honky tonk, which I think
(17:42):
that what's kind of cool about that is you can
catch trends with these because without you know, if five
years the country music trend in southern California is is hot, yeah,
you could do something maybe different. And that's what's nice
about having a long term lease, but having these locations
where people expect something.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
I think the key thing there being seasonal.
Speaker 4 (18:01):
So I shut off every year, and because I shut off,
I can shut off, shut down, tell my you know,
tell all of my audience thank you so much for
coming out for the season, and we'll see you next season.
And then in those few months of its winter, I
just sit and I write a plan, and I go
through every single venue. I think about what work, what did,
and how we can improve. I book all my talent,
I book all I create all my promotions. I figure
(18:23):
out what I'm gonna do to make esthetically different, more
or exciting for the consumer, and I literally reopen them
every year, so almost like new businesses every years, a
new vibe as a business owner.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
I promise you every person that listens this and owns
a business, yeah, would be like, oh my god, I
wish I had the opportunity to close down, close.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
Down for three months.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Yeah. Do you write a marketing plan every year and
kind of a game plan for locale? You know what?
Speaker 3 (18:49):
I probably should. I run local very much by the
seat of my plans. I'm I try to be as
responsive as absolutely possible to everything.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
So it's just yeah, I'm I'm not as good as you.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
No, not at all, but not at all I.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Need to be, and I'm learning. I'm learning the same
way are listening.
Speaker 4 (19:06):
I tell a lot of people who come and ask
me for advice, I said, if you can just stop
every year, stop every year, even if you're giving yourself
like a week window to just sit and think about
how you can improve and grow your business every year
and then write a plan like literally put that on
a deck.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
I usually hit the end of the year and I'm
so exhausted, I just totally don't talk to me.
Speaker 1 (19:26):
Don't talk to me for three weeks.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
Most people do, and trust me, I Ei there's times
where I'm like, God, I don't want to do this.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
I don't want to write this plan.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
And let me tell you, I call it my project playbook.
By the time I write the plan every year, by
the way, it's about one hundred maybe plus pages.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Well wo.
Speaker 4 (19:42):
And then I bind it and I give it to
my entire team. I give it to Californy's state parks.
I give to the city Huntington Beach. I make sure
that everybody knows what's going on in my.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Head, but it is.
Speaker 4 (19:50):
I think the one secret to helping me be like,
helping me be successful is being able to look back,
think about how I can improve, put a plan together,
showcase plan, and then book everything a year out and
then give it to everybody so we're all on the
same page. And that's just like one big key detail
to I think keeping these all fresh, and keeping the
concepts fresh all the way from the art installations to
(20:13):
the food, to the entertainment, the promotion. So that sounds
like some secret sauce, right, it's some secret sauce.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
There's a lot of work. I'm a special kind of psychopath.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
I guess, well, let's talk about that, because we've already
talked about having all these restaurants and locations and working
all the time, and then I showed you this when
we got in the car. But then you're like, well,
let's go ahead and on top of all of that,
make a cookbook. So why don't you tell me about
California forkinsman? It's something I have in my kitchen. I've
actually I can't remember what I tried. I have tried one,
(20:43):
but I'm not like a you know, not a culinary expert.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
I get asked all the time like how did you
you know? How did you get here? How did you
do this?
Speaker 2 (20:51):
What you know?
Speaker 4 (20:51):
And and there is a long story which we're kind
of talking about right now, and I wanted to tell
that story, but I wanted to do it through the
eyes of food. I've been cooking Huntington Beach all these years,
and I say, I, myself, my team, my chef's what
we've been feeding the community all these years. So basically,
it's a it's a culinary storytale of from sea legs
to sea salt, to all the things that we peeked
(21:14):
out on in food. Because we are a food I'm
a food beverage company. We are you know, we are
addicted to the industry, and so there are things from
like pizza to cocktails to brunch where we decide. We
took such deep dives into trying to figure out what
was cool, what people are doing, putting together ingredients, and
then creating our programming. And so with that, I basically
(21:35):
laid this out in a way that it took all
the different sections and it told the story of all the.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Food that we've been feeding Huntington Beach all these years.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
That basically indirectly tells the story of you know, how
I got to where I'm at right now.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
And I think with the California name, I mean a
lot of the people that visit are from out of town.
I'm sure a lot of locals are there, but there's
a lot of out of town ors and it gives
them a way to take a little piece of California
home with them and recreate that.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
Some of it. That's awesome.
Speaker 4 (22:00):
Well, the last concession I'm opening, which is still in construction, let's.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
Talk about those because now we're going to the other
end of the beach. So there's a different story here.
Speaker 2 (22:08):
Yeah, there is a different story now.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
We worked with that.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
We got the bulls of cheek and we got the four,
but now we're driving by a whole new bunch of them,
one of them named after your daughter.
Speaker 4 (22:17):
Yes, okay, So now we're at Huntington State Beach, and
so you're obviously right. There's Bolsa, Chica State Beach with
its own entity, and then you've got Huntington State Beach. So,
as this opportunity came up to bid on Huntington State Beach,
and as I learned what my customers wanted, I learned
how to be like being a partner at California State
Parks and what that meant, I definitely felt like this
(22:38):
was my next quest and was to bid on this beach.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Take out Huntington Beach House.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
We're passing right now. Sorry I interrupt you, but that's
one of them right there, the heart of Huntington.
Speaker 2 (22:47):
G Huntington Beach.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:49):
And so I put a bid together knowing that these
have become available, and I was prepared. First time I
did it, I had no idea what I was doing.
Second time, I was prepared. So I was when the
bid came out, I heard my concepts together, my renderings,
like I'm going to win all of these.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
I was determined how many were available this.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
Time three here, but then I asked to place a
fourth one, which is my sandbox, and it's like a
little kiosk store at the beach because there's just a
need for being able to sell firewood and cold beverages
and sunscreen to the beach goers.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
So now there's four, but.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
The last one and Unhoused burned our bathroom building down
and so the last one is delayed. And the last
one the state Parks had to demo the bathroom building
and then they had to then redo all the concrete
around the concession, which was a lot of engineering, and
now they're having to reput the new bathroom building up.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
It's taken four years.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Wow, and so four years to build a bathtub, and.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
So it's going to be called California Fork and Spoon.
So that's how the cookbook ties it all into this
and find at the final location, the recipes from the
cookbook will be offered there, a handful of the recipes.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
And then also that location is going to be I
think for the brides out there, they're probably interested in
and people throwing events, probably one of the coolest places
to get married in California.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Right, that's our goal.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
We're going to turn this into a wedding and special
events venue on the water here, right on the corner
of you know, Huntington and Newport.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Are you taking reservations yet?
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Not yet.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
I want to make sure we're a little bit closer
on the construction because you don't get there.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
Brides are always playing in advance, and if they find
out they get married on the beach, that might change things.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
We have so many people who have asked already if
they can start getting planning for weddings there.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
If you don't realize we're driving back and forth through
Huntington Beach on we're going by Sahara. Now Sahara like
the Desert Pizza place, which is named.
Speaker 2 (24:34):
After your my daughter.
Speaker 3 (24:36):
To have your daughter named after her, how cool is
that to get to name something after your daughter and
put her I mean she has to feel really special.
Speaker 4 (24:43):
You know, so funny. I'm glad that we actually get
a touch on this. So she was seven when I
broke the bid for that, and I will.
Speaker 1 (24:49):
She was on your chest when this all started.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Yeah, she's got a very interesting perspective.
Speaker 4 (24:53):
Now she's fourteen, and I only imagine what she's going
to do with her life, because she's just rode this
whole thing with me.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
But I was sitting there talking to.
Speaker 4 (25:00):
Her, and when I was thinking about what I was
going to call these and what I was going to
create a concepts for, and I was really stumped. I
didn't know what to call that one particular. And just
so you know, that location is actually the best place
to put a festival on in Huntington. It's the whitest
gap of sand in the Western Hemisphere as far as
where the boardwalk goes to the ocean, there's about a
mile about out to the ocean, so it's perfect to
(25:21):
put the stage towards the ocean, and so you can
get you know, twenty thirty thousand beach goers out there
they do in which they do. Yeah, And so I
was really trying to think of something cool to be
on the back side of where the festivals should be.
And then I was talking to my daughter and I
and she was talking about volleyball, which she plays, talking
about going to the beach, and I just thought to myself,
wait a minute, Sahara. I named you after the most
(25:41):
mysterious body.
Speaker 3 (25:42):
Of landand that's about the size of the Sahara that
beach because it is a hike to.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
Get to the water.
Speaker 4 (25:49):
For me, it is a hike together the water. And
so once I saw that, I went, oh, my gosh,
how perfect Sahara. But then what an opportunity to then
incorporate her into this, which she deserves because no one
has taken more the bathroom building going.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
Oh, yeah, there's the back. Yeah. Four years later they
got half of the blocks.
Speaker 2 (26:04):
Of yeah, we're there.
Speaker 4 (26:06):
So uh so, I, you know, it was really important
for me once I saw the vision ning name it
after her, then what am I going to do with that?
Speaker 1 (26:13):
Right?
Speaker 4 (26:13):
And she deserves it because no one has taken more
of a sacrifice than my daughter, you know, with when
I've had to work late nights or early mornings, so
she has to be quiet while she's playing, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
One, especially.
Speaker 4 (26:28):
It's hard for your mom's frustrated or mom's you know this, yes,
and so so it.
Speaker 2 (26:34):
Was kind of like my homage to her.
Speaker 4 (26:36):
But with that, I wanted to make this like a
learning moment for her because if her name is.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Worth something, what do you do with it?
Speaker 1 (26:43):
Right?
Speaker 4 (26:43):
And so I've been really working with her and at
a young age, trying to teach her the word advocacy
and what that means. And if your name has some
has waight to it, what do you do with that?
So we I got involved with a company called Families Forward,
which is out of Irvine. They help families that are
on the verge of homelessness. And these are families who
just can't make ends meet. These are not people who
(27:04):
are you know, drug addicts and people who just don't care.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
These are people who are.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Working really hard, but the cost of living is getting
so high they can't they can't make up that difference.
And so Families Forward helps jump in, give them food,
help pay bills if they need to help, give their
kids backpacks or whatnot. So I put my daughter in
the front of that and made her become an advocate
for Families Forward. And with Sahara Sandbar, we give a
dollar back from every pizza oh too Families Forward's coat
(27:30):
and I personally make Sahara herself actually deliver pizzas.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
Here to Huntington in Huntington Beach to families that are
in need.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
And it's a great opportunity for her to be able
to see what a you know, a diverse audience that
we have out there and how lucky that we are
and to be able to give back to our community
and to people who are you know, underthanked and under
you know, will Is call it privilege if that's the
right word, but and be able to say, hey, thank you,
here's a warm meal from us, and open up our
heart for that. So with her name on there, we
(27:59):
don't really talk about it a lot because that's not
what we were. You know, I'm not We're not doing
this to boast that we're giving back.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
But with that between.
Speaker 4 (28:06):
Me and her, I want her to walk away as
she gets to be an older, you know, an adult,
and realize when she has an opportunity to do good,
do it. Yeah. And so her name wasn't here to
be popular or cool. Her name was here to be
able to do something and make a difference in this world.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
So I love that.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
Yeah, that's yeah, deep, A little deeper there, Sarah.
Speaker 4 (28:28):
She's fourteen, and she's like, I hate the word advocacy.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Stop talking about me.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
I know, she really.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
Well, I think we've got a chance to cover a
lot of your story.
Speaker 2 (28:41):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
We're kind of heading back towards the office, but awesome,
this is.
Speaker 3 (28:44):
A good chance to tell people maybe like what they
can expect this summer, what they might expect coming up,
some of the things you're excited about, like maybe maybe
the barbecue, you know, some of the things you've had.
I mean, for sure, you got some pretty good barbecue
at the beach, and maybe some bands coming up. I
think maybe there's a good chance to sell a little.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
Bit the I had a ten year I've been at
Bolsa Chica for ten years. So I had to redo
the bid for Bolsa Chika to be able to extend
my lease.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
That was last year.
Speaker 4 (29:09):
It was very scary because at this point now I've
really built something and there's a lot of people who
would love to come get it. And so I had
to bid against the public and do a public bidding
process to keep my lease. And I spent three months
writing again once again and put together a plan of
how I could then and keep you know, making Bolsa
Chica in you know, a great place to visit. And
(29:31):
so changing Sea Salt to the honky Tonk, changing Pacific
Kitchen to pH Talk wasn't really talking to my Latin
audience that's here at the beach. Anyways, we I won
that bid, thankful, and grateful that I won that bid
and I can still stay out.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Here and serve my community.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
And so with that being said, that is why people
are seeing all these changes at Bolsa Chica. I've put
a lot of money back into Bolsa Chica to enhance
that beach. And so if you haven't been out to
the honky Tonk.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
Yet, line dance lessons so cool.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Yeah, redneck Rodeo residency.
Speaker 4 (30:05):
Barbecue, I mean, gosh, the honkey talk is so cool.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
It is, it is so fun.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
And then pH Tacos is so cool to I got
these like shaboomis. They're like these luffing pieces of material
covers float. Yeah, they kind of float, and it's so
pretty when you're going to Bolsa Chicai. I have a
dozen of them floating in the wind and those are
like sun covers.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
And then we are doing free salted dance lessons at
pH Tacos.
Speaker 4 (30:30):
We have got a really great Mexican menu that's there
from Agwao Chiles to Agua Frescas to a Agua Fresca
cocktail bar Maurisco's, and so trying to bring in like
a Cabo Vibe sea legs the beach is still.
Speaker 2 (30:43):
Just an institution.
Speaker 4 (30:44):
I mean, we just had an incredible week of Long
Beach dub All Stars, and we've got so much more
to go. Moto Beach is coming up, Jeep Fascists coming up,
the air Show is coming up. I mean, Huntington Beach
just keeps getting better, and I feel like we're enhancing
all those other great events that come to Huntington, and
then more events keep coming to Huntington with my partnership
with California State Parks and this vision between my superintendent
(31:06):
at California State Parks and California State Parks and Sacramento
to really revitalize our coastline with this concessions experience. What
each one has a different vibe and a different look
and a different feel and a different menu and speaks
to different audiences culturally. You know, I think that we're
really kind of starting to find who we are Southern Californians.
And this is truly where the culture of Southern California's
(31:28):
laze is really starting to be here in Huntington, at
our on our coastline. And so yeah, I guess that's
that's my spiel. But I'm really proud to be leading
that movement.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Well, I'm gonna I'm gonna lead with proud and I said,
I think Huntington Beach should be proud of what you've
built here. Thank you personally, proud, Thank you to see
your growth from where we met to where you are now.
It's just a pleasure and you're just the nicest person
to deal with and for that, my family visits quite often.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
And I just want to thank everybody also for joining
us on this episode of Locals Only and we'll see.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
You next time.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Awesome, thank you.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
I want to thank everyone on the straw Hut Media team,
and as always, a big thank you to Fletcher Jones
Motor Cars in Newport Beach for providing this beautiful Mercedes
Benz EQE to be our rolling podcast studio. Join us
next time on Locals Only, where you can buckle up
and go for a ride in our mobile podcast studio
(32:32):
with some of the coolest people in Southern California.
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