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About Chris:
Christopher is a First generation American of Polish descent. Passionate father, leader, entrepreneur, restaurant/food professional on a mission to make a positive impact on myself and those around me.
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Success Takes Time So Get Off Your LAZY ASS | Chris Ciezak
It’s a special pleasure of mine because I have an in-studio guest. I’ve known this dude. We played baseball when we were in our teen years a lot and basketball. Chris Ciezak, welcome.
Thank you so much. I’m excited to be here. It’s been a long time when we first met. Seeing you where you’ve progressed to, I’m so excited and happy for you. Thank you for having me on.
I’m grateful for you being here because you got a lot of cool things going too. You’ve got years of success in the hospitality industry and service, which is awesome. You and I didn’t even see each other for years. You’ve proven leadership in people development, team growth, Founder of Wholey Granoly, which is what we’re talking about. It’s a cool name.
I’ve been getting great feedback. I was apprehensive about it at first. I was like, “I don’t know how people are going to respond to this.” So far, it’s been a great response across the board. I’m excited to bring it to the market.
You also earn Best Beer Bar in Chicago. What was that?
It was at the World of Beer in Evanston. That was a franchise I was working with at some point. We got deep into providing awesome beer experiences for people through different varieties and exclusive products. We got into being educational about beer and teaching people because that was when craft beer was starting to take off. I’m trying to do to the best we could with the products we had. What was beautiful about craft beer is these are independent small business operators. They have created their dream of a brewery.
We’re taking it, scaling it out and trying to push it out to communities to have people come out, try and build things up. One of the great stories was about the founders of Not Your Father’s Root Beer. It was good, very strong. The 10% was one that we took on early on. We gave these guys opportunities. It was an older gentleman dropping it off in his van and dropping this off kegs. We put it up and were promoting it. It was part of the reason they started to grow and became national. They got bought out at some point.
You were behind the whole founders deal then too. It wasn’t just to Not Your Father’s Root Beer part. That’s phenomenal. That did take off huge. I see that in bars and in a lot of barbecue joints nationwide too. I don’t know why it’s there. It was in a barbecue joint right down the road that sadly closed because of COVID. I’m sure this is going to work into our conversation with that too. As much as I hate the word pivot, they didn’t. Pivot became a lot of pivoting. What they were doing was pivoting. They never made that past tense that, “We pivoted.” They were behind in their actions, taking that action and trying to do what they needed to do to stay open. They didn’t even get on DoorDash or Uber Eats until three months into the pandemic in 2020. How could they stay open if that was the case?
In my role, I’m in sales and consulting for a broad-line food distributor. You see this with a lot of operators. We’re coming in with solutions and ideas to help you be on trend, make more money, all these different ways to market. You’re bringing all these gems to people. A lot of times, they don’t see the opportunity. They don’t understand it and are scared of it. There are probably one million reasons why they don’t act upon some of these things. When people didn’t adapt and then they’re trying to catch up on the DoorDashes and the Uber eats for some it was too late. It was unfortunate.
I could see it from the perspective of them. DoorDash and Uber Eats take 30% of the price. That model is not an old model either. On my field, like the iTunes app store from Apple takes 30% of the revenue. It’s like the tax almost to be on that platform but they’re providing you so much more exposure.
There are ways to mitigate that 30%. Customers are willing to pay a little more for convenience. Everything is delivering to their house.
They couldn’t even go to the restaurant. If they want the food, they’re going to pay more for it.
Even pre-COVID. You could mitigate that and get some of that down. It’s being open-minded, looking at things from different perspectives. The possibilities are out there, and a lot of people did succeed. They did pivot, adapt or continue to evolve and create different ways to make money. One of the biggest and best things that come out of the pandemic is our ability, and we all know that no matter what happens, we’re going to survive. We’re going to find a way to make this business keep going. There were many businesses that did better through the pandemic than they did pre-pandemic. In many ways, a lot of them added all the seeding outside with tables and tents. Their delivery services skyrocketed, especially those that were on its pre-pandemic. Many businesses were doing 25% of the business through the delivery services, still being profitable and making money. You take a little hit. We can achieve a lot when we’re pressed into a corner. We have to figure it out.
A friend of mine who’s my very first client in cyberspace was the one that pushed me over the edge to go out on my own. He did the same thing with his auto mechanic starter shop. He’s like, “It’s doing great. You need to do the same thing.” When he saw my face on the Nasdaq Jumbotron, he’s like, “I didn’t know you’re going to be like this.” In 2020, he owned six Buffalo Wild Wings franchises. They did 70% of the revenue during the course of the pandemic from 2020 compared to 2019. That was without alcohol sales. It was incredible. His net profit was higher because during this time to fulfill all those orders, now he didn’t have to have servers on staff. I’m talking from an owner’s perspective here. I hated seeing everybody getting laid off, and so did he because that’s the kind of person he is but in order to keep the business alive, he was already on DoorDash and Uber Eats.
You had to change your model, the way you operate in and that did come down to a skeleton staff and a handful of people.
It was like four people. A manager and three other people per store, he was saying. Going from 500 employees down to a staff of four whenever they were open across these six locations. He’s doing 70% of what he was doing without the alcohol.
There are a lot of those success stories. People who would not refuse to lose were going to find a way. That story is they’re a little bit bigger Buffalo Wild Wings. It’s a franchise but an owner, a manager and an employee have been forced to operate their business day-to-day because there wasn’t enough revenue coming in to support more staff. On the flip side, now it’s the time that everybody needs more staff. That’s the struggle. A crisis that everyone’s dealing with is getting these people off the bench and back into the workforce.
I know he’s struggling with that too on the flip side of that conversation now that everything is back open in Chicago. That 500 employee mark, he’s sitting in about 300 employees trying to staff his stores. It might not sell. He’s still got 300 people for everybody who’s reading but that’s a 40% dip in your labor force. It’s not that he’s not bringing people back. He needs this other 40% to operate his restaurants at full capacity.
It gets a huge crisis. I got people begging me to like, “Can you help me find people?” I’ve got guys who have brand new built-out restaurants ready to open. They have two employees and no one’s showing up to interviews. No one’s applying. It’s stagnating the recovery of the economy with people not wanting to come back into the workforce. It’s unfortunate. There are millions of people on unemployment. We need those people back in the workforce. I don’t have the answer. It’s definitely something that needs to be addressed in some way whether through policy or whatever the case maybe.
Let’s talk basic economics. It’s not even politics. If you’re getting Federal subsidies for unemployment and that person is making more not working, they have more money going into their bank account not working or lifting a finger at all, it’s a little bit difficult from a psychological perspective to say, “Why don’t you come back to work and make less?”
I try to think back too. When I was in my mid-twenties, if I was making that type of money, staying home and the summer is coming up, am I going to go work? I don’t know. People need that. They need to get back out and get into the workforce. Even if it’s part-time, it helped a lot of these businesses. It’s not just the restaurant industry. You drive through any area like we’re in here where there are lots of warehouses, different things and office buildings. You see nothing but hiring signs.
There’s a shortage in almost every industry. That’s because people are sitting on their lazy asses at home. Back right to when I was departing Best Buy. When I was working there, I was a Regional Manager for Sales. I had moved over from Geek Squad to the B2B side of this. I wrote the sales playbook, B2B for Best Buy. When they were eliminating that division, I had a 30-day notice. I came off of an FMLA leave because my twins were born. I knew this was coming and they were completely eliminating this division.
It was good timing for me because I was able to take the six weeks off and be with my twins, which was awesome but then when I came back, they were only legally required to keep me for 30 days. By that time, all my bosses, directors, regional vice presidents were all gone because the whole division was tanked. My new boss was one of my peers six weeks prior because he was default chosen for this new director role to manage himself and one other person was like, “Rick, in the next 30 days, I don’t even care if you come to the office. Nobody’s going to give you a severance.”
Even though I was with Best Buy for seven years, there’s no severance with this stuff. “I know they offered you an assistant manager role in one of the stores.” I’m in retail. I did that gig. For him, it was the 30-day thing. I looked at that as temporary. I could have gone on unemployment. I could have done all these other things and sat on my ass at home for six months, taking on, pulling in money. I hope that people that are reading when I say, “Get off your lazy ass,” get back to work because the economy needs a flow of money. Money has to keep moving in order for the economy to be sparked where it needs to be.
Take the time that you have but don’t be like, “I’m getting paid.” With those 30 days, I’m like, “I need to get my crap in order.” That’s when I started putting everything in line to launch my own IT consultancy, forming a corporation, doing bank accounts, getting a merchant account so I could accept credit cards, getting everything, stop calling clients that no longer had a home. Buffalo Wild Wings was my very first one. I’m like, “Division’s going away. This is what I’m doing. I’m finally doing it. You push me.” He’s like, “I’m your first one.” I hustled for those 30 days. I didn’t sit home playing Xbox, PlayStation or some crap like that. I have twins to care for.
Not everybody’s built like us. The same thing happened to me. When I got let go of this toxic restaurant group, the toxicity of that company drove me to look for more information where I got into reading books, podcast, leadership stuff. When I got let go from them, I had already started my business plan for Wholey Granoly. My job now is I’m going to the library, build this out and get everything lined up. That was years ago. I’ve been looking for locations and things. The pandemic happened but it’s those moments like that when you get blindsided. You’re like, “What happened here?” I thought it was in a good place. You got kicked in the back and you’re like, “Let’s figure this out. I’m done depending on other people. I’m going to do this for myself.” It’s those moments in life where you got to do something else because your people let you down so many times after all the investment of time, energy and turning businesses around.
The restaurant industry is tough like that. It’s not an industry where oftentimes you get used for a certain period of time. Once you run your course and built their business, they’re like, “You want more money? Never mind. We’ll find someone else.” Those are some of the underlying motivators for me also creating a company, being through some of that toxicity through the restaurant industry and wanting to create better culture. A big thing that I want to do that is back for the people that helped me build this company as we start to grow is profit-sharing. How can I give them some skin in the game? I know how much time, effort and energy it takes to run restaurants. There are so many moving parts and difficult things you deal with every day. I want to make sure and take care of the people who are going to help build this company. That’s what I would have wanted when I did this for other people. That’s one of those underlying motivators from culture and the people part of it.
I bet you a lot would have no issues coming back to work if that was the case. If a lot of owners would be like, “I want to take care of my people. I got profit-sharing,” because now they would come back and be like, “If I can help them make money, I can make more money too. I don’t have to depend on the unemployment because it’s up to me.”
That’s one of the reasons I’m starting to build this company. I’m excited about it. I’m fired up because there’s so much opportunity. The restaurant industry is starting to come back. People want to gather, eat together, celebrate and do all those things. Everybody misses it. It’s a part of human nature. We need to be with people and others. It’s an exciting time with that. I’m fired up.
You’ve been in the hospitality industry for years. I would consider you successful. I hope you consider yourself successful.
I do. It’s all part of the learning lesson. You take those bumps and bruises and work those 70-hour weeks. All that commitment and time has led to this moment and me being able to launch my own thing. That’s what I’m speaking to those kids that are sitting at home on unemployment, those twenty-something-year-olds, “Get in the game. Come out here. Learn something. Build your interpersonal skills. Learn how to talk to people.” With social media, everyone’s texting but interpersonal skill is something that the younger generation needs to probably work on a little. They need to get out there. The restaurant industry is something that will challenge you. It will teach you a lot of lessons.
That’s how you get to where you want to ultimately go. You may be starting off in an entry-level position now but it’s part of your journey. Who knows where that journey may take you? It was funny when we were together. That bartender was talking about like, “I want to bartend. That’s my passion.” I’m happy for her. She was young. You’re like, “You don’t even know what’s going to inspire you down the road. It’s great that you’re inspired by this now and that you’re in a place where you’re learning to talk to people and take care of people in many different ways,” but she probably has a lot more in store for her than she even realizes.
She was in her twenties. She’s fantastic. It’s a restaurant where you met Joe and Dan. They opened that in the midst of all the chaos. They’re giving people jobs which is awesome. In my early twenties, I didn’t know what I want to do.
You don’t but you got to get out there and do something. That’s what we need in the industry and business. These kids need to learn. Get out there. Take on some responsibility. Learn some new things. Challenge yourself.
Fall on your face.
In order to get where you want to go, you’re going to take a lot of bumps and bruises.
How would you feel if fear wasn’t a factor and you felt like you couldn’t fail?
Over time I’ve been fighting through those fears. I don’t want to say I’m not going to fail because it’s going to happen. You’re going to have bumps and bruises but I’m at a point in life where I know no matter what happens, I’m going to push through, get through, get to where I want to go, get what I need to get and build what I need to build for myself, people around me and communities we’re going to serve. Failure is going to happen but fear should never stop you from doing anything. You can’t be scared. I’ve had this mindset change and all through this process when I start telling people, “I’m opening a restaurant.”
I was looking for a little bit of money from some of my family like, “I need a few bucks here or there.” They’re more looking at you like, “Are you nuts? What are you doing? Why are you going to open a restaurant?” I was so focused on fire. I never thought of fear or questioning whether I should or shouldn’t do this. It never came into my mind. Things fall into place. It’s just that feeling of when you’re on fire and I’m sure you’re in that mode where you have so many good things happening for you. You’re very focused. You know what’s going on. I’m in that boat too in my direction with opening this restaurant, creating a brand and a larger company that’s going to benefit everybody.
It’s the momentum that creates success. In that momentum too, there are bumps along the road. I’ve never had anything. I’ve had some big losses, I’ll call it that. Failures, if you want to call them that, sure. Falling on my face, that’s cool but I’m not dead and there’s nobody around me that’s dead, which means that I can keep going tomorrow.
We got to be grateful for what we have. There are so many people in the world who don’t have the possibilities we have in this country. It’s all around us. You got to go get it. That’s up to you as a person not to get derailed or sidetracked when something doesn’t go perfect because there’s no such thing as perfect. You adapt, pivot or however you want to call it, you keep pressing forward.
How do you define success for you?
Making the most positive impact I can on my family, friends, everyone around me, with this restaurant, on the communities we serve and trying to make the world a better place in some way. I know it sounds cheesy but how can I impact people in a positive way? It’s one of my mantras. A prayer I do is, “Please, Lord. Help me impact myself and the people around me.” I didn’t lay it out as perfectly but essentially, that’s my direction. “How do I impact myself and the people around me in a positive manner, move forward and get better every day?” That’s the focus.
I know what’s your concept Wholey Granoly because you mentioned something before the show and alluded to it here that you want to build something bigger beyond that and that was franchise. You’ve opened twelve franchise locations.
I’ve worked with various franchises. I opened them from the ground floor. That’s what I’m teeing this concept up to be. Wholey Granoly is going to be unique in many ways. I can’t wait to have you come out and see it. We’re focused on providing a better food experience for people. Another one of the main passions behind this is I got nerdy into what’s in our food, preservatives and additives. We’ve been fed for so long that was terrible for us.
The high-fructose corn syrup or a lot of the refined products that we eat is bad for the body, the world and our country. Part of it started off with my parents getting into some health issues and me trying to find out how I can help them? Maybe through changing their diet. There’s so much power and food is medicine. My driver as well is, “How can I help my dad lower his blood pressure and help his heart situation through the things he eats?” We were talking about a stubborn Polish immigrant dad who grew up on meat and potatoes. I try to change his diet.
He’s in love with meat and potatoes.
I do too but not every day. That’s where this stem from is how do we provide better food for our community? I grew up in Bolingbrook, where our first location is going to be. We’re going to create something exciting and new with a better way of eating and being conscious about it. We talked a little bit about what we eat impacts everything. It impacts your neighbor, everyone you know and the environment. I got nerdy into that as well. I started seeing, “Where does our food come from? Why is it this way? What is it this way? How can we be better?” I’m watching a lot of different documentaries on food. I try to incorporate all these things, ideas and thoughts into a restaurant concept that’s more sustainable, that has healthier food, cleaner labels, less preservatives, functional foods and things that when you eat have a higher density of nutrition. You may be eating the same type of burger but we’ve thought through every element of that burger and how can I make this better for you, Rick when you come and eat this burger that it’s better for you.
Burgers can totally be good for you. I get a grass-fed cow every year from Michigan. Even the care of the animals, there is something that goes into what makes it even tastes so good because the animal is not stressed.
That toxicity when those animals are fed crap and stress because they’re tied into a little space. When you eat that stressed meat, it puts toxins in your body that your body has to fight off. When you start thinking about those things and how they impact the environment and the world, we want to be in a different place and change the way things are looked at. It’s not easy still to get all organic or all different things. To find all that in a restaurant setting from broad-line distributors is still a little difficult. We’re going to dial this thing in to be a better concept and food for people.
Do you think that the distributors are going to catch on to this? This is a wave that dudes like you got to start. They might pick up on it later on and say, “Maybe this is what people want.”
It is. The broad-line distributor I work for is good at that. They’re ahead of the trend. That’s part of my inspiration too. They’re releasing these products. The problem that I see is a lot of operators aren’t taking advantage and seeing that people do want these products. All the data and research show that people want something a little healthier. They’re more conscious about where their food comes. You can impact your environment and the world by how you eat. It’s coming along. It’s an exciting time for restaurants and for myself at least to try to implement as much of this as I can into this concept.
What can you tell me about it? I know you signed your lease.
I got my first draft design from the architect. We’re working through that. It’s a unique concept. There are two concepts within the concept. There’s a quick service element like AAA style counter service, order at the counter, pick up and head out. In that element of it, we’ll call it Wholey Granoly Express. We’re going to do some good smoothies, some things with some health elements against functional foods, being able to add more nutritional content. I start every day with a nutritional green smoothie.
It’s got things like flax seeds and chia seeds into it. I have one of those smoothies in the day. It carries me to at least 11:00 to 12:00 without eating any breakfast. There’s so much nutrition in there. We’re going to do some smoothies, fresh frappés with fresh fruit, high-quality yogurts, higher-end coffee drinks, lattes and all those fun stuff that people love. In that Express, we’ll also have some quick-service breakfast, lunch options. It’s focusing on the ingredients and wanting to make sure that everything that goes into these dishes is high quality and gives your body something back when you pay for it.
Are you going to have traditional table service?
There will be. That’s the second element. You walk in the door. You’re going to go to the right. If you’re there for a quick service type of experience, you can come in, come to the counter, order what you need and head out. Through the other door to the left is going to be a full-service breakfast, lunch concept. I’m into global flavor profiles. I want to incorporate a lot of the things Americans love, all types of global, the Asian or Hispanic global flavor profiles and incorporate a lot of that into the dishes you know. A lot of people are doing those things in different types of fusions but we’re going to try to be creative. I love food. I’m a foodie. This is another early on motivation for me.
I started cooking at home probably in 10 to 12 years old, getting in the kitchen and making foods that I like. I’ve carried that passion on. I don’t watch TV shows. I watch food shows that I can learn things from. I’m on YouTube scrolling through chef videos to learn different techniques or understand ingredients. I’m so consumed in the food side and wanting to express this in a restaurant. I’ve had this urge to build this newer, exciting concept with better ingredients, cool flavor profiles and more creativity for a very long time. It’s coming to fruition. I’m excited. When I get so pumped up about this, I got to calm myself down.
I upset some people too and that happens. It’s like, “I want things to happen right now.” I’ve been told, “We need to build the plane as we fly it.” It’s like, “Could we at least have some wings first? We don’t necessarily need the rest of the body but maybe just one engine. It might help us a little bit.”
As entrepreneurs, we have to keep pushing the momentum forward at least if it’s one more step towards the goal. That’s how this lease negotiation happened for me too. I went next door, picking up a tux for a wedding and saw a sign on this door. I’m like, “It’s open.” I peeked in and I’m like, “This is perfect.” I made the call. It took six months to get to that final lease signature. In some days, I still can’t believe it. It was one little step after another and next thing you know, we’re signing a lease. I’ve got the architect coming in and GC on deck.
He’s ready to get started. Anybody can do this. People, just get out there and do it. If you want something bad and if you’re passionate about something, for me, I’ve been in this business all my life. I love food and people. I learned so much about nutrition and what’s better for people. I want to explode it all out into a restaurant for you and for everybody we know. As this passion comes out and I talk to people about it, a lot of people are excited about this. That makes me excited too because they feel where we’re going. They want this type of experience that I’m painting.
How do you feel about this with the future of your family? Does it worry you? Does it excite you? You’re going all-in on this side.
I’m excited. They’re excited. I’m teaching my kids. I’m like, “Look at this architectural design. We’re opening a restaurant.” I want them to be like, “We have to up our game, all of us. We’re going to be business owners in this community. We have a responsibility to the people here in how we act and present ourselves each day.” The whole way, I’m talking to them as they’re adults like, “I’m negotiating a lease. I got this and that,” or whatever the case may be. They’re 8, 9 and 5. They don’t necessarily know but they know we’re starting a business and we’re doing something. I talked to them like this all the time. A lot of things that I learned from your show, some other podcasts or books that I read, I talk to them as if they need to know this information. It’s awesome to see when they’re hearing and feeling it.
It’s Christmas time and I took my daughter to the dollar store. She’s like, “Can I go to the dollar store and buy everybody a few gifts for Christmas?” I’m like, “Sure.” I gave her a few bucks. It brought a tear to my eye when I opened up what she bought for me. It was this little itty-bitty magnet. It said, “We rise by lifting others.” That’s the best present I’ve ever gotten in my life but that also tells me that she’s hearing what I’m talking about because I’m constantly talking about things like that. It gives me goosebumps. It’s on the refrigerator. I see it all the time. For her at age eight, to absorb a lot of this information that I’m talking to her about that’s probably way above on some level which you wouldn’t expect an eight-year-old to be able to absorb. It made my year. I couldn’t have got a better gift. It was $1.
I was at dinner with my family. My sister and mom were there the first time since everything started in 2020. She’s got a husband who had a stroke a few years back. He’s high risk. I’m sitting there talking with my thirteen-year-old son about all of my acquisition plans. He’s asking questions and throwing out terminology. He’s part of the production here on the show too. He hears all the guests. He does a lot of the video editing on this. You see everything that’s up there. That’s my son that’s doing a lot of that. He’s here over in production, editing some of the previously recorded shows. He’s asking these questions. He’s picking up everything that all the guests are saying too. He’s even using the right vocabulary for high-level business acumen at thirteen. My sister is like, “Does he understand all this?” I’m like, “Yes.” We underestimate kids too much. 8 or 13 years old, why does it matter? Talk to them like they’re adults.
It’s what you put in your brain. That’s why we talk about these personal growth journeys we’ve been on. You’re constantly listening to high-level entrepreneurs, people who specialize in their field and you’re soaking this in all day. That’s all I do in my car. I’m driving around from account to account, doing different things and absorbing all this great information. It’s, “How can it not get you fired up?” They talk about, “You are what you eat, what you think and what you’re consuming every day into your brain.” That’s been a part from my younger self to now. Those are two different people. I’ve evolved and have a different mindset. I have a question for you because I know you’re into this too. Sometimes you learn something and you have some piece of information. You’re super excited about to share with people and you share it with a lot of people. I share your show often with a lot of people and you don’t get the excitement back. I’m like, “How are you not pumped up about this?”
It’s annoying. You’re talking about that it comes from a place of genuine compassion for everybody else. You’re so fired up about this new piece of knowledge. It’s like, “If only you could get this, it would change your life.” All you have to do is keep going. I recognize a little while back that everybody is at a different place in their journey. With a lot of things that I pick up on, the reason I’m so open to it is because at one point in time I wasn’t open to it. I can never count or remember all the little bits and pieces of the single sentence out of that one book that I picked out years ago that may be would have sparked this whole thing. I don’t know what book it is. I have no idea but it’s been a culmination of rewiring over time.
Some people can get it faster than others which is fine. They might be genuinely be more open because of conditioning but another big thing too is the environment. If that individual is in the wrong environment and it’s hard for them to see it, it’s like a brick wall. You’ll never going to get through and nothing’s ever going to get through to them until they can get out of whatever toxicity they’re in at the moment. It could be a bad job, a bad relationship, something that they’ve put themselves in, some addiction or something like that but that’s the environment that they’ve allowed to be created or even created themselves around them. One of those shows that you share might punch out 1 single brick or 1/2 brick at some point. You keep banging against it.
I’ll never stop. I know what’s good. I’m trying to help you. It comes from a place of sharing or caring. Maybe in our mid-twenties, it might not have resonated with us at that time. It’s a timing thing for every person, every individual. You want to change someone’s mindset or help them look at things differently because it does. It changes your life and all your possibilities when you have that shift. You’re evolving and you’re open to it. You look at it from a different perspective. You take a negative situation, a failure, a fall on your face and turn that into a learning lesson. “This taught me something. Now I can move forward stronger and more knowledgeable.” A lot of people get hung up on those failures or those times where you get kicked in the back and they let us go down.
They feel like, “It wasn’t meant to be here. I wasn’t meant to do that.” That could be perfectly true but you’re totally meant to do something else. That could be even better than what you were thinking at this point. This was maybe there to say, “This isn’t for you.” That’s also okay but looked at this big, ginormous, amazing thing if you open your eyes to the other side of your body.
I’m sure you’ve dealt with it. I know I’ve dealt with it. Like your show, you’re constantly bringing great and awesome information to people. I love it. Once you get on that journey where you want to learn more and grow more, it’s addicting. It’s the best thing you could be addicted to. “How do I learn more? How do I be a better myself?”
As long as you take action.
It took me time to take action not because I wasn’t ready for it. It’s got to be the right timing. I probably looked at 10 or 15 different restaurant properties before I finally have committed to this one. In everything in this particular location, I checked all my boxes. That’s why once that happened, I’m full speed ahead.
Looking at those 10 to 15 properties is still taking action.
Keep the momentum going. Keep looking. I know my family and friends were probably like, “Here we go again. Chris found another restaurant property.” It freaks my wife out but she’s finally calming along because most people are scared.
She wouldn’t respect you if you weren’t the way that you are. I’m sure it brings fire to her life and pushes her too. At the same time, I’m sure she balances you out to make you think twice about something that you might.
Sometimes you need that little bit of a voice. “Are you sure?” Sometimes when you’re sure, you’re sure. That’s why at this point in time, despite it being in a pandemic and probably not the best time for the restaurant industry, I knew this was all right. The right timing and the right place. It’s a long process. You want this thing to open, start construction and allowing people in to come see what you’ve built. You got to take deep breaths and relax because it is a process and it takes time but we’re well along the way. I’m excited about it.
I appreciate you being on. We can find you at LinkedIn. Is there a site for the restaurant?
It’s going to be WholeyGranoly.com. It’s not quite up yet. We’re getting there.
I can’t wait until you open. It’d be fun to do a live show there, just a follow up too on-premise. Would you be open to that?
I would 100% loved to do that.
Thank you for being out.
Thank you. I appreciate you having me out.
Important Links:
- Wholey Granoly
- DoorDash
- iTunes
- Best Buy
- LinkedIn – Chris Ciezak