I Get Two Kinds of Calls
The first operator is building. He has something working and he wants to make sure the next move is the right one. New location. Key hire. Menu overhaul. Service model change. The decision is in front of him, not behind...
Restaurants Dont Fail Operators Do
Not a revenue number. A discipline. At every level of the operation — simultaneously. The operator who didn’t grow never defined what success actually required. Never built the product the Guest actually needed. Never developed the cast that could deliver...
The Advantage You Already Have and Arent Using
The large hospitality companies are in crisis. Turnover is catastrophic. Burnout is systemic. Guest experience is declining. The diagnosis from inside those organizations is familiar — better scheduling software, smarter labor algorithms, more efficient procedures. That diagnosis is wrong. It...
The Phone Isnt the Problem
The missed call isn’t your problem. The overwhelmed human is your problem. There’s a category of AI tool being sold to restaurant operators right now that promises to solve missed calls. Answer the phone 24/7. Never miss a reservation request....
Relational Hospitality
Not a technology. Not a data strategy. Not a luxury hotel concept. A human framework for the independent restaurant operator who wants to understand why their best servers are different from their good ones. Here is the distinction. Unobtrusive Service...
A Mediocre Guest Experience Is the Cement Not the Platform
The dashboard is green. The numbers are clean. The room is dying anyway.Forty-four years on the stage, and the same argument keeps coming back wearing a new outfit. The revenue-management thinker has the data. The frame the data sits inside...
The ThreeLegged Stool of Unearned Authority
It never ceases to amaze me how many people post content about how to do things they’ve never actually done.I’m not talking about researchers, academics, or analysts. They have a lane and they know it. I’m talking about platform CEOs...
The Twelve Laws of the Guest Experience
Your Guest has already decided.Not after the food arrived. Not after the check. Before the server said a word. The emotional read landed the moment they walked in — the room, the energy, the feel of the place — and...
What Warren Buffett Taught Me About How to Run a Better Restaurant
In 1969, Warren Buffett wrote a line in his partnership letter that most investors have read and almost none have fully applied: “Commitments of less than about $3 million cannot have a real impact on our overall performance.” Three million...
Same Drumbeat New Equipment 44 Years on Tech in Our Business
Tech has to support the Guest Experience, not supplant it. Fourteen waves of receipts.Since 1982, my position on technology in our business has been the same.Tech has to support the Guest Experience, not supplant it.That year was the first time...
