February 14, 2025 • 45 mins
In this eye-opening interview, restaurant marketing innovator Shawn P. Walchef reveals why traditional advertising is dead and how restaurants must adapt in 2025. The founder of Cali BBQ Media shares his groundbreaking "Be the Show, Not the Commercial" philosophy, explaining how any restaurant can build a powerful digital presence through authentic storytelling. From live streaming kitchen preparations to building genuine community connections, Walchef provides actionable insights on transforming your restaurant into a media powerhouse, regardless of your location or technical expertise.
RestaurantMarketing #FoodContent #DigitalStorytelling
Are you a hospitality or restaurant industry leader looking to amplify your voice and establish yourself as a thought leader? Look no further than SavorFM, the premier podcast platform designed exclusively for hospitality visionaries like you. ➡ Visit www.savor.fm
Follow on X: Savor_fm
RestaurantMarketing #FoodContent #DigitalStorytelling
Are you a hospitality or restaurant industry leader looking to amplify your voice and establish yourself as a thought leader? Look no further than SavorFM, the premier podcast platform designed exclusively for hospitality visionaries like you. ➡ Visit www.savor.fm
Follow on X: Savor_fm
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back to another episode of Rock My Restaurant. Today
is going to be a good one because we're going
to dive in to what is happening in the restaurant
branding and marketing scene for twenty twenty five and a
lot of people have asked us give people on that
can talk about the marketing tactics. Branding tactics. Well, today
that's going to be our effort. I think you guys
(00:20):
may recognize this guy on the other end, and that
of course is Sean Walschef who is coming over from
CALLI BBQ. Great to have you on the show, Sean.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
I appreciate you having me on. Paul.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm a huge fan of your work, the work that
your network does, and what you do for the industry,
So thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Hey, listen, we are We're out there knocking it out
every day and today is no different because we're going
to deliver some crazy insights yes for your restaurant. If
you're thinking, hey, I need to spice up my marketing,
I need to do something different to kick the ass
of my competitor down the street. What can that be, Well,
today we're going to unlock those benefits for you, So
(00:56):
stand by right here.
Speaker 4 (00:59):
Turn up the voice and subscribe now to Rock My Restaurant,
the podcast Setting your Brand on Fire Coming too. You
live every week branding, marketing, innovative tech.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Don't get left behind. The future is now all right.
So we're back here with Sean. Sean, this is great.
I heard that you were coming in from San Diego,
one of my favorite cities. Still a beautiful, beautiful city.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
We love San Diego.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Anything new happening out there?
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Well, I was recently at an event that Google put
on for restaurants in New York City, and while I
was at that event, my wife texted me about a
small fire that was burning on a hill, and that
small fire turned out to be a big wildfire. In
my fans crazy had to evacuate. So yeah, we've we've
gone through. It's been a busy, busy start to twenty two.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
How far down did it come to you, guys? Which
which fire was the one that we had?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Our own fire?
Speaker 1 (02:00):
It was separate than the La fires?
Speaker 2 (02:01):
So different, yeah, completely different than La Man.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Those Santa Ana wins are no joke, Yes, that is
for sure. I had a chance to live in southern
California in my early days of working in the restaurant space,
and I was working in a skunk works lab for Starbucks, okay,
and it was up in Thousand Oaks. So I got
a chance to kind of hunt around Ventura County for
(02:24):
a long time and at a great time, learned a lot.
And it was really where I started to meet a
lot of the fast casual founders, the original founders. You know,
the Habit grill was launched there. I just talked to
the guys over at Urbank Cafe. I don't know if
you know, you just ate them.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
We just ate Urbane Cafe yesterday with my wife and
my mother in law.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Oh man, they do such a fan of that plastic
job it is. It is a great one. And Tom
is you know, their CEO is one. I don't know
if you know this about Tom. He was an ex
star in motocross.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Did you really know?
Speaker 1 (03:00):
It was like when I don't know, if you go
way back into like the nineties, there was a whole
group of just radical motocross writers and he was one.
So anyway, a short story there, but.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
He's done well with our band Cafe. We're a huge
fan of that brand.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And they do a great job Hey, let's get into
a little bit of the topic around restaurant branding and marketing.
And this is something that we talked to a lot
of operators about, and then we talked to some consultants
where they kind of give us the insights of, hey,
what's the cool thing to be looking at? Last year?
(03:38):
Short form content influencers really kind of the focus we
saw that, of course explode. What about in twenty twenty five.
Is there any particular theme or thread that you guys
are seeing that says, all right, we need to start
preparing for something that's starting to brew here in terms
of marketing.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
So we're huge fans of social content. Obviously, we built
our business believing in the Internet and doing things that
other people weren't doing. People say that they pivoted during
the pandemic. We didn't pivot. We just went all in
on storytelling and utilizing technology in our restaurant. And what
we see in twenty twenty five, I think, is how
(04:18):
much quicker are we going? We believe in four c's content, commerce,
communication and community. Content, commerce, communication and community, all of
those things they all live on a smartphone device, and
right now we live in this TikTok world. Everyone understands
what TikTok shop is. I believe that in twenty twenty
(04:40):
five we're going to start to get tools from companies
like Meta and companies like Google where I could be
going on a YouTube live stream and we could have
integrated live social selling where I can actually start purchasing
someone that's watching the live stream of preparing barbecue with
my pitmaster would actually be able to VC style. But
(05:01):
for twenty twenty five and beyond it, I think social
selling is something that's coming. I don't know how fast
it we'll get here because there's integrations that have to happen,
but that's something that I'm really excited about.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah, you know, it's interesting. We have so we have
two networks within our holding company, and one is in
the tech and the blockchain side. That one is massive.
It has about a million plus subscribers on YouTube. We
have a merch store, We have all sorts of integrated partnerships.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
You know.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Then we obviously we have Savor is more of a
thought leadership platform. And one thing that I've noticed, at
least with PBN, which is our tech and crypto side,
is when we started building community that was really when
things shifted for us, and that was three four years ago.
We started actually adding in the Telegram group, which is
(05:54):
something that I don't see a lot of operators really do.
It's like either hey, get on my email list or
in my loyalty platform, but it's more of a broadcast
mechanism rather than a true community. Do you feel like,
first of all, is there a restaurant brand out there
that has been able to do that that I just
don't know about. I haven't seen one.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
That's a good question, I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
I mean, I'm always looking for you know, I'm very
fortunate to you know, sit on the Toast Customer Advisory Board,
so I you know, sit with you know, some pretty
impressive operators throughout the country. I'm also on some other
you know, tech advisory boards, so I'm constantly in contact
with restaurant brands. And I think, to your point, community
is hard to build. It's easy to build from a
(06:35):
B two C standpoint, how do you get someone to
buy into the brand? But buying into a local community
where you're actually bigger than just your restaurant is something
that there are brands that do it well.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I'm just not nothing that comes top of mind.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Well, most of the time it's been I think on
social media to an extent, where there's a Facebook group
or maybe just the Facebook audience themselves integrating or over
on X the most part, I feel like that. But
when you get into private communities kind of like, hey,
this is our niche and we're only talking with them.
They're talking to us specifically, so we can be much
(07:10):
more transparent about what's happening in the restaurant, what's happening
with new menu items, marketing, store openings, all sorts of
things that we can get a lot of input on
because you do have, at least in the restaurant industry,
it really feels like it's more village driven, especially in
the fast casual space. I know, you know from working
with hundreds of brands throughout my years, is they all
(07:33):
kind of focus in on these little subregional or even
local areas in terms of how they target to their customer.
If you had a step process for a you know,
startup restaurant brands out there, we'll stay in the fast
casual space for now, but less than five units and
they don't really know what is the next step. I
(07:53):
have a Facebook account. You know, I have a Twitter account,
I have an Instagram or a TikTok account, and hosting
to those daily. Yeah, what is the next step for
a restaurant brand like that?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
You know, for me, we believe on my hat it
says be the show, not the commercial, and I believe
that wholeheartedly.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Be the show not the commercial.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The problem that most brands, ninety percent of the brands
out there, is they think of social media as a
place to sell. And social media is not a place
where I don't go on Instagram looking to go buy
something like if somebody entertains me, if somebody educates me,
then I'm interested. It's a storytelling platform. Whether it's Instagram,
whether it's Facebook, TikTok, x, Blue Scott, you name the platform,
(08:38):
all of those platforms, We're going there to either be
educated or to be entertained. Right and what a fast
casual brand can do right now is lean into video.
The reason that I believe so much in video. You
know you mentioned short form video. I just care about
video in general, whether it's short form, whether it's long form.
I care about video because it shows show me what
you're doing, don't tell me what you're doing right. People
(09:01):
posting on Instagram a canva picture of you know, this
is my happy hour or come buy my you know,
buy one, get one free. That's that's not That's not
why people go to Instagram. That's not why people go
to Facebook. That's not why people watch a TikTok video.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Well, and this is something, you know, because a lot
of people when I'm talking with them in this area,
especially when I'm talking to CEOs or restaurant brand marketing leaders,
and I just ask them, you know, why aren't you more?
Because this is a problem that has existed in the
food industry for a very long time. You know, We've
grown gosh, half a dozen YouTube channels to over one
(09:40):
hundred thousand subs each, We've got one million sub channel,
and I have yet to see a restaurant brand truly
embrace YouTube and execute on it, like, really execute on it.
What is holding these guys back?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
What is it?
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Do you feel that.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I will share a story about.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
I just went to Go Go got invited for a
restaurant leadership summit to share Google's best practices, and I
actually presented about YouTube and for me, it was interesting
to present on our Cali barbecue YouTube change. We have
a Cali Barbecue media where we do more B to
B business type content, but Cali Barbecue specific for our
restaurant page. I recently hired in October a short form
(10:22):
video creator. He was focused on doing Instagram reels, doing
Facebook reels, doing TikTok, and I told him I want
to focus on YouTube. I truly believe that YouTube is
a platform that is underutilized by restaurants, by lots of
small businesses, and that since we've done that commitment to
(10:43):
YouTube first is what we say. Building for YouTube first
is completely different than taking a reel that you post
on Instagram or a reel on TikTok. And as you know,
as someone that's built legitimate, big, high volume subscriber counts
on your YouTube channel, you have to have tags, you
have to have proper thumbnails, you have to have so
many best practices that it almost becomes like running another
(11:06):
website for a restaurant owner. Yep, you know, and they
currently probably don't do a good job with their existing website,
let alone having the tools to do another website. But
you know, from a foundational principle, chief information officer like
who is responsible for giving out information for the brand.
I was talking to a local firefighter. I walk with
(11:27):
him every morning, we do a sunrise Gratitude walk, and
he was telling me about social media in fire departments
and firehouses, and what he said is that there's someone responsible.
They're called the chief information officer. That person has the
log in credentials for Instagram, they have the log in
credentials for Facebook. They're the ones that are telling the
public what is going on at the local fires. Well,
(11:49):
I love that idea because so many brands, especially in
the restaurant space, we don't have a chief information officer.
Sometimes they have an agency, a social media agency that's
responsible for posting on behalf of the brand, but boots
on the ground, somebody that's actually in the restaurants.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
They're not posting on behalf of the restaurant.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
They don't have the ability right without you know, without
having to have proper approvals.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Well, I think the you know when you get into
because a lot of times we'll dive into this topic
with marketing directors and vps and you know, for the
most part, I'm like, you know, why don't you employ
some of your teams there's probably someone within the team
that is probably doing a YouTube channel right now, a
gaming channel, whatever it might be, so they know and
understand kind of the mechanisms to get it done, or
(12:37):
you get into the solution of you know, outsourcing this.
I know it's tough with brands, but even if you're
just a smartphone, you know, recorder of the you know,
your restaurant operations. I think if you're a restaurant, you
owner operator, you there, first of all, you have so
much content available to you that's just happening in front
of you all the time. So it's easy to I
(12:58):
think at least collect it now, get it into a
format like you're mentioning, you know, whether it's short forms.
Do you like shorts or regular long form video for
restaurant brands. For restaurant brands, I would stick to shorts.
Short's long long takes a different strategy. You need to,
you know, properly have you can You can capitalize on
YouTube shorts with a strategy that works for Instagram, that
(13:21):
works for Facebook, that works for TikTok you know.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Video.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Short form video I think is still something that's much
lower lift than actually building out a YouTube channel.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Yeah, for sure, we I'll show you guys on you know,
just on our website when you guys go over to Savor,
you know, you can get into the podcasts in general
to catch all the podcasts. But this is something too
that we're we're finding more people doing, and that is
if you're maybe look if as a thought leader. And
(13:51):
this is something that and I want to wanted to
mention this is these thought leaders that are starting to
create their own content. You know, much like you've built
your own business around this, but why not go the
direction of a thought leader within a community. So I
look at and this is something that a friend of
mine and I have been talking about. I actually started
(14:11):
a business many years ago that was designed to create
It was a platform to create local podcasts because we
saw the vision of eventually, you know, mainstream news would
start to fractal and you pretty much have no place
to go to get real content news for your own community.
And that has happened. You know that that problem is
(14:32):
now here. Why couldn't a restaurant be that hub. I mean,
you're kind of connected to the community in almost every way.
Why not just even if it's just something simple. You know,
here's what's happening in all schools. Here's what's happening in
the Facebook groups for you just re reporting what's happening
in the local community to get people to jump in.
What do you think about that.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I think it's a great idea and I think a
lot of it has to do with the mentality shift.
You know, you believe to your core, just like I
believe to my core. An omni channel story, audio, video, words,
images like, we don't discriminate how someone's going to consume
our content. We're going to put it on all the platforms,
and we have tools that help us do that. Obviously,
we've been doing it for a long time, so we've
(15:11):
learned that if you're doing a written newsletter, there's no
reason why you can't make a three minute video talking
about the things that you're talking about in that use
or start with the video and then make the newsletter.
But nonetheless, I think it takes just an approach of
understanding that there are so many technology tools that allow
us to become our own media company. And to your point,
(15:33):
restaurants are that restaurants already are the hub of their community.
You know, I know phenomenal restaurants just here in San
Diego that do a phenomenal community based newsletter. But they
don't think in terms of maybe I should make that
a show or a series on Instagram where I can
do a short form video sixty seconds where someone from
the restaurant just says, Hey, this is what's happening with
(15:54):
the local charity event that we're doing for the school,
This is happening at the fire station, this is what
we're doing, and you know at the street festival, come
on down and do that. But doing that and reaching
out to other people, you know, I think for me personally,
we held an amateur barbecue contest in front of our restaurant.
So I invited other restaurant brands to come in front
(16:15):
of our barbecue restaurant, a partner.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Elite to compete.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Yeah, so we had an amateur barberie and we did
that for ten years in front of our restaurant. It
was a huge ordeal. It took me a lot of time,
a lot of effort, a lot of planning. But what
we learned is one of our foundational principles is that arising.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
Tide lifts all ships.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Yeah, so many business owners were like, why are you
inviting other barbecue restaurants in front of your barbecue I'm like,
because there's only maybe seven barbecue brands in San Diego
at best, and every single one of them are different.
All of my barbecue friends that own restaurants, they all
serve different barbecue. So if we came together as an
industry and we put on an event in front of
our restaurant, we would have more people throughout the three
(16:54):
point three million people in San Diego County talking about
craft barbecue.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Right. Well, I was just I think that's one thing
that people are missing more and more is is really
understanding the connection to the community. Yeah, you know, I
was looking at your website here. First of all, great,
great job. I think this is yeah, well done in
the sense of really tying into a localized community. Oh man,
(17:19):
that looks pretty good.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Peach cobbler so good.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
We only have one dessert, if one dessert, and this
is only dessert on.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
The menu because we believe so deeply in it.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
I love that. Well, hey, I got to get to
one of your places. I love peach cobbler.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That's like, I can't wait to see you in San Diego.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
So when you look at you know, this localized component,
because this is something that restaurant owners can really understand
because local store marketing has been kind of the DNA
of almost every restaurant out there. They know about local catering,
they understand kind of getting into the clubs and the
sports teams. From a media standpoint, that's a different animal.
(17:57):
Do you feel like that is too much of an
undertaking or an average restaurant operator that has all of
the things? Now, granted I wouldn't say your average because
you've been able to do it, but on average, do
you think it's too much of an undertaking?
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I don't believe so.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
I think it has to do with surrounding yourself with
the right people.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
You know.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
That's why we put out as much free content as possible,
because we believe. I mean, if you Google, you go
to Google Earth and see where our restaurant, Spring Valley
is located. We're We're not in gas Lamp, We're not
in La Joya. We're not you know they tell you
location location. We are off the beat. I mean, the
reason that we're still in business is our inherent belief
in storytelling, technology and the Internet. But that doesn't mean
(18:40):
that other restaurants don't have the opportunity to take advantage
of all the technology, like, we don't need to go
and create YouTube. It's there and it's free. We just
have to have the courage to make bad videos, right.
I think that's the I think that's there.
Speaker 1 (18:53):
You go make bad videos at first, and that's okay.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
If we're honest, Paul, that that's the problem. The problem
is that brands don't want to look bad.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
They try to overthink it.
Speaker 3 (19:04):
They want to overthink they want to stylized commercial, and
that's not what social media wants. Social media doesn't want
a brand commercial. Social media wants real and authentic. And
in order to get real and authentic, you've got to
be bad in the beginning. You have to have the
courage to look bad, to have nobody watch the video,
to have no engagement, to do it again and again
and get a little bit better each time, and then
(19:25):
look back after a quarter or six months and go,
oh wow, we've really learned how to take that one
video that we used to do just for Facebook and
now put it on Instagram reels and put it on
TikTok and do YouTube shorts.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah. I think the I think the operators themselves are
missing for the most part, the ones I talk to
because that's usually the first barrier they set up. Hey,
I just you know, I don't know how, or you
don't have the time, you know, et cetera. And of course,
the argument I have always you have the time to
save your business. Of course, these are the kind of
(19:58):
things that are going to save your business. And I
look at this media shift and I want to kind
of float over to this topic for a second. You know,
we had an election, you know, last year, and it
was really the first time that I had seen mainstream
media be completely decimated by podcasts. And I'm looking back
(20:18):
and I'm thinking, you know, I've been podcasting since gosh,
two thousand and seven, we started the first restaurant industry
podcast called podcast Grill. Everybody laughed at me. By the way,
I still know who all those people are that laughed
at us. And I just said, hey, listen, it's going
to replace. It's going to replace the idea of media.
(20:41):
One day and I ended up leaving my partners in
my second media program because we got in a disagreement
about the future of video and I was trying to
transition what was a print magazine and an online magazine
to transition to YouTube and pod casts. Completely that was
(21:01):
just a decentralized model and they were losing it over
that idea. And of course that was twelve thirteen years ago.
But the point I'm getting at is this landscape has
shifted a lot, and I think finally almost anybody and
everybody recognizes that.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Now.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
My question is what is this going to look like
in the next two or three years. If you think
about just the last twenty four months, what we've seen
in the deconstruction of media, this changes everything because that's
been the vehicle where most companies advertise in the past. Correct,
So now it goes back to your mantra, you know what,
(21:41):
does it be the story, not the commercial.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Be the show not the commercial? All right?
Speaker 1 (21:44):
So when in that kind of scenario, do you think
influencers are just going to become the go to place
or is it going to be a different landscape of
how media is going to be constructed over the next
few years.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
I believe that there's going to be more deeper social silos.
And to your point, I believe that every brand is
a media brand, and I have the problem with legacy
media is to your point, it's broadcast yep, and it's
not community based and I think what people have seen,
you know, from the election and from the shift into
new media and the consumption that we have on all
(22:18):
of our devices and at home, and you know, Quod
cutting and my I mean, I have a seven year
old boy and a five year old girl, and I
share this story all the time.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
But you know.
Speaker 3 (22:29):
When they were when they first started interacting with YouTube kids,
do you know what button? The first digital button that
they learned how to touch?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
Play? No, what's that?
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Skip?
Speaker 1 (22:40):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Skip?
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Oh? Jeez good, yes, yeah, of course skip.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Well, they don't want their stories interrupted.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
They're watching cartoons and then an advertisement for another cartoon
comes on, but they're focused on their one story.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
It's so say, and.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Then they away.
Speaker 3 (23:01):
I couldn't believe it. It was like I was like the
sociological experiment where I'm like, oh my.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Gosh, there went the advertising market.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
There went the advertising market.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Yeah, so I love it. You know when you listen
to some of these these podcast hosts which I got
to get better at this, you know, speaking of that
today's sponsor is you know, yeah, where they just kind
of build it in so fast that the skip butt
doesn't work correct.
Speaker 3 (23:27):
But my point is it's integrated storytelling because we need sponsors.
Like we're not running nonprofit media companies. You have to
tell the true and genuine, authentic story. And I think
you know, Okay, well that.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Brings up a big question here. I have so many
questions for you, man. So so you get a restaurant operator,
because this is something that I talked to a couple
of operators about this, and I have one that's doing
it now. And he's a great Italian restaurant here in
my local community. And you know, I've been friends for years,
and I said, listen, I just want you to start
a YouTube channel and just do wine reviews. That's up.
(24:01):
You're you have a great psalm. You just have him
do twenty seconds on one wine.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
That's it.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
So he's doing this and all of a sudden, he
calls me up one day and he says, Paul, one
of my wine companies want to wants to pay for that.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
I said, uh, that's what that's a new reason you
take his money.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
That's the first question.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
So my question is this is that. Okay, So I'm
a restaurant in the local community. Yes, I'm trying to
sell admire and I'm trying to sell Hobbs and all
my you know, different wineries that you know is going
into my wineless. But at some point do you feel
like the community says, oh, wait a minute, they're trying
to sell me something. Do you do you feel like
(24:48):
that barrier can be broken and that trust can be
broken at some point?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (24:53):
I mean that's how do you avoid it?
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I think the only way, you know, the the only
way to avoid it is to believe in what you're
acting actually selling. You know, we now I'm a B
to B creator. I get paid as a creator. We
have media companies, we have clients, we have sponsorships of
our program. But like it's up to me to make
sure that just because the company is offering us money
for some AI tool, do I truly believe it's going
(25:16):
to help. I am a restaurant owner, you know, I'm
currently running owning restaurants and I'm creating media about it.
I want to know, like if I lose the trust
of our audience and I tell them, hey, go check
out x y z ai company, and they go and
they spend whatever it is, one hundred dollars SaaS per
month and they go, Sean, the company was terrible. They
didn't deliver on their promise. Now, I don't trust you
(25:38):
with anything that you're doing one percent. I can totally
I can totally ruin what we've created.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
So you really have to trust in the product, which
is good. I think that starts to it changes the
dynamic of advertising very quickly because if you get into
a scenario where imagine all of media today actually trusted
in the products they were selling, well.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
What if you had to use them?
Speaker 3 (26:04):
Like, what if it was a different relationship where it
was it wasn't just the financial Hey I'm paying Paul
to use this, but you actually believed in it, and
you were gaining them whatever rate to continue to buy
the products because you believed in them.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
You be completely different about it.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
That's funny you say that because microphone that you're using
right now, you chose that for a reason.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
You've had how many microphones since you've started?
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I don't know, A lot?
Speaker 4 (26:28):
A lot.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
I will I'll give that one a plug. This is
the s M seven B. Sure, it's the it's the
mic that every podcaster that's serious is using. But you're right,
sure is probably one of the best brands out there,
and it gets it gets the plug on YouTube. Yeah,
you're using a shure right there, so it gets the
plug on YouTube. So I think it's a natural evolution
because the podcasters have faith in that, Correct, And I
(26:50):
agree with you there so, And it's funny you say
that because with with PBN, with our operation over there,
we don't really take advertise. What we do is we
reach out to people that we want to partner with,
correct and we kind of pick the ones that we
think are really good because that's a obvious a financial
(27:12):
and tech network and so we're very cautious on worried
about that because that industry has such a scammery in
it right now, that's a problem. So we've started to
do that is reach out. Do you think a restaurant
operator would be willing to go out and say, Okay,
here's my best supplier for protein. Yes, here's my best
supplier for wine, here's my best supplier here. I'm just
(27:34):
going to go reach out to them and ask them
to support me in this. Do you think that would
be like step one?
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Step one is going through and who do you believe in?
For the companies that you the companies that you currently
send checks to on a daily basis, weekly basis, quarterly basis,
or when you open up a new restaurant, why do
you believe in those brands and then reach out because
you know the traditional model of scaling a restaurant. You
want to enemies of scale for your supply chain, right
(28:02):
so you can get better deals on produce, better deals
on meat, better et cetera, et cetera. What I'm talking
about from a storytelling standpoint is, if you're a good storyteller,
if you're good at creating media new media, whether it's podcast,
whether it's YouTube, whether it's newsletters, you already believe in
those products. I'll give you two examples, my friend Deuce Raymond.
So I'm going to cater Source to speak with Deuce Raymond.
(28:24):
We're going to talk about social storytelling. Actually in Fort Lauderdale,
close to your area. Hopefully I can come and see you.
But Deuce Raymond created a show called Barbecue Like a Boss.
South Raymond, his uncle and his uncle and his father
created Sweet Baby Raised Barbecue sauce. Okay, so sold it
way back twenty years ago, but they still own the seat.
(28:45):
Sweet Baby Raised Barbecue caterian brand. But he created a
show Barbecue Like a Boss, now that show, he has
over eight hundred thousand sub subscribers across TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook,
and he's creating engaging content once a week where he's
teaching his community's teaching his audience. He's not promoting his
catering business. He's not promoting his restaurant. He's just sharing
(29:08):
the secrets of how do you barbecue like a boss.
And by doing that, now he's getting brands that he's
reaching out to because I'm helping him coordinate, Like how
do you reach out to the brisket company that you
know you're buying, the brisket company, the knife company that
you're using, the oven company that you're using. And he's
getting brand deals for the show that he's already created. Yeah,
(29:29):
another company, San Pedro Fish Market. They created an Amazon
Prime show called Kings of Fish. This incredible Southern California company,
Long Beach, fourth generation, Mike and Gara and family.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
They created a show.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
They had a digital show for seven years, but they said,
why don't we make a story, a docuseries on us
the struggles that we went through opening up our new
location right a new you know, sixteen thousand foot location
on the Wharf in Monterey, but they created a show
Kings of Fish, and now they have brands that they're
reaching out to that are sponsoring that show.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
You know, it's funny you say that we should probably
bring back all of the all of the video shows
that we had on Amazon. Sabor had Gosh, we had
Table forty two, which was kind of our restaurant review show,
across the Bar, Chef's Chef and Rare Beer Artists, and
(30:26):
these were all shows that it was pre Covid when
we could actually go out and film on location, and
then Covid of course, completely flipped that business model on
its head. You know, for almost two years you couldn't
couldn't really get into restaurants and film anymore, so it
pretty much shut those down. But prior to that, you know,
we launched the documentary Fast Casual Nation, and to this day,
(30:49):
it's ironic, we still get people coming to us to
distribute that. Yeah, and that was launched a decade ago.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Still our number one video viewed on YouTube is the
full We put out the full documentary up there about it,
I don't know, six or eight months ago and pulled
it off of off of Netflix and made it just
general release. You can still buy it if you want
to own it over on Amazon. But I can see
how that is a and those are big undertakings though,
I mean, you know, to film a show, definite.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yeah, if we're talking about Kings of Fish, that's the
highest echelon of like pitching.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Exactly, crime, super premium content.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
Much more of what Deuce Raymond has done is starting
with zero, starting with nothing, knowing that he has expertise
in caterie he has expertise, and barbecue he has expertise,
and restaurants he has expertise, and how to make sauce.
How do we just share that story on a weekly
basis a show or a series. So if you have
a show or you have a series, now you're giving
(31:51):
educational content and entertaining content to your followers and your
com well.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
And you know, this brings up a good point because
there has been a shift. I think it was kind
of forced because of what was happening in the industry
with you know, with the pandemic, is that the way
in which content was being done was different because you
couldn't get film crews out. I mean, that was there
was problems with that so everybody reverted to their iPhone. Fortunately,
(32:17):
the iPhone is a fantastic camera and has decent sound.
Even on the like the fourteen and up, you've got
a pretty good mic system. But I'm kind of curious,
do you think, because I listened to Gary Vee talk
about this all the time, is that he thinks there
is a shift away from traditional vlogging, you know, which
was the Casey nystats of the world that have kind
(32:38):
of built the blogging model that everybody knows today, and
it's shifting into this much more almost like you're breaking
the you know, the third wall, the fourth wall. Do
you think restaurants would be able to make that kind
of story content?
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Yea, I'll share. Like so live streaming I started.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
The first live stream I ever did was when Facebook
added the feature I'm not sure what year was, twenty
let's call it twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen allowed you to
go Facebook Live. And I remember I was actually hiking
on this beautiful hill in Anchorage, Alaska with my wife
and I wanted to share that I was there with
her family who live in Bulgaria, and I'm like, I'm
going to try Facebook Live, and I went on Facebook Live,
(33:25):
and I couldn't believe how many people, my friends, people
I hadn't talked to, just in general, just started I mean,
the algorithm was posting that. They were like, oh my god,
I've never been to Alaska. I want to go to Alaska.
I look so beautiful. All of these things. I'm like, Wow,
this is incredible technology. And fast forward to the pandemic
where I started going live on TikTok TikTok. I was
(33:45):
going live in our barbecue restaurant. I'm not the chef.
I have incredible pit masters that do incredible work. Bernice
is one of our pit masters. She has videos that
have millions of views across all platforms. But I'm like,
I'm just going to go live from the kitchen while
we get ready for Father's Day, one of our biggest
days of the year.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Highest volume sales day.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
We cook over two hundred racks of Saint Louis pork ribs,
we cook brisket, we cook pork butts, we cook try
to I'm like, I'm just going to go live. So
I'm going live for four hours, four and a half
hours until my phone died. I was like, I'm going
to go until literally until my arm falls off or
until my phone dies. Yeah, and that live stream, it
was four hours, but it reached over one hundred thousand people.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
It's amazing to me. Yeah, And I think a lot
of people don't give live the credit that it's due
because even though there's a lot of people going live
simultaneously on YouTube all the time, when you look at
the number of channels that are out there, and then
the localized potential here for an algorithm to pick up
a live stream in San Diego, yep, and for it
(34:49):
to have something to do with restaurants, the algorithm is
going to reward a lot of that uniqueness because a
lot of people think, oh, there's too many people going live.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
I mean these algorithms, these if you look at just
the TikTok algorithm, I mean it's like it knows exactly
what everything everything is coming next. So I mean, these
algorithms are getting so good. And now we're getting into
potentially this you know, kind of this concept around agentic AI,
where we're going to start to see you know, agents
within these tool sets that are going to kind of
(35:22):
change I think the way that we consume media because
it's going to select it for us, it's more relevant
to our search history, et cetera. But with all of that,
I mean, the text seems like it's advancing so quickly
this and you know, it's like the hero's journey. It's
the it's the number one story that's ever told out there.
And I think every restaurant operator has that journey going
(35:46):
on right now within their operation. So it's not easy,
I'm sure, but it's definitely doable.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
It takes courage, you know, it goes back to fear,
I think, and I know you have a lot of restaurants, CEOs, founders,
owners that listen to this show, and I would just
challenge every single one that's listening to know that, like
we believe at our core that no one's coming to
tell your story. I believe that Kevin Cobb in Field
of Dreams is full of shit. The problem that business
(36:13):
owner buy, we buy into this narrative. If you build it,
they will come. Yeah, well one's coming. Not only is
no one coming, but no one can tell the story
better than you can, exactly.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
And once you have the.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Courage to realize I don't need to be a content creator.
That's the problem is people think of it as extra work.
I'm already too busy to do anything. All you need
to do is literally capture what.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
You're already doing.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
You're already doing it and it's cool and it's different,
and no one's showing it. If you show what you're doing,
you're already going to stand out because no one else
has the courage because they want to have some big production,
you know, commercial that goes out that nobody watches. And
to your point about Gary Gas, that's one hundred percent,
that's what people want.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Totally fast is better, and you know, I think the
candid quality of whatever you're doing, and especially now, the
the content that's being produced on a lot of the
tech today, whether you're on Android or iPhone or even
if you're just using a little DSLR, it's super high quality.
I mean I laugh at this with my former producers
(37:15):
and directors that. I mean, we used to have a
studio that had thirty people in it that were.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
Some ridiculous you do now yeah, yeah, all of that
can be done with bandbag.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
It's crazy. So I think there is no excuse for
you restaurant operators who are listening in or watching right now,
for you not to step in and kind of go
this next evolution of where you know, telling your own story.
Last thing I want to hit on here to kind
of talk about is when you look at the idea
(37:47):
of these stories, the component of being able to get
localized to your brand and maybe you know, on a
national level. But for the most part, I think the
Independent probably has the best opportunity here. But at the
same time, you have big brands that are out there
and they are doing exactly what you're talking about where
they slow everything down. I don't know if you remember
(38:09):
Chipotle did that whole Scarecrow series, you know, a decade ago.
They abandoned it when I think it was it was
before Steve left, but it was when Scott was still
in the marketing side of it. Anyway, they did that
and then they just kind of left it hanging and
they never really executed on the story. Beyond that, what
(38:31):
would it take a big brand to become a red
bull for the restaurant industry.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
I mean, I'll share a quick story about what I
just saw on Instagram, Like you know, I saw KFC
in Dubai. They're open for twenty four hours, but they've
been having problems getting customers to realize that they're open
for twenty four hours a day. Okay, So some marketing
genius in Dubai for Kansas, for Kentucky Fried Chicken decided
we're going to remove all of the doors, the front
(38:58):
doors of the restaurants. They took the front doors off
of the restaurant and literally have been putting those front
doors in the high traffic volume places where high tourist
destinations say KFC, hey we're open twenty four hours now do.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
You believe us?
Speaker 3 (39:12):
And crazy popping up all over social media and it's
like it takes that kind of Ryan Reynolds type of
grassroots where you don't need this huge budget, you just
have to have the courage to do something that peopled
off to talk about.
Speaker 1 (39:25):
Yeah. Well, I think the ideas are coming in as
well now from a different generation, because we're starting to
see gen z become you know, marketing directors in these organizations.
And gen Z is one of the I think one
of the unique generations. Millennials I thought might get it,
(39:46):
but they were too connected to my generation Gen X,
which was very tactical and the tech wasn't there. You know,
we knew what it was like before cell phones. So
but you look at gen Z, it is a complete
different dynamic and the Alpha generation and now Beta's just
born this year. This is going to be a very
(40:08):
interesting next thirty years.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1 (40:11):
With all of this happening, convergence of AI, convergence of
the tech being brought down, the distribution systems really expanding dramatically.
People could make a mistake here and just kind of
missed the wrong one. Like you joined Threads, yep, you
know instead of X. Everybody was thought Threads was just
(40:33):
going to kill X, and you know it didn't work out.
But my point is is that when you look at
a restaurant operator, they could make a mistake. You know,
I could have put all my money and time in TikTok.
Not that it's going to get banned, but it looks
like it might.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
And I didn't do anything over on Instagram, and now
I have all of that over there. What do you
think about kind of this owning your own content and
you go back to community building a little bit, What
do you think about that?
Speaker 2 (40:59):
I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 3 (41:01):
I mean, that's why we believe so deeply in having
your own branded website and having your own newsletter, collecting
emails like nuts and bolts of collecting phone numbers for
text based marketing. But it goes back to omnichannel storytelling.
It's understanding that with the evolution of all this technology,
I truly believe, whether it's be two C content, B
to B content, the most important content.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
Is H to H, which is human to human and
that human to human content, truth vibrates the fastest. When
we see truth.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
We stop scrolling when we see something we haven't seen,
when we see something interesting, that's what makes us want
to share it, want to bookmarket like that's the type
of content that the only way to do that. It's
crazy for me that there's so many amazing restaurant tours
out there that literally they built their dream, they sell
their they sold their idea to somebody, to their loved one,
(41:52):
to their wife, to their husband, to their investors, and
they're like, I have this amazing dream. I want to
build this Cuban restaurant in my I mean, it's never
been done before this way that I want to do it.
But somehow that story gets lost. They stop telling that story,
and the answer is repetition. You know, the greatest comedians,
the Jerry Seinfelds, the Kevin Harts and Chris Rocks, all
(42:14):
the greatest comedians of all time. How many times do
they tell their joke before they get in their stadium tour.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
That's a really good point because I think you're right, Yeah,
people don't realize their story is sore.
Speaker 3 (42:26):
Like they've already heard, they already know, how like, exactly, yeah,
this is a new audience every single day that's going
to come that.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Doesn't especially with this shift in demos. Exactly, you know,
you're you're retraining. You know, the thirty year old or
the twenty two year old who's never heard that story before,
and the first time they hear it, they think of
it the same way that you told it the first
time you told it, which was, oh my god, this
is why I love this restaurant so much. You know.
I think that's a very good point that you hit
(42:53):
on there with with that, and I like the approach
on the big brands is that sometimes the courage for
big brands is a little tough because of what they have,
you know, they feel like they have to lose. Listen.
I think big brands are in a bit of a
trouble right now, because you've got a lot of you know,
emerging brands that I think will continue to drill in
(43:15):
on that market. And because of the shift and the demos.
This is the real shift that I think a lot
of people are just now realizing. The boomers are aging out,
Gen X is now going into retirement soon, and then
you've got millennials who are in the prime, and then
the two next generations which will mostly make up the
(43:36):
restaurant industry in the next decade.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
So it's a big This is a very critical time
going forward. How can everybody find you, Sean.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
I'm weirdly available, so you can find me at Sean
p WALCHF s h A w np w A l
c h e F Instagram, LinkedIn, you can email me
Sean at calibbq dot media. We love having conversations with
anyone in the end story about technology, restaurants, storytelling all
the things.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
Hey, listen, it's been really good having you on today.
Thank you so much. Love to talk shop with people
that understand what's going on out there, so I.
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Wait to have you on our shows. Thank you, Paul,
It's been a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
See you later. Take care, appreciate it and listen to
you guys. If you're not, as I said, if you're
not subscribed over to the show, all you have to
do is jump over to YouTube saver Fm. You'll find
us over there. And of course, if you're listening over
on the audio side of things, whether it's on on
Spotify or on Apple Podcast, all you have to do
is leave us a rating over there. That's the best
way to kind of interact with the show. We have
(44:35):
a new co host jumping in on here on Rock
My Restaurant coming soon, So be ready because that's going
to be a big deal that you guys are going
to love and we'll see you soon right here on
Rock My Restaurant.
Welcome back to another episode of Rock My Restaurant. Today
is going to be a good one because we're going
to dive in to what is happening in the restaurant
branding and marketing scene for twenty twenty five and a
lot of people have asked us give people on that
can talk about the marketing tactics. Branding tactics. Well, today
that's going to be our effort. I think you guys
(00:20):
may recognize this guy on the other end, and that
of course is Sean Walschef who is coming over from
CALLI BBQ. Great to have you on the show, Sean.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
I appreciate you having me on. Paul.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
I'm a huge fan of your work, the work that
your network does, and what you do for the industry,
So thanks for having me on.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Hey, listen, we are We're out there knocking it out
every day and today is no different because we're going
to deliver some crazy insights yes for your restaurant. If
you're thinking, hey, I need to spice up my marketing,
I need to do something different to kick the ass
of my competitor down the street. What can that be, Well,
today we're going to unlock those benefits for you, So
(00:56):
stand by right here.
Speaker 4 (00:59):
Turn up the voice and subscribe now to Rock My Restaurant,
the podcast Setting your Brand on Fire Coming too. You
live every week branding, marketing, innovative tech.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Don't get left behind. The future is now all right.
So we're back here with Sean. Sean, this is great.
I heard that you were coming in from San Diego,
one of my favorite cities. Still a beautiful, beautiful city.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
We love San Diego.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Anything new happening out there?
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Well, I was recently at an event that Google put
on for restaurants in New York City, and while I
was at that event, my wife texted me about a
small fire that was burning on a hill, and that
small fire turned out to be a big wildfire. In
my fans crazy had to evacuate. So yeah, we've we've
gone through. It's been a busy, busy start to twenty two.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
How far down did it come to you, guys? Which
which fire was the one that we had?
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Our own fire?
Speaker 1 (02:00):
It was separate than the La fires?
Speaker 2 (02:01):
So different, yeah, completely different than La Man.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
Those Santa Ana wins are no joke, Yes, that is
for sure. I had a chance to live in southern
California in my early days of working in the restaurant space,
and I was working in a skunk works lab for Starbucks, okay,
and it was up in Thousand Oaks. So I got
a chance to kind of hunt around Ventura County for
(02:24):
a long time and at a great time, learned a lot.
And it was really where I started to meet a
lot of the fast casual founders, the original founders. You know,
the Habit grill was launched there. I just talked to
the guys over at Urbank Cafe. I don't know if
you know, you just ate them.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
We just ate Urbane Cafe yesterday with my wife and
my mother in law.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Oh man, they do such a fan of that plastic
job it is. It is a great one. And Tom
is you know, their CEO is one. I don't know
if you know this about Tom. He was an ex
star in motocross.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Did you really know?
Speaker 1 (03:00):
It was like when I don't know, if you go
way back into like the nineties, there was a whole
group of just radical motocross writers and he was one.
So anyway, a short story there, but.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
He's done well with our band Cafe. We're a huge
fan of that brand.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And they do a great job Hey, let's get into
a little bit of the topic around restaurant branding and marketing.
And this is something that we talked to a lot
of operators about, and then we talked to some consultants
where they kind of give us the insights of, hey,
what's the cool thing to be looking at? Last year?
(03:38):
Short form content influencers really kind of the focus we
saw that, of course explode. What about in twenty twenty five.
Is there any particular theme or thread that you guys
are seeing that says, all right, we need to start
preparing for something that's starting to brew here in terms
of marketing.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
So we're huge fans of social content. Obviously, we built
our business believing in the Internet and doing things that
other people weren't doing. People say that they pivoted during
the pandemic. We didn't pivot. We just went all in
on storytelling and utilizing technology in our restaurant. And what
we see in twenty twenty five, I think, is how
(04:18):
much quicker are we going? We believe in four c's content, commerce,
communication and community. Content, commerce, communication and community, all of
those things they all live on a smartphone device, and
right now we live in this TikTok world. Everyone understands
what TikTok shop is. I believe that in twenty twenty
(04:40):
five we're going to start to get tools from companies
like Meta and companies like Google where I could be
going on a YouTube live stream and we could have
integrated live social selling where I can actually start purchasing
someone that's watching the live stream of preparing barbecue with
my pitmaster would actually be able to VC style. But
(05:01):
for twenty twenty five and beyond it, I think social
selling is something that's coming. I don't know how fast
it we'll get here because there's integrations that have to happen,
but that's something that I'm really excited about.
Speaker 1 (05:12):
Yeah, you know, it's interesting. We have so we have
two networks within our holding company, and one is in
the tech and the blockchain side. That one is massive.
It has about a million plus subscribers on YouTube. We
have a merch store, We have all sorts of integrated partnerships.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
You know.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Then we obviously we have Savor is more of a
thought leadership platform. And one thing that I've noticed, at
least with PBN, which is our tech and crypto side,
is when we started building community that was really when
things shifted for us, and that was three four years ago.
We started actually adding in the Telegram group, which is
(05:54):
something that I don't see a lot of operators really do.
It's like either hey, get on my email list or
in my loyalty platform, but it's more of a broadcast
mechanism rather than a true community. Do you feel like,
first of all, is there a restaurant brand out there
that has been able to do that that I just
don't know about. I haven't seen one.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
That's a good question, I don't think so.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
I mean, I'm always looking for you know, I'm very
fortunate to you know, sit on the Toast Customer Advisory Board,
so I you know, sit with you know, some pretty
impressive operators throughout the country. I'm also on some other
you know, tech advisory boards, so I'm constantly in contact
with restaurant brands. And I think, to your point, community
is hard to build. It's easy to build from a
(06:35):
B two C standpoint, how do you get someone to
buy into the brand? But buying into a local community
where you're actually bigger than just your restaurant is something
that there are brands that do it well.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I'm just not nothing that comes top of mind.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
Well, most of the time it's been I think on
social media to an extent, where there's a Facebook group
or maybe just the Facebook audience themselves integrating or over
on X the most part, I feel like that. But
when you get into private communities kind of like, hey,
this is our niche and we're only talking with them.
They're talking to us specifically, so we can be much
(07:10):
more transparent about what's happening in the restaurant, what's happening
with new menu items, marketing, store openings, all sorts of
things that we can get a lot of input on
because you do have, at least in the restaurant industry,
it really feels like it's more village driven, especially in
the fast casual space. I know, you know from working
with hundreds of brands throughout my years, is they all
(07:33):
kind of focus in on these little subregional or even
local areas in terms of how they target to their customer.
If you had a step process for a you know,
startup restaurant brands out there, we'll stay in the fast
casual space for now, but less than five units and
they don't really know what is the next step. I
(07:53):
have a Facebook account. You know, I have a Twitter account,
I have an Instagram or a TikTok account, and hosting
to those daily. Yeah, what is the next step for
a restaurant brand like that?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
You know, for me, we believe on my hat it
says be the show, not the commercial, and I believe
that wholeheartedly.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Be the show not the commercial.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
The problem that most brands, ninety percent of the brands
out there, is they think of social media as a
place to sell. And social media is not a place
where I don't go on Instagram looking to go buy
something like if somebody entertains me, if somebody educates me,
then I'm interested. It's a storytelling platform. Whether it's Instagram,
whether it's Facebook, TikTok, x, Blue Scott, you name the platform,
(08:38):
all of those platforms, We're going there to either be
educated or to be entertained. Right and what a fast
casual brand can do right now is lean into video.
The reason that I believe so much in video. You
know you mentioned short form video. I just care about
video in general, whether it's short form, whether it's long form.
I care about video because it shows show me what
you're doing, don't tell me what you're doing right. People
(09:01):
posting on Instagram a canva picture of you know, this
is my happy hour or come buy my you know,
buy one, get one free. That's that's not That's not
why people go to Instagram. That's not why people go
to Facebook. That's not why people watch a TikTok video.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Well, and this is something, you know, because a lot
of people when I'm talking with them in this area,
especially when I'm talking to CEOs or restaurant brand marketing leaders,
and I just ask them, you know, why aren't you more?
Because this is a problem that has existed in the
food industry for a very long time. You know, We've
grown gosh, half a dozen YouTube channels to over one
(09:40):
hundred thousand subs each, We've got one million sub channel,
and I have yet to see a restaurant brand truly
embrace YouTube and execute on it, like, really execute on it.
What is holding these guys back?
Speaker 2 (09:55):
What is it?
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Do you feel that.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I will share a story about.
Speaker 3 (09:59):
I just went to Go Go got invited for a
restaurant leadership summit to share Google's best practices, and I
actually presented about YouTube and for me, it was interesting
to present on our Cali barbecue YouTube change. We have
a Cali Barbecue media where we do more B to
B business type content, but Cali Barbecue specific for our
restaurant page. I recently hired in October a short form
(10:22):
video creator. He was focused on doing Instagram reels, doing
Facebook reels, doing TikTok, and I told him I want
to focus on YouTube. I truly believe that YouTube is
a platform that is underutilized by restaurants, by lots of
small businesses, and that since we've done that commitment to
(10:43):
YouTube first is what we say. Building for YouTube first
is completely different than taking a reel that you post
on Instagram or a reel on TikTok. And as you know,
as someone that's built legitimate, big, high volume subscriber counts
on your YouTube channel, you have to have tags, you
have to have proper thumbnails, you have to have so
many best practices that it almost becomes like running another
(11:06):
website for a restaurant owner. Yep, you know, and they
currently probably don't do a good job with their existing website,
let alone having the tools to do another website. But
you know, from a foundational principle, chief information officer like
who is responsible for giving out information for the brand.
I was talking to a local firefighter. I walk with
(11:27):
him every morning, we do a sunrise Gratitude walk, and
he was telling me about social media in fire departments
and firehouses, and what he said is that there's someone responsible.
They're called the chief information officer. That person has the
log in credentials for Instagram, they have the log in
credentials for Facebook. They're the ones that are telling the
public what is going on at the local fires. Well,
(11:49):
I love that idea because so many brands, especially in
the restaurant space, we don't have a chief information officer.
Sometimes they have an agency, a social media agency that's
responsible for posting on behalf of the brand, but boots
on the ground, somebody that's actually in the restaurants.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
They're not posting on behalf of the restaurant.
Speaker 3 (12:07):
They don't have the ability right without you know, without
having to have proper approvals.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
Well, I think the you know when you get into
because a lot of times we'll dive into this topic
with marketing directors and vps and you know, for the
most part, I'm like, you know, why don't you employ
some of your teams there's probably someone within the team
that is probably doing a YouTube channel right now, a
gaming channel, whatever it might be, so they know and
understand kind of the mechanisms to get it done, or
(12:37):
you get into the solution of you know, outsourcing this.
I know it's tough with brands, but even if you're
just a smartphone, you know, recorder of the you know,
your restaurant operations. I think if you're a restaurant, you
owner operator, you there, first of all, you have so
much content available to you that's just happening in front
of you all the time. So it's easy to I
(12:58):
think at least collect it now, get it into a
format like you're mentioning, you know, whether it's short forms.
Do you like shorts or regular long form video for
restaurant brands. For restaurant brands, I would stick to shorts.
Short's long long takes a different strategy. You need to,
you know, properly have you can You can capitalize on
YouTube shorts with a strategy that works for Instagram, that
(13:21):
works for Facebook, that works for TikTok you know.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
Video.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Short form video I think is still something that's much
lower lift than actually building out a YouTube channel.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Yeah, for sure, we I'll show you guys on you know,
just on our website when you guys go over to Savor,
you know, you can get into the podcasts in general
to catch all the podcasts. But this is something too
that we're we're finding more people doing, and that is
if you're maybe look if as a thought leader. And
(13:51):
this is something that and I want to wanted to
mention this is these thought leaders that are starting to
create their own content. You know, much like you've built
your own business around this, but why not go the
direction of a thought leader within a community. So I
look at and this is something that a friend of
mine and I have been talking about. I actually started
(14:11):
a business many years ago that was designed to create
It was a platform to create local podcasts because we
saw the vision of eventually, you know, mainstream news would
start to fractal and you pretty much have no place
to go to get real content news for your own community.
And that has happened. You know that that problem is
(14:32):
now here. Why couldn't a restaurant be that hub. I mean,
you're kind of connected to the community in almost every way.
Why not just even if it's just something simple. You know,
here's what's happening in all schools. Here's what's happening in
the Facebook groups for you just re reporting what's happening
in the local community to get people to jump in.
What do you think about that.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I think it's a great idea and I think a
lot of it has to do with the mentality shift.
You know, you believe to your core, just like I
believe to my core. An omni channel story, audio, video, words,
images like, we don't discriminate how someone's going to consume
our content. We're going to put it on all the platforms,
and we have tools that help us do that. Obviously,
we've been doing it for a long time, so we've
(15:11):
learned that if you're doing a written newsletter, there's no
reason why you can't make a three minute video talking
about the things that you're talking about in that use
or start with the video and then make the newsletter.
But nonetheless, I think it takes just an approach of
understanding that there are so many technology tools that allow
us to become our own media company. And to your point,
(15:33):
restaurants are that restaurants already are the hub of their community.
You know, I know phenomenal restaurants just here in San
Diego that do a phenomenal community based newsletter. But they
don't think in terms of maybe I should make that
a show or a series on Instagram where I can
do a short form video sixty seconds where someone from
the restaurant just says, Hey, this is what's happening with
(15:54):
the local charity event that we're doing for the school,
This is happening at the fire station, this is what
we're doing, and you know at the street festival, come
on down and do that. But doing that and reaching
out to other people, you know, I think for me personally,
we held an amateur barbecue contest in front of our restaurant.
So I invited other restaurant brands to come in front
(16:15):
of our barbecue restaurant, a partner.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
Elite to compete.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Yeah, so we had an amateur barberie and we did
that for ten years in front of our restaurant. It
was a huge ordeal. It took me a lot of time,
a lot of effort, a lot of planning. But what
we learned is one of our foundational principles is that arising.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
Tide lifts all ships.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Yeah, so many business owners were like, why are you
inviting other barbecue restaurants in front of your barbecue I'm like,
because there's only maybe seven barbecue brands in San Diego
at best, and every single one of them are different.
All of my barbecue friends that own restaurants, they all
serve different barbecue. So if we came together as an
industry and we put on an event in front of
our restaurant, we would have more people throughout the three
(16:54):
point three million people in San Diego County talking about
craft barbecue.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Right. Well, I was just I think that's one thing
that people are missing more and more is is really
understanding the connection to the community. Yeah, you know, I
was looking at your website here. First of all, great,
great job. I think this is yeah, well done in
the sense of really tying into a localized community. Oh man,
(17:19):
that looks pretty good.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
Peach cobbler so good.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
We only have one dessert, if one dessert, and this
is only dessert on.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
The menu because we believe so deeply in it.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
I love that. Well, hey, I got to get to
one of your places. I love peach cobbler.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
That's like, I can't wait to see you in San Diego.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
So when you look at you know, this localized component,
because this is something that restaurant owners can really understand
because local store marketing has been kind of the DNA
of almost every restaurant out there. They know about local catering,
they understand kind of getting into the clubs and the
sports teams. From a media standpoint, that's a different animal.
(17:57):
Do you feel like that is too much of an
undertaking or an average restaurant operator that has all of
the things? Now, granted I wouldn't say your average because
you've been able to do it, but on average, do
you think it's too much of an undertaking?
Speaker 2 (18:12):
I don't believe so.
Speaker 3 (18:14):
I think it has to do with surrounding yourself with
the right people.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
You know.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
That's why we put out as much free content as possible,
because we believe. I mean, if you Google, you go
to Google Earth and see where our restaurant, Spring Valley
is located. We're We're not in gas Lamp, We're not
in La Joya. We're not you know they tell you
location location. We are off the beat. I mean, the
reason that we're still in business is our inherent belief
in storytelling, technology and the Internet. But that doesn't mean
(18:40):
that other restaurants don't have the opportunity to take advantage
of all the technology, like, we don't need to go
and create YouTube. It's there and it's free. We just
have to have the courage to make bad videos, right.
I think that's the I think that's there.
Speaker 1 (18:53):
You go make bad videos at first, and that's okay.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
If we're honest, Paul, that that's the problem. The problem
is that brands don't want to look bad.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
They try to overthink it.
Speaker 3 (19:04):
They want to overthink they want to stylized commercial, and
that's not what social media wants. Social media doesn't want
a brand commercial. Social media wants real and authentic. And
in order to get real and authentic, you've got to
be bad in the beginning. You have to have the
courage to look bad, to have nobody watch the video,
to have no engagement, to do it again and again
and get a little bit better each time, and then
(19:25):
look back after a quarter or six months and go,
oh wow, we've really learned how to take that one
video that we used to do just for Facebook and
now put it on Instagram reels and put it on
TikTok and do YouTube shorts.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah. I think the I think the operators themselves are
missing for the most part, the ones I talk to
because that's usually the first barrier they set up. Hey,
I just you know, I don't know how, or you
don't have the time, you know, et cetera. And of course,
the argument I have always you have the time to
save your business. Of course, these are the kind of
(19:58):
things that are going to save your business. And I
look at this media shift and I want to kind
of float over to this topic for a second. You know,
we had an election, you know, last year, and it
was really the first time that I had seen mainstream
media be completely decimated by podcasts. And I'm looking back
(20:18):
and I'm thinking, you know, I've been podcasting since gosh,
two thousand and seven, we started the first restaurant industry
podcast called podcast Grill. Everybody laughed at me. By the way,
I still know who all those people are that laughed
at us. And I just said, hey, listen, it's going
to replace. It's going to replace the idea of media.
(20:41):
One day and I ended up leaving my partners in
my second media program because we got in a disagreement
about the future of video and I was trying to
transition what was a print magazine and an online magazine
to transition to YouTube and pod casts. Completely that was
(21:01):
just a decentralized model and they were losing it over
that idea. And of course that was twelve thirteen years ago.
But the point I'm getting at is this landscape has
shifted a lot, and I think finally almost anybody and
everybody recognizes that.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Now.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
My question is what is this going to look like
in the next two or three years. If you think
about just the last twenty four months, what we've seen
in the deconstruction of media, this changes everything because that's
been the vehicle where most companies advertise in the past. Correct,
So now it goes back to your mantra, you know what,
(21:41):
does it be the story, not the commercial.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Be the show not the commercial? All right?
Speaker 1 (21:44):
So when in that kind of scenario, do you think
influencers are just going to become the go to place
or is it going to be a different landscape of
how media is going to be constructed over the next
few years.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
I believe that there's going to be more deeper social silos.
And to your point, I believe that every brand is
a media brand, and I have the problem with legacy
media is to your point, it's broadcast yep, and it's
not community based and I think what people have seen,
you know, from the election and from the shift into
new media and the consumption that we have on all
(22:18):
of our devices and at home, and you know, Quod
cutting and my I mean, I have a seven year
old boy and a five year old girl, and I
share this story all the time.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
But you know.
Speaker 3 (22:29):
When they were when they first started interacting with YouTube kids,
do you know what button? The first digital button that
they learned how to touch?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
Play? No, what's that?
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Skip?
Speaker 1 (22:40):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Skip?
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Oh? Jeez good, yes, yeah, of course skip.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Well, they don't want their stories interrupted.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
They're watching cartoons and then an advertisement for another cartoon
comes on, but they're focused on their one story.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
It's so say, and.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Then they away.
Speaker 3 (23:01):
I couldn't believe it. It was like I was like the
sociological experiment where I'm like, oh my.
Speaker 1 (23:05):
Gosh, there went the advertising market.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
There went the advertising market.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Yeah, so I love it. You know when you listen
to some of these these podcast hosts which I got
to get better at this, you know, speaking of that
today's sponsor is you know, yeah, where they just kind
of build it in so fast that the skip butt
doesn't work correct.
Speaker 3 (23:27):
But my point is it's integrated storytelling because we need sponsors.
Like we're not running nonprofit media companies. You have to
tell the true and genuine, authentic story. And I think
you know, Okay, well that.
Speaker 1 (23:38):
Brings up a big question here. I have so many
questions for you, man. So so you get a restaurant operator,
because this is something that I talked to a couple
of operators about this, and I have one that's doing
it now. And he's a great Italian restaurant here in
my local community. And you know, I've been friends for years,
and I said, listen, I just want you to start
a YouTube channel and just do wine reviews. That's up.
(24:01):
You're you have a great psalm. You just have him
do twenty seconds on one wine.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
That's it.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
So he's doing this and all of a sudden, he
calls me up one day and he says, Paul, one
of my wine companies want to wants to pay for that.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
I said, uh, that's what that's a new reason you
take his money.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
That's the first question.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
So my question is this is that. Okay, So I'm
a restaurant in the local community. Yes, I'm trying to
sell admire and I'm trying to sell Hobbs and all
my you know, different wineries that you know is going
into my wineless. But at some point do you feel
like the community says, oh, wait a minute, they're trying
to sell me something. Do you do you feel like
(24:48):
that barrier can be broken and that trust can be
broken at some point?
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (24:53):
I mean that's how do you avoid it?
Speaker 3 (24:55):
I think the only way, you know, the the only
way to avoid it is to believe in what you're
acting actually selling. You know, we now I'm a B
to B creator. I get paid as a creator. We
have media companies, we have clients, we have sponsorships of
our program. But like it's up to me to make
sure that just because the company is offering us money
for some AI tool, do I truly believe it's going
(25:16):
to help. I am a restaurant owner, you know, I'm
currently running owning restaurants and I'm creating media about it.
I want to know, like if I lose the trust
of our audience and I tell them, hey, go check
out x y z ai company, and they go and
they spend whatever it is, one hundred dollars SaaS per
month and they go, Sean, the company was terrible. They
didn't deliver on their promise. Now, I don't trust you
(25:38):
with anything that you're doing one percent. I can totally
I can totally ruin what we've created.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
So you really have to trust in the product, which
is good. I think that starts to it changes the
dynamic of advertising very quickly because if you get into
a scenario where imagine all of media today actually trusted
in the products they were selling, well.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
What if you had to use them?
Speaker 3 (26:04):
Like, what if it was a different relationship where it
was it wasn't just the financial Hey I'm paying Paul
to use this, but you actually believed in it, and
you were gaining them whatever rate to continue to buy
the products because you believed in them.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
You be completely different about it.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
That's funny you say that because microphone that you're using
right now, you chose that for a reason.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
You've had how many microphones since you've started?
Speaker 1 (26:26):
I don't know, A lot?
Speaker 4 (26:28):
A lot.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
I will I'll give that one a plug. This is
the s M seven B. Sure, it's the it's the
mic that every podcaster that's serious is using. But you're right,
sure is probably one of the best brands out there,
and it gets it gets the plug on YouTube. Yeah,
you're using a shure right there, so it gets the
plug on YouTube. So I think it's a natural evolution
because the podcasters have faith in that, Correct, And I
(26:50):
agree with you there so, And it's funny you say
that because with with PBN, with our operation over there,
we don't really take advertise. What we do is we
reach out to people that we want to partner with,
correct and we kind of pick the ones that we
think are really good because that's a obvious a financial
(27:12):
and tech network and so we're very cautious on worried
about that because that industry has such a scammery in
it right now, that's a problem. So we've started to
do that is reach out. Do you think a restaurant
operator would be willing to go out and say, Okay,
here's my best supplier for protein. Yes, here's my best
supplier for wine, here's my best supplier here. I'm just
(27:34):
going to go reach out to them and ask them
to support me in this. Do you think that would
be like step one?
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Step one is going through and who do you believe in?
For the companies that you the companies that you currently
send checks to on a daily basis, weekly basis, quarterly basis,
or when you open up a new restaurant, why do
you believe in those brands and then reach out because
you know the traditional model of scaling a restaurant. You
want to enemies of scale for your supply chain, right
(28:02):
so you can get better deals on produce, better deals
on meat, better et cetera, et cetera. What I'm talking
about from a storytelling standpoint is, if you're a good storyteller,
if you're good at creating media new media, whether it's podcast,
whether it's YouTube, whether it's newsletters, you already believe in
those products. I'll give you two examples, my friend Deuce Raymond.
So I'm going to cater Source to speak with Deuce Raymond.
(28:24):
We're going to talk about social storytelling. Actually in Fort Lauderdale,
close to your area. Hopefully I can come and see you.
But Deuce Raymond created a show called Barbecue Like a Boss.
South Raymond, his uncle and his uncle and his father
created Sweet Baby Raised Barbecue sauce. Okay, so sold it
way back twenty years ago, but they still own the seat.
(28:45):
Sweet Baby Raised Barbecue caterian brand. But he created a
show Barbecue Like a Boss, now that show, he has
over eight hundred thousand sub subscribers across TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook,
and he's creating engaging content once a week where he's
teaching his community's teaching his audience. He's not promoting his
catering business. He's not promoting his restaurant. He's just sharing
(29:08):
the secrets of how do you barbecue like a boss.
And by doing that, now he's getting brands that he's
reaching out to because I'm helping him coordinate, Like how
do you reach out to the brisket company that you
know you're buying, the brisket company, the knife company that
you're using, the oven company that you're using. And he's
getting brand deals for the show that he's already created. Yeah,
(29:29):
another company, San Pedro Fish Market. They created an Amazon
Prime show called Kings of Fish. This incredible Southern California company,
Long Beach, fourth generation, Mike and Gara and family.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
They created a show.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
They had a digital show for seven years, but they said,
why don't we make a story, a docuseries on us
the struggles that we went through opening up our new
location right a new you know, sixteen thousand foot location
on the Wharf in Monterey, but they created a show
Kings of Fish, and now they have brands that they're
reaching out to that are sponsoring that show.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
You know, it's funny you say that we should probably
bring back all of the all of the video shows
that we had on Amazon. Sabor had Gosh, we had
Table forty two, which was kind of our restaurant review show,
across the Bar, Chef's Chef and Rare Beer Artists, and
(30:26):
these were all shows that it was pre Covid when
we could actually go out and film on location, and
then Covid of course, completely flipped that business model on
its head. You know, for almost two years you couldn't
couldn't really get into restaurants and film anymore, so it
pretty much shut those down. But prior to that, you know,
we launched the documentary Fast Casual Nation, and to this day,
(30:49):
it's ironic, we still get people coming to us to
distribute that. Yeah, and that was launched a decade ago.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Still our number one video viewed on YouTube is the
full We put out the full documentary up there about it,
I don't know, six or eight months ago and pulled
it off of off of Netflix and made it just
general release. You can still buy it if you want
to own it over on Amazon. But I can see
how that is a and those are big undertakings though,
I mean, you know, to film a show, definite.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yeah, if we're talking about Kings of Fish, that's the
highest echelon of like pitching.
Speaker 1 (31:27):
Exactly, crime, super premium content.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
Much more of what Deuce Raymond has done is starting
with zero, starting with nothing, knowing that he has expertise
in caterie he has expertise, and barbecue he has expertise,
and restaurants he has expertise, and how to make sauce.
How do we just share that story on a weekly
basis a show or a series. So if you have
a show or you have a series, now you're giving
(31:51):
educational content and entertaining content to your followers and your
com well.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
And you know, this brings up a good point because
there has been a shift. I think it was kind
of forced because of what was happening in the industry
with you know, with the pandemic, is that the way
in which content was being done was different because you
couldn't get film crews out. I mean, that was there
was problems with that so everybody reverted to their iPhone. Fortunately,
(32:17):
the iPhone is a fantastic camera and has decent sound.
Even on the like the fourteen and up, you've got
a pretty good mic system. But I'm kind of curious,
do you think, because I listened to Gary Vee talk
about this all the time, is that he thinks there
is a shift away from traditional vlogging, you know, which
was the Casey nystats of the world that have kind
(32:38):
of built the blogging model that everybody knows today, and
it's shifting into this much more almost like you're breaking
the you know, the third wall, the fourth wall. Do
you think restaurants would be able to make that kind
of story content?
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Yea, I'll share. Like so live streaming I started.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
The first live stream I ever did was when Facebook
added the feature I'm not sure what year was, twenty
let's call it twenty sixteen, twenty seventeen allowed you to
go Facebook Live. And I remember I was actually hiking
on this beautiful hill in Anchorage, Alaska with my wife
and I wanted to share that I was there with
her family who live in Bulgaria, and I'm like, I'm
going to try Facebook Live, and I went on Facebook Live,
(33:25):
and I couldn't believe how many people, my friends, people
I hadn't talked to, just in general, just started I mean,
the algorithm was posting that. They were like, oh my god,
I've never been to Alaska. I want to go to Alaska.
I look so beautiful. All of these things. I'm like, Wow,
this is incredible technology. And fast forward to the pandemic
where I started going live on TikTok TikTok. I was
(33:45):
going live in our barbecue restaurant. I'm not the chef.
I have incredible pit masters that do incredible work. Bernice
is one of our pit masters. She has videos that
have millions of views across all platforms. But I'm like,
I'm just going to go live from the kitchen while
we get ready for Father's Day, one of our biggest
days of the year.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Highest volume sales day.
Speaker 3 (34:04):
We cook over two hundred racks of Saint Louis pork ribs,
we cook brisket, we cook pork butts, we cook try
to I'm like, I'm just going to go live. So
I'm going live for four hours, four and a half
hours until my phone died. I was like, I'm going
to go until literally until my arm falls off or
until my phone dies. Yeah, and that live stream, it
was four hours, but it reached over one hundred thousand people.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
It's amazing to me. Yeah, And I think a lot
of people don't give live the credit that it's due
because even though there's a lot of people going live
simultaneously on YouTube all the time, when you look at
the number of channels that are out there, and then
the localized potential here for an algorithm to pick up
a live stream in San Diego, yep, and for it
(34:49):
to have something to do with restaurants, the algorithm is
going to reward a lot of that uniqueness because a
lot of people think, oh, there's too many people going live.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
I mean these algorithms, these if you look at just
the TikTok algorithm, I mean it's like it knows exactly
what everything everything is coming next. So I mean, these
algorithms are getting so good. And now we're getting into
potentially this you know, kind of this concept around agentic AI,
where we're going to start to see you know, agents
within these tool sets that are going to kind of
(35:22):
change I think the way that we consume media because
it's going to select it for us, it's more relevant
to our search history, et cetera. But with all of that,
I mean, the text seems like it's advancing so quickly
this and you know, it's like the hero's journey. It's
the it's the number one story that's ever told out there.
And I think every restaurant operator has that journey going
(35:46):
on right now within their operation. So it's not easy,
I'm sure, but it's definitely doable.
Speaker 3 (35:52):
It takes courage, you know, it goes back to fear,
I think, and I know you have a lot of restaurants, CEOs, founders,
owners that listen to this show, and I would just
challenge every single one that's listening to know that, like
we believe at our core that no one's coming to
tell your story. I believe that Kevin Cobb in Field
of Dreams is full of shit. The problem that business
(36:13):
owner buy, we buy into this narrative. If you build it,
they will come. Yeah, well one's coming. Not only is
no one coming, but no one can tell the story
better than you can, exactly.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
And once you have the.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
Courage to realize I don't need to be a content creator.
That's the problem is people think of it as extra work.
I'm already too busy to do anything. All you need
to do is literally capture what.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
You're already doing.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
You're already doing it and it's cool and it's different,
and no one's showing it. If you show what you're doing,
you're already going to stand out because no one else
has the courage because they want to have some big production,
you know, commercial that goes out that nobody watches. And
to your point about Gary Gas, that's one hundred percent,
that's what people want.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Totally fast is better, and you know, I think the
candid quality of whatever you're doing, and especially now, the
the content that's being produced on a lot of the
tech today, whether you're on Android or iPhone or even
if you're just using a little DSLR, it's super high quality.
I mean I laugh at this with my former producers
(37:15):
and directors that. I mean, we used to have a
studio that had thirty people in it that were.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
Some ridiculous you do now yeah, yeah, all of that
can be done with bandbag.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
It's crazy. So I think there is no excuse for
you restaurant operators who are listening in or watching right now,
for you not to step in and kind of go
this next evolution of where you know, telling your own story.
Last thing I want to hit on here to kind
of talk about is when you look at the idea
(37:47):
of these stories, the component of being able to get
localized to your brand and maybe you know, on a
national level. But for the most part, I think the
Independent probably has the best opportunity here. But at the
same time, you have big brands that are out there
and they are doing exactly what you're talking about where
they slow everything down. I don't know if you remember
(38:09):
Chipotle did that whole Scarecrow series, you know, a decade ago.
They abandoned it when I think it was it was
before Steve left, but it was when Scott was still
in the marketing side of it. Anyway, they did that
and then they just kind of left it hanging and
they never really executed on the story. Beyond that, what
(38:31):
would it take a big brand to become a red
bull for the restaurant industry.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
I mean, I'll share a quick story about what I
just saw on Instagram, Like you know, I saw KFC
in Dubai. They're open for twenty four hours, but they've
been having problems getting customers to realize that they're open
for twenty four hours a day. Okay, So some marketing
genius in Dubai for Kansas, for Kentucky Fried Chicken decided
we're going to remove all of the doors, the front
(38:58):
doors of the restaurants. They took the front doors off
of the restaurant and literally have been putting those front
doors in the high traffic volume places where high tourist
destinations say KFC, hey we're open twenty four hours now do.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
You believe us?
Speaker 3 (39:12):
And crazy popping up all over social media and it's
like it takes that kind of Ryan Reynolds type of
grassroots where you don't need this huge budget, you just
have to have the courage to do something that peopled
off to talk about.
Speaker 1 (39:25):
Yeah. Well, I think the ideas are coming in as
well now from a different generation, because we're starting to
see gen z become you know, marketing directors in these organizations.
And gen Z is one of the I think one
of the unique generations. Millennials I thought might get it,
(39:46):
but they were too connected to my generation Gen X,
which was very tactical and the tech wasn't there. You know,
we knew what it was like before cell phones. So
but you look at gen Z, it is a complete
different dynamic and the Alpha generation and now Beta's just
born this year. This is going to be a very
(40:08):
interesting next thirty years.
Speaker 2 (40:10):
I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1 (40:11):
With all of this happening, convergence of AI, convergence of
the tech being brought down, the distribution systems really expanding dramatically.
People could make a mistake here and just kind of
missed the wrong one. Like you joined Threads, yep, you
know instead of X. Everybody was thought Threads was just
(40:33):
going to kill X, and you know it didn't work out.
But my point is is that when you look at
a restaurant operator, they could make a mistake. You know,
I could have put all my money and time in TikTok.
Not that it's going to get banned, but it looks
like it might.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
And I didn't do anything over on Instagram, and now
I have all of that over there. What do you
think about kind of this owning your own content and
you go back to community building a little bit, What
do you think about that?
Speaker 2 (40:59):
I couldn't agree more.
Speaker 3 (41:01):
I mean, that's why we believe so deeply in having
your own branded website and having your own newsletter, collecting
emails like nuts and bolts of collecting phone numbers for
text based marketing. But it goes back to omnichannel storytelling.
It's understanding that with the evolution of all this technology,
I truly believe, whether it's be two C content, B
to B content, the most important content.
Speaker 2 (41:22):
Is H to H, which is human to human and
that human to human content, truth vibrates the fastest. When
we see truth.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
We stop scrolling when we see something we haven't seen,
when we see something interesting, that's what makes us want
to share it, want to bookmarket like that's the type
of content that the only way to do that. It's
crazy for me that there's so many amazing restaurant tours
out there that literally they built their dream, they sell
their they sold their idea to somebody, to their loved one,
(41:52):
to their wife, to their husband, to their investors, and
they're like, I have this amazing dream. I want to
build this Cuban restaurant in my I mean, it's never
been done before this way that I want to do it.
But somehow that story gets lost. They stop telling that story,
and the answer is repetition. You know, the greatest comedians,
the Jerry Seinfelds, the Kevin Harts and Chris Rocks, all
(42:14):
the greatest comedians of all time. How many times do
they tell their joke before they get in their stadium tour.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
That's a really good point because I think you're right, Yeah,
people don't realize their story is sore.
Speaker 3 (42:26):
Like they've already heard, they already know, how like, exactly, yeah,
this is a new audience every single day that's going
to come that.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Doesn't especially with this shift in demos. Exactly, you know,
you're you're retraining. You know, the thirty year old or
the twenty two year old who's never heard that story before,
and the first time they hear it, they think of
it the same way that you told it the first
time you told it, which was, oh my god, this
is why I love this restaurant so much. You know.
I think that's a very good point that you hit
(42:53):
on there with with that, and I like the approach
on the big brands is that sometimes the courage for
big brands is a little tough because of what they have,
you know, they feel like they have to lose. Listen.
I think big brands are in a bit of a
trouble right now, because you've got a lot of you know,
emerging brands that I think will continue to drill in
(43:15):
on that market. And because of the shift and the demos.
This is the real shift that I think a lot
of people are just now realizing. The boomers are aging out,
Gen X is now going into retirement soon, and then
you've got millennials who are in the prime, and then
the two next generations which will mostly make up the
(43:36):
restaurant industry in the next decade.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (43:38):
So it's a big This is a very critical time
going forward. How can everybody find you, Sean.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
I'm weirdly available, so you can find me at Sean
p WALCHF s h A w np w A l
c h e F Instagram, LinkedIn, you can email me
Sean at calibbq dot media. We love having conversations with
anyone in the end story about technology, restaurants, storytelling all
the things.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
Hey, listen, it's been really good having you on today.
Thank you so much. Love to talk shop with people
that understand what's going on out there, so I.
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Wait to have you on our shows. Thank you, Paul,
It's been a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
See you later. Take care, appreciate it and listen to
you guys. If you're not, as I said, if you're
not subscribed over to the show, all you have to
do is jump over to YouTube saver Fm. You'll find
us over there. And of course, if you're listening over
on the audio side of things, whether it's on on
Spotify or on Apple Podcast, all you have to do
is leave us a rating over there. That's the best
way to kind of interact with the show. We have
(44:35):
a new co host jumping in on here on Rock
My Restaurant coming soon, So be ready because that's going
to be a big deal that you guys are going
to love and we'll see you soon right here on
Rock My Restaurant.
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