Brett Linkletter (00:00:00):
Hey guys. In this episode I interview Christian J. Fisher. Man Christian is incredible. He has been in the food service industry for over 35 years. He's a chef, he's an educator, he's an author, he's a business trainer and podcaster, and in this episode we discuss a number of topics from elevating yourself from a chef to an entrepreneur, what it means to make that transition from working in your business versus on your business. We talk about the future of the restaurant space. We talk about what's coming. We talk about what you should be paying attention. Now in the next couple years, Christian has a very interesting way of how he approaches helping restaurant owners grow their businesses, and I think he shares a lot of information I think that you can really gain if you're looking to move from one store onwards, because hey, when you're going from one store to two, you're literally doubling the size of your business overnight, and there's a lot that goes into that. He's got a lot of insights around this. We also talk about the future of the restaurant space and how AI might be playing a role in that, on how AI might be suggesting certain places based upon your dietary needs or restrictions. We talk about so many interesting topics that I really think you're going to enjoy. So without further ado, let's dive right in.

Brett Linkletter (00:01:29):
Hey, my name is Brett Linkletter, CEO and Co-founder of Dine Line, 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,

Brett Linkletter (00:02:39):
Christian, how are you?

Christian Fischer (00:02:41):
Good. How are you doing today, Brett?

Brett Linkletter (00:02:43):
I'm good, man. I'm really good. I was really enjoying the 4th of July break recently because man work has been a lot and I actually just got a new puppy recently and

Brett Linkletter (00:02:53):
Congratulations.

Brett Linkletter (00:02:55):
Thank you. Between the puppy and we're also remodeling my kitchen actually in my apartment. It was just like work the kitchen remodeled the puppy. She's playing in the construction with the construction workers half the time. I'm like, I just need a moment where we can hopefully get the construction in order plus get the puppy a little more organized. But yeah, man, I'm doing really well. I'm very excited to chat with you.

Christian Fischer (00:03:17):
Congratulations on the new edition. My little puppy is sleeping there. She's 14 now, so she became our office mask up, so

Brett Linkletter (00:03:23):
She's hanging

Christian Fischer (00:03:24):
Out with me here in the office today.

Brett Linkletter (00:03:26):
Oh, perfect. Yeah, she was here and I got rid of her because the last podcast I did, she was kind of acting a little crazy, so she's still only 13 weeks, so she's sleeping and then she wakes up and then she's just insane. A

Christian Fischer (00:03:39):
Hundred percent. Yeah,

Brett Linkletter (00:03:42):
I love that. But Christian, I'm very excited to chat with you, man. You have a lot of interesting, you have so much interesting experience here. I think we're going to discuss you also, I know you're a former chef. Are you still a chef also? You're still a chef also.

Christian Fischer (00:03:56):
I think it's like everything else. So if he wants a chef, he will always be a chef, so I'm still in the food industry play a lot. So yeah, at the end of the day, I'm just a cook.

Brett Linkletter (00:04:05):
Yes. Yeah, no, but you're a cook and you're doing a lot of different things and I'm excited to chat with you about all these things. Well, I guess for everyone who doesn't know much about you though, can you give us just a quick introduction, just like you were saying, I know you came from Austria. Tell us a little about your story and how you came to be where you are today.

Christian Fischer (00:04:23):
That's really good. So first off, thanks a lot for having me be really excited to collaborate with you and I'm really excited for this conversation. So my name is Christian, I'm native Austrian, so if you haven't picked it up on the accents, I grew up in Austria. My parents had a hotel. I grew up in the food industry and my dad made me become a chef. He says, you know what, you need to be a chef because in order to be a chef, you always have people which want to have good food. There's always going to be work and you can do so many different things. At the time I was 14, I thought he was out of his mind, and now I think he's a genius, but started in the industry as I was 14, I did a six year apprenticeship, graduated on the top of my class.

(00:04:59):
I became the second youngest European master chef at the time. I opened up my first restaurant at 19, had six by the time I was 23, and then a company named Nestle came and said, Hey, we love your restaurant concept. We want to buy it and bring it to the US and make it the concept for STO hotels at the time for the f and b. And I was like, this just makes no sense. I'm not really sure. Then they wrote me a check and offered me a job for 20 years, came with them to the us, worked with them for 18 years, did 17 countries in 18 years for them, and then they asked me to move back with them to Brazil or to Austria. And at the time I was married, so my wife is American, I've adopted children from China. So we had some kids at the time, so I had to say no.

(00:05:44):
And one of my customers at the time was Compass Group, which was still the largest food service company, and I was the chief culinary officer for them for 18 years at the height, managed three and a half billion in food and beverage. Then Covid happened, and I always had a side hustle. I had a culinary nonprofit, which is the Culinary Leadership Academy where we teach chefs life skills and stress management. We started in 2011 because I lost a really good friend of mine, and then a friend called me and said, Hey Christian, we need to start something to give back to the industry during Covid. So we hosted free mastermind classes to teach people life skills and if they want to start a business, so we help them with business. And out of that somebody said, I want to write a book. I says, oh, you know what?

(00:06:28):
I wrote books. We taught people how to write books. Since I have 34 books on the market and 34 books, we started a publishing company, which is the premier hospitality publishing company. Oh my God. And what we do is we teach chefs how to write a book in eight weeks and we help them to write a book, not de book. So we have a little bit of 400 students, which went through our program and it became a little bit of everything. So then I started a food. So we have now our GPOI support a few international companies with technology, a company which makes a really cool product, which is an encapsulated oil molecule. I work with a company out of Israel where we 3D print stakes. I work a company out of Singapore, which has some really cool new ways of looking at plant-based products. So we are doing a little bit of everything. And today, out of Covid, we built 16 different businesses. We,

Brett Linkletter (00:07:23):
Oh my God,

Christian Fischer (00:07:24):
Managed as a company and by default we became a media company. So we have a media company now. We help have our consulting division. We have now a talent agency where we help celebrity chefs come into the US market. And just most recently we started our first ice cream company called Chill Craft, creamy Handcrafted Happiness. So we make CBD and DHC ice cream for the marketplace.

Brett Linkletter (00:07:48):
Wow, that's awesome, man. I love it. So Covid was pretty good for you guys then in that sense. It sounds like a lot came from Covid.

Christian Fischer (00:07:55):
Yeah, for me, I over said Covid happened for me, not to me because Covid really gave me the opportunity to do what we do and it'll be four years after. And so many other chefs, if you want to do something, do it now because I should have done it 10 years ago. Not during Covid, but Covid was really good to us.

Brett Linkletter (00:08:13):
Wow. But that's cool, man. I love to hear that because obviously the whole food space, it was pretty brutal during Covid, obviously us too as well. I mean, it was, man, we almost broke. I mean, I think at the time we only had 14, 15 employees. We got down to a total of six people. I mean, it was brutal. I felt so bad. We had so many new people that just joined the team and then I mean, what do we do? It was just a brutal situation. We had clients leaving left and that there was nothing we could do. I mean, they were closing down. It was awful. It was sad. But man, this is very interesting. So you mentioned, okay, you're teaching chefs life skills and stress management. What does that look like? What kind of life skills are you guys typically? So

Christian Fischer (00:08:55):
There's a few things. Just look at really simple industry stats. Nine out of 10 restaurants fail. It's not because they don't make amazing food is the chefs or the culinary schools never teach what goes with it. HR piece, the finance piece, the people management piece, and then also how to design and build out a kitchen. None of that is ever taught in the industry. And in my lifetime, I had the opportunity to do a lot of that for some different companies. And we, in my years with Compass Group, we had about 400, $500 million in projects running all the time. And we designed spaces, we design concept, we design franchisees and franchises. So for us, I took all of that learning because I had the opportunity to do that as a career. And I want to teach chefs because I honestly feel that every chef is one skill, one connection or one strategy away to have a total different lifestyle and a total different career. And we all need somebody who sees in us what we don't see in ourselves, and that's what we provide for the industry.

Brett Linkletter (00:10:01):
I love that man. And by the way, I would totally agree. I mean, we tell people that all the time. We're all in the marketing front obviously. But it, it's interesting because a lot of people tell me, I don't get it. We got great food, we got great service. Everyone says they like us, but we're just not growing. I mean, the bottom line is not moving at all, or we've been stuck here since Covid or we've never been back to where we used to be pre covid. And I think you're right. It's usually one or two things away from really getting to the next step, I guess. What do you think are the most common pitfalls you see in that area? What is typically holding someone back?

Christian Fischer (00:10:34):
I think our industry, and you probably see it as much as we do chefs, a very unique breed of people. I always compare ourselves to the military. I had the opportunity, my father-in-Law was the senior master sergeant for the Air Force. So I spent a lot of time with the military and I always said, oh my God, chefs are just like people from the military. You don't ask no any questions. You show no fear, you're going to get it done. And it doesn't matter what happened, you get the shit done. And it's perceived a weakness to raise your hand and say, yeah guys, I need help. So what I feel and what we teach people, so if we come to in one of our mastermind groups, we have 12 members usually in the groups, and we have somewhere between 150 and 200 years of experience with all the people in the room.

(00:11:19):
So everybody has unique circumstances. Everybody had to overcome a unique experience. So if you are in that same, there's a very good chance if you raise your hand and say, Hey, I don't really understand the difference between scaling and growing in my restaurant. And somebody could say, oh, I can do, because I thought it was this. You know what? I lost it because I didn't understand what it was, but now I learned it. Let me three years to learn it. Let me show you how to end a conversation. So for us, what I think the number one thing for chefs is they think they know it all. They feel like they need to do it all on their own. It's not true. Get yourself people, which are better in things than you are. And chefs also think we great marketing people. I have never seen a great chef

Brett Linkletter (00:11:59):
Market. I agree. Agree. I can 100% agree with that.

Christian Fischer (00:12:03):
So you know that. And so for me, I think that's one of the pitfalls that the industry looks at up on chefs, that it's a weakness for me to say, you know what? I need some help here. Not just do I need help. I need to get myself a mentor. I need to get myself a coach, whatever you want. I currently have three mentors. If somebody would've explain to me that they can help you scale much faster than on your own, I would've done this 20 years ago. And so that's how we support the industry. I

Brett Linkletter (00:12:32):
Love that. I love that, man. It sounds to me also, I mean I totally agree, it is just a lot of chefs working also too much on their business versus in it or in it versus on it, right? I mean, I talked to a lot of people this in the past, but a lot of owners have told me, going from one store to two stores, one of the biggest struggles because they're doubling the size of their business and they're also learning that, wait, I'm one person. I can't be in two stores at once, right? Holy shit. I got to somehow figure out how to replace myself. And that's the first big step for a lot of people, right? I mean, would you agree? It's like you're doubling overnight basically. Yes.

Christian Fischer (00:13:07):
Spot on. I'll be working with a young lady. She has a really cool concept. Mom is Puerto Rican, she's Peruvian. And so she made these healthy market type concept. I go there all the time, love the flavors, love how they looking at food, and she wants the scale. And as we started working with her, she says, oh, I don't think I'm ready to scale because I don't want to let go. What do you mean if you want to let go? I don't want to teach them my stuff because then they know my stuff.

Brett Linkletter (00:13:33):
Oh my

Christian Fischer (00:13:34):
God. I don't want to teach them my system because then they know my systems. And I think the hardest thing for chef is to go from one to two to let go. Because if you try to manage, you heard it said the person which chases two rabbit catches none. It's just really letting go. And I think that's an industry specific thing. And she said it straight up. He said, I don't think I'm ready because I am not ready to let go. That's

Brett Linkletter (00:14:01):
So interesting. But what's interesting about what you're saying, I totally agree with you. They really think they know it all. I talk to people all the time that say, you know what? I've never needed marketing. I've always been so good. And I was like, well, what's the best you've ever done? What's your best month? 120 grand. Now for some people, hey, maybe that's great. Others, that's nothing, right? I mean nothing. So it is all relative. And I think to your point, you don't know what you don't know. You got to seek some help. I personally, man, I don't even know what we've spent our business over the last 10 years. We probably spent close to 300 grand. And it comes to coaching, consulting, even me and my partner at this point, it's not even a question of whether we're going to do coaching or not in the future. We just will. We know something we're going to hire to fix that problem we have or we're going to learn how to do it and then teach someone else, right? It's a

Christian Fischer (00:14:57):
Standard what us. Yeah. I think that what makes us unique because we are looking at the same way. We have an annual budget visa. It's a quarter million dollars. We belong currently to a mastermind, $75,000. And I also realized if people don't pay, they don't pay attention. I started as I went to my very first mastermind at the time, it was 300 bucks a month. I was like, oh shit, how am I going to afford 300 bucks a month? And the information they gave me was great, but 300 bucks a month wasn't a pain point. Now we pay 75 grand to be part of that. We need to get ourselves through the event. So it's really a hundred, $120,000 mastermind. Okay? So you better believe it. There's a few guys there which scaled. And when they scaled, they said, oh, we went from 8 million to 14 million and Amazon, how the fuck did he do that?

(00:15:47):
And they said, it's actually not that hard. And I think it's Tony Robbins who says proximity is power. And it's so true. If you hang out with people which play a different level game now I laugh about 300 bucks. 300 bucks is stupid. Exactly the access it buys me, it's not about the money because if they give me advice, it's worth a hundred grand, not 75 would be paying for it. And out of the 12 people, which bought my group, three of us have two businesses together. And I think more is to come because you probably noticed that as you become more successful, your circular of friends become smaller. In my age group, I spent some time with a really good friend of mine, he's talking about retiring. I said, what are you retiring? I'm talking about scaling. What do you mean you're retiring? And I think we are a different breed or we think differently. And so if you asking me, I think that's just sets a apart because you're the first guy I heard in a long time said, I spent 300 grand on bringing in this somebody to learn something. I think that's the way to scale.

Brett Linkletter (00:17:05):
Yeah, it's really interesting. My background was in e-commerce before I was selling stuff like sunglasses or whatever online. And the one thing I loved about e-comm was, man, it's like it was 20, I remember it was like 20 16, 20 17, 20 18, those three years, damn, if you did an e-commerce business and you had a decent product, you could scale through ads like no freaking other. And it was the glory days. I mean, dude, you could put up a pair of glasses online with a white background that said buy these and people would buy it and convert really high. So it was the

Christian Fischer (00:17:41):
Glorious

Brett Linkletter (00:17:43):
And it was interesting. It was such a new industry. And I went from that industry, which was like there was something new every and everyone was coaching and teaching and everyone was so open-minded to it. It was just the standard. And then I went to restaurants. And to your point, I think, I know it's an industry thing because no one in restaurants wants to do anything new. And they're like, well, this has been our family business for the last 150 years, or this is how we do things. It worked 10 years ago. Why doesn't it work now? I'm like, is that a real question? Is that a real question? I mean, I'm serious.

(00:18:16):
It's wild to me. So I totally see what you're saying and I get it. And to be honest, I don't know a lot of other restaurant masterminds. I think what you're doing is really cool and unique and I respect it because I see the need for it every day. I tell my sales reps all the time, we're not just selling a marketing service and advertising service to grow someone's company. We have to do a lot of business coaching and consulting in general just to get their head to wrap around what does it mean to have a cost per acquisition? What is a good profit margin? What does it mean going to have a higher profit margin because you have a higher revenue that month? I mean, there's some of these basics that to your point, a lot of these guys, it's hard to get their head to wrap around it or even open up their head to be open-minded to learn these things. Really.

Christian Fischer (00:19:11):
Yeah, I spun on, I couldn't agree with you more because if there's one thing Covid did to our industries, our consumer changed overnight and the way people consume restaurants today is different than it was pre Covid. The way people consume experiences is different than pre covid. And in our restaurants and even here with my office, we don't call ourselves food service professionals. We are architects of memories, everything. What we do is we help people create memories. And that's our slogan. We said we call ourselves architects of memories.

Brett Linkletter (00:19:46):
I love that, by the way. That's so cool.

Christian Fischer (00:19:49):
Because we need to be memorable. And also we learned if you don't live on the phone, you don't exist. So that was really a big learning curve for me. Also, I'm from a generation just do it. If you build it, people will come. We built it. Nobody came.

Brett Linkletter (00:20:07):
Some people have already told me that before and I'm like, come on, really? And we were

Christian Fischer (00:20:10):
Like, we need to build bigger. Great idea. We built bigger and still nobody came. And then we realized that we needed to become our own cheerleaders, and that's where our media company came from. I have four people now doing media for us because nobody does it for you. And I think that's where the restaurant industry has the biggest opportunity for leaps forward. There's some restaurants which do an amazing job and obviously their bottom line shows it. I think the biggest challenge you currently have, if you are a family business, your restaurant came from two or three generations. I think that's going to be the toughest thing for you to scale than starting something new because there's too much history. And then for me, history for me shows complexity and complexity is the enemy of execution. So for me, too much history is usually a bad thing. And that's not just in a restaurant business that's anywhere else. If you have a business and somebody has a lot of history around the business, that's usually the person which is the most difficult to manage. For me, a lot of history is complexity. Too much complexity prevents you from scaling.

Brett Linkletter (00:21:26):
Yeah, that's interesting. That's interesting you mentioned that. I completely see that and feel that every day, honestly. You said the way that people consume experiences is different from pre covid. Talk to me about that. In what core ways would you say? So

Christian Fischer (00:21:39):
I use me as an example. My wife prefers a vegan lifestyle, so she does eat, I call it more of Arian. My kids are Asian, so when we go out to eat, we don't look that we go to one restaurant. So sometimes we go to two or three, we go, Hey, we go to this taiyaki place, we have some sushi as an appetizer. You know what? Then we go to the place called nami. It's a Vietnamese noodle bar. So we go and have some noodles and we eat something else. So I don't think there was in the last few years that we had appetizer Andre and the dessert in a restaurant. I think that's what changed us. And then also we looking at now, because kids are really the drivers of where you go to eat, because if my kids are not happy, dinner's no fun. So they are really the decision makers where we're going to go. And they all are Gen Zs, so they want to go, Hey, I want to go this new place here because they do fusion. Hey, have you seen this place? They mix Pakistani food with Indian food with an Asian flare. We should go there. So I think that's where I think the difference is.

Brett Linkletter (00:22:51):
And question for you, how old are your kids, by the way?

Christian Fischer (00:22:54):
So my oldest 1 27. Youngest one is 13.

Brett Linkletter (00:22:57):
Okay, so question. And how are they finding these restaurants to find out to check out? Usually

Christian Fischer (00:23:02):
They find it from peers that they went somewhere or they find it from social media. And it seems TikTok is the place and whatever the yellow one is. Spotify? No, no. What is the yellow

Brett Linkletter (00:23:15):
One? Snapchat.

Christian Fischer (00:23:16):
Snapchat, okay.

Brett Linkletter (00:23:18):
Honestly, Snapchat. I haven't heard even people mention it in a while, but that's interesting. Yeah, I mean Snapchat obviously is still around. We don't do any advertising with it. But man, they're still kicking

Christian Fischer (00:23:29):
My youngest daughter. She says, oh, we need to go to this place. I seen it in Snapchat. Somebody just sent me a snap about it, and that's different. And then for my wife, it's really important to us, how do we source, Hey, where do the protein comes from and how do they treat the cow before they kill the cow kind of thing. That stuff. So that's important to, so for us, all of that changed. And I also think consumers pre covid versus now, I think now they have a lot bigger bullshit radar. It used to be pre covid it as you could say, all farm raised, honey stung, chicken breast, whatever. And now they're saying, is it really farm raised? Doesn't get it. And I know they get from Cisco. Cisco is not farm raised. So I think that's changing a little bit.

Brett Linkletter (00:24:19):
Interesting.

Christian Fischer (00:24:21):
I think that's for me the biggest one. I think people expect more other restaurants than they used to.

Brett Linkletter (00:24:26):
I think you're probably right. Honestly, I've noticed that too. I guess it is super interesting for me. Okay. So you mentioned earlier that you were going to go to Brazil I think at some point. So I actually live, I'm more in Miami now, but my girlfriend's Brazilian and I've spent a lot of time back and forth to Brazil. And it is been very interesting for me to see the differences in how the Brazilian restaurant market works and the technology they use and how Brazilians find restaurants to go to versus how Americans do. And I mean, one thing I'll say, which was a huge shocker to me, is I think when it comes to technology in the restaurant space, Brazilians are way beyond the US to be honest, bold statement. But I swear it's true. I mean you think about it, right? Man, 20 years ago they were bringing the point of sale to the table to tap your credit card.

(00:25:19):
The US just started doing this, what, five years ago maybe. But I mean, look, in Brazil, they did it because in Brazil you have your credit card, you give it to the server, and if you let him walk away with it, he's not coming back. So it a little different, but so that's why they did it. But I've seen the most interesting FinTech models and apps and just ways in how they operate. And what I've noticed too is back to your point of how the market is kind of closed-minded, what I've learned is it's the restaurant market in general I think is a little bit closed-minded, these new things, the American restaurant market, even more close-minded, to be honest. Super interesting. Another thing I noticed in Brazil is, okay, here in the US, if you want to find a restaurant, you find a restaurant that you like, one of the first things you do is maybe look it up on Google and maybe look at the reviews, right? Super common practice. Well, Brazilians never even look it up on Google. I mean maybe they get map directions, but it's not like a staple that they think about.

(00:26:27):
It's more so like the Instagram newsfeed. So you see so much time and attention that goes onto this Instagram newsfeed. Now restaurants here still do the same, but they're like, every single brand does this and the servers use the Instagram to display their items and about it at the restaurant even. So it is very interesting, but I don't know why this is the case. I don't know why Americans have, I mean, I talk to people still every day that are still doing mailers, radio, television, I'm like, I can't even remember the last, I mean, no, I know the last time it was a Super Bowl when I watched it commercial. That's about it every year.

Christian Fischer (00:27:06):
I love that. And for me also, we spend a lot of time in Asia, and I think even Asia is a little bit further ahead with robotic bus boys and all the other stuff they're doing. It's finally catching on.

Brett Linkletter (00:27:20):
Interesting.

Christian Fischer (00:27:21):
I do think as in the us, we're very much steeped in tradition. And especially if you do something new, a lot of people don't really take to it. It's the younger generation, which really takes on. And so for me, if I really have to look at the crystal and where restaurants are going, I think hyper niche. And I think if you could do that, you have a window on your hand.

Brett Linkletter (00:27:49):
Yeah. What do you think when it relates to, I know you said your kids are using Snapchat and they're using TikTok. You didn't mention Instagram. Absolutely. Do you think that the new generation is not as interested in Instagram?

Christian Fischer (00:28:03):
My kids tell me, oh, Facebook is for old people. Instagram is for business people just like LinkedIn. They link them together, LinkedIn and Instagram, almost like the same.

Brett Linkletter (00:28:13):
No way. Really. Instagram,

Christian Fischer (00:28:15):
Instagram is also a place to pick up people. And then TikTok is where you get your news from because my kids get all the news from TikTok and it totally changes. And it's interesting, and you probably know that as a marketer, that we behave different on every platform we go to, even though it'd be the same person. But it's interesting how they're looking at Facebook is definitely for all people off. That's your generation. Nobody goes on Facebook. And then Instagram. Oh, Instagram is, so yesterday Instagram is turning into Facebook and they don't like that Instagram and Facebook got one company. And then so it's really my kid, TikTok Snapchat is the two places they spend most of their time.

Brett Linkletter (00:28:57):
Wow. Yeah, no, it's interesting that they're associating Instagram, like LinkedIn. I've never heard that, but honestly, I have a baby brother, he's 23. I always ask him these questions. I'm always just curious what's going on. Yeah, he doesn't care for Instagram either. I didn't think he even had an account for two years. And I basically told him, I was like, can you make an account so I can share stuff with you finally. But God, it's so interesting what's happening. Well, let's go back to the chef versus entrepreneur thing. I think that's a very interesting point that again, I think is a major pain point. I guess how do you talk to a chef who's so stuck in their ways and not just being a chef and maybe being resistant to new technologies and all this new stuff, but how do you make that transition to more so being the owner of a business versus working in the business too much? What does that look like? I mean,

Christian Fischer (00:29:57):
You said it earlier. I think the biggest challenge for chefs is to take that step back to work on the business that in it, because at the moment you work in it, you've just gotten yourself a new job and it's just a different job. You work for yourself, but there's still a job. So we come from chef to entrepreneurs. There is transferable skills anybody has, and it could be it's something you're interested in or something I love to do for fun. And we always tell chefs, what do people ask you the most about? And a good chef friend of mine, his name is Lawrence, Lawrence said to me, I've been a chef all my life. I had my first business on home meal replacement 25, 30 years ago. He says, nobody knew about it. I did already meals, home meal delivery. And he says, but when I go out and I talk to my friends, they talk to me about coaching because I am a really good baseball coach.

(00:30:50):
He says, I plays baseball. And he says, FD asked me that question. I paid attention more people asked me about coaching than anything else. And he realized, he says, I'm really good coach. Maybe this because I was a chef, I always, you have to keep your eyes everywhere. You need to make sure people are at the right place, that they're doing the right thing. And people watch out overall for each other. And so he wrote a book about coaching, like a chef not teaching baseball or whatever his name, like a chef. And I have another good friend of mine who is a very successful consultant in the food service space. And then I honestly believe the reason he's so successful is because he goes in there and it's a really cool business model where they're saying, oh, we pay you X, Y, Z money. And he says, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

(00:31:39):
This is way too much money. How about we do this and you give me a little equity because then we both have skin in the game and you don't need to manage me. I was like, people actually doing that. He says, yeah, I have six businesses, I own 5% there, 10% there, and I consult for them for equity. And he says, because I know, he says, as a chef, I have learned all of these different things. So for me, we are the chef to entrepreneur movement. We want to bring new ideas, new thought process and new individuals to the culinary space where chefs can say, I can do that. I know I will be really good at this. And we want 'em to start with, I don't like the term side hustle, but do something on the side which creates income and which creates income for very little work. How great would it be? And we are using books as an example. So for me, we teach people how to write books and I books. We want you to write a book, not de book. And how about if you have a book, 120, 150 pages, and it teaches people once on your scale, you'll get at. And how about that book gives you 300, 500 bucks on the side, a base for a family vacation, a base for you, BMW, rather than having a Chevy, nothing against Chevy. Yeah,

Brett Linkletter (00:33:01):
Exactly.

Christian Fischer (00:33:02):
Upskilling, which keeps paying for your lifestyle. And so you can have your income to do what you need to do, but build yourself a side hustle, which starts eventually paying for your lifestyle. Because that's what I started doing. And that comes that point where, hey, if I can make a hundred grand working five hours a week, you know what? I could make 200 working 10 hours, I can make 300 working 15 hours, I can make 400 working 20 hours, which is less than a work today. And that's what we teach in our program. We want to awaken the entrepreneur and every chef because I think chefs by nature are entrepreneurs. It's just the way the industry is and they just need somebody to see in them what they don't see in themselves. And that's what our program is. We just throw stuff at 'em and where they say, you know what? I really love that because I honestly feel when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. So let's stay in front of them and teach 'em valuable skills they can implement into actionable changes tomorrow.

Brett Linkletter (00:34:01):
No, that's awesome, man. Mean, so we actually wrote a book too in 2020, and it's a little outdated now because marketing changes every six months, right? It's insane. But what I noticed the moment we wrote a book was our level of authority in this industry just exploded. I mean, people just trusted us more. It's like, oh, he's an author, he's got reviews on a book. People say stuff about it. It's very

Christian Fischer (00:34:31):
Simple psychological thing because we don't like anybody better than we like ourselves. So a written word, if I read it, I read it to myself automatically, I put you up as an authority because you just confirmed with me reading through me that you're the authority. And for me, that's one really cool side thing of the book. But what really gets me excited about writing a book and have chef write a book and entrepreneurs writing a book on who you become writing the book. And if you wrote a book, you know exactly what goes into it. If you're not disciplined, it'll never get on a shelf. If you have shortcuts, you will never get it on the shelf. If you are not true to who you are, people will call you out on it and the book is done. So for me, what I love about writing the book is the person you becoming writing the book, not just the book itself, because I honestly believe it makes you a better person just doing the process.

(00:35:27):
Even if the book never publish it, and it makes you automatically a finisher, you're more true to who you are as a person and you're a lot more aware. For me, the coolest thing about writing a book, and that's why everybody should do a book in our program, we say that we want to help a million chefs out the next 10 years writing a book because it makes you a better person, it makes you an authority, and it gives you just awareness you wouldn't have. And for me, a book is the single best tool to become an overnight expert in anything you do.

Brett Linkletter (00:36:01):
Yeah, no, I love that, man. I think that's really cool. So you said fusion is kind of like a big thing these days and it's becoming Well, okay. Especially here in Miami. I'll tell you, it's hilarious because I had a friend that's visiting recently and he's like, this is crazy. Everything in Miami is like Asian fusion. And I never thought about it, but he's so right. And it's like you get these Peruvian Japanese concepts and then you get something else that's just got some other Asian fusion and it is almost becoming more and more of a thing. And it kind of just popped up here in Miami where everyone kind of does it. And I didn't even see it coming. It just happened all of a sudden overnight. Why is that happening? I mean, is this a trend that's here to stay? You think it's only a trend? What are your thoughts?

Christian Fischer (00:36:49):
So I honestly believe it's here to stay. And for two reasons. When I hear Asian in any food concept, for me it brings craftsmanship because in doing Asian food really well, you need to be a good craftsman. So for me, that's why I think the Asian thing is, and then also if you look at Asia, there's part of India. India is considered Asia. Asia is big.

Brett Linkletter (00:37:11):
It's big, yes.

Christian Fischer (00:37:13):
And then also it makes things relatable because for me, what a lot of great concepts do today, they tap into not just the psychology of the food itself, but also the sensory piece. And I think having that Asian overlay maybe gives you that extra spice, that extra layer, that extra crunch, which provides that added layer of complexity to the dish. And then it also, for me, it's just, I think it just heightens the sensory experience.

Brett Linkletter (00:37:45):
A hundred percent. A hundred percent. And the other thing you said is look, nine out of 10 restaurants fail. We all know it's a tough industry, but I guess it's interesting. I was talking to on another pocket, I was talking about this, but there's plenty of restaurants here in Miami that just are incredible. Plenty of that pop up that you think you're going to kill it, and then they're out business in six months. I know for a lot of 'em, especially the new ones, that first year can be brutal, right? Sorry, I know for a lot of people it comes down to sometimes they haven't raised enough money, they raise just enough to launch and then they have a staffing issue, they have this issue, they have pitfalls that they didn't see come and then they're gone. But I guess, what do you think are some of the core things you need just need to think about during that first year? What are some of the main problems I guess people go wrong with? Because again, it's pretty wild here in Miami. It's like this. I mean, it's crazy.

Christian Fischer (00:38:43):
I love that question. That's a really good question because I see it all the time. And for me, I'm very fascinated by that because for me, I think I boil it down to three things. They are really good cooks, they're terrible businessmen. And being a great chef doesn't make you good businessman. So number one, and the second thing is people really don't understand finances. And a little success is very dangerous because you feel like you want to do more. That's not what the restaurant is. So for me, a restaurant I looking at, food cost is part of any restaurant. The end of the night, okay, how did we do? What ingredient can we possibly cut out or bring into other dishes in order to keep our inventory manageable? Also, controls systems, standards. For me that's missing. So for me, when I walk into the restaurant and see that they're struggling, they could see number one, no systems, no strategies, no tools.

(00:39:44):
And they usually thought by the driver method. So question number, if it answer number one, they're not good businessman. Number two, they think they know it all and they're not really good in financially. And finally, the third one is that they don't have somebody who not just holds 'em accountable. And maybe you call in an accountability partner, but you need somebody who puts the brakes on. And if somebody says, oh, I want to do wagu beef tomorrow, have you thought about it? Is our consumers really looking for it? Is this something you want to do? Is it just you want to do on your chest? For me is you need somebody who is the voice of reasoning and every restaurant needs somebody, or for

Brett Linkletter (00:40:27):
Sure. For

Christian Fischer (00:40:27):
Me, those are the three things. So no accountability. They really don't really truly understand financials in a restaurant and they think they're good businessman, but they just amazing chef business.

Brett Linkletter (00:40:39):
What to you is a good profit margin in a restaurant, a great profit margin? What do they want aim for?

Christian Fischer (00:40:45):
So I always said, if you can be in the mid-high twenties, you do fantastic. If there you can be. But a restaurant industry is usually a penny industry. And we always say you want to be in the tents, low deans will be a great way to survive. But if you want to scale, you need to find a way to move into, that's why needs.

Brett Linkletter (00:41:06):
Got it. Yeah, no, I agree. It's interesting. This is kind, well, it's a good segue, but also at the same time, look, franchisees for example, okay, I've worked with a lot, I've worked with plenty of franchises and I got to just say it honestly, it is sad. But this is what I hear. People come to us because they feel like they're getting completely fucked by their franchise. Honestly, it's like 99% of the time, this is the feeling. They're like, I was sold on this. This is what happened. And you told me systems and standards are missing. Well, someone buys into a franchise because they're trying to get a system and a standard, but then the franchisees, and by the way, it's really interesting. I've been on so many calls where I'm talking to a franchisee, they connect me to their CMO, who big guy or girl, and just thinks I know it all.

(00:42:12):
And they're trying to sabotage the deal and they're really trying to prevent their franchisees from actually getting any outside help. So to our point from the very beginning of the conversation, it's like not only is the industry in general a little close-minded, when finally someone in a franchise is trying to get outside help, the franchise is like, Nope, slaps their wrist and says you can't do anything. Why is that? Is it like they're insecure that they're going to find something better than the corporate's giving them? This is crazy. To me it is happened a lot. And this isn't like a couple times we're talking like three, four or five, sometimes 15 times a month with us. This kind of situation. I mean it's wild.

Christian Fischer (00:42:59):
It's interesting. I have a really good friend of mine who manage multiple i a concept and he has multiple units. And with him is him and I talk about this a lot because at the height of my career I managed almost 400 locations. But it's like everything else, even though I have the same systems for everybody, the same menu, we do the same. How to go the strategy, how to market strategy. We have same employment training, but where we need to look at, it's a human business and you probably see it within your employees. I can give somebody, sit 'em in front of the computer and say, this is what we need to do, make it better. And they run with it. And then you have somebody says, okay, can you give me a little guidelines? How much better do you want to do? Where are my boundaries?

(00:43:50):
And I see this also with franchisees. You can give somebody manual, they run with it and there's some of them and says, it doesn't make sense. Can you show me? Because they visual awareness. Totally. And for me, I think that's the biggest, not just hurdle, they're trying to treat everybody the same. It's not, this is a human business and certain people need maybe a little bit more handholding, a little bit more support. Even though it's a system, it's their business. They don't want to make decision because it's their money. And sometimes I see people going into a franchise because I think they're buying themselves security, never realizing that it's not that easy. So for me, it's the end of the day. If you peel back, this is a human business and some people just need a little extra support, that little extra guidance a little more.

(00:44:40):
And some of them need boundaries because they just want to run because they want to do their own thing. And the challenge with master franchisees, they don't want to damper with their brand because they think if they let this guy do, what is everybody else going to do? They're going to just going to run rogue, which is not the case. So I think there needs to be, and I always said if I would start a franchise, I would have levels. There's this type of franchisee, which I know they're going to run another park, but there needs to be some of the franchises you need to be able to challenge because they make your brand better. How can we get 'em in and make this a working partnership? And then there's some of them, we should never be in the franchise business because they just don't want to put in the work it takes to run a business.

Brett Linkletter (00:45:25):
Yeah, I mean it's very interesting though, and I like that a lot though, what you're mentioning, levels of franchisees. I don't think I've ever heard of that. Is that a common practice at all? I mean, I haven't seen it.

Christian Fischer (00:45:38):
No, it's not. I mean, for me, I learned it. Like I said, I was in that position for 18 years and we won the hospitality side from a high education, which is a very predictable business. It's no different than any other franchise. I knew exactly when the students come, I will know when the students leave. There's 34 weeks in the school year, there's 17 in a semester, we know when the holidays are. We know all of that. And it's really easy to come in and bring in a new guy saying, Hey, this is where you need to start cutting back on your purchases. This is where you need to start watching your staff because students move out and all the other stuff. So it's really easy to do that because too much history, what you talked about earlier. Exactly. But as a new guy, he could sit there and say, Hey, okay, I understand, but how now is the opportunity?

(00:46:27):
We going from pre-prepared stuff, we doing stuff a la carte, we do exhibition style, now it's time to shine because now I can knock it out of the park because I have left students here. Let's service the shit out of the few we have. And sometimes as the master owner saying, no, this is not, we don't want to do that kind of thing. So for me, I think there needs to be, and the way I treated it, I treated all of our units like franchises, and our thing was really simple, 75% and non-negotiables, you need to do what you need is 75% non-negotiable. You need to stick to the program, the 25%. You need to incorporate something regional because that's what makes you different. It might be an ingredient, might be a bakery, that might be something else, which kind of help you to make it regional and you become a real part of the community.

(00:47:17):
And then the is the PN an opportunity for you to give back because how are you going to support your community to become an itegrated part of the community? Totally. And that always was give those people which want to have leadway and do more, let's give them the 25% and let them run. And then the other ones would say, no, no, I'm safe the way I am. Let them have the 75% be the a hundred percent. And they just work within a confined space. But there needs to be an opportunity to localize and to be really part of a community. And I always use the example, especially when you get into the middle of the country, there could be a bakery, which is in business for five generations. The students come to that university within a year. They know this is a business, a stable business, which did amazing things for the community. And you need to bring that into the school so you could really show them, this is what we do. And if you don't allow for that, I think you will frustrate a few people. But for me, I called it the 75 25. And it was highly successful for us.

Brett Linkletter (00:48:26):
I mean, well, it's interesting for me as the marketer and advertiser also to steal this because look, like I said, I mean, I wrote a book and I'm not afraid to admit it, right? I told you before, I mean, it's outdated. People still buy it and there's still a lot of value in that. But damn, are we doing completely different shit today than we did four years ago, right? Completely different. And I'll just tell you right now, I am not going to say the name, but was speaking with another franchise recently. And okay, I dunno if you know this, it's very interesting. And anyone listening by the way, you can just do this also, it's kind of an interesting little hack, not even a hack, but you can go to anyone's Facebook page, business page, any restaurant business page, and all you got to do is go to their about section, and then there's a section that goes page transparency.

(00:49:09):
And you can just see all the ads they're running. It's open to the public. They did this after the Cambridge Angelica stuff. They wanted to be transparent, whatever, which by the way, they had to, but those were the glory days before. Oh my God. You could get anything. The data was insane. Anyway, I'm getting off track. But what I'm saying is you always can just look at someone's stuff. Well, if we're talking to a big brand, I always just want to look under the hood and see what's going on here. What ads are they running? Nine times out of 10, it's really bad. And I'll tell you an example. It's like national brand, let's just say hundreds of stores. They got one ad running with some offer. And to get that offer, you click, you go to the page, there's all this red tape to collect someone's information.

(00:50:00):
Then you go and you select the store that's nearest to you. Then you go and do this other step. And I'm like, okay, just standard digital marketing protocols. The more steps it has to take for someone to give you their information or opt-in or whatever it's you're trying to do or pay for something. Even the lower the conversions. I mean, it's just the standard. If it's harder to accomplish the goal, you'll get less of the thing you want just standards, right? Well, they're running the same ad across the entire country, and then the franchisees are like, whatever you're doing is not working, but we have to give 2% of our budget towards this, and they're just handcuffed. And these are situations that I'm like, I feel bad because I know that they're already in not the best margins that they'd like, and now they're giving another 2% to something that doesn't do anything. I mean, it's sad. It's sad to watch, honestly.

Christian Fischer (00:50:57):
Yeah. No, I love that, Anna. I love the way you broke it down, and I encourage the listeners to go back a few minutes and do it because it's so true. I like that kind of look behind the curtain a little bit. See what they actually

Brett Linkletter (00:51:11):
Do. You can totally do it. I mean, when we were first coming up as an agency, I would look at all the other agencies, what ads are they running? I mean, hey, I'll admit it again. I would just copy other people's ads in the early days and now people copy my ads. And you know what? It's there for the taking and there's nothing we can do about it. But let's go to innovation. I know we talked about innovation through food fusion and stuff like that. What about technology today? What about, what are things that you see in the restaurant space that have really piqued your interest that maybe you've consulted some brands on that they should be thinking about right now as it relates to tech?

Christian Fischer (00:51:46):
That's a really good question. So I'm a big fan of technology. So for me, I look at where AI is going to take us from, not just, there's this technology, let's from Italy, it's called Duss. If you have a check it out, is this headband you put on? If you eat something, the program is going to tell you if you like it or not. So even if you, oh, this is really good, but really didn't like it. Interesting. It breaks it down.

Brett Linkletter (00:52:14):
Sorry, can you spell that? How do you spell that?

Christian Fischer (00:52:16):
Sorry, make sure I don't like you. It's T-H-I-U-M-S. Timus.

Brett Linkletter (00:52:22):
T-H-I-M-U-S.

Christian Fischer (00:52:24):
Yeah, I might spell it. Yeah. T-H-I-M-U-S. Timus. Mario is the CEO of that really, really cool technology. And so now when you do tastings, you exactly know what people like and what they don't like. Really cool stuff out there. And I think that's becoming even more hyperized. I think if you go down the next five, 10 years and looking at how wellness and AI move together, how great would it be? Have an app and the app I use whoop to measure my stuff and how about whoop tells me, Hey, you running low on this, this is what I recommend you need to eat. And so I think that's certainly coming. And then also ai. AI will change the way we write menus. How do dishes compare? If you remember Watson, I, IBM supercomputer now 20 years ago wrote a book and actually they fed him all that data and the first thing it spit out, it was an Austrian chocolate burrito if you remember that. So I think AI is going to make this even a lot more so for me. How about if the wearable you have kind of measures you, what are you actually craving and interesting it has that,

Brett Linkletter (00:53:48):
No, sorry, but this is so good. I guess what I'm hearing too, just overall overarching is nutrition is starting to matter a lot more in general.

Christian Fischer (00:53:58):
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I honestly feel so even looking back from my years, people won't have healthy option but they choose not to. I think there will be a point, and I'm not sure if this, but for me, if I looked in the crystal ball, how about there's a health insurance company which tells you, hey, you need to wear this thing, you need to eat what that thing tells you because it helps you lead a healthier lifestyle. But if you do this, your premium is going to be much smaller. People will jump on.

Brett Linkletter (00:54:32):
That's incredible. I love that.

Christian Fischer (00:54:33):
I honestly feel this is the direction we're going to go. I think this is going to be the same thing in driving, Hey, if you allow me to tap into your car based on your driving records for the last week, this is your premium Next week. Hey, you overdid it last week. Your premium is higher next week because you screwed up last week. That hyper customization I think is coming to everything and especially in the food. And then for me it's ai, look at it, there's AI ovens, there is a microwave which takes a picture of your food and you can tell this was cooked, this is not cooked and provide different technology and the amount of heat onto the products being cooked. I think that's or is just going to be hyper sped up. And for me, I think if you're asking me where it's going in a few years, you will be able to go to a restaurant saying, Hey, I want to have this, I want to have this, this on it, and I go down, it's done. And so that they don't have a menu anymore, they have ingredients and the AI based on the ingredients in the house will help you build a dish.

Brett Linkletter (00:55:43):
Wow, okay. So what do you think about the paper menu?

Christian Fischer (00:55:49):
Paper menu is like the so war it had its purpose. Not anymore because for me, my kids don't look at a paper menu. They think it's gross, it's dirty, and my kids hate when people put a sticker over out of that or sold out. I think AI is the way to go because it lets you customize and also if there's a dish out, it's just not visible to consumer.

Brett Linkletter (00:56:15):
Yes. Okay, well thank you for saying this because this is what I preach on a regular basis by the way. I mean that's what our product is dio, right? It's a digital menu. And it's funny because the idea came around while I was in Brazil actually taught us on other podcasts too. But I was basically in Brazil. I'm on a date with my girlfriend and I look at the menu and the menu showed up in English and obviously in Brazil they speak Portuguese. So I was like, why is this in English? What's going on? And her menu is in Portuguese, but mine's in English. What's going on? I asked the waiter, he's like, oh yeah, it's a smart menu. It knows that the settings in your phone are in English and therefore it changed to English automatically. And I was like, what the, are you serious?

(00:57:03):
And I was just so blown away and moved by it because that was so simple yet just such an incredible experience to have. And to your point, hyper customization. It is, I completely agree. It is coming like no other. You're going to view the menu, it's going to be in your language, it's going to know other restaurants maybe you liked. It's going to know your nutrition habits, dietary restrictions. God, I mean one of my good friends, she has celiac so she can't have gluten or she gets just terribly sick and we go out all the time and big groups of friends of ours and whatnot and she's always asking, is this gluten free? The waiters don't know. 80% of the time they got to go check and then she's always like, I'm just not going to do it. It's not worth it. It's just there's always drama. I want

Christian Fischer (00:57:53):
To take the risk. Yeah, yeah, agreed. Yeah.

Brett Linkletter (00:57:57):
But to point from the beginning, people still are just like a paper menu. No, that's me. I won't let it go.

Christian Fischer (00:58:06):
No, I think I call it paper menu. It's great for decoration, not for actual use because as hyper-personalization comes, look at Pepsi, it's a Pepsi or Coke. One of the two companies is working with Apple where if I'm diabetic, if I go up to the machine, all the beverages, I'm not allowed to drink it automatic it blocks out. So I don't even have the option to drink it. And I think that needs to happen. I love the idea of the gluten-free because as our technology from a medical improves, I think a lot more people realize, hey, I'm actually have a certain gluten intolerance. Maybe I'm just 15%, whatever the number is. Or hey, maybe I realized I'm actually allergic to sage. I never knew that kind of thing. And I honestly feel having a wife, which leads a very healthy lifestyle. We don't go to certain restaurants because my wife doesn't trust them that they truthful on the menu.

(00:59:02):
Having a digital product like yours can bypass it. How great if the consumer can go in and learn a little bit more, Hey, this is how, this is the oil we use, this is the stove we use where you actually make people not comfortable. But I think transparency is a good thing. And overall, if you look in the restaurant, the greatest thing the restaurant industry did is broke down the wall between the front of the house and the back of the house. It increased chef's psychological wellbeing a hundred fold because they knew, oh, I can't say certain things. Oh I need to work cleanup because they're watching me. I can't curse at this guy, I can't do this. It automatically, it overnight changed how restaurants in the back of the house worked.

Brett Linkletter (00:59:48):
I never thought about that, but that makes so much sense. That's awesome. And

Christian Fischer (00:59:53):
I think that's what for me, I think that's what you brought us for the paper menu. It exposes the paper menu that people can lie under the paper menu and can write on what they want and that your product is kind of the truth secret. It's the outlier in the menu space.

Brett Linkletter (01:00:12):
And that's what we're trying to do here. I mean I'll show you real quick, check this out and I apologize to purely the listeners can't see this, but I'll walk you through it. So this is an example menu. We have casa day Iline. If you click this button here, filter, you can filter the menu to only show you what you want. So I click gluten-free, I click show results. Now I'm only seeing gluten-free items. And this is one feature of many that this product does, but it is really simplified. This you can imagine, right? It's made things easier, A lot easier. And I think it's funny, I hear a lot of people say back to it, I don't like the QR codes, blah blah blah. Well

(01:00:59):
We're talking about let's say 3, 5, 6, 7 years out maybe, right? God, I mean I dunno if you've seen Meta's smart glasses recently. Oh God. I mean the things they're doing now, I am going to call it right now another prediction. We're all going to wear glasses in the next four or five years and you're going to look at a QR code and the menu's just going to pop up on your glasses and then you're still going to want the paper menu. I mean come on. It's the natural progression. I love your analogy of that. The paper menu was like a sword. It had a purpose, it sword in war, but now we got something else.

Christian Fischer (01:01:36):
Yeah, we fight different.

Brett Linkletter (01:01:39):
Exactly.

Christian Fischer (01:01:41):
The first bomber we just had out there, which is a hundred percent unmanned and it pulled stunts with 1617 cheese, which you couldn't do with somebody in the seed. It's changing everything. And I think your product does exactly that. And for me, hyper-personalization, what it also does is with us, we eat out very little because of my wife's health condition. We would like to eat more. So your product becomes a reassurance for the ness which really have to watch something. And I like you had one of your filters was refined sugar. Hey, I just choose for whatever reason not to refine sugar. How great would it be if every restaurant would have the capability to

Brett Linkletter (01:02:25):
Do, isn't it crazy? Or we have seed oils too. Why is no one talking about seed oils? Oh my god, America is fatter, more obese and has more depression issues than ever in history. And we're wondering why it is crazy.

Christian Fischer (01:02:45):
Don't get me going. It's a whole separate episode because I

Brett Linkletter (01:02:47):
Couldn't

Christian Fischer (01:02:49):
Agree with you more. I honestly feel that food has a huge part of your mental wellbeing and also how we manage stress and how we do with what we do. So for me, that's a whole separate episode, but I couldn't agree with you. More and more people need to start using your product. So if there's a listener who hasn't checked out your product yet, hustle over there. Not even hustle, fucking run over there and get yourself thank

Brett Linkletter (01:03:19):
You.

Christian Fischer (01:03:19):
Sign up and become part of

Brett Linkletter (01:03:20):
The program. I appreciate that man. Really appreciate it. I mean it's been like a two year build for us at this point, which is you never imagine it's going to be that long to build a truly great software product, but it's honestly, it's been one of the most fulfilling things I think I've ever done. Because I mean, like you said, we got to save this for another episode, but I'm also very passionate about the nutrition space. I mean you mentioned transparency was such a big thing. Our company mission and vision is literally to create tools that foster transparency and growth within the restaurant industry. That is really what we're aiming for. We're a marketing company that helps brands grow. We've gotten really good at it. But more than that, I mean I truly really want to make an impact for the better of our country and for the better of wellbeing of the world. It's not even just about growing a business, but like, hey, how do we grow a business and also foster that transparency between consumers, between the brands they love. I mean it's like,

(01:04:22):
God, it's a terrible analogy, but I like these little, this product I recently called Knickknack. It's like these little nicotine things I throw in and it helps me get through after lunch on my workday. I know these aren't good for me. And there's a label right there on the front. It goes, this product contains nicotine. Nicotine isn't anti chemical. I know it's not good for me. I'm choosing to have it. I can hustle with it and I've just learned this by myself. My girlfriend hates it, but I know that. But why doesn't the world know that cedar oils are so bad or refined sugars are so bad and they're to your point, kind of hiding it, which kills me inside. I

Christian Fischer (01:05:04):
Honestly believe what is coming really, really quick, where AI is going to look at your calendar, you got to eat and AI is going to tell you, Hey, you have a big meeting coming up, eat this. Not that you have all of this, eat this and that. Hey, you have a flight tomorrow, eat this. Not that. And I think that's going to mesh between lifestyle and food. I think this is becoming seamless. I think AI in a very short period of time is going to take over in how you consume food. Because for me, I just read a study two weeks ago from Harvard where I was saying people which read data coming in about patients. So they had 85 doctors, I think they oncologists are reading diagnosis from different patients and they diagnosed what they had. They were like 40% or something accurate and they were the best of the best.

(01:06:04):
Currently there is an AI program which is already the accuracy in the high eighties, low nineties. So who do you going to trust in a few years? People or ai, which is a higher success rate. So for me, I think that's just the beginning and it's coming into food. And I think it's not because consumer want to, because I think they cannot being channeled into that. And I always use the health insurance space. How about the way you currently have a credit score? I think there's going to be a health score. If you get insurance, this is going to, they're looking at it. If you get a certain car or if you do something else, I think people will start looking at that because lifestyle is a big component on how people not just execute on a daily label of how they contribute to the society.

Brett Linkletter (01:07:01):
Yeah, man, I love that you mentioned this, but this is so interesting. I mean I haven't even thought about this way AI really, I'm not going to say controlling, but just assisting and aiding and helping you make the right choices specifically with nutrition. Of course. That's so interesting. Random question. I know we talked a little bit about social apps earlier. What do you think about a social app specifically in the restaurant space? Have you come across any that you like? There's a lot of apps coming out right now that are trying to become something in that likings, but I haven't seen something that really has popped out. Have you come across any?

Christian Fischer (01:07:44):
That's a really good question. I have not. I actually honestly haven't looked for one. But I actually think that's not coming from personal developers. I think to start with, it's going to come from the Apples of the world, from Googles of the world. But I think I'm sure somebody is working on it. And that's coming fairly quick because again, for me, I go back, I track everything I do with whoop and I would love for whoop to talk to something else and saying, Hey, you just stretched a little bit today because my perfect range is about 20% or 20 what they call on, how much strain you put on your system. So if you wanted to recover fast, I would be great to do that. And then also, how about if you recommendations? So for me, I personally, I take NMN and transversal, that's my two things I take every day where I could tell me, Hey, you need to take this vitamin, you need to take this supplement today because you just overdid it today. And for better recovery and for more, not just mental alertness, but how do you can perform at a higher level. It would be great if somebody develops that. I'm sure if it is. And if somebody is to listen to this, please comment below. And Brad and I are the first ones with signing up.

Brett Linkletter (01:08:59):
Yeah, well no, but this is interesting, the whoop connection to a social platform to help you find a restaurant you're looking for. That's interesting. I love that, man. Well, I know we're kind of coming up on time here, I guess Christian, you're just so full of knowledge. You got so much great information. If someone's listening and they want to get more involved with you in particular they want to find you online, what's the best way they can do that?

Christian Fischer (01:09:26):
The best way is my website. It's christian cha fisher.com or one word. We brought everything in there from there. Links out to everything we do. Check out our podcast, check out what we do. You can email me. My email is on the website. So if you go to Christian J. Fisher, everything lives there. We would love to welcome you in our space.

Brett Linkletter (01:09:46):
Absolutely. Absolutely. And then your podcast again, the Disruptive Chef. Give us the name of it. The Disruptive Chef Entrepreneur, right? Yeah,

Christian Fischer (01:09:55):
Disruptive Chef Entrepreneur is our podcast. We have a YouTube channel. There's all of our episodes out there. Even if we do, we have a private group, we call it Disruptive chef.club, which is our private community. We record this and then after a month we put that stuff out there. So we have I think a hundred episodes we pushed out there in that space.

Brett Linkletter (01:10:13):
Amazing.

Christian Fischer (01:10:14):
But we are here to inspire the culinary and hospitality world to think definitely of the jobs, not just the way they use and use their jobs. How can they contribute at a higher level?

Brett Linkletter (01:10:28):
A hundred percent. I love that, man. Well, really cool stuff. Christian, thanks for your time today, man. This has been incredible and I know we're planning now. I'm going to be on your podcast now on the 25th. We

Christian Fischer (01:10:37):
Decided. Yeah, my podcast the 25th. So if people haven't done so, make sure you ear marketing, we going to have some really cool conversation. And then because of who he is, we going to have rapid fire questions, so you will not see the questions. My team is going to put

Brett Linkletter (01:10:50):
A few

Christian Fischer (01:10:51):
Questions together.

Brett Linkletter (01:10:53):
I love it. I

Christian Fischer (01:10:53):
Love it. It's going to be a really good time. And Brad, I appreciate the opportunity to be here. And to our listeners, thanks for listening that long. Hopefully there was some value you got from the today's conversation. And if you need anything, you know where to find us.

Brett Linkletter (01:11:06):
Absolutely. And I'll be sure guys, listening to this episode now, we'll put all the links below this episode so you can easily access what he was talking about. Again, Christian, thank you so much for your time today, man. This has been incredible and looking forward to chatting in just a couple of weeks. We'll go from there.

Christian Fischer (01:11:20):
Appreciate it. Thanks everybody.