The greatest gift of leadership is a boss who wants you to be successful.
The simple things can be really powerful.
I think success is a relative term. If you're a caveman, success is capturing an elephant. Success is achieving better than the norm. Success is being exceptional. It's exceptional reputation, exceptional income, and exceptional respect.
When you're on-stage, you're expected to perform in the bar business. You shake hands. You smile. You're all positive energy: you add to your environment. When you walk in the door to the back of the house, that's like a stage door. You're off-stage now.
Pushing for excellence is a fight. You have to fight to hire the right employees, fight to get the supplies you need, to move line items around. Being a great manager means pushing to get those few extra inches every day. It's almost like a football game - the team that wins sometimes wins by just inches.
When I was running the Troubadour, there was this transition from the classic singer/songwriter Jackson Browne types to bands like Black Flag, the Dead Kennedys, and Fear. Those are just some that come to mind. Oh, and Adam Ant! The Fear fans wanted to 'crush' the Ants. These guys hated each other.
You have to connect with your market and your employees. First, understand that what your market says is fact and what you say is opinion. Then, take the time to create a good connection with your employees. Without those two key connections, your business will be stuck in mediocrity forever.
If I'm your boss, and I truly want you to be successful... I'm inherently going to teach you. I'm inherently going to correct your mistakes. I'm inherently going to spend time with you. I'm inherently going to lead you.
A plate of food hits the table, lands right in front of you. One of two things happens. Either you sit up and look at it and react to it, or nothing happens. If nothing happens then that restaurant is stuck in mediocrity forever.
You ever see a bar with 200 beautiful women go broke? But I've seen a lot of bars with great DJs go broke.
I've always said that my greatest crises are my greatest opportunities to prove my own character to myself.
Human interaction is something that I believe, as humans, we crave for. And that is where bars and social environments come into play.
In my extensive experience, I can honestly say that Sculpture Hospitality's inventory solutions are world class and, by far, the most comprehensive in the industry.
The Knack were a very, very powerful band, and you got to understand, when they came in, all the punk stuff was still going on. There was an amazing conflict within the scenes.
The right personality with a weak resume can be filled in. That's the employee who will become great.
If you have to signal a bartender to get a drink, then they're not looking at you, which is their problem. They're not doing their job. So don't feel rude when you signal a bartender. They're the ones who caused you to signal them. Go for it.
Don't build a bar for yourself. Build it for your customers. It's all about them: the walls, the finishes, the textures, the food, the beverages, literally everything has to be for them.
Failure is an extremely personal thing, and so is success. The problem with people is they don't own their failure, and if you don't own your failures, you're never going to own your successes.
I'm a businessman, not a bartender.
The word 'mixology' adds $3 to the price of any drink.
