April 24, 2024 • 42 mins
The Pre-Shift Podcast presented by 7shifts is a deep dive into what it takes to run great restaurant teams.
Host DJ Costantino covers the restaurant industry with conversations featuring industry leaders and innovators sharing their business growth insights, backgrounds, and valuable lessons on running restaurant teams.
In this episode, Chris Britt, Chief Operating Officer of Epic Restaurants, joins us.
For nearly five years, Chris has served in a leadership capacity at Agave & Rye, one of the fastest-growing restaurant concepts in the U.S. He has accumulated a diverse array of experiences since joining the Agave & Rye team in 2018, and through his expertise, Chris has helped continually grow the company into a now multi-brand restaurant group, touting such revered concepts as Agave & Rye, S.O.B. Steakhouse, Shindig Park—and the soon-to-be-unveiled, Trashy Dawg. Chris started as the GM of the original location in Covington, Kentucky, before taking the same position at Agave & Rye’s flagship location in Liberty Township, Ohio. Soon after, he was promoted to Regional Director, followed by a promotion to the Director of Operations role. Chris has been in his Chief Operating Officer role for more than a year, right in time for expansion plans in 2023.
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Credits
Host & Producer: D. J. Costantino
Producer: Samantha Fung
Editor: Fina Charleston
About 7shifts
7shifts is the complete team management platform for restaurants. 7shifts provides tools that help restaurateurs make more profitable decisions, improve team retention, and get operations in order. 7shifts is made for everyone — from FOH to BOH — and is trusted by over 40,000 restaurants and 1 million restaurant pros.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello and welcome back to another episode of the
Pre-Shift Podcast.
My name is DJ and I'll be yourhost, diving deep into what it
takes to run great restaurantteams.
Joining me on the show today isChris Britt, chief Operating
Officer at Epic Brands.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
My name's Chris Britt , Chief Operating Officer, COO
of Epic Brands and Agave Rye.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Chris has been around since the first location of
Agave and Rye and now the groupboasts more than a thousand
workers across thousands oflocations and a few different
concepts.
We chat about how they'veexpanded while maintaining their
core values, the otherchallenges and scaling that
quickly, and the distinctionbetween running a restaurant and
operating business.
This is a long one, but a goodone, and I promise you, if you
stick around, you'll come awaywith some really valuable
(00:44):
insights.
As always, the Pre-ShiftPodcast is brought to you by 7
Shifts.
Team management for restaurants.
Chris, how are you, man?
Doing well, doing well.
Thanks for having me.
Absolutely Glad you could joinus today, Excited.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Anytime we can talk, our lovely industry it's a go
for me.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Yes, I'm looking forward to it.
I'm just going to dive right in.
So I understand you were partof Agave and Rye, kind of from
the very beginning.
Can you tell me about yourdecision to join that team in
the early days and what wentinto that?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Yeah, it's crazy.
We just celebrated our six-yearanniversary in February from
our initial store.
Thank you, and Covington,kentucky.
I originally worked for ourownership group.
We're still husband and wifeprivately owned Wade and Yvonne
Sarber.
I went to Ohio State back afterhigh school in Columbus and
degrees in sports business.
(01:37):
Don't know how I ended up inthis industry, but I had picked
up a bartending job, part-timerestaurant called Oliver's in
Columbus and that's one thatWade and Yvonne had owned, in
addition to two other ones atthat time.
Quickly, within six months Iwas GM of that restaurant and
I've never left never left thisfun and exciting and chaotic
(01:59):
industry.
But we had no clue what we weredoing back then.
We call those old co-days.
We had no clue what we weredoing back then.
Right, we call those old codays.
You know, I think we had themindset and Wayne, yvonne had
the mindset of a lot of firsttime entrepreneurs when it comes
to the industry, where it'ssimple and easy All you do is
sell food and drinks and getguest pay and it's and it's
happy and not understanding allthe ins and outs and the million
(02:23):
variables that go into asuccessful restaurant.
As you know, 60% fail in yearone, 40% don't make it to year
three and we were part of thosenumbers back in Columbus at that
time.
So Wade and Yvonne had arestaurant coach fly up from
Austin Texas.
He said you need to close orsell and start from scratch.
(02:43):
So they sold Oliver's, where Iwas GM, and closed DeNovo, which
was our fine dining restaurant,both downtown.
We've learned downtown marketsare also difficult.
But at that time Yvonne hadstarted working on the agave and
rye concept and looking to moveout of Columbus somewhere in
the Cincinnati market and theyfound this small 1500 square
(03:06):
foot corner restaurant acrossthe river in Covington, kentucky
, with a little bit of debt$1,200 to their name and an old
U-Haul of restaurant equipmentand artwork and started a God
band right there, with agigantic risk as a lot of owners
would have just switchedindustries right.
But they kept it going.
So I did not go with them.
(03:28):
Initially I stayed on at GM atOliver's in Columbus with the
previous owner but always stayedin contact with Yvonne
throughout the day.
She's kind of a second motherfigure to me.
She has a daughter the same ageas myself, so we have that
familial bond and when you trustand love and respect the people
you work for, it makesdifficult decisions In this case
(03:49):
of me moving from Columbus,where I lived for 12 years, down
to Kentucky and we always laughthat you know.
I always say you know, going toKentucky to sell tacos and
tequilas kind of sounded like anasinine idea, but clearly it's
paid off.
So that was the decision makingon my end to come down there.
(04:10):
After, like I said, they openedin February, I came down in
December.
I came down after Christmas Eveof 2018 and took over GMing of
that first restaurant there andit's been a whirlwind, a
positive whirlwind ever sincethat's awesome.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Um, you know, I know from a previous interview, um,
you know that first location wassuccessful but given the past,
uh, the owners, uh, yvonne anduh didn't really want to expand.
You know, they wanted to stickto that one restaurant.
But, um, you know, I read inthe news now you've got over 100
locations of just Agave and Ryeplant, in addition to being a
multi-unit restaurant group,epic Brands.
(04:50):
What was the deciding factor inthose early days?
Let's actually go and expandthis and see what it can become,
rather than just kind of reston that one location.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Yeah, sure, and piggybacking off what you said,
you know we owned, any giventime in Columbus, five
restaurants at one time, alldifferent concepts, right.
So I think the thought ofexpansion and this is where a
lot of restaurants go wrongright is the difficulty from
just number one to number two isso severe and dramatic and has
(05:23):
to be systemized.
So I think there was a littlehesitation on doing that until
we knew for sure we hadsomething that was duplicatable,
especially in, you know, acasual full service restaurant.
It's very difficult toduplicate, unlike a QSR
non-scratch kitchen model.
But about 14 months in, werealized we had something
(05:45):
special there and we took in aminimal outside investment to
open that second location andpart of our third and we've
self-funded ever since then,which is great and rare.
And now we've learned you canonly self-fund so far.
You need that working capital,that cash flow.
(06:05):
So lessons learned throughoutscalability.
But, yeah, we opened our secondlocation in Lexington, kentucky
, in June of 2019 and have beenexpanding ever since.
The second location wasn't verybusy and is still our least.
It's our lowest sales grossingrestaurant currently.
(06:26):
So that kind of gave a littlepause as well.
But then, once we opened ourthird location in greater
Cincinnati.
I transferred over to open thatrestaurant as GM and that's
been our flagship location eversince and our number one
grossing restaurant, and at thatpoint we knew we had a brand
(06:47):
that could continue to scale andcontinue to be successful.
And we sell things that youcan't find anywhere else.
We're not a commodityrestaurant, it's an experience,
economy, experience, hospitalitythat's what we do.
Our food is 100% scratch.
You can't find it anywhere else.
There's always imitators andnow everybody wants to do tacos,
which is totally fine.
You know tacos is our vessel,that we do whatever we want into
(07:11):
it.
A lot of American cuisine.
We're not Mexican it's amisnomer, because people think
tequila and taco is Mexican.
We use a lot of the Mexicanstaples and turn them into a
unique, innovative menu and wewin awards all the time for best
tacos, most innovative menu.
We just won both of those inCincinnati, which is a huge
market and a huge food scene.
(07:32):
So we're super proud of theteam for doing that.
Yeah, there's no end in sight,obviously.
We just opened our 17thlocation in Cleveland, our
second Cleveland location.
We have one more scheduled thisyear in greater Cincinnati
again.
Then we have our steakhouse SOBsteakhouse, our QSR model in
Alabama called Trashy Dog, andwe're opening a new concept in
(07:54):
Grandview, which is Columbus,here in about a month, called
Loco Social, which is also a QSRmodel.
So a lot of fun things, whichis also a QSR model.
So a lot of fun things thatwe've accomplished, but a lot of
more fun, exciting things wewant to do in the future and we
like to say we'll continue to beaggressive but not reckless.
Once we get reckless, that'swhere kind of the chaos no
(08:18):
longer can be controlled.
So, yeah, looking forward to it.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, that's exciting and congrats to all of that and
looking forward to seeing whathappens.
But, um, to get from that onelocation, um, as a GM now to COO
, um of a multi-brand restaurantgroup, um, I'm sure you've
learned a lot along the way andI want to tap into that.
Um, but what is a typical day?
What is a COO of a multi-brandrestaurant group?
(08:43):
What are you responsible forand what do your days look like?
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, sure, and my role might not be atypical to
other restaurant groups I'm notquite sure.
I do have a lot of connects andas we grow we've been able to
build our network and I've beenable to grow my network of
resources and people within theindustry, which is one of the
great things Because we all havethat same passion and drive in
(09:11):
our industry.
We wouldn't be in it but, yeah,like you mentioned, that
transition from having workedevery position in hospitality
and in the restaurant businessand have grown and have always
been the second hand to ourownership group.
So it's always been kind ofYvonne 1A, me 1B or 1-2 punch,
right, yvonne, we're driven onfounder's mindset and very
entrepreneurial.
(09:31):
I'm probably more of theanalytical, logistical,
operational type of thing, soit's a great, I think that's a
great successful brand.
You always have those at thetop to kind of bounce ideas off
and feedback and we have a goodrelationship.
We're not afraid to make theother person mad because we all
have the same goal right Toprotect the brand and to protect
(09:55):
our people and to scale thebrand.
So, throughout that scalabilityprocess and, mind you, none of
us have done this before in ourgroup, right, everyone that
we've hired in has never workedfor a large corporate entity or
in the hospitality industry.
So in regards to my days, theyvary, right that you know.
(10:15):
Nowadays it's almost 75%probably behind a computer or
behind a phone and 25% insideour restaurants.
You know I love being insideour restaurants and it'd be
being kind of spraying.
All day can get monotonous andsometimes you lose the
perception or perspective ofactually what's going on inside
your four walls and interactingwith the people and make sure
(10:38):
that culture is still there, themorale is still there, it's a
clean restaurant, the, the, theteam's performing well, the
foods, foods consistent.
But in regards to now, you knowI get up every morning plethora
of emails.
Going through those, most ofthem go into the spam folder, as
I'm sure you can imagine,intranet, so to speak, on all of
(11:00):
our we require everybody toleave daily notes.
So checking all of ourdepartment heads notes and
making sure it's my job to makesure I have that firm pulse
right of what's happeningthroughout our brand, not just
in the stores but within thedepartments, that kind of
facilitate on how the storesoperate.
So you know now I havemarketing reports to me, it
(11:21):
store operations, culinaryfacilities, maintenance,
purchasing, events and cateringand worked in tandem daily with
finance and HR, so it's a largepercentage of those departments
and those directors that reportdirectly to me.
We did scale up our corporate wecall it Beehive quite heavily
(11:45):
for an anticipated fastergrowing scalability.
But before we do that, like Imentioned, we don't want to be
reckless.
We want to make sure we havethe right people on the bus
right, because we like to do theanalogy right.
If you have one cog or ifyou're on an 18-wheeler that
represents every department orwhatever, and you have one flat
(12:06):
tire or one that's running outof air slows down the entire
operation.
So we've scaled that back alittle bit and it's actually
helped because now everybody'skind of more on that same
seamless page, knowing wherewe're going and achieving the
same goals, and so it'sdifficult because I also am
(12:28):
responsible for day-to-dayoperations.
I have a great regional directorwho kind of oversees the more
micro part of that.
I oversee more of the macro butthen also focusing on strategic
growth, concept, developmentand you know what, the trends of
the industry, where are wegoing?
The crazy economy, thefinancials, the you know how to,
you know our numbers in lineand communicating that down, top
(12:52):
down, bottom up and now we'reprobably 1200 deep right and
team members.
So a lot different from thatfirst story where there was 30,
from that first world wherethere was 30.
You know, so that's been alittle challenging in essence,
but I think we do a really goodjob and you know, we preach.
You know, if we do these fourthings every day, right, hold
(13:13):
each other accountable,over-communicate with humility.
Right, Throw the ego out of thewindow and then have fun, smile
and be happy.
You smile and be happy, goodthings happen.
And if we can, we say TLC, train, lead and develop or coach and
develop our leadership at thestores, because ultimately,
they're the most importantpeople.
(13:33):
I don't get to work in thestores every day, I'm not
interacting with our guests.
So it's up to that LOH, leaderof the house, which is our
acronym for GM, and his or herleadership team to facilitate
our brand standards down.
We like to create the frameworkfor them to operate freely
within, to achieve brandstandards and deliver on our
(13:55):
promise, which is deliver anepic experience to our guests,
team members and community.
And we have 17, 18, 19 storesnow.
Sometimes I lose track.
It's difficult, verychallenging, especially with
three to four different conceptsand we like to.
I was having a coachingconversation with our director
of operational FP&A yesterday,ryan and you know, having you
(14:19):
know, and he takes ourfinancials in and helps
communicate it down to the storelevel ops team and he was a
little frustrated.
I'm like, well, you can'tdeliver the message the same to
all 16 stores.
It's no different than a GMhaving 16 different servers.
The end goal is the sameProvide that experience Right,
(14:44):
facilitate and get to know thepeople on a human basis and know
what makes them tick, whatmakes them have that motivation
and inspiration and allow themto come up to the solution
themselves, instead of yougiving them that solution.
And it's challenging for a lotof people, but that's the
exciting part of this industryis every day is a challenge, a
new challenge, and then seeingthe rewards and seeing people
(15:04):
happy our team and our guests iswhat makes us do what we
continue to do.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
That kind of goes in.
I've heard you speak beforeabout there's a difference
between running a restaurant andoperating a business.
Is that kind of thatdistinction for you?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
Yeah, especially as you grow and scale, because when
you have one, two, three, four,it's still kind of running a
restaurant Right.
That that that mindset shift.
John Maxwell has a book calledLeader Shift, which is kind of
appropriate and knowing how toyou know.
That's the thing.
Everybody that works in arestaurant currently right in
(15:39):
our, in our stores, probablymost restaurants right can
properly facilitate running aday-to-day shift.
Everyone knows the openingprocedures, everybody knows that
a server should be doing abartender, a cook, the food, the
drinks, providing that service,hospitality to the guests,
right, that's kind of the 101.
(15:59):
But as people get promoted andcontinue to grow their career in
this industry and move up thecompany ladder or whatever you
want to call it, there's thatshift Even from.
You know you said the wordmulti-unit right, even to
oversee.
We've had a lot of GMs,originally LOHs, that have been
(16:20):
promoted into district roles,right, originally LOHs that have
been promoted into districtroles, right.
So instead of workingday-to-day in one store, now
they're kind of overseeing fourto six stores operating and
that's a gigantic shift and verydifficult to understand.
That you're literallyresponsible and the GM, I'll say
, is literally responsible foreverything that happens inside
those four walls.
(16:41):
They have to take.
Although they don't own theactual restaurant.
They have to take ownership ofresponsibility and
accountability for everythingthat goes inside of that.
And running a shift is just afew of those variables right,
super important.
But are you running a shift tobudget, right?
Or do you know how to read aP&L?
(17:02):
Do you know what prime cost is?
Do you know what income fromoperations is?
Do you know what managementfees are?
Do you know all of these typesof things In addition to how to
market your store?
Are you using the collateral wesend to you to upsell for
guests?
Are you using the data we'regetting to make strategic
(17:23):
decisions on staffing and theP-mix, on how to properly prep?
How are you holding everybodyaccountable?
Sometimes culinary is a littleseparated too, but they're
responsible for culinary side aswell.
Do you know how to fix a leakytoilet?
(17:44):
Or do you call somebody Right?
Do you put in a facilitiesticket?
You know on and on and on, andI think that shift from you know
owning to operating a businessand knowing you're responsible
for everything inside those fourwalls is challenging.
I think it's intimidating, Ithink it's scary for a lot of
people, especially in a greenbrand.
(18:06):
By green I mean young brand asourselves, and especially those
that have been promoted fromwithin our brand and haven't
maybe worked in restaurantsbefore.
It's a big shift and we're veryyou know we have a system for
everything.
It's a big shift and we're veryyou know we have a system for
everything.
It's our job to minimize thatgray area right.
(18:26):
A restaurant's never going tobe black and white, but
sometimes there can be a lot ora little gray area and it's our
job to facilitate, provide thetools and resources and
information necessary forleaderships to make the decision
where they feel comfortable,knowing shifts are going to run
smoothly, maybe when they're noton the floor, you know, so they
can focus on more of theadministrative side, which takes
(18:48):
up a large portion.
You know, like expensing andeverything's tech now.
So you know tip cards and wehave, you know what we call in,
burst cards when money getsloaded and that becomes a store
debit card if they need to goout and purchase things.
So it's a lot.
And then, being a role model, afigure of leadership, are you
(19:08):
showing presence and prowesswhen you're on the floor, when
you walk the stores?
Do you know that person's incharge comfortably and then
knowing how to see everything,because no one thing in the
restaurant industry is difficult.
Right, there's just a millionvariables and how to prioritize
those variables.
Urgent, important now,delegation, whatever it may be,
(19:33):
and that's a difficult trait toteach anybody, let alone in our
industry.
And we like to say I like tosay, when people ask me what my
favorite animal would be, or ifI had to be an animal to best
describe me, when people ask mewhat my favorite animal would be
or if I had to be an animal tobest describe me, I always say
an owl.
Right, because I want people tojust step back, observe you,
just take a breath and step backand stand maybe in one spot for
(19:53):
20 seconds and then go toanother area of the restaurant
for 20 seconds and just swivelyour head like an owl up in the
tree, right, you'd be amazed athow many things you can see.
You know it provides youcoaching opportunities.
You might see a light bulb out.
You might see a guest you knowneeds a water refill.
But if you're just walking thefloor on the floor, right, a lot
(20:14):
of times you just go throughthe motions.
Right, we say lead on the floor.
You should be coaching the teamon your floor, interacting with
the guests on the floor, thosetypes of things, and then that
develops that wisdom that youneed to provide out to the team
and then they know you're goingto see something and they don't
want you to see that before theydo.
So that's going to make them bemore motivated to achieve the
(20:35):
promise of the brand as well.
So, yeah, it's a big shift,especially even on the corporate
side of you know, when it wasjust me and Yvonne right to then
grow in our bus, and nowthere's probably about 20 of us
on the corporate side that weoversee, and you know,
delegating out things that Iused to do and having others do
it and then hold themaccountable, even if you know it
(20:56):
might not be done the way youwant it to or the way you used
to do it or whatever it may be.
You never will growindividually or personally and
professionally if you don'tallow those people to make
mistakes, because that's theonly way they're going to grow
and learn into, and that's theonly other way you can measure
their performance as well.
So it's definitely been anadjustment, but it's been a fun
(21:17):
ride what are the best keptsecrets from successful
restauranteurs like stella?
Speaker 1 (21:22):
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Now back to the show, and itseems to me like the kind of
(21:45):
nice segue.
I want to talk a little bitabout the core values, and that
seems to be one of those thingsthat helps to facilitate all of
that consistency and some ofthat leadership.
So curious.
You know what went into thecreation of those core values
and then like, how do youoperationalize them?
Right?
So it's like it's one thing tojust come up with a list of
these are the things we stand by, right, but how do you make
(22:05):
sure that that actually makesits way into everyday decision
making?
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Sure, yeah, a lot of companies have, you know,
mission statements, visionstatements, whatever you want to
call it.
Um, so it's probably year twowhere Yvonne, as founder, kind
of sat down and kind of thoughtabout what is Agave and Dry.
At that time it was before wehad any other concepts.
(22:29):
So you know why do we do whatwe do?
Right, we require allleadership to read Simon Sinek's
, start With why.
That's one of our books and wehave a whole book club we can
get into later.
But you know why do we do whatwe do and how do we do that?
So Yvonne took some time andput some energy into it.
(22:51):
We used to just have definitions, right, but it's a lot easier
to attach words to thosedefinitions as an easier way to
remember or coach.
And so you know, we came upwith love, respect, inspire,
community, exceed expectationsand epic hospitality.
So those six pillars kind ofare the framework, the
foundation of why we do what wedo.
(23:13):
And any successful group has toactually back up and practice
and preach and talk about thosewhere they just don't become
another poster on the wall.
And you know each of those havehave, have definitions, of
course, and no one is moregreater than the other.
(23:35):
You need all six kind ofseamlessly integrated in order
to succeed or get the pointacross right.
If you're, if you're lovingsomeone but not showing them
respect, it's kind ofcontradictory.
So, and you know, are youshowing yourself?
Respect the team, respect, youknow the community, respect
everybody your bosses, yourcoworkers, your peers, and all
those are applicable to allsituations and require our team
(23:56):
to carry a core value card onthem as part of their uniform.
It just fits in their wallet orthe back pocket and we'll go
around and do some auditssometimes.
Hey, you got your core valuecard and, yep, they're always
super excited to pull that outof their pocket, which is great
in English on one side and it'sin Spanish on the other side,
because we have a Latinopresence and our culinary team
and some of our front of thehouse team as well.
(24:18):
So we want to make sure theyfeel inclusive as well.
Team as well.
So we want to make sure theyfeel inclusive as well.
And if we accomplish or strivefor emulating and demonstrating
our core values, that allows usto fulfill our promise right,
which is very simple.
We promise to deliver an epicexperience to our guests,
community and team, andsometimes our team thinks, you
(24:40):
know, sometimes we forget aboutall three of those.
And it has to be, you know,because sometimes what we have
to do to the guests maybedoesn't make our team super
thrilled, or vice versa, ortheir store or responsibilities
and not stepping back and seeingthe big picture of the overall
(25:06):
operation business that we'vetouched on earlier.
But everyone can strive toachieve that promise.
And, lastly, if we have thatfoundation of core values and we
practice and preach and deliveron our promise, that allows us
to achieve our dream right.
In simplistic terms, our dreamis to make sure that everybody
(25:27):
that works for us we give a door, an access point, the tools and
resources that they can take oninto another profession or off
to college or another degree orwhatever it may be, and
(25:49):
ultimately that's why we do whatwe do.
We don't do it to make money.
Obviously you have to beprofitable to succeed and to
scale, but profitability is theoutput right of putting in the
effort to demonstrate our corevalues, our promise and our
dream Do you have one of thosecards on you.
I have one.
Let me see in my bag here.
(26:10):
Yeah, I'm curious, see if I canfind it.
I used to have a stack.
Let me see, because my wallet'supstairs.
I'll send you.
I'll send you a copy of it.
Yeah, that'd be awesome.
Yeah, it's pretty, I'll sendyou.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
I'll send you a copy of it.
Yeah, that'd be awesome.
Yeah, it's pretty, pretty cool.
It's nice to kind of carry oneof those things uh, you know
that just remind you of um, youknow purpose or what you need to
be doing, or um, even if you'renot like looking at it all the
time, just knowing that it'sthere, I feel like, makes you
think about it and um justdrives that home well, and when,
sometimes, if there's a teammember violating a core value,
(26:47):
right or not demonstrating orwhatever, when leadership sits
down with that team member, youknow hey, get out your core
value card.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
What?
Which one of these aren't youfollowing?
Um, probably this one.
And then then there can be adialogue and a coaching
opportunity, um, based off ofthat, which is great to see yeah
, absolutely, it gives almost a.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Like you said, it's a conversation starter, it's a.
You know, sometimes, I think,if you don't have that, giving
people feedback positive ornegative can be difficult, as
you know.
It's like oh, it's up tointerpretation.
But if you have that kind ofthing, it's like no, like this
is what we follow and, forwhatever reason, you're doing a
great job at this one or youknow you need to work on this
one.
(27:31):
Um, we have something similarhere at seven shifts a little
bit different of a type ofbusiness, right, but, um, we
have our own core values.
Um, so, uh, correct me if anyof these numbers are wrong.
Um, but I have that.
You guys guys sold 2.3 milliontacos last year, which is about
6,400a day, and over a millionmargaritas.
So that's quite a lot.
As you've scaled, I'm curious.
(27:53):
We focus on employees a lothere and team management of
course.
So what's been the biggestchallenge in scaling that
quickly but also maintaining ahappy team, because it can be a
lot of stress, I imagine, on thecorporate side and getting that
done and trickling down to theteam probably is easy, and you
(28:15):
know how do you avoid that.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Sure, no, there's a lot of ways we can go here, but
the anytime you scale,especially a full service
restaurant, a scratch kitchen,right, you're always worried
about that consistency amongstproduct, right, not necessarily
even from store to store, butfrom visit to visit.
You know, if a guest dines atour coveted location on Monday
(28:43):
and gets two tacos, they comeback two weeks from them and get
the same two tacos and ifthey're not the same, that's a
challenge, right, andinconsistency is can be the the
downfall of any successful brand, whether you know restaurants
or group or whatever it may be.
So, um, and we try, we preachthat consistency as much as
(29:04):
possible.
But, as you know, when you'rebringing more people on and
there's a bigger flow ofcommunication, especially it's
something new that comes out ora menu change, whatever it is,
how are we ensuring our team isset up for success?
We know we do enough.
We know we provide the tools,resources, everything they need.
I question, I say probablyprobably better than most I
(29:27):
would.
People inside the store stillhave to take those tools and
resources right and use it tosucceed, and sometimes that's a
caveat of over-communication andhaving a lot of oversight from
afar, where the stores may stillview the corporate team or
others as a crutch right.
(29:48):
Instead of operating, you know,instead of just a support
system, right or thinking thatwe will or someone else will be
doing some of the things thatultimately they are required to
do.
And that's always a challenge Alot of times.
Hiring the right people rightand holding them accountable,
(30:11):
which is which is challenging.
But the consistency part right.
Growing quickly didn't allow usto maybe train external hires
correctly, cause I, like I said,we're very operationally savvy.
We have a lot of systems, wehave a lot to learn.
We're a scratch kitchen, ascratch bar, so if you come in
(30:32):
and you only get two weeksbefore you have to be thrown
into a store, you know that'sprobably not enough for them to
be comfortable from day one.
So there's a lot of learning onthe fly and they'll always be
learning on the fly, right.
So, setting our teams up forsuccess in a short amount of
(30:53):
time, because as you grow, yourinternal pipeline slowly gets
exhausted.
By exhausted I mean shortenedor less people right that can be
internally promoted to aposition without promoting them
to a position where they're notnecessarily qualified or have
the tools and resources tosucceed.
Because once you put someone inthat position now there's
really not a way out, becauseyou can never put them back in
(31:15):
the other position, because it'sa demotion and those things
never work out.
So we've learned a lot oflessons along the way on that.
And just because you're a goodserver, bartender, host, doesn't
mean you're going to make agreat team lead or a member of
leadership.
Or maybe because you're a goodGM doesn't make sense that
(31:37):
you're going to be a gooddistrict.
Maybe those skill sets.
So identifying those skill setsalong the way, but ultimately
right, you, you, you need peopleto run shifts, you need people
to operate from within the store.
So sometimes we have to do thatand then provide that, that
extra oversight.
But once you provide extraoversight somewhere, someone
else is then getting lessoversight.
(31:58):
So trying to balance that ebband flow, the teeter-totter
effect to making sure everybodyhas the tools and resources when
they need to succeed, and thenthat you know, trusting the
process from afar, you know howcan we, how can I know sitting
here today in the office thatour stores are operating
(32:19):
efficiently?
Right, that's always a bigconcern and you can base that.
We have a lot of metricsoperational metrics, financial
metrics, right.
But you know, when a negativereview comes across the screen,
how the hell did this happen?
There should be zero way thatthis happened to this guest.
(32:39):
So what went wrong?
And then you're thinking, okay,what else is going wrong at
that store or with that memberof leadership?
And then trusting the processthat they get it and with the
people we've hired to it, like Isaid, with that oversight on
the corporate team, if we trustand respect them to have that
same passion and vision.
(33:00):
And no one works for our brandjust for a paycheck, right?
That's the output again fromwhat you put into it.
For a brand just for a paycheck, right, that's the output,
again from what you put into it.
So those have been somechallenges.
And then you know we talkedabout core values on.
You know, are those beingfollowed?
Is our morale up?
Do our teams still have thatbuy-in that they did a couple of
(33:22):
years ago, now that we'veexponentially grew our team, or
as a new server, gettingonboarded properly, and
obviously we have all thesemetrics that track these things.
But these are always thingsthat are going to your mind.
And then how, through quickgrowth or quick scalability, how
can you continue to beproactive and approach instead
(33:45):
of reactive?
You see that a lot in thisindustry it's reactive, reactive
, reactive, reactive.
This happened, okay, I got todo this Instead of I know this
is going to happen.
Let me do these eight, nine,ten things to make sure if this
does happen, or when it happensyou know, every day you have a
plan for plan B, c and D in ourindustry.
Someone's going to call offsick.
(34:06):
There's going to be some crazything that happens.
Are you prepared to handlethese situations?
And then, are we prepared tohandle big situations, right?
Is someone going to you knowrandomly?
Is a guest going to slip andfall and sue us?
Right?
What do we do in thesesituations to mitigate those
types of things?
Because, as you grow, peoplethink, oh, money, money, money,
(34:27):
money.
Well, restaurant industrymargins are still the same and
even thinner now, with inflationand costs going up, which is
crazy, right, you know, making,you know, one cent off every
dollar sometimes doesn't clicklike that.
So that kind of goes back tothe operating.
A business side of thing isunderstanding.
Okay, you might've done $10,000today, great day.
(34:50):
But if you were over labor 15%,right, instead of quote unquote
, bringing just the thousanddollars to bottom line.
Maybe you only bought brought300, or maybe you ran out of
cheese and had to go to thestore and pay double the cheese
and then you lost theopportunity costs of the time in
the restaurant.
So what went wrong there?
That means you weren'tinteracting with guests on the
floor because you were runningto a grocery store to get
(35:13):
something right.
So all these things that everyrestaurant group deals with and
trying to mitigate and minimizethe opportunity for disadherence
to what we want to do.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
Absolutely.
There's a lot that goes into it.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Oh yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
I imagine, though and I know you go a little off
script before we wrap up theinternal promotions and looking
at that as you grow, it seems tobe a strategy for you guys to
look internally and providethose career paths, and is that
something that you guys arelooking to do?
Or, I guess, is it somethingthat you prioritize, because it
(35:54):
seems like you do, and what goesinto that and what are the
advantages of it?
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Yeah, of course, and kind of goes back to our core
values right, our dream right,providing those opportunities
but setting the team up forsuccess.
The good thing about valuesright, our dream right,
providing those opportunitiesbut setting the team up for
success.
The good thing about internallyright, people have worked with
you X amount of time, whetherthat's months or whatever.
You can gauge their buy-in.
You can gauge if they're a goodperson.
You can gauge if they havepotential to develop into an
(36:21):
all-star or a leader.
You can tell if people look upto this person.
So that kind of eliminates alot of the unknowns from maybe
an external hire.
Everyone can interview good,these days, references you're
limited on what questions youcan ask.
So what we have noticed prosand cons to both.
(36:45):
Right, the internal people,like I mentioned, we don't want
to promote them too quickly.
So we're working.
Katie, our chief people officerwe brought on over a year ago,
phenomenal.
We're working together on aplan called it's called Road to
Ready right.
So if you are a server and youwant to become a member of
(37:06):
leadership, because you havethis brand, you see the growth
opportunities, you know what itstands for, you see a career in
this industry, you know exactlywhat steps you need to
accomplish and in what timeframeto be eligible to be a ETL,
which is our Epic Team Lead,which is our entry-level hourly
position.
And then, if you get thatposition, you know exactly what
(37:26):
you need to do to become adining room manager, which is
our entry-level store salaryposition.
So, developing that, because aswe've grown quickly, right,
some people have been put intoroles after a few months, just
in a previous position, andother people see that within the
brand and sometimes assume,well, this person did it in two
(37:46):
months, I should be able to doit in two months.
And then it creates that grayarea that we mentioned.
So, in that course ofconversation, if you say, well,
we don't think you're ready tothem, that can be seen as a they
don't believe in me type ofthing and that's not the case at
all.
Right, we want to set you upfor succeed because as we grow,
(38:12):
we need people in leadershippositions that can operate with
less and less oversight, becausethe corporate bus always grows
at a much smaller percentagethan new openings in theory.
I mean that's kind of the model, you know, new openings in
theory.
I mean that's kind of the model.
Now the external right.
(38:33):
We have a lot of recent onesthat have came on with great
experience, great previousrestaurant groups they've worked
for, they're eager, they lovethe brand.
But it's difficult right whenyou've been doing something a
long time to kind of shut offand learn the new way of doing
things or the agave way or theEpic Brands way of doing things,
and sometimes they don't agreeor not, you know, but we're open
(38:55):
to that feedback.
But so they have the basics ofrunning a shift that we've
talked about, or Restaurant 101,the management side.
Then it's transitioning theminto the leadership side of the
equation and developing themwhere they're comfortable, also
knowing all the systems in ashort period of time, as opposed
(39:17):
to those that have beeninternally promoted or we want
to promote.
Internally, they've been doingthe systems for a long period of
time.
Internally they've been doingthe systems for a long period of
time and, as you're a scalablebrand, what it was, if you're
not growing or evolving orchanging right, you're dying,
quote Right.
So our brand is always tryingto try to stay on trend, create
(39:39):
trends.
We had beer, yet tacos twoyears before.
It was a.
It's a thing Now it's a thingeverywhere and it's our number
one seller, seller by far, andjust things like that.
But once again, as you'reconstantly changing or evolving,
those changes in evolution haveto be communicated down, bought
in to provide that consistentproduct that can make or break
(40:00):
you.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
Absolutely yeah.
I mean I think that's that's agreat place to kind of wrap
things up.
I'm curious, you know, I knowyou have an opening coming up
soon, but what does the rest ofthe year look like for for you
and and for the Epic Brandsgroup?
Speaker 2 (40:26):
great market and we have one more in the books, one
more agave and rye in the booksand it's taken, geez, probably
five years right to get asystematic, documented approach
right for a successful, scalablebusiness.
So we eventually want to scaleour steakhouse and open some new
concepts, like I mentioned.
But that shift from one to two,especially at a steakhouse.
The consistency is even moreimportant at the higher price
(40:47):
point.
So we're going to work on maybedeveloping this year some more
systematic approaches.
What does a duplicatable SOBlook like and how can we do
those types of things and thenevaluate?
You know, with our fast growth,we haven't really had a time to
sit back.
You know, with our fast growth,we haven't really had a time to
sit back.
Roundtables, collaborativecommunication on what does the
(41:10):
next year look like, and that'sall this year.
Election years are always crazyin our industry.
The weather is out of whacknowadays and the economy.
You know we have to make surewe're financially stable for
what we want to do.
Right, we want to launch aloyalty program later this year.
Right, We've been in contactwith a bunch of providers.
We want to do a lot of things.
(41:30):
We want to offer more benefitsto our team.
We want to redo our bonusprogram, our operational metrics
.
There's a lot of these things,but everything costs money or
time and how to use the best ofour resources in time to succeed
those.
So we want to get Hamilton,which is on the outskirts of
Cincinnati, open, probably inJuly.
(41:51):
That'll give us the last halfof the year to kind of
strategize for the future, whichwe're super, super excited
about.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Awesome.
Well, chris, I appreciate youcoming on today.
Thanks for sharing all yourexpertise and learnings with our
audience and thank you so much.
Yeah, anytime, much appreciated.
Thanks again for listening tothis episode of the Pre-Shift
Podcast.
If you enjoyed it, please leavea review and share it with one
of your friends to help our showgrow.
We could not do it without yoursupport.
As always, I would love to hearwhat you think.
(42:22):
You can email me atdj7shiftscom.
I look forward to hearing fromyou.
Until next time.
Hello and welcome back to another episode of the
Pre-Shift Podcast.
My name is DJ and I'll be yourhost, diving deep into what it
takes to run great restaurantteams.
Joining me on the show today isChris Britt, chief Operating
Officer at Epic Brands.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
My name's Chris Britt , Chief Operating Officer, COO
of Epic Brands and Agave Rye.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Chris has been around since the first location of
Agave and Rye and now the groupboasts more than a thousand
workers across thousands oflocations and a few different
concepts.
We chat about how they'veexpanded while maintaining their
core values, the otherchallenges and scaling that
quickly, and the distinctionbetween running a restaurant and
operating business.
This is a long one, but a goodone, and I promise you, if you
stick around, you'll come awaywith some really valuable
(00:44):
insights.
As always, the Pre-ShiftPodcast is brought to you by 7
Shifts.
Team management for restaurants.
Chris, how are you, man?
Doing well, doing well.
Thanks for having me.
Absolutely Glad you could joinus today, Excited.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Anytime we can talk, our lovely industry it's a go
for me.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Yes, I'm looking forward to it.
I'm just going to dive right in.
So I understand you were partof Agave and Rye, kind of from
the very beginning.
Can you tell me about yourdecision to join that team in
the early days and what wentinto that?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Yeah, it's crazy.
We just celebrated our six-yearanniversary in February from
our initial store.
Thank you, and Covington,kentucky.
I originally worked for ourownership group.
We're still husband and wifeprivately owned Wade and Yvonne
Sarber.
I went to Ohio State back afterhigh school in Columbus and
degrees in sports business.
(01:37):
Don't know how I ended up inthis industry, but I had picked
up a bartending job, part-timerestaurant called Oliver's in
Columbus and that's one thatWade and Yvonne had owned, in
addition to two other ones atthat time.
Quickly, within six months Iwas GM of that restaurant and
I've never left never left thisfun and exciting and chaotic
(01:59):
industry.
But we had no clue what we weredoing back then.
We call those old co-days.
We had no clue what we weredoing back then.
Right, we call those old codays.
You know, I think we had themindset and Wayne, yvonne had
the mindset of a lot of firsttime entrepreneurs when it comes
to the industry, where it'ssimple and easy All you do is
sell food and drinks and getguest pay and it's and it's
happy and not understanding allthe ins and outs and the million
(02:23):
variables that go into asuccessful restaurant.
As you know, 60% fail in yearone, 40% don't make it to year
three and we were part of thosenumbers back in Columbus at that
time.
So Wade and Yvonne had arestaurant coach fly up from
Austin Texas.
He said you need to close orsell and start from scratch.
(02:43):
So they sold Oliver's, where Iwas GM, and closed DeNovo, which
was our fine dining restaurant,both downtown.
We've learned downtown marketsare also difficult.
But at that time Yvonne hadstarted working on the agave and
rye concept and looking to moveout of Columbus somewhere in
the Cincinnati market and theyfound this small 1500 square
(03:06):
foot corner restaurant acrossthe river in Covington, kentucky
, with a little bit of debt$1,200 to their name and an old
U-Haul of restaurant equipmentand artwork and started a God
band right there, with agigantic risk as a lot of owners
would have just switchedindustries right.
But they kept it going.
So I did not go with them.
(03:28):
Initially I stayed on at GM atOliver's in Columbus with the
previous owner but always stayedin contact with Yvonne
throughout the day.
She's kind of a second motherfigure to me.
She has a daughter the same ageas myself, so we have that
familial bond and when you trustand love and respect the people
you work for, it makesdifficult decisions In this case
(03:49):
of me moving from Columbus,where I lived for 12 years, down
to Kentucky and we always laughthat you know.
I always say you know, going toKentucky to sell tacos and
tequilas kind of sounded like anasinine idea, but clearly it's
paid off.
So that was the decision makingon my end to come down there.
(04:10):
After, like I said, they openedin February, I came down in
December.
I came down after Christmas Eveof 2018 and took over GMing of
that first restaurant there andit's been a whirlwind, a
positive whirlwind ever sincethat's awesome.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Um, you know, I know from a previous interview, um,
you know that first location wassuccessful but given the past,
uh, the owners, uh, yvonne anduh didn't really want to expand.
You know, they wanted to stickto that one restaurant.
But, um, you know, I read inthe news now you've got over 100
locations of just Agave and Ryeplant, in addition to being a
multi-unit restaurant group,epic Brands.
(04:50):
What was the deciding factor inthose early days?
Let's actually go and expandthis and see what it can become,
rather than just kind of reston that one location.
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Yeah, sure, and piggybacking off what you said,
you know we owned, any giventime in Columbus, five
restaurants at one time, alldifferent concepts, right.
So I think the thought ofexpansion and this is where a
lot of restaurants go wrongright is the difficulty from
just number one to number two isso severe and dramatic and has
(05:23):
to be systemized.
So I think there was a littlehesitation on doing that until
we knew for sure we hadsomething that was duplicatable,
especially in, you know, acasual full service restaurant.
It's very difficult toduplicate, unlike a QSR
non-scratch kitchen model.
But about 14 months in, werealized we had something
(05:45):
special there and we took in aminimal outside investment to
open that second location andpart of our third and we've
self-funded ever since then,which is great and rare.
And now we've learned you canonly self-fund so far.
You need that working capital,that cash flow.
(06:05):
So lessons learned throughoutscalability.
But, yeah, we opened our secondlocation in Lexington, kentucky
, in June of 2019 and have beenexpanding ever since.
The second location wasn't verybusy and is still our least.
It's our lowest sales grossingrestaurant currently.
(06:26):
So that kind of gave a littlepause as well.
But then, once we opened ourthird location in greater
Cincinnati.
I transferred over to open thatrestaurant as GM and that's
been our flagship location eversince and our number one
grossing restaurant, and at thatpoint we knew we had a brand
(06:47):
that could continue to scale andcontinue to be successful.
And we sell things that youcan't find anywhere else.
We're not a commodityrestaurant, it's an experience,
economy, experience, hospitalitythat's what we do.
Our food is 100% scratch.
You can't find it anywhere else.
There's always imitators andnow everybody wants to do tacos,
which is totally fine.
You know tacos is our vessel,that we do whatever we want into
(07:11):
it.
A lot of American cuisine.
We're not Mexican it's amisnomer, because people think
tequila and taco is Mexican.
We use a lot of the Mexicanstaples and turn them into a
unique, innovative menu and wewin awards all the time for best
tacos, most innovative menu.
We just won both of those inCincinnati, which is a huge
market and a huge food scene.
(07:32):
So we're super proud of theteam for doing that.
Yeah, there's no end in sight,obviously.
We just opened our 17thlocation in Cleveland, our
second Cleveland location.
We have one more scheduled thisyear in greater Cincinnati
again.
Then we have our steakhouse SOBsteakhouse, our QSR model in
Alabama called Trashy Dog, andwe're opening a new concept in
(07:54):
Grandview, which is Columbus,here in about a month, called
Loco Social, which is also a QSRmodel.
So a lot of fun things, whichis also a QSR model.
So a lot of fun things thatwe've accomplished, but a lot of
more fun, exciting things wewant to do in the future and we
like to say we'll continue to beaggressive but not reckless.
Once we get reckless, that'swhere kind of the chaos no
(08:18):
longer can be controlled.
So, yeah, looking forward to it.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yeah, that's exciting and congrats to all of that and
looking forward to seeing whathappens.
But, um, to get from that onelocation, um, as a GM now to COO
, um of a multi-brand restaurantgroup, um, I'm sure you've
learned a lot along the way andI want to tap into that.
Um, but what is a typical day?
What is a COO of a multi-brandrestaurant group?
(08:43):
What are you responsible forand what do your days look like?
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, sure, and my role might not be atypical to
other restaurant groups I'm notquite sure.
I do have a lot of connects andas we grow we've been able to
build our network and I've beenable to grow my network of
resources and people within theindustry, which is one of the
great things Because we all havethat same passion and drive in
(09:11):
our industry.
We wouldn't be in it but, yeah,like you mentioned, that
transition from having workedevery position in hospitality
and in the restaurant businessand have grown and have always
been the second hand to ourownership group.
So it's always been kind ofYvonne 1A, me 1B or 1-2 punch,
right, yvonne, we're driven onfounder's mindset and very
entrepreneurial.
(09:31):
I'm probably more of theanalytical, logistical,
operational type of thing, soit's a great, I think that's a
great successful brand.
You always have those at thetop to kind of bounce ideas off
and feedback and we have a goodrelationship.
We're not afraid to make theother person mad because we all
have the same goal right Toprotect the brand and to protect
(09:55):
our people and to scale thebrand.
So, throughout that scalabilityprocess and, mind you, none of
us have done this before in ourgroup, right, everyone that
we've hired in has never workedfor a large corporate entity or
in the hospitality industry.
So in regards to my days, theyvary, right that you know.
(10:15):
Nowadays it's almost 75%probably behind a computer or
behind a phone and 25% insideour restaurants.
You know I love being insideour restaurants and it'd be
being kind of spraying.
All day can get monotonous andsometimes you lose the
perception or perspective ofactually what's going on inside
your four walls and interactingwith the people and make sure
(10:38):
that culture is still there, themorale is still there, it's a
clean restaurant, the, the, theteam's performing well, the
foods, foods consistent.
But in regards to now, you knowI get up every morning plethora
of emails.
Going through those, most ofthem go into the spam folder, as
I'm sure you can imagine,intranet, so to speak, on all of
(11:00):
our we require everybody toleave daily notes.
So checking all of ourdepartment heads notes and
making sure it's my job to makesure I have that firm pulse
right of what's happeningthroughout our brand, not just
in the stores but within thedepartments, that kind of
facilitate on how the storesoperate.
So you know now I havemarketing reports to me, it
(11:21):
store operations, culinaryfacilities, maintenance,
purchasing, events and cateringand worked in tandem daily with
finance and HR, so it's a largepercentage of those departments
and those directors that reportdirectly to me.
We did scale up our corporate wecall it Beehive quite heavily
(11:45):
for an anticipated fastergrowing scalability.
But before we do that, like Imentioned, we don't want to be
reckless.
We want to make sure we havethe right people on the bus
right, because we like to do theanalogy right.
If you have one cog or ifyou're on an 18-wheeler that
represents every department orwhatever, and you have one flat
(12:06):
tire or one that's running outof air slows down the entire
operation.
So we've scaled that back alittle bit and it's actually
helped because now everybody'skind of more on that same
seamless page, knowing wherewe're going and achieving the
same goals, and so it'sdifficult because I also am
(12:28):
responsible for day-to-dayoperations.
I have a great regional directorwho kind of oversees the more
micro part of that.
I oversee more of the macro butthen also focusing on strategic
growth, concept, developmentand you know what, the trends of
the industry, where are wegoing?
The crazy economy, thefinancials, the you know how to,
you know our numbers in lineand communicating that down, top
(12:52):
down, bottom up and now we'reprobably 1200 deep right and
team members.
So a lot different from thatfirst story where there was 30,
from that first world wherethere was 30.
You know, so that's been alittle challenging in essence,
but I think we do a really goodjob and you know, we preach.
You know, if we do these fourthings every day, right, hold
(13:13):
each other accountable,over-communicate with humility.
Right, Throw the ego out of thewindow and then have fun, smile
and be happy.
You smile and be happy, goodthings happen.
And if we can, we say TLC, train, lead and develop or coach and
develop our leadership at thestores, because ultimately,
they're the most importantpeople.
(13:33):
I don't get to work in thestores every day, I'm not
interacting with our guests.
So it's up to that LOH, leaderof the house, which is our
acronym for GM, and his or herleadership team to facilitate
our brand standards down.
We like to create the frameworkfor them to operate freely
within, to achieve brandstandards and deliver on our
(13:55):
promise, which is deliver anepic experience to our guests,
team members and community.
And we have 17, 18, 19 storesnow.
Sometimes I lose track.
It's difficult, verychallenging, especially with
three to four different conceptsand we like to.
I was having a coachingconversation with our director
of operational FP&A yesterday,ryan and you know, having you
(14:19):
know, and he takes ourfinancials in and helps
communicate it down to the storelevel ops team and he was a
little frustrated.
I'm like, well, you can'tdeliver the message the same to
all 16 stores.
It's no different than a GMhaving 16 different servers.
The end goal is the sameProvide that experience Right,
(14:44):
facilitate and get to know thepeople on a human basis and know
what makes them tick, whatmakes them have that motivation
and inspiration and allow themto come up to the solution
themselves, instead of yougiving them that solution.
And it's challenging for a lotof people, but that's the
exciting part of this industryis every day is a challenge, a
new challenge, and then seeingthe rewards and seeing people
(15:04):
happy our team and our guests iswhat makes us do what we
continue to do.
Speaker 1 (15:08):
That kind of goes in.
I've heard you speak beforeabout there's a difference
between running a restaurant andoperating a business.
Is that kind of thatdistinction for you?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
Yeah, especially as you grow and scale, because when
you have one, two, three, four,it's still kind of running a
restaurant Right.
That that that mindset shift.
John Maxwell has a book calledLeader Shift, which is kind of
appropriate and knowing how toyou know.
That's the thing.
Everybody that works in arestaurant currently right in
(15:39):
our, in our stores, probablymost restaurants right can
properly facilitate running aday-to-day shift.
Everyone knows the openingprocedures, everybody knows that
a server should be doing abartender, a cook, the food, the
drinks, providing that service,hospitality to the guests,
right, that's kind of the 101.
(15:59):
But as people get promoted andcontinue to grow their career in
this industry and move up thecompany ladder or whatever you
want to call it, there's thatshift Even from.
You know you said the wordmulti-unit right, even to
oversee.
We've had a lot of GMs,originally LOHs, that have been
(16:20):
promoted into district roles,right, originally LOHs that have
been promoted into districtroles, right.
So instead of workingday-to-day in one store, now
they're kind of overseeing fourto six stores operating and
that's a gigantic shift and verydifficult to understand.
That you're literallyresponsible and the GM, I'll say
, is literally responsible foreverything that happens inside
those four walls.
(16:41):
They have to take.
Although they don't own theactual restaurant.
They have to take ownership ofresponsibility and
accountability for everythingthat goes inside of that.
And running a shift is just afew of those variables right,
super important.
But are you running a shift tobudget, right?
Or do you know how to read aP&L?
(17:02):
Do you know what prime cost is?
Do you know what income fromoperations is?
Do you know what managementfees are?
Do you know all of these typesof things In addition to how to
market your store?
Are you using the collateral wesend to you to upsell for
guests?
Are you using the data we'regetting to make strategic
(17:23):
decisions on staffing and theP-mix, on how to properly prep?
How are you holding everybodyaccountable?
Sometimes culinary is a littleseparated too, but they're
responsible for culinary side aswell.
Do you know how to fix a leakytoilet?
(17:44):
Or do you call somebody Right?
Do you put in a facilitiesticket?
You know on and on and on, andI think that shift from you know
owning to operating a businessand knowing you're responsible
for everything inside those fourwalls is challenging.
I think it's intimidating, Ithink it's scary for a lot of
people, especially in a greenbrand.
(18:06):
By green I mean young brand asourselves, and especially those
that have been promoted fromwithin our brand and haven't
maybe worked in restaurantsbefore.
It's a big shift and we're veryyou know we have a system for
everything.
It's a big shift and we're veryyou know we have a system for
everything.
It's our job to minimize thatgray area right.
(18:26):
A restaurant's never going tobe black and white, but
sometimes there can be a lot ora little gray area and it's our
job to facilitate, provide thetools and resources and
information necessary forleaderships to make the decision
where they feel comfortable,knowing shifts are going to run
smoothly, maybe when they're noton the floor, you know, so they
can focus on more of theadministrative side, which takes
(18:48):
up a large portion.
You know, like expensing andeverything's tech now.
So you know tip cards and wehave, you know what we call in,
burst cards when money getsloaded and that becomes a store
debit card if they need to goout and purchase things.
So it's a lot.
And then, being a role model, afigure of leadership, are you
(19:08):
showing presence and prowesswhen you're on the floor, when
you walk the stores?
Do you know that person's incharge comfortably and then
knowing how to see everything,because no one thing in the
restaurant industry is difficult.
Right, there's just a millionvariables and how to prioritize
those variables.
Urgent, important now,delegation, whatever it may be,
(19:33):
and that's a difficult trait toteach anybody, let alone in our
industry.
And we like to say I like tosay, when people ask me what my
favorite animal would be, or ifI had to be an animal to best
describe me, when people ask mewhat my favorite animal would be
or if I had to be an animal tobest describe me, I always say
an owl.
Right, because I want people tojust step back, observe you,
just take a breath and step backand stand maybe in one spot for
(19:53):
20 seconds and then go toanother area of the restaurant
for 20 seconds and just swivelyour head like an owl up in the
tree, right, you'd be amazed athow many things you can see.
You know it provides youcoaching opportunities.
You might see a light bulb out.
You might see a guest you knowneeds a water refill.
But if you're just walking thefloor on the floor, right, a lot
(20:14):
of times you just go throughthe motions.
Right, we say lead on the floor.
You should be coaching the teamon your floor, interacting with
the guests on the floor, thosetypes of things, and then that
develops that wisdom that youneed to provide out to the team
and then they know you're goingto see something and they don't
want you to see that before theydo.
So that's going to make them bemore motivated to achieve the
(20:35):
promise of the brand as well.
So, yeah, it's a big shift,especially even on the corporate
side of you know, when it wasjust me and Yvonne right to then
grow in our bus, and nowthere's probably about 20 of us
on the corporate side that weoversee, and you know,
delegating out things that Iused to do and having others do
it and then hold themaccountable, even if you know it
(20:56):
might not be done the way youwant it to or the way you used
to do it or whatever it may be.
You never will growindividually or personally and
professionally if you don'tallow those people to make
mistakes, because that's theonly way they're going to grow
and learn into, and that's theonly other way you can measure
their performance as well.
So it's definitely been anadjustment, but it's been a fun
(21:17):
ride what are the best keptsecrets from successful
restauranteurs like stella?
Speaker 1 (21:22):
what do employees actually want?
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description.
Now back to the show, and itseems to me like the kind of
(21:45):
nice segue.
I want to talk a little bitabout the core values, and that
seems to be one of those thingsthat helps to facilitate all of
that consistency and some ofthat leadership.
So curious.
You know what went into thecreation of those core values
and then like, how do youoperationalize them?
Right?
So it's like it's one thing tojust come up with a list of
these are the things we stand by, right, but how do you make
(22:05):
sure that that actually makesits way into everyday decision
making?
Speaker 2 (22:09):
Sure, yeah, a lot of companies have, you know,
mission statements, visionstatements, whatever you want to
call it.
Um, so it's probably year twowhere Yvonne, as founder, kind
of sat down and kind of thoughtabout what is Agave and Dry.
At that time it was before wehad any other concepts.
(22:29):
So you know why do we do whatwe do?
Right, we require allleadership to read Simon Sinek's
, start With why.
That's one of our books and wehave a whole book club we can
get into later.
But you know why do we do whatwe do and how do we do that?
So Yvonne took some time andput some energy into it.
(22:51):
We used to just have definitions, right, but it's a lot easier
to attach words to thosedefinitions as an easier way to
remember or coach.
And so you know, we came upwith love, respect, inspire,
community, exceed expectationsand epic hospitality.
So those six pillars kind ofare the framework, the
foundation of why we do what wedo.
(23:13):
And any successful group has toactually back up and practice
and preach and talk about thosewhere they just don't become
another poster on the wall.
And you know each of those havehave, have definitions, of
course, and no one is moregreater than the other.
(23:35):
You need all six kind ofseamlessly integrated in order
to succeed or get the pointacross right.
If you're, if you're lovingsomeone but not showing them
respect, it's kind ofcontradictory.
So, and you know, are youshowing yourself?
Respect the team, respect, youknow the community, respect
everybody your bosses, yourcoworkers, your peers, and all
those are applicable to allsituations and require our team
(23:56):
to carry a core value card onthem as part of their uniform.
It just fits in their wallet orthe back pocket and we'll go
around and do some auditssometimes.
Hey, you got your core valuecard and, yep, they're always
super excited to pull that outof their pocket, which is great
in English on one side and it'sin Spanish on the other side,
because we have a Latinopresence and our culinary team
and some of our front of thehouse team as well.
(24:18):
So we want to make sure theyfeel inclusive as well.
Team as well.
So we want to make sure theyfeel inclusive as well.
And if we accomplish or strivefor emulating and demonstrating
our core values, that allows usto fulfill our promise right,
which is very simple.
We promise to deliver an epicexperience to our guests,
community and team, andsometimes our team thinks, you
(24:40):
know, sometimes we forget aboutall three of those.
And it has to be, you know,because sometimes what we have
to do to the guests maybedoesn't make our team super
thrilled, or vice versa, ortheir store or responsibilities
and not stepping back and seeingthe big picture of the overall
(25:06):
operation business that we'vetouched on earlier.
But everyone can strive toachieve that promise.
And, lastly, if we have thatfoundation of core values and we
practice and preach and deliveron our promise, that allows us
to achieve our dream right.
In simplistic terms, our dreamis to make sure that everybody
(25:27):
that works for us we give a door, an access point, the tools and
resources that they can take oninto another profession or off
to college or another degree orwhatever it may be, and
(25:49):
ultimately that's why we do whatwe do.
We don't do it to make money.
Obviously you have to beprofitable to succeed and to
scale, but profitability is theoutput right of putting in the
effort to demonstrate our corevalues, our promise and our
dream Do you have one of thosecards on you.
I have one.
Let me see in my bag here.
(26:10):
Yeah, I'm curious, see if I canfind it.
I used to have a stack.
Let me see, because my wallet'supstairs.
I'll send you.
I'll send you a copy of it.
Yeah, that'd be awesome.
Yeah, it's pretty, I'll sendyou.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
I'll send you a copy of it.
Yeah, that'd be awesome.
Yeah, it's pretty, pretty cool.
It's nice to kind of carry oneof those things uh, you know
that just remind you of um, youknow purpose or what you need to
be doing, or um, even if you'renot like looking at it all the
time, just knowing that it'sthere, I feel like, makes you
think about it and um justdrives that home well, and when,
sometimes, if there's a teammember violating a core value,
(26:47):
right or not demonstrating orwhatever, when leadership sits
down with that team member, youknow hey, get out your core
value card.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
What?
Which one of these aren't youfollowing?
Um, probably this one.
And then then there can be adialogue and a coaching
opportunity, um, based off ofthat, which is great to see yeah
, absolutely, it gives almost a.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Like you said, it's a conversation starter, it's a.
You know, sometimes, I think,if you don't have that, giving
people feedback positive ornegative can be difficult, as
you know.
It's like oh, it's up tointerpretation.
But if you have that kind ofthing, it's like no, like this
is what we follow and, forwhatever reason, you're doing a
great job at this one or youknow you need to work on this
one.
(27:31):
Um, we have something similarhere at seven shifts a little
bit different of a type ofbusiness, right, but, um, we
have our own core values.
Um, so, uh, correct me if anyof these numbers are wrong.
Um, but I have that.
You guys guys sold 2.3 milliontacos last year, which is about
6,400a day, and over a millionmargaritas.
So that's quite a lot.
As you've scaled, I'm curious.
(27:53):
We focus on employees a lothere and team management of
course.
So what's been the biggestchallenge in scaling that
quickly but also maintaining ahappy team, because it can be a
lot of stress, I imagine, on thecorporate side and getting that
done and trickling down to theteam probably is easy, and you
(28:15):
know how do you avoid that.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Sure, no, there's a lot of ways we can go here, but
the anytime you scale,especially a full service
restaurant, a scratch kitchen,right, you're always worried
about that consistency amongstproduct, right, not necessarily
even from store to store, butfrom visit to visit.
You know, if a guest dines atour coveted location on Monday
(28:43):
and gets two tacos, they comeback two weeks from them and get
the same two tacos and ifthey're not the same, that's a
challenge, right, andinconsistency is can be the the
downfall of any successful brand, whether you know restaurants
or group or whatever it may be.
So, um, and we try, we preachthat consistency as much as
(29:04):
possible.
But, as you know, when you'rebringing more people on and
there's a bigger flow ofcommunication, especially it's
something new that comes out ora menu change, whatever it is,
how are we ensuring our team isset up for success?
We know we do enough.
We know we provide the tools,resources, everything they need.
I question, I say probablyprobably better than most I
(29:27):
would.
People inside the store stillhave to take those tools and
resources right and use it tosucceed, and sometimes that's a
caveat of over-communication andhaving a lot of oversight from
afar, where the stores may stillview the corporate team or
others as a crutch right.
(29:48):
Instead of operating, you know,instead of just a support
system, right or thinking thatwe will or someone else will be
doing some of the things thatultimately they are required to
do.
And that's always a challenge Alot of times.
Hiring the right people rightand holding them accountable,
(30:11):
which is which is challenging.
But the consistency part right.
Growing quickly didn't allow usto maybe train external hires
correctly, cause I, like I said,we're very operationally savvy.
We have a lot of systems, wehave a lot to learn.
We're a scratch kitchen, ascratch bar, so if you come in
(30:32):
and you only get two weeksbefore you have to be thrown
into a store, you know that'sprobably not enough for them to
be comfortable from day one.
So there's a lot of learning onthe fly and they'll always be
learning on the fly, right.
So, setting our teams up forsuccess in a short amount of
(30:53):
time, because as you grow, yourinternal pipeline slowly gets
exhausted.
By exhausted I mean shortenedor less people right that can be
internally promoted to aposition without promoting them
to a position where they're notnecessarily qualified or have
the tools and resources tosucceed.
Because once you put someone inthat position now there's
really not a way out, becauseyou can never put them back in
(31:15):
the other position, because it'sa demotion and those things
never work out.
So we've learned a lot oflessons along the way on that.
And just because you're a goodserver, bartender, host, doesn't
mean you're going to make agreat team lead or a member of
leadership.
Or maybe because you're a goodGM doesn't make sense that
(31:37):
you're going to be a gooddistrict.
Maybe those skill sets.
So identifying those skill setsalong the way, but ultimately
right, you, you, you need peopleto run shifts, you need people
to operate from within the store.
So sometimes we have to do thatand then provide that, that
extra oversight.
But once you provide extraoversight somewhere, someone
else is then getting lessoversight.
(31:58):
So trying to balance that ebband flow, the teeter-totter
effect to making sure everybodyhas the tools and resources when
they need to succeed, and thenthat you know, trusting the
process from afar, you know howcan we, how can I know sitting
here today in the office thatour stores are operating
(32:19):
efficiently?
Right, that's always a bigconcern and you can base that.
We have a lot of metricsoperational metrics, financial
metrics, right.
But you know, when a negativereview comes across the screen,
how the hell did this happen?
There should be zero way thatthis happened to this guest.
(32:39):
So what went wrong?
And then you're thinking, okay,what else is going wrong at
that store or with that memberof leadership?
And then trusting the processthat they get it and with the
people we've hired to it, like Isaid, with that oversight on
the corporate team, if we trustand respect them to have that
same passion and vision.
(33:00):
And no one works for our brandjust for a paycheck, right?
That's the output again fromwhat you put into it.
For a brand just for a paycheck, right, that's the output,
again from what you put into it.
So those have been somechallenges.
And then you know we talkedabout core values on.
You know, are those beingfollowed?
Is our morale up?
Do our teams still have thatbuy-in that they did a couple of
(33:22):
years ago, now that we'veexponentially grew our team, or
as a new server, gettingonboarded properly, and
obviously we have all thesemetrics that track these things.
But these are always thingsthat are going to your mind.
And then how, through quickgrowth or quick scalability, how
can you continue to beproactive and approach instead
(33:45):
of reactive?
You see that a lot in thisindustry it's reactive, reactive
, reactive, reactive.
This happened, okay, I got todo this Instead of I know this
is going to happen.
Let me do these eight, nine,ten things to make sure if this
does happen, or when it happensyou know, every day you have a
plan for plan B, c and D in ourindustry.
Someone's going to call offsick.
(34:06):
There's going to be some crazything that happens.
Are you prepared to handlethese situations?
And then, are we prepared tohandle big situations, right?
Is someone going to you knowrandomly?
Is a guest going to slip andfall and sue us?
Right?
What do we do in thesesituations to mitigate those
types of things?
Because, as you grow, peoplethink, oh, money, money, money,
(34:27):
money.
Well, restaurant industrymargins are still the same and
even thinner now, with inflationand costs going up, which is
crazy, right, you know, making,you know, one cent off every
dollar sometimes doesn't clicklike that.
So that kind of goes back tothe operating.
A business side of thing isunderstanding.
Okay, you might've done $10,000today, great day.
(34:50):
But if you were over labor 15%,right, instead of quote unquote
, bringing just the thousanddollars to bottom line.
Maybe you only bought brought300, or maybe you ran out of
cheese and had to go to thestore and pay double the cheese
and then you lost theopportunity costs of the time in
the restaurant.
So what went wrong there?
That means you weren'tinteracting with guests on the
floor because you were runningto a grocery store to get
(35:13):
something right.
So all these things that everyrestaurant group deals with and
trying to mitigate and minimizethe opportunity for disadherence
to what we want to do.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
Absolutely.
There's a lot that goes into it.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Oh yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
I imagine, though and I know you go a little off
script before we wrap up theinternal promotions and looking
at that as you grow, it seems tobe a strategy for you guys to
look internally and providethose career paths, and is that
something that you guys arelooking to do?
Or, I guess, is it somethingthat you prioritize, because it
(35:54):
seems like you do, and what goesinto that and what are the
advantages of it?
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Yeah, of course, and kind of goes back to our core
values right, our dream right,providing those opportunities
but setting the team up forsuccess.
The good thing about valuesright, our dream right,
providing those opportunitiesbut setting the team up for
success.
The good thing about internallyright, people have worked with
you X amount of time, whetherthat's months or whatever.
You can gauge their buy-in.
You can gauge if they're a goodperson.
You can gauge if they havepotential to develop into an
(36:21):
all-star or a leader.
You can tell if people look upto this person.
So that kind of eliminates alot of the unknowns from maybe
an external hire.
Everyone can interview good,these days, references you're
limited on what questions youcan ask.
So what we have noticed prosand cons to both.
(36:45):
Right, the internal people,like I mentioned, we don't want
to promote them too quickly.
So we're working.
Katie, our chief people officerwe brought on over a year ago,
phenomenal.
We're working together on aplan called it's called Road to
Ready right.
So if you are a server and youwant to become a member of
(37:06):
leadership, because you havethis brand, you see the growth
opportunities, you know what itstands for, you see a career in
this industry, you know exactlywhat steps you need to
accomplish and in what timeframeto be eligible to be a ETL,
which is our Epic Team Lead,which is our entry-level hourly
position.
And then, if you get thatposition, you know exactly what
(37:26):
you need to do to become adining room manager, which is
our entry-level store salaryposition.
So, developing that, because aswe've grown quickly, right,
some people have been put intoroles after a few months, just
in a previous position, andother people see that within the
brand and sometimes assume,well, this person did it in two
(37:46):
months, I should be able to doit in two months.
And then it creates that grayarea that we mentioned.
So, in that course ofconversation, if you say, well,
we don't think you're ready tothem, that can be seen as a they
don't believe in me type ofthing and that's not the case at
all.
Right, we want to set you upfor succeed because as we grow,
(38:12):
we need people in leadershippositions that can operate with
less and less oversight, becausethe corporate bus always grows
at a much smaller percentagethan new openings in theory.
I mean that's kind of the model, you know, new openings in
theory.
I mean that's kind of the model.
Now the external right.
(38:33):
We have a lot of recent onesthat have came on with great
experience, great previousrestaurant groups they've worked
for, they're eager, they lovethe brand.
But it's difficult right whenyou've been doing something a
long time to kind of shut offand learn the new way of doing
things or the agave way or theEpic Brands way of doing things,
and sometimes they don't agreeor not, you know, but we're open
(38:55):
to that feedback.
But so they have the basics ofrunning a shift that we've
talked about, or Restaurant 101,the management side.
Then it's transitioning theminto the leadership side of the
equation and developing themwhere they're comfortable, also
knowing all the systems in ashort period of time, as opposed
(39:17):
to those that have beeninternally promoted or we want
to promote.
Internally, they've been doingthe systems for a long period of
time.
Internally they've been doingthe systems for a long period of
time and, as you're a scalablebrand, what it was, if you're
not growing or evolving orchanging right, you're dying,
quote Right.
So our brand is always tryingto try to stay on trend, create
(39:39):
trends.
We had beer, yet tacos twoyears before.
It was a.
It's a thing Now it's a thingeverywhere and it's our number
one seller, seller by far, andjust things like that.
But once again, as you'reconstantly changing or evolving,
those changes in evolution haveto be communicated down, bought
in to provide that consistentproduct that can make or break
(40:00):
you.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
Absolutely yeah.
I mean I think that's that's agreat place to kind of wrap
things up.
I'm curious, you know, I knowyou have an opening coming up
soon, but what does the rest ofthe year look like for for you
and and for the Epic Brandsgroup?
Speaker 2 (40:26):
great market and we have one more in the books, one
more agave and rye in the booksand it's taken, geez, probably
five years right to get asystematic, documented approach
right for a successful, scalablebusiness.
So we eventually want to scaleour steakhouse and open some new
concepts, like I mentioned.
But that shift from one to two,especially at a steakhouse.
The consistency is even moreimportant at the higher price
(40:47):
point.
So we're going to work on maybedeveloping this year some more
systematic approaches.
What does a duplicatable SOBlook like and how can we do
those types of things and thenevaluate?
You know, with our fast growth,we haven't really had a time to
sit back.
You know, with our fast growth,we haven't really had a time to
sit back.
Roundtables, collaborativecommunication on what does the
(41:10):
next year look like, and that'sall this year.
Election years are always crazyin our industry.
The weather is out of whacknowadays and the economy.
You know we have to make surewe're financially stable for
what we want to do.
Right, we want to launch aloyalty program later this year.
Right, We've been in contactwith a bunch of providers.
We want to do a lot of things.
(41:30):
We want to offer more benefitsto our team.
We want to redo our bonusprogram, our operational metrics
.
There's a lot of these things,but everything costs money or
time and how to use the best ofour resources in time to succeed
those.
So we want to get Hamilton,which is on the outskirts of
Cincinnati, open, probably inJuly.
(41:51):
That'll give us the last halfof the year to kind of
strategize for the future, whichwe're super, super excited
about.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Awesome.
Well, chris, I appreciate youcoming on today.
Thanks for sharing all yourexpertise and learnings with our
audience and thank you so much.
Yeah, anytime, much appreciated.
Thanks again for listening tothis episode of the Pre-Shift
Podcast.
If you enjoyed it, please leavea review and share it with one
of your friends to help our showgrow.
We could not do it without yoursupport.
As always, I would love to hearwhat you think.
(42:22):
You can email me atdj7shiftscom.
I look forward to hearing fromyou.
Until next time.
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