SPEAKER_01 0:00

For more than half a century, Jim Keat has built hundreds of restaurants, businesses, and an extraordinary life through risk, sacrifice, faith, family, and a relentless determination to succeed. A few notable restaurants in his portfolio are Petit and Keat, Flyway Brewing, Cyper Social, Tzeki's, Waldo's Chicken and Beer, Big Bad Breakfast, Sonny Williams, and many more. Today we talk about what drove him, what it cost, the incredible reward of building alongside family, and his perspective on a culture and a country undergoing profound change. This is a story of success, hard-earned, and a life well lived. Welcome to Extreme Sensibility, Jim Keaton. Jim, thank you for joining us today on Extreme Sensibility. You know, I've heard a lot about you over my lifetime. Uh, you know, you are, I know you've heard this a lot, a legend in your industry around uh in the restaurant. And I've actually, you know, known uh one of your sons for for quite a while, uh, you know, married a girl from my hometown. So it's uh interesting how small our little state is. You're constantly reminded of that. But your story is intriguing, uh, to say the least. And I wanted to have you on so that you could share uh your story and some of the lessons that you've learned throughout life, some of the foundational things that you found uh in your journey through life and working with family and in an industry that I am now familiar with. And is one of fun yet? Yeah, it it can be. It can be but one of the most uh chaotic and difficult uh industries, and that is restauranting. Um so before we get into all of your history, I've got to ask why restaurants? Why what brought you into that? What what directed you into the restaurant world?

SPEAKER_00 2:24

When I was uh 15 years old, I was working in a lumber yard during the day and a Kentucky fried chicken at night. Wow, that's combo. Had a had a Honda 50 to get me to work, and and then that turned into uh uh a gas station. And uh so I worked in in restaurants, hotels, in a gas station, and a bunch of other stuff uh during high school, and then that's that's how I got through college. Oh wow. Was uh at steak and ale. And uh one thing led to another, and it was just paying the bills to get me through college. And um between my junior and senior year, I went to Cincinnati and worked that year uh in the restaurant business as a I mean excuse me, hotel business. And um when I graduated, they offered me a sign-up bonus, and so I decided to go into the hotel business.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:25

Excuse me. And so uh I've been in restaurants and hotels since I was 15 years old.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

Wow. Well that's a uh early introduction. Yeah. Had any of your family been in the restaurant business and that was just on your own just to earn a buck, huh?

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Well, it was just to pay the bills. Right, right. You know, it was uh Yeah. Uh I love serving people and I and I work hard. Right. And so those two things help you in any business, but they're essential in the restaurant business. If you if you don't come across as really loving people, both your staff as well as your guests, you're not gonna succeed.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Right. Yeah, there's a lot easier ways to earn a living. And uh that's one of the things, you know, uh I ask uh other people in the restaurant industry, and the ones that have succeeded have pretty much the same answer. Yeah, and it is about serving people. Yeah. Um and you know, whether you're in the restaurant industry or whether you're guiding offshore or whether you're in the uh healthcare industry, all of those seem to align in service. And if that's why you're doing it and you're willing to work hard, like you said, you know, you can definitely uh make a go at it uh because people pick up on that. You know, you're not in it for the money, you're in it to make a living, but the money isn't the driver all the time. I wouldn't I'm in it for the money.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

No, uh that's a hundred percent right. People see right through you. If if you just have kind of a line that you've been taught that you're supposed to say this with your guests or whatever, right, and it isn't coming from your heart or that you don't really mean it, they're gonna know that right away.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

Right. They pick up on it. Yeah, we're all and your your employees. I I believe that it feeds over into your employees. If you have a passion for it, uh then they it's contagious. And everybody from the dishwasher to your hostess, you know, uh picks up on that and it becomes that that kind of standard. And if they buy into it again, I think it's you're you create that ecosystem that when people step through your door, you know, they they definitely pick up on it. And uh it I also believe it kind of separates you from the norm, especially nowadays, you know, if you can have that overall genuine appreciation of people walking through your doors.

SPEAKER_00 6:05

100%. I mean, I've been very fortunate over the years. I've had over 7,000 employees. Wow. And 172 restaurants now, and plus the hotels that I ran and all that stuff. But uh yeah, I mean it's just all based in in genuine hospitality and caring about people and empathizing with them when they have problems. If they're your staff and uh kind of, you know, it's such a cliche that is so overworked, but you really do kind of create a family type atmosphere where people they know that you're genuinely concerned about them, you know, as employees. And you never ask an employee to do something that you wouldn't do, and it's an old cliche, but uh it it's like and a good example uh kind of recently is uh New Year's Eve a year ago, uh we were just slammed. We had at Petite and Keat, we had a huge crowd, and it was a great night and all that, and so we got really behind in the dish room. So I took my coat off and I went back there for uh about two and two and a half hours. And at the end of the night, uh everybody was coming up to me and saying, that was amazing. It's never been that organized back there, you know, with so much stress, and you didn't even get a speck of anything on your white shirt.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Almost like you'd done it before.

SPEAKER_00 7:33

Almost like I had done it before, because I have done it before. Right, you know, but uh people appreciate that, and you know, they see me on the back end of a broom or a mop, and you know, my sons have incorporated that same, you know, type of love for their staff and for the business into what they do. Right. And and my biggest privilege in all these years that I've spent in the business is being able to work with my two sons. Right. You know, and my daughter-in-law and and my other daughter-in-law for um several years, who's now taking care of uh uh four dogs they call the rats. Right. You know, and so she but uh she does a great job for us just as being a wonderful part of our family and helps us on things that the you know if we have a condo problem or whatever, and she's she's wonderful, but being able to work with my sons is um it's a it isn't just a pleasure, it's it's an honor and it's just a blessing, you know, to be able to work with them and see them grow uh and uh and we learn from each other. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 8:44

You know, you know, that to hear you talk and tell you're being absolutely truthful, and that's what I'm experiencing now as well. You know, when uh we were in the uh early on in opening the restaurant and working it, I share your philosophy. It's something that was passed down to me by my grandfather and my father, is you never ask anyone to do anything that you are haven't done before or were unwilling to do. And um and when it needs done, you step in and do it. And you're never above anything if it's under your roof either.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

You know, so yeah, I have I have great memories of uh as an example, uh Tommy, my oldest son, who is an attorney, recovering attorney. Um, but uh when we opened the um Waldos in North Little Rock, we got behind and we had uh one of our dishwashers didn't show up. The first thing he did is take a trash bag and cut you know uh holes for the neck and the arms and worked his tail off for you know for several hours back there, just pitched right in. Jake has done the same thing in all of our restaurants, you know, just um I love them to death and I appreciate that they have kind of taken on my approach to the business, you know, just loving your staff and and loving your guests and uh no excuses. There are no excuses.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

No, no. That's uh yeah, you you can have explanations, but no excuses. That's right. And uh, you know, the uh the thing that stepping in, you know, it's always there comes a point where there's an ex expectation, you know, I'm not gonna do this because I know someone else will step in and do it because I, you know. But the uh most of the time that I've seen it is the ripple effect of the boss you know, stepping in and doing the jobs that uh, you know, maybe it is it's dishwashing or mopping a floor, cleaning up a disaster in a bathroom, you know, had all been there done that, yeah. And uh people remember that. That sticks with them. And, you know, I tell my sons, you're only one person. You can't be everywhere at once. You know, so make your time count. To be a leader isn't about sitting around and telling people what to do. It's actually about supporting your staff, supporting your team, saving them, recognizing when they're getting underwater and stepping in and helping them get back, and then figuring out why did they get underwater in the first place. That's right. You know, and those are the things that people start appreciating and respecting you for. You know, the everybody says, Well, I demand respect. Well, you can't demand respect. You can earn respect. There's a real fear, you know.

SPEAKER_00 11:48

There's a there's a good book that um it's called The Five Levels of Leadership. And it explains kind of progressing from people will follow you only because they have to, because you're their boss. Right. Versus incorporating your management style and your love for people and your ability to get things done through other people so that they emulate you because they want to, not because they have to, and then they are taught lessons on how to be better. Really a good book.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

Right. I'll have to put that one in the list for for the library, the Galster Library of Self-improvement. There you go. Yeah. But uh, you know, you hit on another thing, and and I saw you light up on that, but working side by side with your sons, and that is something that I have the privilege of doing as well. So I I share in that um reward, if you will. It's not always easy, but um, you know, expand on that just a little bit more. You that just the I guess the reward that you get uh from that. How did that start for y'all? I mean, did they come right on or did they kind of evolve into it?

SPEAKER_00 13:05

No, I had uh I had helped start a company that um was doing very well. I'd always been on the on the board of directors, the executive committee, and all that, and we developed it to we we had uh 2,800 employees in eight states, and it always been doing really well and it was on this wonderful trajectory, and all of a sudden it wasn't, and then it was in trouble, so I had to go fix it. Basically, the board asked me to go fix it. So uh when I finished doing that, uh, and it was things like the first year I made 224 store visits. That may not sound like a lot, but in eight states and turning the company around, you know, over 200 the second year. And then we ended up uh we were approached, I was actually talking to the other investors. I was working with uh Stevens and GE Capital to buy the other investors out, and we were approached by a group that uh was backed by Wells Fargo, and so I was I took my acquisition cap off and uh my sales cap on very quickly, and and so we sold it, and and after we did that, I was just investing in some real estate in Florida and this and that. My oldest son is a was a great attorney. Uh he was working for Windstream, and part of his job was just very uncomfortable for him because he was the one that had to go give bad news if they had a layoff, that kind of thing. Right. My youngest son was uh graduating from Florida State, and so they called me and said, You have any inner any interest in you know going into business with us? And I said, Hell yes. You know, let's do it. So we started looking around. That's where how we got involved in Tzekis. Okay. Uh there were only three of them at the time in Birmingham, and a good friend of mine that I had had done a lot of restaurants with, um, I called him and I said, We're thinking about you know doing these various concepts. And he said, Why don't you come to Birmingham? So I uh and take a look at what we're doing. And I said, All right, so I got the plane, and I'm a pilot, so I put the boys in the plane. We flew to Birmingham. We liked what we saw, and they asked us to help develop the brand, and so we decided to get involved with Tzekis. And um, and then ultimately I became the president of that company and CEO of that company. Uh I told them I'd do it for no less than three, no more than five years. I did it for four. Right. And then came back and we started developing other restaurants and doing other things, um, uh, including Petite and Keat and Cypress Social. Uh were kind of, you know, at that time is and then later Waldo's Chicken and Beer. Right. You know, an additional in in here in in um in Tulsa. And then I have a restaurant in Birmingham doing a little self-promotion here.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

No, great, yeah. No.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

But it's called Blueprint on Third. That's a great restaurant uh in Birmingham. Uh and then we we're involved with uh about 30 restaurants right now that uh we either own 100% of or a significant investment in it. And then, oh my gosh, that's led to some wonderful projects along the way, including the revitalization of Breckenridge Village.

SPEAKER_01 16:33

Right.

SPEAKER_00 16:34

And so um I was I was kind of the guy on the front end who was able to get us a uh pretty amazing loans through Reliance Bank and uh First Financial Bank, and they've been great partners with us and uh other restaurants and other projects, but that was a big one. And so we uh with Hank Kelly and uh the Bodner Group and uh Bo Briggs and all that, uh Travis Hester, we you know, we uh we took it on and I was coming back from Hot Springs the other day with some friends, and I said, take a look to the right. And there was not a we have six hundred and fifty-eight parking spaces. There's not a parking space available. And I said three years ago, there would have been zero costs. So uh it's been quite a commitment, uh financial resources of our time and our energy and all that. And my oldest son Tommy has really been the tip of the sphere on a lot of the restaurants. Uh Jake is uh is more of our not only restaurant to are great at that, but uh more the technological side and systems and stuff like that. But you know, they work hard and uh and work together. They work together and 18 years and we still it's very rare that we have a disagreement, right? Which I'm very blessed.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

Well, that's you know, it it it is so and I I think it probably at least for us, and I'm you know just projecting, it's a lot of it has to do with how you raise your children, you know, what the wife raised our children. There you go. Yeah, and she's amazing. The importance of that, you know, of a of a partner, of picking a good partner, of having a good partner in life. Yeah, I refer to it almost as a superpower. You know, if you've got a a really good partner in life and a good wife uh that you know uh balances a lot because we as guys can tend to go too far in one direction, and a lot of times we depend on our our ladies to kind of yank a snatch you back in and redirect you a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

But my wife and I will have our 55th anniversary uh tomorrow on the fur on the first. Congratulations. And so she put up with me literally working 95 to 100 hours every week, you know, seven days a week, uh for uh uh 16 years. Wow. And you know, I I laugh about it because now my goal has been to cut down, you know, the number of hours I work and you know, to to what most people would consider to be full time, but to like 40 hours, and I'm working to try to do better than that. I'm trying to discipline myself to start cutting back a bit. But um I love what I do. I love being around my my not just my sons, but kind of my adopted family. You know, we have about a thousand employees uh right now and something like that. And uh I love them, you know.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

Right. I'm sure you've got those stories, you know, of the the person that started at one level and now is at another. Do you care to share share any of those?

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Just uh what we're so blessed, we have so many. Um uh a young man that started with us uh 18 years ago uh as an assistant general manager is now our operating partner in Northwest Arkansas. Wow as an example. Uh you start looking around in uh a guy named Joe Fawcett, who is now uh a partner of ours in the Waldos in Conway. You know, started with us, I think, 13 years ago. And we have so many other um people that started in some cases as grillmen, right, you know, uh or as servers, you know, that kind of thing that are now uh running restaurants for us or that are uh area managers uh that are partners.

SPEAKER_01 20:55

Is that something that y'all uh try to create is that potential, that uh that ladder that the right person can climb, given I mean, have you found that that is a benefit to uh 100%.

SPEAKER_00 21:11

Um probably the best example uh recently that I I say recently in the last 10 years uh is a guy named Brent Lenners. And he and his wife joined us ten years ago as the general manager for Petite and Keat. He now is uh the in effect the area director uh but has an ownership interest in like six different restaurants with us uh and is responsible excuse me most uh recently uh in the acquisition of uh Sonny Williams. He really was kind of the tip of the spear in turning that around. Right. And we're super proud of what we've done there. Um but he's been responsible for uh Cypress Social and As a partner there, uh DeLucas. You know, he can has a supervisory role in that. Um, and there are other examples that I can give you, but um we don't want to we don't want to lose great staff members. And we we're we try to be so dedicated to our staffs that it shows up in our turnover rate, which like in this Tzeki's brand as an example, we had the lowest turnover rate in the company.

SPEAKER_01 22:29

Wow. Well, that is, you know, that's one of the things that is attributed to restaurants a lot is just massive turnover. That's just part of the operation. You know, just expect to have a 30% turnover every year or whatever. Or more a lot more than that in some cases.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

And so we're, you know, we have people that have been with us from day one at Petite and Keat and Cypress Social, you know, at at some of our Tzekis, you know, that you know, people have been there, you know, made a career out of it. Right. Um, not all of whom are in the management ranks, but uh really enjoy just working as a server or as a grill man or whatever and have stayed with us because they enjoy doing what they're doing and they excel at it.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

Yeah, we try to, you know, in all of our businesses, we try to find areas where people are gonna experience success. And if that means staying at something that they're damn good at, then we want to support them in that. If that means stepping up, you know, to certain levels of management or, you know, oversight, or even in some cases, ownership uh at some level, you know, that's something that we want as well. Just trying to treat people uh in a way that you would want to be treated, to have the opportunity. If I work my ass off, I want at least to see some potential to advance. And, you know, that's what we try to balance out and find. And we're it's it's an evolution, you know. We're still learning a lot of ropes. But um, speaking of that, your first restaurant that you actually opened.

SPEAKER_00 24:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 24:13

What was it and where was it and when was it? And tell us about that. Well, as an owner, you mean? As an owner, I mean, like just you.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

Um because I did lot when I was with Holiday Inns, I did I was the guy that would go in and and work his ass off, as you said, for no how no matter how many hours it took to turn properties around. And I came up with some pretty innovative ideas on expanding bars and restaurants and things like that, where I became the designer, the general manager, the uh construction lead, the general contractor, and everything else, and and was fortunate to have success. And so I ended up getting kind of plucked away from the franchisee that I work for to go to corporate. And I was only 26 at the time, but um I was responsible for all operational input and design and planning worldwide. Um there's some funny stories about that, but um I learned very I I learned very quickly that uh I like calling the shots. And uh well, this is kind of a funny little vignette. My second day on the job, they had given me the plans for this project, a brand new holiday and a large holiday and large banquet room and everything else in Lubbock, Texas. And so I had those plans and everybody was leaving at five o'clock. And like, where's everybody going? Right. And I had these plans, and at that time we didn't have CAD drawings, it was sepia. You know, that you had to every time you made a mistake, you had it was it was a nightmare, but anyway, so I stayed up till about 11 o'clock that night, made all these changes that would both operationally work better and save a lot of money in the construction process. Right. I had a meeting on my second day with the senior vice president of construction worldwide. I rolled all these plans out and I said, here's why we should do this, this is why it's better ergonomically, this is why it works better with the kitchen or the bar and the banquet room, and here's why that works. And if we do that, we can save about a half a million dollars. Now, this is 1976 dollars.

SPEAKER_01 26:41

That's some serious change now. Serious change.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

That's right. And he said, This is great, I agree with that, that looks good and everything else. So I said, So we're just gonna go ahead and kind of resubmit that so people can rebid it. And he goes, No, we can't really do that. You know, we're pretty far down the line. I went, wait a minute. You just said that you you agreed with that uh we could save so much money and these poor operators out there where I was coming from, because I've had to mess around with these terrible designs, and we're gonna save a half a million dollars and we're not gonna do anything about it. He goes, That's right. I rolled the plans up and I said, You are the stupidest son of a bitch I've ever met in my life. Now, this is my second day on the job, senior vice president of construction worldwide. I came back to my senior vice president of design and planning. He goes, My God, what happened? I said, I told him it was a stupid son of a bitch. He said, You can't do that. He said, I just did it. I just did it. Any rate, I got home that night. My wife was pregnant with her first child. She was in law school.

unknown 27:50

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

And I said, Erl and I told you that we were not gonna move for until you were finished with law school. My goal was to be president of Holiday In by the time I was 30. That was my goal. That's why I moved to Memphis. And I said, I just gotta tell you, I can't work for people that are stupid. I can't do it. You know, I've got to do my own thing. So I started looking, and I had the good fortune uh I I tried to buy into the Wendy's in Memphis, and they offered me a job to run all their development stuff. And I said, I I don't want a job, you know, I want to be an owner. And they hooked me up with Jerry Hamra, and he was a great guy, and we struck a deal on a trip from Memphis to Little Rock and back, and we had a deal. And I became a partner in that. And then uh so we developed 25 Wendy's and two sisters chicken and biscuits together in Arkansas and and uh Texas. And it was great, it was great financially, it was great in every way, but there was there were some things that I wanted to do, and uh so I turned into my resignation and I said I will stay for six months, or I'll stay for six minutes, it's up to you. And uh so I stayed there for about three months, you know, just having a seamless smooth transition with the staff, right? And then took this other opportunity where I became the chairman of a of a company uh that was based in in uh down in Tallahassee.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

And uh was it in the food industry?

SPEAKER_00 29:34

It was in the food industry. Okay. It's called Maxie's uh burgers, basically. And uh so we mer so we did that, basically I merged that with rallies. And we did great. Right. And then I started a hotel company and we sold that to a publicly traded company. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 29:52

Uh you have been busy. I can see where those hundred-hour weeks definitely uh came into play. You know, we uh I think that that is the uh unrecognized and underappreciated uh view of success is, and I try to tell anyone that will listen, is you show me a successful person, and I'm gonna they will have a level of sacrifice in their life that you will be blown away by. At some point in their life, they put it all on the line, their body, their marriage, their sanity, their finances. They sacrificed more than what 99.9% of the population would be willing to do. You know, and uh for some of us I guess it's kind of bred into us, you know, it may be in our DNA, I don't know, or our life the way we grew up as a kid and what we refused to let ourselves become. Uh I know some of that uh influenced me. Um but you know, one of the things that uh I smiled about when you when you said it today, we had a little scheduling uh issue and um Which was my fault.

SPEAKER_00 31:16

Well I think extenuating circumstances, but I didn't want to back out on the commitment.

SPEAKER_01 31:22

Well one one thing that you said, and like I said, I smiled about it because it did not surprise me a second when you said it was I made a commitment and I'm honoring my commitment. And you had plenty of options to get out of it. I hear them all the time, and you do too. And I'm sure this was the last thing that you really wanted to do at the end of the day. But you honored a commitment, and that is something that uh so few people are willing to do. And I think it's reflective of integrity and honoring your word, and that carries on so far through business and life in general, and is reflective. You know, if you let it slip one place, you're gonna let it slip other places.

SPEAKER_00 32:09

I appreciate that. I um just so fortunate, you know, I was talking about my 55th anniversary tomorrow and I think about and I you know, I've always appreciated my wife. I mean, she's you know, she's brilliant, she's beautiful, she's sweet, um you know, she's a real catch. And so um when I was working all those crazy hours, she was stepping in, you know, to be there when I couldn't be. Right. It wasn't that I didn't want to be. Yeah, it's I couldn't be, you know, when I'm in Texas or I'm in Pine Bluff or I'm in El Dorado or I'm in Conway or Russellville or you know, wherever I might be. Um, you know, she was always there for the kids when I at times couldn't be. I always tried my best.

SPEAKER_01 33:03

Well, y'all were a teen. Yeah and she recognized. She was amazing.

SPEAKER_00 33:06

Yeah. So, you know, I was still able to coach, you know, some basketball teams and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_01 33:13

Yeah, that's the the one of the greatest challenges that I have had is the balancing act. You know, we have always been in business for ourselves, and there's no one to save you. So that generally falls on the dad's shoulders, at least, you know, uh for a substantial part of the time as kids are growing and you know there's no one else around to to carry much of the burden. Um but uh that balance of stability, growth, income, and future, and also the here and now, the quality of life and the maintenance and nurturing of a marriage and a relationship with children, uh, because yeah, we can work all the time. I mean, that is a possibility, and some people do fall into that, but you know, finding that that balance, and I'm sure it's not there's not an exact science to it, you know, and I'm sure you had to feel your way through that sometimes, and uh I know I have, but uh any suggestions to to people out there that are that are going through that, you know.

SPEAKER_00 34:30

Oh, is it well it it's probably very simple, it's just balance in your lives. Um, you know, my wife always says, you know, you give yourself a hard time that you weren't around as much as you as you should have been, in my words, right? You know, not hers. She said, you were great, you know, you'd always figure out a way to be there, you know, to have dinner with the kids at night. Um, you know, you're always there for them, you know, you coached. Right. You know.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

So do the dad thing.

SPEAKER_00 35:01

Yeah, you're you're always there, but um, you know, she uh practiced law, you know, for a while until we had our third baby on the way. Right. And uh so we have four beautiful children, we're so lucky. And uh my but my uh Jake, who I work with, uh is he and Stephanie, my daughter-in-law, are just the greatest parents ever. And my other daughter, or my daughter, Chase, uh, is an attorney, married to an attorney. Wow. And is they're amazing parents. Tommy's a great uh doggy dad. And my daughter in California is not married, you know, at this point, but um, yeah, they're they're amazing parents. They are always doing something with their kids. Right. And I would do that, you know, I'd do things like I would coach the my daughter's basketball team and you know, do a Bobby night, throw the chair all the way across the court, you know, kind of stuff. Passion. Yeah. I brought the passion with it. Right. But uh maybe not the coaching knowledge, but I was passionate. There you go. And I remember I was giving a speech. This was back when my political days, I was giving a speech to the uh Underwriters Association, and I had just come from coaching my oldest daughter's uh basketball team. And then I had just been yelling that whole time, and I was so hoarse that I apologized. Right. And I said, Well, I have good news and bad news about the game I just came from. The good news is my daughter was the high point person on our team. The bad news is we got beat 23 to 3. So I wasn't always a successful coach, you know, but but I was passionate.

SPEAKER_01 37:00

There you go. Well, you know, the that kind of leads up to uh, you know, business in general, you know, the the risks that you have to take, you know, to achieve success. What are you, you know, what are you willing to accept? When do you put it all on the line? When do you hold back? And you know, how do you you pick and choose that? I mean, for me, different points in my life, I had different risk tolerances. Um, but I know that's not all.

SPEAKER_00 37:34

Well, I think that's true for everybody. And I it kind of depends on how you define risk and how do you define reward, risk reward relationship. I have been pretty aggressive, you know, uh being willing to put it all on the line, going all the way back to the Wendy states. I mean, I literally sold everything. And uh, and my sweet wife and I, I mean, when we got when we got married, uh excuse me, we lived in a one-bedroom subterranean apartment uh with rented furniture. Right. You know, and so when you have that as a beginning, uh you know you can go back to that and still be happy. That may sound a little crazy. Right. Not that I want to, right, you know, but but you kind of you know you're gonna survive. Well, it gives things in a perspective, right? And so, gosh, I mean, the the best a a really good example, uh, I mean, there's so many that have been so fortunate and blessed in making the right decisions with my family or whatever with my partners that have led to success, thank God. But um, you know, the best example is uh Gateway, you know, where um Bass Pro Shop and uh the 350,000 square foot Outlet Mall and the uh hotel and the apartments and all that. Well, Tommy Hodges was my partner in that, and I got um two other guys, uh Mike Flynn and Harry Abreau in it. Kind of I got the financing together, and then he did a Tommy was brilliant and really great, um great partner, and so we put it all on the line on that deal, uh, because we had like nine million dollars and infrastructure costs, and we had um with no income, you know, coming in. I mean, there were a lot there were a lot of sleepless nights, you know, on that deal. So when we finally got it together and got Bass Pro and we got we built uh we had done Otter Creek also that he had been involved with and had had trouble and um it's a long story, but at any rate, that was a success for us. But so we always call Gateway our 20-year overnight success because there were a lot of times where you know it was pushing the chips you know into the table, and you know, thank God we got the chips back.

SPEAKER_01 40:11

Right, right. And that's you know, one of the things that I have to stop and remind myself, you know, uh, that if you don't risk it, the reward is gonna be a lot less out there.

SPEAKER_00 40:28

Well, you know, the business that we are in, you know, and by the way, I told you about great job at Cajun's Wharf. Oh, excuse me, Cajun Boilers. Yeah, thank you. We went there, I took my uh sweet wife there Saturday, uh, or excuse me, Friday night. Um, and you and your sons and your family really did a nice job of renovating it. Well, thank you. We went there last year, and then we just took the boat over there uh on Friday, had a really nice.

SPEAKER_01 40:59

Oh, y'all came in, so you got to see the the new docks then. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:02

Yeah, put some bumpers on it.

SPEAKER_01 41:04

We are we're we're working on that and some additional uh cleats to tie off on.

SPEAKER_00 41:09

Yeah, but your staff was uh very friendly. Lindsay was our server, and she's 29 years old, big smile, still has braces. Right. And and but as friendly as she could be, this the uh the food was good, everything was really nice.

SPEAKER_01 41:24

We appreciate it. We are, you know, unlike yourself, this was our first go at restauranting. Yeah. And uh, you know, my approach to it, there's always been an underlying desire. You know, it's like an itch that eventually I was gonna have to scratch. Right. Uh, we've talked about it for years and years because I love food and I love the idea of sharing that with people. And I love creation. I love creating things, and my wife does too, and our sons and daughter-in-laws as well. And I believe that the restaurant concept and industry is probably, in my opinion, the pinnacle of the alignment of all of that. It is service on a level that you're just not going to see in most industries. And it is also that opportunity to create and and see people enjoy what you've created. And uh, and that's an evolution too. You know, you learn, you get that feedback, that energy, you see what you're doing wrong, and you see what you're doing right, and and hopefully start uh edging and trending. You care and I were talking about um, you know, just the entrepreneurial brain while we're still early in the restaurant industry, and you know, we're just trying to figure out a way to make a living right now.

SPEAKER_02 42:52

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 42:53

But um, we're already, you know, it's good to set those points out ahead of you so you have something that you're working towards. And, you know, we're we're doing that. But we were reflecting, you know, as people who had my experience in restauranting was I was a busboy at a Chinese restaurant in Pine Bluff when I was 13 and 14. And then in college I worked at a uh family restaurant um named called Kirby's in Fayetteville uh for a couple of years as a waiter. And that was really the extent of my restaurant experience. Now, after that, I ran businesses and had some level of idea of some of the major uh don't do's, you know, the major mistakes, but there was so much that I didn't know. And Kara and I were uh revisiting just this uh our beginning, and one of the things that occurred to me is you know, the the uh If we open another restaurant, no matter what type of restaurant it is, it'll never be our first.

SPEAKER_00 44:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:07

You know, the uh the experience of opening your first restaurant, at least for us, the anticipation, the terror, you know, the screw-ups, the successes, all mashed up into those first few months, um, is like nothing I ever want to experience again, but I am so glad that we did uh because it gives us that base, just like you talked about your wife and you living in a uh, you know, a one-bedroom subdroom. You know you made it through that. And you know what you've learned along the way. And so the next time you're gonna be better equipped and more knowledgeable, and you just kind of leapfrog on that wisdom that's created out of a lot of failures in our in our case, and and some successes mixed in. But have you found that with all of these restaurants that you and your family, especially these that are y'all's, not a franchise, but your identities that you have uh put into, like Cypress Social and Petite and Keat, you know, have you said that?

SPEAKER_00 45:22

Yeah, it's a those are completely different. The uh the risk is much higher. Fifty-two percent of all restaurants that start uh fail in the first year. Right. And the mortality rate is something like 70% overall. And the most of the ones that don't fail are associated with good national brands, right? Where they get the marketing, they get the training, they get it, you know, they all they have to do is implement, they don't have to invent. Right. Um and the mortality rate is a lot higher on startups, you know, where it's just one, you know, one family, one group of people or whatever. And so I've just been lucky again. Louis Petit's a great partner, my boys, you know, and I, you know, s envisioned what we wanted to do with uh the oldest boy we bought from Rush Harding, who's been a longtime friend of mine that that uh has cash now with you know with his son pays, yeah. Um and so we're right across the street.

SPEAKER_01 46:33

I didn't realize that y'all had that. I mean, that's really turned, it had such great potential.

SPEAKER_00 46:38

Well, well, no, Rush has has cash. Okay, okay. Yeah. No, they had a restaurant called Savoy where Petite and Keat is now. Okay. So we bought that from Rush and then reenvisioned it. And so uh it's been great. Yeah. You know, it's been a wonderful success. And then uh Cypress Social Um is a completely different, unique animal there.

SPEAKER_01 47:07

I love what y'all do. We've eaten there several times. I didn't even realize y'all had it when we first um ate there, but uh just what you've done with that old place, you know.

SPEAKER_00 47:17

Oh my gosh. I spent a year and a half there virtually every day, at least once, and sometimes for several hours for a year and a half. Um we took that over, and you know, I I enjoyed designing. Right. It goes back to the holiday ends, you know, starting with a piece of paper and saying, you know, coming up with the concept, you know, or how do you make this architecturally more pleasing or design-wise, you know, that kind of thing. That's something I really is a passion of mine. And so, you know, design the entrance, you know, for Cypress Social and some of the area, other areas. Well, it was constructed so poorly that literally it the floors, some of the floors were stacked on uh cinder block, like two cinder blocks on top of each other, supporting uh two by twelve, sometimes ran, yeah, that that ran you know like 50 feet with no perpendicular support and stuff like that. I mean, it's a coach construction that we ran. Well, you can yeah, I'm sure you did. But you did a wonderful job. It looks great. Well, thank you. Well having been there and done that, you know, I know what you did. But you did a great job.

SPEAKER_01 48:40

It's funny, you know, we uh when we bought uh bought the restaurant, uh the previous owner who started it in 1985, the old Cajun guy, uh was still there and he was having some health problems, but he agreed to stay on with us, and we uh my son worked there for several months, and we came in the last month just to kind of get in the kitchen and get a feel for it because I knew I did not have that restaurant-level kitchen experience. Sure. So I wanted to gain some of that. We learned some of the things to do and some of the things not to do. But but I guess to my point, I had been, I've done construction most of my life, renovations, remodel, built houses, built offices, all that. Thought I had a pretty good grasp of projecting what was needed. We estimated uh about a three-month closure kind of you know, upgrade. Uh it ended up being over a year and three times the budget.

SPEAKER_00 49:43

And you know, it's my son, my oldest son, needs to hear you say that if he listens to this podcast or when he listens to this podcast because uh I I feel you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:55

Um But that that kind of gets to the point that you hear of all these failures in restaurants. And I I I'd heard all of those. I was well aware of that uh ratio and uh percent of failure. And after getting into it, I understand it even more, but I want your perspective on it. I think it's a combination of a few things. First of all, a lot of people that get into restaurants, especially the one-offs, kind of the family restaurants are doing it for the same reason that in a way that that we I did it, um, was because they have a passion. You know, they've worked in it, they love serving people, but they don't have a good business knowledge of how a business operates. But even more so under capitalization. Um looking at the best outcome and planning on that rather than the worst. Um I mean, not being the worst. I guess the worst is total failure, and everybody hates your food. But yeah, you know, even in our level of I would say moderate to higher-end business understanding, just having run business for almost 30 years, um it was shocking how critical every aspect of business becomes in a restaurant, and how much capital is required to float it through those initi not only opening, but prior to opening, to that gearing up, to those unexpected things, to realizing that you know you the piece of equipment that you were counting on, you need to replace it with this one that costs $25,000. You know, it is uh some of those hurdles were self-inflicted just because of ignorance that I didn't, you know, that I had about the ignorance, laugh lack of experience. Well, there you go. I like that that sounds much better. But I mean, what have you seen uh in this failure rate? What what have you seen that uh you would attribute to uh restaurants being that having that label to them?

SPEAKER_00 52:13

Uh I think the biggest component is probably people have not envisioned on the front end just how hard it is, how many hours they're gonna need to put in, how many sacrifices they're gonna have to make, um, how many uh choices they're gonna be confronted with that they've never experienced before. Right. And they're not always gonna be right in their remedies on how they you know go forward. Uh it's just a very difficult business, you know, and no matter how well you treat your guests and how well you treat your staff and everything else, there are still things that that are out of your control, uh including purchasing and things like that. It's like right now, you know, the uh we're at a at a 50-year low in terms of the number of cattle that are available. Right. You know, that kind of thing. We actually did a pretty good job of anticipating that. We locked in a lot of pricing on some of the restaurants and stuff like that, but but there are some things that you can't control. Right. But gosh, when I was in the in the crosshairs with my sons on on uh Cypress Social, because you had to do it right.

SPEAKER_01 53:33

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 53:34

And so I had 239 change orders in that restaurant. And and every day that I would call to G. Yeah, I know, especially my oldest son, I'd say, Well, I have a cool idea. He says, Oh, okay. He goes, Every time you open your mouth, it costs between a thousand and a million dollars.

SPEAKER_01 53:56

My sons would relate to that. They I think they dread my uh late night text.

SPEAKER_00 54:02

Yeah, and uh so anyway, and it was a tough time because then COVID hit. Wow. Just we were supposed to open in April. We already hired a lot of the staff. We'd had had had the entire 10-person management team in place for six months, you know, that we were putting the bill for and all that. I remember I one night I was in bed with my wife, and she goes, Well, I just hope this doesn't turn into Keith's folly. And I said, It's gonna be okay. Right. And so now every night, why not well, virtually every night, my sweet wife gives me a foot rope almost every night.

SPEAKER_02 54:44

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 54:44

And I'll get a call. Actually, it's a text with I get my sales on a number of my restaurants every night. Yeah. And I'll say, well, it's too bad we only did 550 covers tonight at Keats Foley. Right, Keats Foley. Yeah, so it's been a wonderful success, but we made we were out, we were out on a limb there. You know, I mean, we really invested in the long-term success of that business.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

Exactly. That's what I was gonna get at is our culture today is so focused on short-term immediate gratification. And what I've learned, especially in the restauranting, is this is a much longer game than most other businesses. You are creating a culture around your restaurant, and it takes years to develop that. Um and in so doing, you know, you're making tweaks and changes and you're supporting a staff, for instance. I'm sure y'all did the same thing. I mean, we almost overstaffed in the beginning to make sure that our or try to mitigate at least the chances of a failure, you know, early on where we, you know, didn't have people show up or people didn't end up panning out.

SPEAKER_00 56:06

You know, we were kidding in the restaurant business? You don't have a hundred percent success rate with your staff.

unknown 56:12

Right.

SPEAKER_00 56:14

That's unheard of.

SPEAKER_01 56:16

But those were just some of the things that you know we uh in other businesses, it's not as critical. You know, you're not that forward-facing with the customers. And it only takes that one bad night or that one bad server, or that one line cook that forgot that put sugar instead of salt or salt instead of sugar, you know, it uh to reflect on the whole operation and trickle out. And uh, you know, so it it is an industry that uh is there's not a lot of forgiveness in it in in so many ways. But the other part about it is uh you know the fact that it's been around forever. I don't think it's going anywhere. Right. And you were alluding to you know your development, like redoing Breckenridge Village. Restaurants always seem to be an anchor in a successful development, in my opinion. You know, and they uh as much as they get beat up on, they are still so integral to a community and to an area. And when you hear of uh towns, for instance, coming growing up in Pine Bluff, hey, to uh one of the things that uh before we left as you see a a community, you know, reducing you know, you hear about well there's no there's no place to go eat. You know, there's no no good places to eat anymore. There's no restaurants, there's no this. On the contrary indicated error uh on the contrary, when you hear about a uh community that's growing, one of the first things you hear about is how many restaurants there are to eat at. And um, you know, so I think that they're a great barometer of of where uh a town's going, the direction that they're going in, and such an essential part to a you know engaged and and uh uh lively, you know, uh development. I mean, have y'all uh I'm sure you've uh found that.

SPEAKER_00 58:38

Yeah, I mean uh that Breckenridge Village was in trouble. I mean without getting into a lot of the specifics, it needed to have a a rebirth, if you will, you know, a complete rebranding. Um and so uh the people in that area are so grateful that you know, Hank, Kelly, and Bo and our family, uh Travis Hester, who's eaten my catfish and all those people. Oh, yeah, you know, that we uh you know, we put our our money where the where our mouth was and we were not gonna just do a half-assed job. You know, we're we're still working on it. You know, we still uh Labor Day weekend, in fact, um we're gonna be completely redoing the entire parking lot as an example. I mean, that's a lot of money. But but it will make a huge difference in how it presents itself. You know, the theater, uh the Shulman family, you know, put four million dollars into the theater, you know, just in the renovation, just the renovation, not the relationship we have have with them in selling it and all that stuff or partnering with them. So it's been a full-on commitment in each of those. And again, and I mentioned it earlier, but Tommy, my oldest son, was uh instrumental in uh bringing along uh Mount Fuji, uh Waldos, uh you know, just uh, you know, great job on the design, the same thing on the DeLucas. Right. Um and so and Jack Sundell did a great job on the route. Uh Jake has been our primary focus on flyway. Right. And you know, so instead of having one restaurant there that you know has been there quite for quite some time. Well, well, Mount Fuji had been there for a long time, but was a disaster. Right. That was our my first introduction to sushi when I was a little kid, which might you know it's a family deal, but the Jackson family that is involved in it now, we turn a horrible in terms of the physical part of it and inspections and stuff like that into a pristine, beautiful restaurant that uh in fact you know how hard you work is often reflected in your year-over-year sales increases. Well, we're up 24% year over year versus last year. Wow and then that was up a similar amount from the first year. So, you know, we're uh they're wonderful people to work with. Right. Um, you know, the management staff that we have in those restaurants are just, you know, first class have been with us for a very long time. And and so it's been a wonderful success for us. But, you know, there are still challenges every day. Oh, yeah, you know, that you have to fight. But the the group that we have together, the commitment to success. Same thing, like, you know, out at uh Cypress Social with 239 change orders, you know, it became one of my favorite sayings, which it still is today, and that is if somebody would gripe about something, I'd say, you just can't get the ball to the half-yard line and punt on first down.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:06

Right. Gotta take them.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:08

You just go, you know, you gotta go, you gotta go ahead and whatever that final commitment is to make it something really special. I mean, that restaurant, um I knew what I wanted to do. I didn't have the engineering, you know, background. I I had the what I wanted to look like, but I didn't know how to make it work. Right. And so our partner at the time we were uh it was Keatogeri Construction, and we we sold our portion of the company, our half to the O'Garry's now. It's O'Gary. Right. They're great guys, did a wonderful job on that restaurant and stuff. But so he figured out how to do what I wanted to do. Right. And so I wanted to have the whole back of the bar to be overlooking the waterfall. Right. Oh, yeah. I like that. Yeah. Yeah. And um so he figured out how to put it's a it's 46 feet long, four feet wide, that you can't even see, that's in the ceiling, above the ceiling, so that you could have that clear span with the bottles being the decor between the two different levels of the restaurant.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:15

Beautiful and unique, you know, and that's one of the things that we try to embody is every uh family has a unique, you know, story and style. And you know, that's one of the things that we try to embody in everything that we do, but especially the restaurant, it's kind of our I guess our showpiece to our family because of you know, one of the things that we have is especially on my wife's side, is they are Cajun. I mean, there's Cajun in Germany. Oh, yeah, yeah. And so it really allows us to be. It has some good input into it. Yeah, definitely, and her style and and everything. So it's uh it's great, you know, seeing all that develop out and having that vision uh that you are working towards, you know, we're still in fact we're getting ready to double down, you know, on it again. Uh, you know, because we see that potential. Does it make economic sense right now? No. But look into the long term, yeah. Yeah. And you know, one of the things that in a way I've played psychology with myself.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:25

If that's a dangerous road, by the way. I've been there, done this.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:28

But if I commit all the way, then there's no turning back. Yeah, well, there is. You know, if you put it all on the line, you work, you're you're gonna you're you're gonna do everything you can to make that succeed. Uh, if you kind of dabble in it and you don't put enough in where it really hurts, sometimes you don't uh work it as hard. But you know, the work culture uh is something that that keeps coming up. And I know in my life I've seen a change in that, a change in our culture in general. At least I perceive that. You've been in this longer than I have. So is this something that you see that has been the same pretty much since you started, or is this something that just kind of each generation points at the other one? Oh, you don't understand what we went through and how hard we worked.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:26

And well, you know, my my folks were depression-era folks that and so they had that mentality, and so they taught a lot of great lessons about being frugal, you know, about always honoring your word, you know, all that kind of stuff. And I think the school system and everything else was a little bit different back then, and what what has evolved unfortunately is I think there's a little bit of rot uh uh to Certain extent culture-wise, where people will accept things that they shouldn't.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:05

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:07

Whether it's parents or teachers or whatever it may be. And good lord, our teachers are underpaid, and uh have we have friends that are supportive and under supported and stuff like that. You know, I always love on my teachers, you know, I appreciate what they do for our children and grandchildren and all that, you know, so much. But um it's kind of an overlay right now into the society in general, and and so many young people uh don't understand how things are not given to you. You have to really work for it yourself to earn it. Nobody else is gonna provide it for you, and you have to be a thousand percent committed to pursuing your dream. Right. And you may have some interim steps to that. You know, you may start out uh as a bus boy, but if you but if ultimately uh your your dream is to, which you and I both did, but you know, uh to own a restaurant or own a hotel, whatever it might be, it's a step that you learn that you can build upon. It it becomes part of your foundation. Right. And I think I think a lot of people are reticent to they think it's believ beneath them to do menial tasks like construction work or plumbing or electricians or in the restaurant business or whatever, uh they don't appreciate the hard work of people like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:43

Well, I think, you know, back to creating your base, you know, where you started from that story. You know, you you nailed it with uh people thinking that certain uh jobs are beneath them, even though they haven't experienced any job before.

unknown 1:08:00

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:00

You know, which blows me away. You know, they uh and we see that in in restaurants especially because it's an entry into work, just like I did when I was 13 and you did when you were 15. It gives that opportunity for people who have no skills, no knowledge of anything, very young, to start coming into and learning these lessons of having to show up, having to get dressed and put on your clothes, you know, and coming and not only performing a job, but performing it to a standard that may not be yours at home. Maybe you've got a trashed-out room and your car's a mess and you never watch it. But you have to meet a standard when you step through those doors. Right. And it is those basic lessons that you carry throughout life. I you brought up the bus boys. You know, we just I just had a little come to Jesus meeting with our bus boys, you know, because we were having some immaturity issues. You know, they're all friends and they do their job, but they like to play a little too much. So we had a little discussion about that. And what I told them is listen, guys, this is probably not gonna be your career. And I understand that, but this is your job. And you are gonna treat it like that, and you're gonna learn from it, and you're gonna look back on it in 10 years when you are hopefully in your career, and you're gonna say, This is where I started. This is what it taught me, this is what I carried on from that. Yeah. And I said, You can either have it be a positive thing, or you can have it be a shameful thing. It's up to you right now to make that decision. I said, You are not children anymore. You may be 16, you may be 18 and 19, but you have a job and you're gonna be treated as an employee and as a and there are expectations for that. I don't care how old you are, you accepted this position. And it seemed to resonate. We'll see. You know, that's that's been a little bit more. We'll see where that goes. But I was just thinking back to my experiences as a young kid. Not that I I mean approached it seriously all the time, but I did have someone that I was trying to please. I did want to make someone proud, whether it's the lady that employed me at 13, I did not want her disappointed in me. Yeah. And she seemed to be disappointing me all the time. But I know it was just because she was wanting me to do better and better, and and that was that was great. But you know, it was that extra level of understanding of the picture. You are not the center of it all the time. And I think that that's a a big problem that we've got culturally now is it's all about how I feel today. And we, you know, it's not about looking down the road, it's not about long-term gain and and the and the long game. Um, so I'm hoping that this is a uh uh the pendulum is swinging back to more uh reality and truths in uh you know in individual growth, but it's kind of scary right now. Yeah, I think it is. And you know, we see it also, uh I mean, have you seen a change in our customers? I mean, their expectations or their tolerance for anything that rubs them the wrong way. I mean, have you seen uh a difference in that, or has that been pretty standard?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:59

Well, we've never had a disappointed guest in any of our restaurants, so I don't know what you're talking about. No, I I think um 99% of the guests that come in have a reasonable expectation and are appreciative of everything from the cuisine to the service and everything else. There are some people, however, that before they enter the restaurant have an agenda before they get there. And whether it's that I'm gonna go in and gripe about something so I get a free meal or you know, whatever, you you you get that occasionally and you you can kind of see it coming a mile away. Right. Where no matter what you do, you can't please somebody. And and believe me, we try. We don't want a single guest to leave there without giving us a five-star review. We don't, you know, we we pour ourselves into every guest and we let them know that we care.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:58

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:59

Uh are we perfect? No, we're we're gonna make mistakes occasionally, but we always try to rectify that and remedy it.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:06

If you're given the opportunity, but so many times you're not even given the opportunity. You have no idea that anything's gone wrong or that they're unhappy. Even when you ask some people at the table, it's this passive aggressiveness that is something that I've had. I mean, that's like one of my pet peeves. If you've got a problem, speak up. You know, let's let's hear it, let's deal with it. The the social media reviewers, yeah. I mean, it's just it it a difficult industry a lot. It can be frustrating. Yeah, restauranting, it gets crucified. Replay.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:44

But you're saying you're selling something that everybody has different taste buds.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:49

Exactly. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:50

And and so it isn't like being in the hardware business. You know, a hammer is a hammer, is a hammer. You have different kinds of hammers, but at the end of the day, you walk in, you buy a hammer, and you leave, and there's not a lot of creativity in it. Right. And in the restaurant business, um you just it's challenging.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:12

All right.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:13

But that's one of the things that you love. You want to hear from your guests because the statistics are alarming on how many people uh will give a positive review and say positive things about you versus those who don't say anything but will say something in a review or whatever later. We want to know if there's ever a problem, we want to know. And so we can remedy it while they're there. Absolutely. And and love on them and say we're sorry, and let's make it better.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:44

Well, and that's making it better. You know, if you tend to keep doing things the same way unless you learn that it's not being well received. And that's one of our uh greatest uh corrections is through some of the comments, the constructive criticism. You know, I'm wide open to that. Now, sometimes we can make a change based on it. Sometimes it's just a systematic, you know, we can't do anything, or it's a fringe thing. You talked about taste. I mean, you look at culturally throughout the world, the differences in what is determined a delicacy and what is disgusting, you know, and every culture has a little different tweak on it. You know, the tolerances for heat. I know with uh um at Cyber Social, y'all get into the Cajun fair, and you know, people's perception of what that should be and what how they cook it at home, and you know, the the heat level and all that is just that. It's perception. And, you know, we're not uh we can't please everyone. We try to give as much authority as we can, but we we try.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:56

But we try to educate people on the front end when they order certain things. Right. So that you're creating an expectation on the front end, and if you do your part and have been honest with them and they have um ordered that and it may be not quite what they expected, that's okay. We'll replace it with something else, even if we have kind of warned you that it's gonna be too hot, not hot enough, or we've gone through. You know, whatever. You know, we we'll we'll fix it.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:28

Yeah, we just have to have that opportunity. Yeah, yeah. That's right. The um well, where do you see uh restaurants going? I mean, obviously y'all are continuing to invest in it. You're taking on some uh which I wasn't aware of, but I'm intrigued by you're taking on some of these existing restaurants that may have kind of hit a little stumbling over the past few years. Um, yeah, I know Sonny Williams, I mean, that was a gold standard for years, and I kind of lost track of it because I'm not in the Little Rock market anymore. But um, you know, where where are y'all, what is you if you look 10 years down the road now, um, what are you seeing with restaurants? How is it gonna be different? How is it gonna be the same? Is there a future there?

SPEAKER_00 1:17:17

And you know, well the prognosis would probably be that the space will just continue getting crowded. And the people that do a great job are gonna continue doing great. And the people that don't have the right value perception, the right product, the right service, and all that are gonna be part of that 52% that don't make it the first year. But you know, chains are gonna continue to grow that do a good job. I think you're gonna I think you're gonna see some chains that are gonna shrink, not grow, because they're wrong with the guests. There's some good uh um instances of that in the past that you can point to and say uh they increased prices at the same time they cut portions, and that was the the death knell. Oh, yeah, you know, of certain value propositions. That's right. And so I don't think it'll be that much different. I think people are gonna be um probably continue to be a little bit more sophisticated, a little bit more demanding, which is fine. We we want them to be uh because our products are unique and uh we want them to be discerning and we want them to um appreciate the quality that we do. Right. It doesn't matter the price point. That can be Waldo's, that can be Sonny Williams, right? And uh, you know, everything in between, but we just want to give every guest uh the best possible treatment, a really good value, but never, you know, I have a saying, you know, that's pretty simple. It's you know, my my goal is just you know one sentence, you know, and that's maximizing profitability by taking exceptional get care of every guest every time, no exceptions, period. Right. That's what I live by. I never want to have a guest leave there disappointed, and I don't care if they came in and bought one chicken sandwich, or they came in and and and got a 45-day aged um ribeye. I don't care. Uh I want them to be happy, exactly. You know, and I want every one of our staff members to be prideful about what they do and feel good about it. It may be a stepping stone, and maybe they'll be with us for 20 years. I don't know. Right. But one other thing, um, you kind of touched on it, but if we can help build people, their character, their giving a damn, um their uh commitment to their job, whether it's a dishwasher or a general manager or a partner, um we want them to excel. And then if they have another opportunity, as long as we get appropriate notice and stuff like that, we never want to hold anybody back. We we just had a best example just recently, um we we had a young lady, she was the only level two female Somalier in the state of Arkansas, and she had a wonderful, she'd been with us from day one uh at Petite and Keep. She had a really good opportunity in Northwest Arkansas to open up a hotel and be the wine director up there. And she gave us, you know, like a month over a month notice. She was great about it, left with everybody congratulating her and all that kind of stuff. And we have a wonderful Samaya that's working on her level two right now that you know took her place. But um we wanted her to experience that new opportunity, right? You know, she grew into it and and we couldn't be happier for her, right? You know, and I'm not sure. She helped us, she helped uh Petite and Geet be uh uh selected for uh one of the top 100 restaurants in the country by Wine Enthusiast magazine. Wow, you know, we were just listed um in Spectator as one of the best uh restaurants in the country. So awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:34

You know, and it our world is so small, you know, and uh the being able to see someone grow within and then grow beyond you is rewarding. That's great. Uh and they're not gonna forget that. They're not gonna you won't forget how they left you, and they won't forget how you let them leave. Right. And that is one of the things that I've seen with employees over the years, the ones that burn the bridges for no reason. It's this insecurity, you know, that it seems to uh be pervasive uh with some of them, is that well, I don't want to say anything. It's that passive aggressiveness in a way, I don't want to say anything to the last minute, and then we're blindsided. You know, and the reality is we want the best for you. Would we like an opportunity to talk to you about it and see if there's something we could do to give you more advancement here? Yeah, we would like that opportunity, but if you have a better opportunity elsewhere, we want to see you succeed. Absolutely. Go get it. And uh just help us out a little bit. You're important to us, and because of that, you've got an important position. You know, let's work together to transition. And that means so much uh in the overall um feeling and remembrance of the experience. Uh, I just hate seeing relationships that have been fostered over a decade be, you know, squandered because of behavior over a few weeks. Yeah. And uh it really is unfortunate. Unfortunate, yeah, absolutely. Um but uh, you know, the restaurants are kind of a reflection of our society as a whole. Um that's one thing that I have uh witnessed, and it seems like it's kind of that microcosm. You can see every uh socioeconomic background, you've got a diverse group of employees working there. Um, you know, it just it ebbs and flows with our culture. And um, you know, we've talked about kind of the future of of restauranting in general. Um what are your views on the future of America in general? I mean, what is the direction that uh you're seeing us go? Is it positive, negative? Are we heading for a cliff? Is the United States as we know it gonna be drastically changed? I mean, you you have to look at all this stuff. You know, part of running businesses is studying the world and and the economy and all of that. What are your thoughts in general?

SPEAKER_00 1:24:34

In general, uh as a recovering politician who spent eleven years in politics, the thing that is most disconcerting, uh disconcerting and uh frightening is the discord at every level, but especially at the national level, with uh just the parochialism, the uh uh the lack of co cooperation uh people who are um so set in their ways that they can't see a better way. And people that just do things for clicks on both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democrat, there's just so much discord right now and and kind of a vitriolic attitude that that to me just goes much farther than legislation and what gets passed, what doesn't get passed, and all that. It kind of infects the whole culture. Right. Because if your supposed leaders are not collaborating to get things done for the good of the country, that's a real problem. And uh the lack of reaching across the aisle by both Republicans and Democrats and being so dogmatic in their positions, right, is just not healthy.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:57

Yeah, that is uh something that uh at least in my lifetime, you know, having grown up in Arkansas and having a uh strange um interest as a young kid, even in politics. You know, I remember um Jimmy Carter, you know, which I was only four years old. You know, but I remember my parents talking about Jimmy Carter, and then I got to experience kind of the blue dog Democrat days and you know, um and then the evolution from that. But the tribalism now, you know, the not focus focusing on the commonalities, but focusing only on the differences and it becoming just this, like you said, dogmatic, you know, just digging in the no flexibility. Um and the extremes that we're working on on both sides uh is is shocking. Um you know, do you have any suggestions for a solution there, or uh is it something that you think we just have to wave through and suffer the consequences?

SPEAKER_00 1:27:06

What I pray is that we don't have some sort of huge event that almost forces people to love each other, you know, to confide in each other, to help each other, to bury their hatches politically, to what really do what really is in the the common good, if you will. Um I hope there isn't a cataclysmic thing that comes along.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:33

Right. And we I I think that you definitely hit on that. You you we don't know realize how fragile our existence in this comfortable world that we live in is. And uh goes back to one of the things that you're always told, but until you experience it, it doesn't resonate quite as much, but you don't realize how good you have it till it's gone. And when it's gone, it's really hard to get it back. And I think that uh I don't want to experience that. No, no kidding. I've had tastes of that, you know, throughout life, but nothing at a level.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:13

We as a nation have so many vulnerabilities. Whether it's you know the electric grid, whether I mean one of my things that I always think about when I'm thinking about potential potential terrible events that have a huge impact are things like um the Hoover Dam. Now, that's one dam in the entire country that if somehow people were able to figure out how to blow it up or how to significantly damage it or whatever, just think about the impact that that would have.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:53

Ripple. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:54

Yeah. You know, just cyber attacks and things that disable our communications and things like that, where there's not even a shot fired. There are just so many, so many vulnerabilities that we have. And you don't want to dwell on those things. You don't want to worry about them all the time. There's plenty to worry about that, you know, whether my guest at A4 got a good stay. You know, I've got to focus on that, you know. But um it's just uh there are so many people around the world that don't just dislike America and hate America. They hate anything that isn't uh within their religion. Yes. You know, where we just got a big target on our back because we're the biggest and the best and the most affluent and all that.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:43

We have been the stabilizing. I mean, there's lots of examples where the United States has made mistakes, there's no question. Um but overall we have been the good in the world. Um, you know, we have been the ones that keep the bad guys from just spreading and dominating. And one uh and there's a reason now that we are being attacked the way that we are being attacked. We're being decayed now. Like you said, it's not firing a shot. It is a decay that's occurring in our foundation, and a lot of it is bring being driven, in my opinion, now this is my opinion, uh, by you know an outside influence trying to weaken us as a people, as a nation, as a people, as individuals, because it seems like every traditional aspect of our life, from sacrifice to hard work to being a man to being a husband to being a mother, to national pride, to realistic love of your country and and all of those and religion, church, are all being attacked mercilessly. And you ask why, and where is this coming from? And you know, a big part of it is this alignment of bizarre, you know, um combinations of people. You have the communists and Marxists that somehow have re-emerged, you know, that is the most uh I don't know where uh this ideology has been proven successful, but apparently it keeps popping up. And then you have the, you know, uh all of our um social groups uh and uh pronouns and and different things of of that nature, and then you have the racial divides, and then you have uh Islam now that is uh you know bearing down uh where we haven't haven't seen that before. So it's a unique combination of uh warfare in a way that we haven't ever experienced as a nation, and you know, it's gonna take a lot of resiliency, you know, I believe, in our people uh to find, you know what it means to be American and appreciate what that is. And it's not we always talked about you know the United States being a melting pot. And in a way it is, but when you melt things together, you have unity in the end, and I don't think that we're achieving that. I think that we have too much diversity and in ideologies and and people, and that's what's being driven right now, just being pushed apart, pushed apart, pushed apart, and we're seeing it in our leaders and our political sphere, and and it trickles all the way out to this divisive blaming hatred, you know, that is uh not constructive in any any way, shape, or form. Um, but uh hopefully we will we will find a way there. Um you know, one of the things that kind of keeps me grounded, and it's a recent dis experience of mine, but it's faith, you know, um the Christian faith uh for me. Does that play in in your uh in your game plan? I mean, is that something that uh you've relied on or found beneficial, or is that uh not not part of it?

SPEAKER_00 1:33:40

Yeah, I mean I my uh my dad uh was uh a stronger Christian probably than my mom, but he was always I grew up as an Episcopalian. And uh my mom was always just an amazing person, but wasn't as quote religious perhaps as my dad. So I've had that faith background from you know from the beginning. Uh my wife is probably the strongest Christian and most knowledgeable Christian I know, um, even has more uh biblical under understanding than most uh priests or you know, she's she's amazing in that. And so uh our our whole family has you know uh Christian beliefs and has always had that as a part of our foundation as a family.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:34

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:36

I think that the the unfortunate thing is that some people label others uh rather than looking at who they are as a person, they look at uh things that don't really reflect their character and who they are. They just make assumptions that are not well founded and it's too it's too bad. But um the problem right now, you had mentioned the melting pot earlier, is that there are an awful lot of not necessarily religious sects, but just uh people that are uh unfortunately very negative about uh excuse me, our country, our history. And you know, all of us need to learn from the mistakes that we've made in the past, but we don't need to dwell on them. We still have we still have, you know, the rest of our lives, the rest of the future of our country, and we need to be making a deposit, if you will, in the bank. Right. You know, the the United States of America Bank, you know, and doing what we can to make the country better every day. Right. And a lot of that's just going to work and being honest and treating your neighbor correctly.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:56

And the old golden rule.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:58

100% the golden rule. You know, it's so simple, but if you genuinely are trying to help other people be the best they can be every day, and or you what not just in the workplace, but your neighbor. You know, your friend's daughter who has a learning problem that you can help with. I mean, just pouring yourself into the community, into the neighborhood, into the city. You know, it's one of the things that I'm very proud of is that our uh, you know, our whole family has adopted that philosophy of trying to give back to the community and investing our time, our energy, our money, you know, to try to make it a better state, a better city or cities that we're involved in. And uh doing that uh unapologetically. You know, we I have a saying, another one of my sayings, besides the half-yard line deal, is you know, let's find a way to say yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:59

Let's find a way. It may not be what people might want to get from us or hope to get from us, but let's find a way that we can always have people know that we care about what they're doing to improve our community and what can we do to help facilitate to help it.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:16

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think it's a you know, kindness doesn't cost a whole lot.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:21

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:22

And that's something that I think that we uh tend to uh lack now. And and we uh I find myself focusing uh and having to correct myself and from focusing on negative and negativity. Um you know, but kindness and positivity have a reactionary you know component to them. They're contagious as well as negativity. And I think it it almost needs to be our mantra in a way, just kind of reset yourself a little bit every day and uh and try to do something kind out there. Hold a door open, tell someone thank you. You know, those little things go a long way, and I think that they're undervalued in a in our society today. And be a reflection of of who you are, and or even be a refle. I like I like people prejudging me. Uh I I know you've gotten an opportunity to meet with diverse groups and probably travel the world. And I love people assuming who I am going to be and what's going to come out of my mouth. Uh they know I'm from the South. I'm, you know, uh got a beard, whatever, they've seen a picture of me, and then I get to go meet with the you know European manufacturers of prosthetic componentry and experts here and experts there, and you know, they see me walk in and and I they already judge who who I'm gonna be. I'm just you're that hicks up. Yeah, and uh it's then when you get an opportunity to to show who you really are, and uh it catches their attention a little bit more. I think you have a little bit of impact there. So kind of a fun game to play, and I wish more people would, instead of getting their feathers ruffled on how people may perceive them by the way they look or where they're from or their religion or whatever, uh socioeconomic background, prove them wrong. We all have that opportunity to do that, but uh it's horrible when they're right. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:36

It's like damn it. You really had me nailed on that.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:40

I am an old redneck from Arkansas, yeah. But um, well, you've built all of this uh over these years, and you've got your kids uh working with you, and um let's talk about legacy. You know, we we're only here on this earth for as long as God allows us to be. And uh I know I think of where I came from and wanting to leave it better for my family, both through wisdom, experience, and financial stability. Sure. Um what are your thoughts on on legacy? I mean, is that a big driving force behind what you're doing? Uh I think it is.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:25

I think it is to this extent. You know, um I think about I lost my brother uh when he was 78. Uh my wife just lost her sister her sister at 78. My mom passed away at 78. Uh my dad lived till he was 91. But uh he was in he was in amazing shape. Um he was still swimming a mile a day when he was 83. Wow. And uh he fell and had a bilateral subdural hematoma and it pushed him back, you know. But he he hung in there for another eight years, but he was amazing. Um so I I guess when when I think of legacy, I think of not so much monetarily because my mom and dad they they left some money, you know, which was most really appreciated, and uh some land and you know and stuff things like that. Right. But what they left that I hope to leave to my kids and grandkids and everybody else is um a love for my family, uh love for my country, love uh for the Lord, and all of those things that money can't buy. Right. You know, we do fine, thank God, financially, because we work our butts off, and we've been, you know, so far, thank God we've been very successful. And so we've been able to enjoy the fruits of that labor. Uh we do a lot of things as a family that, especially with my two sons, because we're we work so closely together in business that we do some things investment-wise that are not affiliated or associated with the other members of the family, but we try to do things that uh financially and we'll do more, you know, as time passes on for um our other kids. But what I just hope to leave is is a sense that I left this uh good earth a little bit better than than uh you know when I started. Right. And that I didn't compromise my standards, I didn't compromise my love for my staff, my uh real appreciation for them, and always wanted to be a good mentor for them and a good example setter. And so all of those things, you can't put a price tag on that stuff. Right. You know, if if we went broke tomorrow, all those things are still in place. You know, and I I'm very fortunate I have people that come up, it's very embarrassing because oftentimes I haven't seen somebody in 35 years, literally, you know, or 40 years. They may have changed a little bit. I know I damn sure have, you know, that come up and say, Hey Jim, you remember me? And it's like, of course I do. But because I never want to be disrespectful. And I and I had so many people that have worked in my campaigns that have worked and you know, have worked their tails off, you know, and seeking various offices and stuff like that, or in businesses in the past where they worked with me and all that. Right. And I hate it if I don't know their name, how many kids they have, you know, everything about them, because I don't want everyone that seemed disrespectful. But when someone comes up and says, You taught me lessons, you know, 40 years ago that I still have in my life, you can't put a price on that.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:01

No.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:02

You know, so I guess if I would think about legacy, it's just trying to set a good example for the next generation and for my uh employees to let them know that I care you know about them and care about this country.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:16

And yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:18

Well that uh, you know, one of the uh for me, one of the greatest gifts, um it it was the it is the greatest gift, is being able to be a father. Oh yeah. You know, and I look at um a lot of the pressures that are put on people now to create careers and and you know they squander away the years of youth that are the time to have kids, you know, and then I have some of them that you know I've gone to school with and grown up and they waited too long. They're not gonna have that. And I feel so sorry for them. Right. Um, that is my out of all the things we've done and the things we've built, knowing that not only have I been able to touch lives and and with employees and other people around, but I've been able to send forth, you know, good, decent human beings uh to to make this world a little better. And you know, right now the uh consensus with a lot of this youngest generation and I even heard some of it when I was uh Kara and I were um at the age that we were starting to think about kids was this world is so screwed up, how could you bring a child into it? And that's our only way of changing it, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:45:58

That's is it's not gonna change itself.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:02

Right, right. It's putting good people out there and raising them right, and hopefully they become leaders and make a difference and influence more and more people around them, just like we've had that opportunity uh to do in our lives. And you know, I think it's uh it's a responsibility for for us to do that. It's a sacrifice, but it's a sacrifice that has a reward that until you do it and you go through it and you're able to reflect back, you have no idea of how much fulfillment it gives you and resilience. And yeah, I think that that is part of the reason that it's attacked so much, that the nuclear family's attack, that having children is attacked, that is because it is probably one of the the most powerful thing that I've ever been through in my life is being a father. And the most difficult at times, but in in the end, uh the most uh most rewarding. Well we've covered a lot. I could talk to you all night, uh, but I know we have uh other things besides the podcast to get on to. Um I'm fascinated with the uh way you've lived your life, the evolution, and I know that uh there's a lot that you have to share and that you share with uh uh uh many people every day through just operating and and being present. And uh I commend you on that. Uh thank you. I appreciate that. Uh I've learned a little bit uh from you today, and uh hopefully this isn't our last time to uh to talk. And um I continue to stay tuned to the next developments of you and your family. I'm excited to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:58

Hey man, I I can't wait to get back over to Cajun Broilers, and then if everything isn't perfect, I'm gonna call you. Yeah, call me.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:04

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:07

I can tell you my I've my experiences there since uh the renovation and everything that you've done there have all been great. And it's like the docs, you keep trying to improve. And I don't I don't know uh I don't know if like a a large pavilion for conferences is next. I don't know what your big I don't know what your big thing is, but I'm just speculating a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:32

Well, you're uh you're getting close there. You're getting close. Well good. Yeah. I can't wait to see. We've got big plans, definitely. And uh that's fantastic. It's uh it's exciting, and you know, part of what makes things exciting is a little scariness to it, but you've taken that chance a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:49

Well, you you're made you have made the most important investments that you can make, and that's in your kids. Yeah. And so with them by your side, this next adventure, I can't wait to see it. But if you need if you need any help on the architectural part of it, you want my advice. I'm happy.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:07

Yeah, I'm happy to I appreciate it. Well, Jim, I do uh appreciate you coming. Uh we have got a uh little uh exercise that we're gonna do real quick. And um these are our uh little quick fire questions. Um, okay. Best restaurant meal you've ever had that wasn't one of your own restaurants.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:36

Probably the sushi at the umagio in Las Vegas with my youngest daughter.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:51

Was it the experience or the sushi? Yes. Um great operator or a great chef, uh which one would you hire first?

SPEAKER_00 1:50:08

Operator.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:10

Expand.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:12

Well in each of our restaurants that are not associated with a national chain, um I've always said I want a chef without the attitude. Because Holiday Ends, I had the good fortune of working with a French master chef and uh another guy whose family uh had the best Italian restaurant in uh Cleveland. The most fun was a uh an African American guy who went for a competition in Germany, and he won it, and when he came back, he started having speaking everything. This is bizarre with a German accent. I swear to God. It was it was his it was hysterical, but right, but it's kind of off the subject, but the point is um really good operators have to have a greater understanding that goes well beyond the cuisine. Right. You know, they have to understand every aspect of it. And you know, like I say, you you want to have a chef who is part of the team and he doesn't consider himself to be above everybody uh and preaches to them, but have somebody that humility and a chef.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:38

That's uh that's right, a unique rare combination there. That's right. But they're out there, they're out there. Um one business trait you hope your sons inherited from you, and one you hope they didn't.

SPEAKER_00 1:51:53

Uh business trait, uh I would hope it would just be uh loyalty to your staff and commitment to what you're doing every day. Um and one that I would hope they would not incorporate, which they're succeeding in, and that is uh working too many hours. Right. Yeah. You know, be smart about your scheduling, about what you want to accomplish, and then you know, give yourself a break. Yeah. They do a pretty good job of that. Good. You do a better job of that than I do at times.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:24

You know, well, one last one. Uh more important at the end of a life, what you built, who you helped, or who you raised.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:40

All of the above, but who you raised has to be the winner in that category.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:46

Yeah. You can raise a good one or you can raise a bad one. That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:51

Thank God I've raised nothing but great kids with uh my sweet wife right by my side.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:57

Definitely turned out some some great people, and I've had the pleasure of uh meeting a couple of them and can attest to that. And uh, well, Jim, again, life well done so far, and I know there's a lot left in the tank.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:12

I really appreciate the time with you today.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:13

It's been great. And uh, like I said, look forward to seeing what great things y'all are gonna be accomplishing in the in the future.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:21

We have some we have some things up the sleeve, and I can't wait to see the uh conference center.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:26

Yep. The Cajun Conference. Well, thank you again.

SPEAKER_00 1:53:33

All right, thank you.