Brett Linkletter (00:00:00):
Hey guys. In this episode I interview Roger Bodewin. He's the CEO of Restaurant Rock Stars. Roger is a former restaurateur. He was very profitable with four restaurants, and now he services other restaurants As a coach, he helps other restaurateurs stay more profitable. He teaches them the ins and outs that led him to be incredibly successful with his stores. And we talk about a lot of different interesting tactics and strategies in order to help you get your restaurant more profitable, more fun, and how you can empower your staff to be great leaders, to take your brand from where it's at now to drastically further in the next level. We had an amazing chat. We talk about all kinds of things from marketing strategies. Again, leadership. We talk a little bit about specific strategies in that regard on how to get people to come back. We talk about he had a mug club that was incredibly successful, that had a membership program built into it. And long story short, guys, I think you're really going to get a lot of value from this episode, not to mention from Roger in general. So below this episode, you're also going to see a number of links that you can check out his website. He's also got a podcast also called Restaurant Rock Stars. And overall, I think you're really going to benefit. So without further ado, let's dive right in.

(00:01:28):
Hey, my name is Brett Link Litter, CEO and co-founder of dieline, a restaurant growth agency. We help restaurant brands of all sizes grow and scale to new heights, whether that means opening new stores or increasing revenue at an existing location. We have a done for you model where we take care of all the work for our clients on the marketing front. And we also have a unique software solution called dio, which allows owners to showcase their restaurants in the best light possible online, while also turning guest interactions into data to increase profits. Right now you are listening to our podcast Restaurant Misfits, where we'll discuss all things related to restaurant marketing, management and everything else in between. Growing a restaurant business, scaling your restaurant today takes much more than having grit and hustle in this age. It's about utilizing the newest technology, educating yourself on new platforms and trends, and having a deep understanding of how the industry is changing. This podcast is dedicated to keeping you up to speed with the latest and greatest through interviewing the biggest and the best in their restaurant industry. As always, we appreciate you for being here and we hope you enjoy the show. Cheers, Roger. How are you man?

Roger Beaudoin (00:02:39):
Excellent. Thanks for having me on the show, Brett.

Brett Linkletter (00:02:41):
Yeah, thank you for joining. We're very excited to chat. And you also, by the way, are a podcast host. I noticed, and actually a few of my clients have mentioned you at least your podcast a few times by the way. So that's awesome. For everyone who's listening though and hasn't heard of you, can you just give us a quick intro of yourself, who you are and what you do and how you came to be here essentially? Yeah,

Roger Beaudoin (00:03:02):
Absolutely. So business has been a passion of mine for quite a long time, and I've spent the majority of my career in the hospitality industry, mostly founding and operating high volume restaurants, but I never thought I'd be in the restaurant business. I spent some time living in Los Angeles. I worked for a top advertising agency, which was really foundational for marketing for me. I actually worked on the Acura car account business for American Honda Motor Company. So yeah, it was a real high pressure, really intense thing. I was a young person right out of graduate school and suddenly I'm in the forefront of the client and I had to present all this creative, and I was the liaison as an account executive between the creative team that created the ads and I would present it to the client and I'd have to take it back to the creative team and say they hated this or they really loved this.

(00:03:47):
And yeah, it was a really foundational marketing gig for me for sure. But I have a real passion for the sport of skiing, which I've had since I was a young person. I've worked in the ski industry for a long time also. And when I moved back east from Los Angeles, I really wanted to get into the ski biz again. So I worked as a marketing director for a major ski resort in Maine, which then went, well, not global, but went national and started buying up ski resorts across the country. And I got promoted several times with that company. I worked in sponsorships and promotions with big corporate clients like Visa and Jeep and Paul Mitchell, haircare products and Saab automobiles. And so I got a sponsorship and promotion thing going for a while. And then I saw this opportunity to start a restaurant. And it was kind of a crazy idea because when I was in graduate school, I lived in Milan, Italy for a summer.

(00:04:40):
I was doing an internship for this pharmaceutical global pharmaceutical company actually, and I was setting them up with the US subsidiary corporation that I registered in Delaware, and I ate a lot of pizza in Italy. And if you know anything about Italian pizza, which is where it was invented in Naples, Italy and all this kind of stuff, it's this time honored tradition. And they have these elaborately, beautiful brick ovens right in the middle, the dining room that works of art with mosaic tiles all over them. It's a real culture thing for sure. And somehow that kind of stuck in my mind. And when I went to interview for this ski resort company, it was kind of an anomaly because here's this huge ski resort. I think they got five or 600,000 skiers a winter that came through this small little town, and the town was just overrun with skiers and the businesses were really lackluster.

(00:05:32):
No great service, no great sophisticated product offerings. I tested all that out. This idea from all these pizzerias in Italy came back to me. I'm like, you know what? Here's an opportunity. I'm going to start this wood-fired pizzeria. I'm going to set the town on fire. And I got the ski resort job. So I'm working seven days a week to ski resort and simultaneously starting this pizzeria with a business partner. And it was an overnight success because like I said, all those other businesses didn't focus on hospitality and guest service and quality of product. It's like they succeeded in spite of themselves because they had lines out the door every day and they didn't have to do anything special. And so that was a competitive advantage for me. And one restaurant led to two, led to three, led to four, and all that kind of stuff.

(00:06:18):
And along the way it's like I sort of pioneered a new way of looking at the business. I was obsessed with leadership and empowering my people and creating what I call intrapreneurs. I mean, everyone knows what an entrepreneur is. It's someone who takes a risk to start a business in hopes of making a profit. But an intrapreneur is someone that applies that approach to someone else's business and grows it as a point of pride and as a place to move up in the organization. And I cultivated these types of people in my businesses, and that was like an exit strategy for me. I didn't have to work there anymore because my people ran the businesses if they owned it and had to pay for it, and they were incentivized to do that.

Brett Linkletter (00:06:56):
Let's talk about that real quick because I think just that is such an important point that honestly, I mean I'm sure you've seen our stuff. We've done over 2000 different restaurant concepts across the us, some in Canada as well and in some of some other countries across the globe. But I will tell you right now based on what you're saying, this is one of the biggest issues we see is that you have a restaurant owner, especially going from one store to two stores, you're doubling the size of your business, right? Overnight. And so for a lot of restaurant owners, that's a very difficult thing to do, right? Extremely difficult. But I think to your point here, you've got to empower people. You got to put the trust in someone else with the right incentive model so that they can take off without you having to lean over their shoulder and guide them through everything. For those that are listening to this and probably nodding their head and thinking, yeah, that's me. I'm raising my hand to that. That's my biggest problem. I guess let's start there because that's a good point. Where does that process start for you? You want to take first and foremost, how do you find the right person? And then what does your process look like to empower them to become maybe in a leadership role? What's that look like for you?

Roger Beaudoin (00:07:55):
Well, I'd like to first define what leadership and being a leader really means. Because I think the pandemic shifted everything because prior to the pandemic, there were people that we called the boss and they would bark orders at people and they didn't really develop and nurture and recognize talent in people. They would delegate. Everyone knows that word. It's overused. I hate the word delegate. I hate the word management because delegation means you're telling somebody what to do and maybe even how to do it. Hey, you go do that. But that's not a leader. A leader is someone who leads by example, isn't too important to show others the way to do the dirty work when necessary to jump in, but it's not your job. You're setting an example for others. And the nurturing and training, I was a huge believer in daily training. I wanted to deliver the most incredible hospitality experiences.

(00:08:45):
That was a competitive advantage where anyone coming into my restaurants would say, wow, that place is dialed. It's running on all eight cylinders. And the people, they love being there, they're making with customers every single day and they're selling more because they know their products inside and out. They know the restaurant, they're making suggestions, they're increasing our sales, but most importantly, they're giving people lots of reasons to come back again. And that's a leader versus just the manager or the boss that barks orders. And I'm a huge believer in building company culture versus having a mission statement that hangs on the wall that no one looks at, cares about, or even practices. A culture is something that everyone participates in. It's kind of an aura. It's an image. If you were to query or take a survey of your employees and say, what does this place mean to you?

(00:09:32):
What do you think we're all about? And the common thread in that would be team spirit, perhaps it would be respect, it would be we make good money here. It's like we help each other out. We love meeting new people. That's the foundation of a strong culture versus our mission is to deliver great service and take care about quality every day. I totally agree. You know what I'm saying? So there's a huge difference there. So I like to think of this as a paradigm shift, a mindset, a different approach to the business. And a lot of my success also came from applying business skills to a business that isn't traditionally run by MBAs. It's about systemizing the business, not being tied to it and running it seven days a week and you

Brett Linkletter (00:10:09):
Can's leave. What's interesting, we've seen kind of every type of client under the sun from someone who's been in the restaurant business their whole life worth their way from busboy to owner at some point, right? We've seen people like yourself, one from NBA, did some business, got into it. Honestly, just like you said though, it's the most successful owners I see are the ones that can remove themselves from it and let other people go to work. Honestly. It's like, are you working on your business or in your business? We've all done

Roger Beaudoin (00:10:36):
Before,

Brett Linkletter (00:10:37):
Jesus.

Roger Beaudoin (00:10:38):
That's it. That's it, right? And the key to that also is if you're creating this kind of company culture where people respect each other, they like working together, they make good money, they're making friends, you're not going to have a turnover problem anymore. People aren't going to think, oh, the grass is better somewhere else. It's like, no, I'm happy here. I'm having fun. They give me opportunities. I'm making good money. It's fun. Then your longevity goes up, your turnover goes down, your costs go down, your profits go up. People are selling more. It's kind of the magic formula if I have to sum it up, all of that. But the people are foundational.

Brett Linkletter (00:11:10):
Tell me this too, because I've heard this from a few different owners. The culture is obviously extremely important from an internal perspective, but also the culture that you're resonating with, your audience. I've asked a few clients of mine in the past is like, what are you selling? What is your offer? And 99% of the time it's going to be like we sell burgers, but it's the owners that are like, we sell burgers for people that are committed to healthy eating and X, Y and Z, whatever. And it's kind of like, okay, we sell grassed burgers that are made from this one source for people that care about their diet and want the highest quality ingredients, whatever. And the people that do that, from what we've seen, again, more successful, the people that really care about, it's not just a burger, but it's a burger with a, B, c, principles behind it, whatever.

Roger Beaudoin (00:11:59):
Let me add to that. I'm a consultant too on a limited basis when I have some free time, I love to give back and help clients in their businesses succeed. And the first question I ask is, what business are you in and what are you selling? And that's not a trick question, but as you can imagine, your audience can literally think, oh, I'm a restaurant owner, a general manager, and we sell food and drink. That's what you hear. And I stop 'em right there and I go, no. When I ran restaurants, I was not in the business of running a restaurant. I was in the business of running a business and those are two different things. And my products were not food and drink, they were entertainment consistency and a whole lot of good times. And that made all the difference. And there's another paradigm shift. It's like I had a whole different way of looking at the business, and I train my people in that too, deliver hospitality, give your guests amazing experiences that they rave about, create fans for your business, and then they'll spread the word on social media and the rest will take care of itself.

Brett Linkletter (00:12:53):
Yeah, I totally agree. So now that we've defined a little bit of that, let's talk about how do you pick your leaders? You're looking to grab someone that you feel like can lead the charge in some kind of capacity. How do you distinguish that? What's the process look like for you?

Roger Beaudoin (00:13:08):
Well, sometimes it's really easy. Sometimes you just see a fire in someone where they want to learn. They ask a lot of questions, they're eager to take on additional responsibility and they ask for it. So the prime example there is my very first wood-fired pizzeria was 1995 when I started it. I had a 15-year-old dishwasher who is literally the first person I hired. And within three weeks, this kid is asking me, oh, what else can I do here? Can you teach me some things I'd love to learn? Can I close the place up for you so you can go home early? He was asking for more responsibility. So I'm like, you know what? I'm going to trust this kid. I'm going to see what you can do. So three weeks after opening the doors for the very first time, this kid is sending the credit card batch.

(00:13:48):
That was a long time ago. He was locking up, he was making sure all the burners on the stoves were off and all the doors were locked and everything. And I literally got to leave an hour before he did. And then he wanted to learn, so can you teach me this? What about the numbers? How did the numbers work? That kid as a dishwasher, he rose up to be the kitchen manager in two of my concepts, and then he stayed with me for 15 years, and when he left, he only left me to start his own restaurant. So that was an obvious choice. No college education, high school diploma. I taught him, I kind of mentored this kid and he started his own restaurant. So that was the first thing. But then you just kind of recognize, okay, any business, I don't care what business we're talking about, there are three kind of employees in any business, the a's, the B's and the C's.

(00:14:33):
The C players are those who just show up for the paycheck half the time they're up back having a smoke, they're not doing your business any favors. They're not delivering amazing experiences to your customers, that sort of thing. The A players complete opposite personality, plus making friends, teamwork, respect, help others, great personalities, and they have experience in the business. You wish you had 20 more of those people. And then the B players have all those same attributes. Maybe they just lack the experience, they've never worked in a restaurant before, but they have the right approach. They're willing to learn, and that's where the mentoring and the shadowing comes in. So if you can put a B in front of a couple of players, everyone's got best practices, you might learn something from this one and something great from that one before you even turn 'em loose in front of a guest. There's a little bit of a cost investment there. You're paying people to literally train and watch and observe and shadow these amazing players, but boy, what a difference. That made for me. Question

Brett Linkletter (00:15:27):
For you too, Roger. Not to cut you off, but are you No, it's cool. I'm kind of curious. Have you ever used personality tests and what are your thoughts about them?

Roger Beaudoin (00:15:35):
I have actually taken several of them, but I can't say that I've ever put any of my people through them. It's been more of a gut feel thing. I guess where I'm going with this is you just sort recognize people that take initiative or their approach to the job. It just sets them apart from anyone else. Yes. Then if you create this company culture where that's your expectation, you set the bar high and a lot of restaurants and businesses fall short because there's no accountability. Okay, we got the leadership piece. Let's just say you're a leader. But now I hear a lot of complaints in this business, why don't people show up on time? Why do they call in sick? It's like, why can't I rely on them? It's like some days they're good and some days they're not so good because you never one made the crystal clear expectations and you need job descriptions to do that.

(00:16:22):
So you need job descriptions, you need performance reviews, you need recognition and rewards programs, and that's kind of the horsepower and the framework or the template that makes the accountability happen. Because if you've got a job description and if you sat down with someone, I always had three different pieces to a very effective job description. The first I called key success factors. What does that mean? It's a series of words or even a phrase that you expect the person to bring to the job to be most successful, and it might vary job to job. There might be some overlap between this job and that it might be personable. It might be hustle, eyes wide open, accurate cash handling, whatever it is. Those are the basics. And then you've got primary responsibilities for every single job. There might be fine line items, 10 varies on the job, but here's the kicker, next to every line item for every single job, I would sit down with each person.

(00:17:13):
I would read to them, this is what the expectation is in this responsibility, this is where the bar is. And I would ask them, do you understand it one and two, can you do this to the best of your abilities? And if they say yes, they initial that line, maybe a little training goes in there before they can answer, yes, I can do it. But after the training, if I get a signature on that line now as an owner, you should have a very solid understanding of what those expectations are in all of those jobs if you know your business right

Brett Linkletter (00:17:43):
From the inside. And real quick on this topic too, so are you creating when your job description that you're making for each position, how detailed is it? I mean, is it like a blurb? Is it like a big document? I mean is it multiple pages? What's that look like even? Yeah,

Roger Beaudoin (00:17:57):
It varies for the job. I mean some are more complicated than others, but when I'm talking about line items, it could be, I think you can sum up a primary responsibility in two sentences or even one. And if there's any sort of confusion or can you clarify that? I think when I'm reading those job description responsibilities, I'm bringing that responsibility to life for the person. I might even be demonstrating it on the line or wherever it happens to be, and that goes for the training. But I've got leaders that are in charge of each department that are also doing this. But once I've got five or 10 initials there and I've got a clear understanding of what those expectations were communicated to that person, you quickly notice if anything is going sideways and there's the accountability. Suddenly I'm a huge believer in praising in public and critiquing in private, and I never used the word criticize, right? Because a boss would criticize and say, Hey, you're doing it wrong. Go do it the right way. No, I have a conversation with someone and then I revisit the job description and I say, you're doing really great here, but on this responsibility you said you could do this and it's not happening. And instead of me telling them to go out there and do it the right way, I throw the ball in their court and I say, what can you do to get back on track?

Brett Linkletter (00:19:13):
And how often are you having these conversations by the way, in public with the rest of the team? Is it weekly, is it monthly? What's that look like for you?

Roger Beaudoin (00:19:19):
Yeah, so in the beginning, obviously if you have no job descriptions and performance reviews, you have to literally lay out the program and tell people how things are going to be and say you're going to be meeting with people. And again, this takes time. There's homework involved here, but I've created templates over the years for all the different jobs in the restaurants. So that's an easy process for me. But it took me creating the wheel for the first time. And then once people got used to the process, then the mentors would sort of bring the new people along and they would take people through the job description and say, this is how we do it and this is where the expectations are, and all that kind of stuff. So it wasn't just me or my leaders communicating. It was also the mentors and the people that were being trained were having all these interactions. And that's what built what I call the dream team over time. And then there were recognition and rewards programs too that really made the rubber hit the road because we had this culture going of leadership.

Brett Linkletter (00:20:16):
Well, lemme ask a question. Yeah, this is all incredible stuff, but what about the owner that's listening to this right now and thinking, I am so far off where he's going with this. I am in a state of I don't know how to run my team. I've never been a great leader. My team is unmotivated, the guy in that situation. I guess where would you guide him in where to start? Because this empowering his team? I mean, is it one of those things you, because lemme back up a little bit. Sometimes I think there's some people in my opinion that they're going to have it or they're not, right? It's very hard to turn a C player into an A player. At what point do you know as an owner you just got to scrap your team and start new and at what point do you know, hey, you know what, they're not good because I've been a bad leader with bad systems, but I think they can evolve into something great. Is there a way for you to know that? I mean, is there some way that something you look at to measure that or I don't know.

Roger Beaudoin (00:21:13):
Man, that's a great question. It really starts with wanting change in your organization and not being afraid to make the tough decisions. Because yes, I've had that problem and yes, not every person that ever worked for me stayed or fit the organization. So you need to come to this point of reckoning where you either think you can save that person or they just got to go. I used to have this sort of saying, weed the garden, and that means that no matter how good you are, there's always someone that's a little bit better. And I know things have shifted since the pandemic and now everyone's just, I'll take any warm body, short-staffed.

Brett Linkletter (00:21:49):
Exactly. But that's actually really hurting them in the longterm. Right? It is

Roger Beaudoin (00:21:54):
For sure.

Brett Linkletter (00:21:55):
On the topic of recruitment, by the way too. Yes. How does that work for you? Hey, in our business, we have a really great system that's worked for us and I've talked to some of our clients about it. But again, restaurant business is totally different than running an agency. As you know, you're well aware this is an area of opportunity for I think for a lot of our clients. What are your thoughts there? I mean, any special tips on how you go about finding the right person and going through the interview process? What's that look like for you?

Roger Beaudoin (00:22:24):
Well, that can happen two ways. So I'll go back to the very beginning because when I started that first restaurant, there was actually a hotel that was coming into this ski resort and they suddenly needed to hire hundreds of people. They needed housekeepers and concierges and valet parkers and bartenders and servers. And I'm opening this restaurant, I needed like 20 people and I'm like, everybody's going to go to this hotel, how am I going to find these people? And that was a challenge back then, as it is for some of your listeners now. And I thought, well, you can drive down any street USA today still and see any business USA and you'll see the sign now hiring up to 17 bucks an hour and the flags are flying and the signs are on the sign and in the windows, and that's hiring. And that is not the way to find people invariably,

Brett Linkletter (00:23:09):
I totally agree.

Roger Beaudoin (00:23:10):
If you get anybody in the door, you're getting someone else's seat player that didn't work out for them and now you're why bother? So recruiting, alright, let me answer your question. So 30 something years ago, my first restaurant, I hired this one server that was just on fire, a player all the way. And I said to her, God, I wish I had 20 more like you. Do you know anyone else either who works in the restaurant, a restaurant now or who's just like yourself that has that personality, has that approach. If you bring me one or two or 10 of those people, I'll give you a hundred bucks. So 30 years ago, a hundred dollars was a lot of money for a referral. And then I said, okay, if you bring me those people and if they last 60 days and if they assimilate our training and if they fit into our culture and they last 60 days from now and they're doing great, I'm going to pay that person 200 bucks. And that was a lot of money. And some people would say, oh my god, that's a cost. And I'm like, no, that's an investment in the future because turnover costs you far more. So that's recruiting. I still believe in that today and in my last business just before the pandemic we recruited as well, and it's a better way of doing it. So recruiting,

Brett Linkletter (00:24:17):
We've always had incentive like that as well. One thing we have done, just back to the personality test, which is kind of interesting, I was really like you two initially on the hiring side. And it's funny, I have a business partner and we're both very different in how we approach pretty much everything. I ying, he yangs, right? If I'm jumping up and he is ducking, we're just opposite and that's what really complied each other as far as being business partners. It's been awesome. It's very interesting. So I approach things very quickly. I'm like the bull in the China shop, I see where I want to go. I just charge towards it. And he's more methodical and thinks about, okay, well here's the variables involved. Maybe the straightforward route isn't the best, we should go around this way or whatever. And he actually got me really turned on to personality tests.

(00:25:00):
We've been using them for about almost two years now. I don't say we make every hiring decision based off of it, but what's really interesting, and it's not like some zodiac sign thing, it's not like, oh, they're an Aquarius, they're going to be this. It's pretty in depth and we've had almost a hundred percent success rate as far as what the test says is going to happen. And even employees where the test didn't say it was the best fit. We've gone through it a couple times and it's almost always failed for us with that employee. And I'll tell you what's made it really interesting. There's two tests we have are employee's sake. One is called disc, the second is called the Kolbe test, and disc is just how it's spelled. DISC. And then the Kolbe test is K-O-L-B-E. The D stands for kind of dominance, your ability to aggressively go into a conversation, take risks, whatever I is like interpersonal skills.

(00:25:56):
S is like structure and C is basically compliance. I like that structure and it's so interesting. And then the KOLBY is similar. It tests for your ability to have follow through on something you learned or how do you analyze data and then move from that? I'm the kind of person where I'm like, just give me the spark notes and let me run. My business partner wants to do all the research before he moves forward. So it's very interesting for us. But what I've noticed as far as let's say hiring sales reps on our team, they typically have a higher D and a higher, they have a lower lower C. Generally speaking account managers who like structure and working with an orally fashion less risk are higher S, higher C. Again, it's not a hundred percent of the time, but it's crazy how accurate it is.

Roger Beaudoin (00:26:44):
I'm sold on just what I'm hearing. It's

Brett Linkletter (00:26:47):
So interesting.

Roger Beaudoin (00:26:48):
And you've been doing this for years? The

Brett Linkletter (00:26:50):
Same about two years now. Okay,

Roger Beaudoin (00:26:53):
So your hit rate is huge.

Brett Linkletter (00:26:55):
Yeah, we have about 62 employees now, so it's super interesting. I don't know any restaurants listening to this. I don't know if DISC and Kolby are the best tests for some positions. Of course, like a dishwasher, probably not the best choice, but other maybe more leadership positions. It's interesting what you can learn about someone on how they take information and then implement it. Again, some people it's going to take them more time. And so you can go into the personality test knowing this is the kind of person that really wants all of the answers before they move forward. Or some people like myself, I'm like, Hey, just give me the two sentence deal that you're looking to accomplish and I'll get it done. It also tests for someone's ability to want to or desire to work on multiple projects at once or do one at a time. So it's been kind of interesting for me as a leader to look at this and understand someone's personality test before approaching them even. It literally tells you, this is the kind of person that thrives in a, B, C environments doesn't thrive in X, Y, Z environments. It's so interesting. Just

Roger Beaudoin (00:28:02):
Something to think about too. Does the interview come first? Do you do a first interview and if you like the person then you give 'em the personality test and then if they pass the flying colors and your partner interviews 'em or vice versa, what's your format?

Brett Linkletter (00:28:13):
It's, we've done a bunch of different models, but I think the way we do it now is we run ads to get employees, like LinkedIn ads or something. Someone then fills out an application, they go through the application process, send their resume. We actually ask them also to do a two minute video with a few questions about, I love that

Roger Beaudoin (00:28:31):
Position. I'm a huge believer in doing the video. Yeah,

Brett Linkletter (00:28:34):
I love it. And it's interesting because surprisingly enough, the video in itself is a test of not just can they present themselves and look appropriate, which matters in the restaurant space, as you can imagine, of course. But it's some people can't even figure out how do I record a video upload to YouTube unlisted and put it in this? And if they can't figure that out, I mean, damn, we're a marketing agency, they're not going to figure anything out. It's very, very interesting question for you too. Have you ever done any group interviews or you always do one-on-one?

Roger Beaudoin (00:29:08):
It's always been one-on-one for me.

Brett Linkletter (00:29:10):
Yeah, we've tried the group thing and I dunno, some people live by it and preach it. I think it's kind of weird. Yeah,

Roger Beaudoin (00:29:17):
I never got to know people. I also ask some unusual questions because people show up at an interview and they're almost prepared to give you the answer that they think you want to hear to get the job. And it's like, I want to cut through all that. And it's like, I really want to know about what accomplishment are you most proud of in your life? Yes. What are your goals? It's like where, and it's not that. Where do you see yourself in five years? It's like what's on your bucket list? What do you really want to do in life? And that cuts through the clutter. What would your favorite high school teachers say about you? Just,

Brett Linkletter (00:29:52):
Yeah, I like that

Roger Beaudoin (00:29:53):
Random questions and I got to know people that way.

Brett Linkletter (00:29:56):
Question for you two also about back to entrepreneurs, right? I think that's a really important point. Sure. And kind of the theme of this episode, I guess at this point. But it's awesome and I love it and it's something a lot of people struggle with to do within their company. What kind of structure do you have for, let's say a general manager that's been very successful for you in the past? Is there something financially, I know you said you've done a bunch of things in the past. What's that look like for you? I mean, someone who's going from again, one sort to two and they're like, I don't even know how to structure that incentive structure. What do you tell them? What's that look like?

Roger Beaudoin (00:30:32):
Well, we incentivized almost everyone in the business, which was really interesting. So let's start with the intrapreneurs. Got it. I would empower someone to take on a new project if I identified it that it was going to move the needle in some way. Either it was going to increase sales and revenue, it was going to cut costs, whatever it was. So I had, in the beginning of course, I had a bar manager, I had a dining room manager, I had a head host, the typical positions. And then I changed all that and I said, okay, I'm going to give you a piece of the action. If you can grow our business by x percent, I'm going to give you a percentage of x percent. So here's a good example. I identified a long time ago that a mug club was a huge opportunity because we had a big bar business and we served a lot of draft beer.

(00:31:17):
And I'm like, suddenly we can sell memberships and collect an annual fee for selling these mugs, and these people are going to become loyal and they're going to come in more often now because they bought the mug and we're going to give them some value added and a lot of great service along the way and incentives and all this kind of stuff. And that literally grew our business. So I said to my bar manager a long time ago, I'm like, I want to start a mug club. I'd like you to do it. So let's buy some mugs and sell 'em and let's grow this thing. And that's your responsibility. And if you can do that, I'm going to give you X number of dollars for every mug you sell. So the guy, he brought in like 25 mugs just to start, and once they came in, it's like he sold them out in the first day.

(00:32:00):
So we ordered more and then he sold those out. So we started with 25 mugs, and when I sold that, my biggest restaurant in 2014, he had built that club to 1,200 mug club members, and he got a piece of the action. We sold them for 50 bucks and I gave him five bucks for every mug he sold, and then he got five bucks on all the renewals every single year. So that was a nice little income stream for him. It was pure profit for us because again, the Mug Club was sponsored. I had someone put their logos on the mugs, so they paid for the mugs, they paid for the T-shirts, we just collected the membership cash gave the service, gave the value added. But here's the kicker, that was like $60,000 a year in free and clear cash. There was no cost against it other than the five bucks that I gave the guy the piece of the action. But we quickly noticed that people that used to come in maybe twice a month, three times a month are now in three, four days a week, and they're drinking their mug. And it was like Coral, they encouraged their

Brett Linkletter (00:32:59):
Friends. No, that's amazing. You know what I mean?

Roger Beaudoin (00:33:01):
Yeah. It sold itself after a while.

Brett Linkletter (00:33:04):
Well, okay, so I've had a lot of clients also ask about doing a membership program, asking me on how to make it work. Obviously your mug club was tremendous. What did that structure look like? What was I sign up, what do I pay and what do I get as a customer?

Roger Beaudoin (00:33:18):
Okay, so we have a complete course. Restaurant Rockstar Sells a Rock Your Restaurant program that literally if you're starting your very first restaurant, it's all the systems you need. If you've been in the business for a while and you're spinning your wheels and you're wondering why you're not making any money, it's all in there. It's everything I've learned in 30 years about running high profit restaurants. Awesome. But if you want to start a mug club, there's a complete course in the Rocky Restaurant program@restaurantaccess.com. But to answer your question, essentially the bartenders were primarily responsible to sign people up or you could do it through the website, but mostly the renewals came through the website annually, and it was very important for some reason to have a very low number. It was a very prestigious thing to have a number less than a hundred. When there's 1200 mugs, you don't want to be 1,186. You want to be number one, number 10, number 30, whatever. So people really fought for those low numbers. And then after a while,

Brett Linkletter (00:34:14):
The low numbers was the person that you joined. It'd be an order

Roger Beaudoin (00:34:17):
Program in the right. Oh,

Brett Linkletter (00:34:19):
Interesting.

Roger Beaudoin (00:34:19):
The first people that joined it was number one, number two, number 10, and so on and so forth. And as it grew, the numbers went up and all that. But then a year later, people had to renew and most of them did renew, but every once in a while someone wouldn't renew and we'd give them a short window of time where if you didn't renew, we're giving away your mug, and then people would fight to get those lower numbers. It became this hugely exclusive thing. The value added was That's awesome too. So we had a custom logo, t-shirt. It changed every year. It said mug member, it had the date on it, it had our logo, it had the sponsor logo on it as well. It was a really cool high quality. They got that

Brett Linkletter (00:34:56):
That was there. What technology was involved to do this? I mean, that's something I asked all the time. Well, can I just start a club? I was like, well, I don't know, maybe is there technology involved to do the recurring model and all

Roger Beaudoin (00:35:08):
That? Yeah, on the website, on the renewal page, because you can walk into the bar and just hand over your 50 bucks on a credit card or whatever, and we'll sign you up and we'll just enter you in the database and we'll give you your mug and all that happens in person. But if you want to sign up online, then you need a commerce platform like WooCommerce or something like that. And it's not super complicated, but any agency or any tech person could set it up for you. But that's how that worked. So there was value added, but then we had called the kickback card, and how that worked was it was a magstripe card that people would swipe through our POS system. You're a mug club member. Every time you come in, you present your card to your bartender or your server at a table every time you buy something.

(00:35:52):
And then the server will take that and swipe it through the POS and it automatically tracked your spending throughout the month, throughout the year. Got it. So we would award prizes for the biggest spending per month, all this kind of stuff. It was like an incentive program. Got it. It was like gift card loyalty. Same principle applied. And we would get free prizes from our biggest suppliers. We were spending hundreds of thousands of dollars with our food supplier, our beer, our liquor suppliers. Wow. We would ask them every year for prizes. They would give us all this valuable stuff and we would fill closets with this stuff. And then you could program these cards to randomly award a prize. Like you might be a mug club member, and you come in on a Wednesday, you swipe your card, and then all of a sudden the POS lights up, this person won a prize kind of thing. The bartenders would ring this big bell, say, Hey, you just won. Hey, let's take a trip to the closet we'd open to see anything you like, valuable merchandise. It was unbelievable.

Brett Linkletter (00:36:46):
Interesting. That was really

Roger Beaudoin (00:36:47):
Cool

Brett Linkletter (00:36:47):
Too. It's interesting to hear this too. Obviously this has been so amazing for you, but I hear all the time too, so many restaurant owners that tried to do some kind of loyalty club, and those more often than not, to be honest, fail them. But this isn't really a loyalty club. This is different. I mean, this just seems on a different level, I guess. Why do you think some people who try programs, why does it not work for them? What are they getting wrong?

Roger Beaudoin (00:37:13):
Well, it started a long time ago, that old school coupon book, okay, you buy five pizzas and you get one free. And then that suddenly became the model for loyalty clubs. And that's not innovative thinking. Okay. So I was using other people's leverage to create value for my customers in doing something completely different. I learned a long time ago, you don't ask, you don't get, and this whole idea started so long ago when I was at one of my suppliers, I think it was a liquor supplier, and I walked by a conference room and I saw all this valuable merchandise on the table, and there were neon signs for this liquor and that liquor, and there were really nice wearable clothing items, and there were some sporting goods. There was a pair of skis and a snowboard and a tennis racket and all this kind of stuff.

(00:37:57):
I'm like, what's all that? And the guy says, oh, well, we do business with all these companies and we ask them for prizes that we use for employee incentives, and it's a good problem to have, but we get more stuff. We get more merchandise than we actually can award to people, and we don't want to just randomly give it out unless people earn it. A lot of this stuff ends up collecting dust in the warehouse, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, you know what? I've been doing business with you for years. I probably spent a couple hundred grand with you on a year. Can I have any of that stuff? I asked for it. Next thing you know, the next day the truck shows up and all that stuff I saw on the table gets walked into my business. I'm like, that's cool. So the light goes off. I'm like, I'm going to ask all of my suppliers for amazing stuff, and then I'm going to create photo contests. When someone buys some of our retail merchandise, if they take a really creative picture somewhere interesting around the world wearing our stuff, they're going to win some killer prize. And that all this stuff created loyalty and raving fans. You know what I mean?

Brett Linkletter (00:38:56):
No, but that's huge. I mean, that's also way more fun than, Hey, come in five times to get a free pizza. It was super fun. Yeah, it was

Roger Beaudoin (00:39:02):
Super fun. Exactly. It was different.

Brett Linkletter (00:39:05):
And I know you've done a lot in marketing in the past, obviously, and I know you are kind of a marketing guru yourself, obviously. I talk to people all the time that have trouble marketing. That's kind of what we do. So I guess, where have you had the most success as it relates to specifically restaurant marketing? What has worked really well for you in the past?

Roger Beaudoin (00:39:24):
I'll tell you a crazy idea. I was at a convenience store one day, or maybe it was a supermarket, and lottery fever is still going on. They have these billion dollar jackpots now that you hear about, right? It's crazy. It seems like every time I go to a convenience store, the person in front of me is always trying to pick the roll of tickets. Do I want that one? Do I want this one? Everyone buys these tickets a long time ago. I'm like, wow. What if I create my own custom branded lottery ticket that looks like a lottery ticket? And it's one of those scratch off things where you pull off a quarter and there's all these little squares or circles on it, blah, blah, blah. And it's got my colors, my logo, it's got a catchy name, something sweepstakes, whatever it is. And it's like I put them in the check presenters after somebody paid their check, the server, the bartender would say, Hey, we're having this fun promotion.

(00:40:10):
Here's a lottery ticket. I hope you win. Well, what the customer didn't know was every ticket was a winner. So you might've scratched off the first circle and it said, try again, try again. And then on the third one, it says, you win bing, bing, bing. What did they win? Well, again, I was really obsessed with profit. And there are things called cash cows in restaurants that have high perceived value by the client or the customer, but they cost you very little to serve. They're byproducts of something else, whatever it is. But they're appealing items. I sold so much beer, draft beer from this one craft supplier that they gave me free kegs of draft root beer that I could then sell to the kids for three 50. I would get free kegs of root beer, and I could sell hundreds of glasses of root beer for three 50 at no cost to myself.

(00:40:57):
That's a cash cow. So I can give that stuff away to somebody as an incentive to bring them back in the door. So someone scratches it off, they win. They either put it in their wallet or they put it under a refrigerator magnet and they're like, oh, let's go back to that place one, it was fun. And two, we get a free, whatever it is, the average check was 75 or 80 bucks because usually two people come in, sometimes three, and then the check is higher. But over time, I tracked it, and the average spend was about 75 to $80 for something that cost me either nothing, or it was like 35 cents to make and give them, and they would spend 80. That was a genius idea.

Brett Linkletter (00:41:35):
Okay. Well, by the way, thank you for saying this because you just gave me a really great idea for our own product. So oh my God. By the way, just real quick, this is amazing though, Roger. This is brilliant. No, I'm serious. I've never heard anyone talk about this. Really.

Roger Beaudoin (00:41:51):
It was fun. It was exciting, and my customers loved it. It was like something different, something new. And that's the key word. Stand out from the competition. Be different,

Brett Linkletter (00:42:00):
Man. This is really good though. And the reason I'm excited also is our project, I dunno if you've seen, so our company's called din, right? But we also have a software product called dio, and we launched in January. So we're still early on, but we're growing tremendously. And one of the newest features that we just launched only a couple of weeks ago is called Dine Forms. And basically what it is, is DIO has a digital menu product that's meant for in-store. Use a QR code menu, right? Yeah, sure. The difference between ours versus your typical PDF QR code menu is the menu is extremely interactive. You can filter it based upon dietary restrictions. Let's just say you have a gluten intolerance. You can only see gluten-free items if you'd like. There is a review button on it. There's a lot of ways you can click on an item and get suggested items below that.

(00:42:45):
So it's really cool. But this dine forms feature, what you got me so excited about with this is we have a pop-up on the menu, and basically you're looking through the menu and it says, Hey, do you want to, so-and-so offer on your next visit, or do you want to join our email club? You can customize it however you want. People then put in the information, they get emailed this coupon or whatever you'd like to do. Maybe you don't do coupons, right? Sure. Well, man, this idea is brilliant. And the idea that we could put a lottery ticket in there. Would you like to opt into the lottery this month? I think the idea of what you said here though too is brilliant too, because people think that they're getting something special. They want something. I bet the chance of them coming back is tremendously higher. That's insane. That's really cool.

Roger Beaudoin (00:43:30):
Yeah. Our main goal was to capture, I hate the word customer also, I like to use the word guest. Anyone in my place, we want to deliver hospitality. We want to treat you like the guest. You're the most important guest. So yeah, it's about creating excitement, but it's also about creating so much value added that you stand apart from your competition. You create fun. I'm a huge believer in hooks. Also. I believe that every business can't have too many hooks. What sets you apart? What's unique, special, different about the way you do business or about something? We were at a ski resort in some of my restaurants, and we actually had a snowmaking gun that made snow on the dance floor when people were dancing to the rock bands. We had all kinds of crazy things that captured the pub. The phones come out and they're capturing the videos and they're going viral. Love this. Yeah, I mean, this is free marketing, right? It's like how wacky can you get? And I understand if you get a five star white tablecloth restaurant, you're not going to be doing this stuff. But if you've got a fun family casual place, the wackier the better. Set yourself apart from the competition. And that's what we did every day.

Brett Linkletter (00:44:30):
So another question for you on the marketing front. What about acquisition of new guests? How do you go about that? I mean, it's one thing to do something in store to bring someone back, but all the time our clients ask us, well, how do I go ahead and find brand new people? Sometimes it's like, I want young people. My clients are getting a little bit older. I want this type of guest. It just depends. But how do you go about that? Any kind of tips in that regard?

Roger Beaudoin (00:44:57):
That idea actually pre prefaced the lottery ticket idea. I actually did the idea I'm going to tell you about now. Before I did the lottery ticket, the lottery ticket, it was a way to get somebody back. But okay, this idea I only did when I wanted to drive new business to a new restaurant that I was opening just to seed the market, to capture the market share, that kind of stuff. I called it strategic alliances. I drove around a five mile radius of my new place, and I identified certain businesses that I thought that had a lot of high traffic, but they weren't restaurants. They were non-competing businesses. Maybe it was a tanning salon, maybe it was a certain retail store, maybe it was a movie theater. It could be any of those things. And I approached the owner or the general manager, and I introduced myself, and I'm like, Hey, I am Roger, and I'm starting this new restaurant, and I'd really like to give your customers something for free just to get them in to try my restaurant.

(00:45:53):
And I printed up these four color business cards, high quality stock, but it was a professional photograph of a hook, one of those amazing things that cash cow cost me virtually nothing to serve, but it had high perceived value. This is worth something. And I sold these things for 10 bucks on the menu, but the cost was something like 28 cents to actually sell it. So it was almost pure profit. Absolutely. So we took a professional photograph of that item, and then I had this hyperbolic copy, like, fantastic, amazing, stupendous, dah, dah, dah, absolutely free, $10 value, blah, blah, blah. So I had these coupons printed and I went to these strategic businesses, introduced myself, and I said, listen, if you pass these out, no obligation, you can just give them to your customers. And if you stamp the back somehow so I can track where it's coming from, I'm going to give you 10% back at my restaurant in trade for every dollar you drive in the door before tax.

(00:46:50):
So I had my office manager just kind of create a spreadsheet and track this stuff. I had my servers or bartenders staple the coupons to the guest check, and that was also a 75 or an $80 spend for 28 or 30 cents that drove a ton of business. Not every partner actually sent me a lot after a while. Some of them did amazing and some of 'em didn't. But the key ones, I had three or four that in a three month period of time drove somewhere between 10 and $15,000 in new business in the door customers that I may not have ever seen. And then I thought, okay, I got these people. I think we gave them amazing hospitality and great service. I hope they really liked the products. We serve them. And that's where the lottery ticket came in. Now you came in with this coupon when you leave, I'm going to give you the lottery ticket. I want to get you back again. And then my team took over. The company culture, the hospitality, all that kind of stuff, and the great, and the hooks and all the crazy stuff that was happening all the time. And the rock bands we had on weekends. We called it the three ringing circus. Now I got you. So we

(00:47:54):
Dominated the competition. I owned that business for 20 years. I sold it in 2014. I go back there now as a customer, 90% of my staff that I hired is still there. The guest that I knew for years are still, and I sit there and I just watch the magic happen and it's still happening because the guy that bought it from me was smart enough not to fix what wasn't broken. He kept it all the same. Oh,

Brett Linkletter (00:48:17):
Amazing. So it's so

Roger Beaudoin (00:48:18):
Gratifying to do that. You nurture, you build a business, you create intrapreneurs in a business, you create this really powerful thing and then you sell it, you exit out, and then you go back there as a customer and got a big smile on your face and you're still having fun.

Brett Linkletter (00:48:32):
That's amazing. That's so cool. It's cool.

Roger Beaudoin (00:48:34):
It

Brett Linkletter (00:48:34):
Is cool. I love it. No, it's super interesting and it is actually interesting for me to see. So I dunno if you know this about me. I spent a lot of time in Brazil. My girlfriend is Brazilian, and we're basically back and forth. We were almost basically 50 50 like three months here in Miami, three months in Lum Paulo, kind of back and forth. And what I've always thought was so interesting about the Brazilian restaurant market is how differently they operate. Because let's just say in the US here, a lot of times the way you're going to find new restaurant, if you're visiting a new town or whatever, is you look on Google, you search on Google, you check out the reviews In Brazil, no one really uses Google for that. In fact, it's scary how many people use Google for that. They're searching other things like watching the TV show Big Brother or something like that.

(00:49:18):
They love that show. It's hilarious. But I guess it's been interesting for me to see the differences and looking at the differences in culture and how they're approaching and how they're finding restaurants. Question for you, and this is something that is more of a newer thing, right? In Brazil, right? They're looking at more of an Instagram profile and judging a restaurant based on that because it's really photo heavy, right? In comparison to what you'll see on Google, what do you think about online marketing today and where is an effective place to be? Because that's the thing that obviously we focus on too. Again, for Brazilians, it's like Instagram is number one here as well too, but Google's a little heavier I think. What are your thoughts though? What are someone's trying to get started on social media or I guess one channel in particular? Is there one you in particular, or do you say you got to be a little bit of everything or what are your thoughts there?

Roger Beaudoin (00:50:07):
Yeah, I think you need a mix. And I exited out of that equation when I own these properties because I always knew that people younger than myself that were on these platforms constantly knew it better. They knew what to post, when to post, how often to post. And I gave them creative licenses long as they represented our brand on brand and on strategy. And they knew what our culture was and they took pictures of really cool stuff and they got really creative with it and they ran the social media campaigns and they were incentivized to do so, and that worked really well. So back then it was mostly Facebook and then it was Instagram and now I believe they're using TikTok. And I am hearing that TikTok is starting to make a difference with not younger people, but people that do go to restaurants that influence restaurant choices. Totally. And those are about quick hit, like short little, catch your attention right up front, give people reasons to stay watching and then drive 'em in the door. It looks like fun. So I guess my best advice is if you're not a social media guru, and if you don't really know where to start, chances are someone that works for you does and find the right person, get

Brett Linkletter (00:51:14):
Some help,

Roger Beaudoin (00:51:15):
Incentivize them to do it, and then make it fun and just make sure that you following the rules and that you're on brand and then watch what happens. But I, I'm think something to do

Brett Linkletter (00:51:26):
It, it's kind of a matter of if you don't know it, hire for it. Right?

Roger Beaudoin (00:51:31):
I didn't know it. I didn't. I was not a tech person, so I just said, you know what, I'm going to give that to somebody else. No,

Brett Linkletter (00:51:37):
I hear you. So next thing I also wanted to talk with you about was menu costing and profit analysis.

Roger Beaudoin (00:51:44):
Oh wow. Yeah. Oh wow.

Brett Linkletter (00:51:46):
This is something we get asked all the time, and I'll be the first to say, it's not my expertise. So

Roger Beaudoin (00:51:52):
What an opener.

Brett Linkletter (00:51:53):
Yeah. What are some techniques for effective menu pricing that you would recommend? So

Roger Beaudoin (00:51:59):
We have a course for that as well, and there's a template that walks you through the process and makes it simple. But it really starts with costing out your menu. And I can't tell you how many restaurants, this is one of the, I've always said the restaurant business is one of a thousand details, okay? Because it really is. But there is nothing more important because there are people with volatility in the markets and cost of goods and rising costs and inflation and the highest labor costs we've ever had to pay in the restaurant business. We're paying line cooks 25 bucks to start in certain markets and that's cost prohibitive. And you can't control that stuff other than efficient scheduling. You cannot control those wages and paying that kind of money. But the biggest needle mover, the one thing you can control is how profitable is your menu.

(00:52:44):
Because you could have a busy restaurant, you're filling your seats and you're spinning your wheels wondering why is my bank account not growing, losing money, selling half the stuff because I don't know what it costs me to sell the customer this or that. Okay, so the template works like this. We teach you how to cost out your menu, which is kind of like reverse engineering. Every ingredient that goes into every single item, every restaurant knows that there's different categories, there's appetizers, some people call 'em starters. There's soups and salads, burgers and sandwiches, entrees, desserts. Those are all categories. I consult on this often and I find that there is a spread, a difference in profit among items in each category. One appetizer might kick in a $3 profit, another might kick in a $5 profit. What people don't realize is most of the time the lower profit items are bigger, more popular sellers, and they're taking sales away from what you could be selling that contributed two or three bucks more.

(00:53:37):
So you've got a person sitting at a table and they're ordering everything that's not really contributing a ton of money, but they're taking up space for an hour, an hour and a half when you could be selling them and maximizing your throughput. So the template works like this. We teach you how to cost out the menu, and then we have an automated calculator that ranks things in every category most to least profitable. Once you identify in every category, which things are the most profitable, the first thing you do is you train your staff to make those recommendations. Every time my favorites are these, or you're going to love this, or those are guest favorites, you make that suggestion at the table and you swing the decisions from the lower profit items to the more profitable. You can do that immediately. Okay? You plug all this information into this template and then every restaurant has a point of sale system.

(00:54:27):
It'll give you data over a period of time. So if you change your menu once a year, you got 12 months of data, you change it twice a year, you got six months of data, the more data, the more telling the information. You take volume of sales from a product mix or a sales report, you plug that into the template and then you press the go button and it automatically shows you where you're making and losing money every single day in every category. It shows you the spread difference from the most profitable entree to the least profitable. So to end this very long conversation, I'm going to give you two examples from some recent clients I worked with. These are two restaurants that were similar. They did a busy lunch business and a busy dinner business. They were sort of high-end places. They sold steaks, they sold seafood, all that kind of stuff.

(00:55:12):
So they were both under just under 3 million a year in annual sales. One was like 2.8 mil, the other was like 2.9, two five, very similar. So I ran this exercise with them and we plugged all their information into the template. And when I pressed the go button, I showed both of them. One of them left a potential profit last year of $343,000 on the table, and the other one was about 365. What an eye opener that is because I could show them in every category your lower profit items, the volume of sales is much higher. It's taking sales away from what you want to sell. So yes, not everybody is going to want to get the seafood stuff, shrimp, which is the most profitable item. But the key is there's several things you can do to reduce that spread and create a menu where everything is within a dollar of each other. Not three bucks lost here, five bucks on the entree side. Some of these restaurants were losing as much as $12 because they sold this item versus that one. Wow. So if you can redesign that menu where everything contributes a dollar at the difference, a dollar. So interesting. You don't care what you're selling, it's like as long as you, man,

Brett Linkletter (00:56:20):
God, I would love to show you our product on another call too, because God, if we could just get your brain to plug into some of the technology stuff we're doing on the backend, oh, this is just music's my ears, which is really cool. I mean

Roger Beaudoin (00:56:34):
This

Brett Linkletter (00:56:34):
Thing, yeah, I got to show you this product, but it's interesting for me also because to hear this and think it makes so much sense and no one's thinking this way, right? No one, literally no one.

Roger Beaudoin (00:56:47):
That's the NBA side. I was obsessed with profit. I was obsessed with hospitality and training my team and creating this culture. It's like I focused on those things. Those were the systems that moved my needle. And when I sold those restaurants, I cashed out because it was a turnkey business. It's like it ran itself. The entrepreneurs ran the business. The person that owned it could work there or not, could go on and start other businesses like I did. It's like that was a powerful formula. But you need the systems, their foundation

Brett Linkletter (00:57:14):
100%. It's weird for me though also to be in this business that we're in, and I'll tell you this, one of the first things we ask a client about when they first sign up with us is, okay, what are you doing in monthly sales in store? What are you doing in monthly sales across all your other rev channels such as catering, private events, online orders, almost nine times out of 10, they don't even know. So we have to plot it out for them and just walk through each process because someone will come to us and they'll say, Hey, I just want to get a lot of catering sales with you guys. And we say, okay, we can help you do that. What percent of your sales are now we're catering. And either they don't know at all, never even thought about that for even a second.

(00:57:54):
Or it's like, ah, we're getting one or two orders a month. And well, that ends up being like let's just say three 4% of their entire business. And so what that means also is that, well, we can help you get that up a little bit, but it sounds like it's never really been a big thing for you, so it's going to be a little more difficult. Maybe we start with the in-store, build that up and then we can remark on the backend that you do catering. But it's interesting to think about because like you just said, no one is thinking about it that way.

Roger Beaudoin (00:58:19):
They're not running businesses, Brett.

Brett Linkletter (00:58:21):
Exactly. That's how

Roger Beaudoin (00:58:22):
We started this whole thing. Are you running a restaurant or are you running a business? What are you selling? It's like, what are you doing differently? And it's like, are you tied to this place missing your kids' high school soccer games and graduations and stuff? Because working the store seven days a week, killing yourself saying, I'm trapped. What do I do now? It's like I made it through the pandemic, but I don't love this business anymore because I'm always here and I'm missing my life go by. That kills me to see that kills me. Roger,

Brett Linkletter (00:58:49):
What do you think about this? What are some opportunities you see today that are you think just some really quick wins that someone could be taking advantage of that maybe weren't available even just four or five years ago? What are some of the new things that you see a lot of brands doing that have been really great and successful for them? In particular, some recent wins.

Roger Beaudoin (00:59:09):
I'm a big fan of entertainment and creating not just a reason to go into a restaurant just to order food and drink. It's like if you can create an entertaining experience, one, it brings people again, but two, it keeps people spending more in your place longer if you've got the seats and if you've got the space. So we had lots of hooks. I mean, we were family friendly, so we had a whole sort of game area with arcade games. It was a separate profit center because parents wanted to have a nice meal on their own without the kids bugging them. So they were handing the kids 10 and $20 bills to put in the change machine. And we had those candy crane games and the stuff, stuffed animal cranes and the advanced video games and all that kind of stuff. We set room aside for that.

(00:59:54):
And I guess not everyone has the real estate for that, but then we had the stage and we had live entertainment, so suddenly we could charge cover charges at the door to have the best rock bands in the area, and we would fill the place for that. And then the mug club add value added, I told you about that kickback card the mug club member had totally. They also could use those to get VIP admission without paying the cover charge and cutting the velvet rope line and walking right in. They're the VIPs, which what happened that sold more mugs, then those people would come to the entertainment. So it's like entertainment is huge for sure, and I've seen it a lot. So you asked, what have I seen? So a friend of mine in Chicago is an investor in some really hot concepts right now.

(01:00:37):
And I visited three of them in Boston, and one of them is called Flight Club, and it's like the coolest dart concept you've ever seen. So it's like a pub with really great food, really great service, but it's fully automated like darts and that keeps people entertained. And then we went down the street and then they had something called Putt Shack, and it was started by the top golf people. And Putt Shack is miniature golf on a whole nother level. I would call every single hole like a kinetic sculpture where there was a drum kit and you tap the ball and it bounces off the bass drum and the snare drum and this drum and that drum, and then it drops into the hole if you hit it just right. All kinds of crazy features, not your grandmother's miniature golf course for sure. And that was huge. And then the third concept, I'm a huge Formula one racing fan. You have a F1 racing in Miami. You know what that's all about? Yeah, of

Brett Linkletter (01:01:28):
Course. So fun.

Roger Beaudoin (01:01:30):
So they have a concept called F1 F1 arcade. And you walk in there and there's all these F1 simulators. They cost thousands of dollars a piece. Oh, wow. And it's the most incredible virtual reality racing things you've ever sit in. And they shake and they move and you can crash into cars and all that kind of stuff. But again, it wasn't just the hook of that entertainment. It was hospitality at the highest level delivered by people that cared, that had really great food. The menus were top notch, the drinks were awesome. And I'm like, wow, every one of these is a winner. It's like huge. That's what I'm seeing. I'm seeing not just food and drink, but again, hook. What are your hooks? What's different? What sets you apart from the competition? What's going to bring somebody back again and again where they want to keep coming and most importantly, they're spreading the word on social media, on online reviews, all that kind of stuff. And they're building your business for you. That's what marketing is all about today.

Brett Linkletter (01:02:27):
Yeah, it's interesting. And one thing I've seen, which is just obviously blowing up, is ai, right? Yeah. Oh yeah. Do you have any thoughts about AI right now in the restaurant space? I mean, do you see it innovating anything right now? Can you see it innovating and changing anything in the future? What are your thoughts there?

Roger Beaudoin (01:02:43):
Yeah, I think that goes back to the loyalty question. I've always been a huge fan of one, making friends with your guests and then creating that loyalty through your people so that people want to ask for your guests, want to ask for your best people by name. Oh, I want Michelle, is she on tonight? I want her to serve my table. All that kind of stuff. So the AI piece recognizes people's habits and what they like and even their birthdays and special events so that you can dazzle the guests by just knowing something special about them that touches them in a personal way. And I think that's the key of using ai. And I know I feel special. I was just on family vacation. We were in the Greek islands with my family last week. Amazing. And we stayed at this really nice hotel and it's like the hospitality was over the top, and it's like every time we went into this beautiful open air restaurant looking at the a Gian C, they remembered us. They remembered our names. They remember what we had for breakfast yesterday. They asked, would you like the french toast that you enjoyed so much yesterday? It was like amazing. They knew Which

Brett Linkletter (01:03:49):
Island did you want, by the way?

Roger Beaudoin (01:03:50):
We went to Menos.

Brett Linkletter (01:03:51):
Nice. I love

Roger Beaudoin (01:03:53):
Menos. Always a good time. We're on mics

Brett Linkletter (01:03:55):
For sure. What what's interesting though is I feel like here in the US we think that our restaurants here are using the best of the best tech, and we're way ahead of the curve. But then you go somewhere like Menos, you have that kind of experience where me and Brazil, it's interesting what the world is doing, and it's been interesting for me to see honestly sometimes how close-minded the US is to the rest of the world. To be frank. I mean, going back to Brazil, Brazilians, were doing the point of sell at the table 20 years ago. Now it's different because you don't want to hand your credit card to someone in Brazil. They walk away with it and they might not come back ever. So that's why they did it. But here in the US, I still see so many restaurants. You get'em their credit card, they walk in the back and they bill you. Why are you not bringing a point of sale to the table? It just, I don't know. It's interesting. It's interesting to see how far behind we still are in so many ways.

Roger Beaudoin (01:04:44):
Yeah. Now you're talking about efficiencies and throughput also. It is also about not only getting great experiences, but turning the tables and maximizing your revenue on a daily basis. And I was obsessed with that too. But yeah, tech is definitely constantly evolving. There's so much. If you go to the NRA show every year, it's like 80% of it was tech. What's new? What's this? It's robots, it's artificial intelligence, it's augmented reality, it's all this kind of stuff to, and that's all well and good with a caveat. It's like I would never want technology to replace the human interaction and the personal touch and the hospitality piece. If it can enhance it, great. If it takes away from that just to make it quicker, faster, whatever, I'm not a fan of it

Brett Linkletter (01:05:26):
A hundred percent. No, I agree, man. It's interesting. I hate the concepts before you go and you have to order through the menu at your table. I'm just like, can I just talk to you, please? I know. Yep. For sure. Well, with all this be said, Roger, any other last minute thoughts? I know you have your podcast, you got a course. Honestly, I think I'm going to be a customer. I want to get the course too. I want to check it out from what you've told me today, I've learned a ton. I would love to, it's chat with you on another time and just show you what we have as well and get your thoughts. I mean, I think I've learned a lot personally about what you've done and what you're doing. How can someone listening to this who also wants to learn more about you, how do they connect with you? What does that look like?

Roger Beaudoin (01:06:08):
Well, there is a part of me that I mentioned loves to give back. And if any of your audience are listening and if they have any particular questions or anything I can help them with, they can reach me through my email address, which is R-O-G-E-R, at restaurant rock stars.com. That's our website of course. And then like I said, everything we talked about today is included in that program called the Academy at that website. But the podcast is also called Restaurant Rock Stars podcast. And just like you can sign up, it's on Apple, it's on iTunes, it's on Spotify, it's everywhere. You can look for it, but you can also get it in your email inbox every week if you opt in on our website. And we won't spam you, but you can get the podcast. And what sets us apart is we release it as both a video because some people like to watch. You and I are interacting right now on video. You can watch me speak and you speak and all that kind of stuff. And also in audio, if you're walking the dog or driving to work, you can listen to it. So that's the RSO podcast. So yeah, I

Brett Linkletter (01:07:11):
Love it. I love it, man. Six

Roger Beaudoin (01:07:12):
Years, 400 episodes and every week we do a new one.

Brett Linkletter (01:07:16):
Oh my God, I got to get on your game, man. That's incredible. So yeah, I will definitely be sure to put your website, your email as well on this podcast. Thank you very much. Awesome, Roger, thanks so much for your time, man. Again, learned a lot and looking to connect soon. For sure.

Roger Beaudoin (01:07:29):
Right on. Yeah, I hope your audience listening just rediscovers the passion of this business. It is a passion of pride and everyone just building that teamwork and that respect, and it's so gratifying when your business is just running on all cylinders. You need systems to do that, and hospitality is the foundation of everything. So thanks for having me on the show.

Brett Linkletter (01:07:49):
I absolutely agree. Thanks a lot.

Roger Beaudoin (01:07:51):
Right on.