Advice Line with Danny Meyer of Shake Shack

Today’s callers: Janell from Kentucky wonders how to build a sense of hospitality into her canned bourbon cocktail brand. Jade from South Carolina considers the upsides and risks of shipping her smoked salmon directly to customers. And Bar from Colorado considers strategies for bringing his protein-packed cous cous to quick service restaurants. Plus Danny talks about the elements of a strong company culture as described in his new book, What Could Possibly Go Right? Thank you to the founders of Ponyboy Slings, Angel Oak Smokehouse, and Boostcous for being a part of our show. If you’d like to be featured on a future Advice Line episode—where Guy and former show guests take questions from early-stage founders—leave us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and a specific question you’d like answered. Send a voice memo to [email protected] mailto:[email protected] or call 1-800-433-1298. And be sure to listen to Shake Shack’s founding story https://art19.com/shows/831bd173-0992-41b7-b1eb-112db904d947/episodes/8c547c4f-f0e8-49c3-91eb-0baa14860c3f/embed as told by Danny on the show in 2020. This episode was produced by Chris Maccini with music by Ramtin Arablouei. It was edited by John Isabella. Our audio engineer was Jimmy Keeley. You can follow HIBT on X https://x.com/HowIBuiltThis & Instagram https://www.instagram.com/howibuiltthis/ and sign up for Guy's free newsletter at guyraz.com http://guyraz.com/ and on Substack https://guyraz.substack.com/. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 5:36Guy Raz?

  Hello and welcome to the Advice Line on How I Built This Lab. I'm Guy Raz. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges. Each week, I'm joined by a legendary founder, a former guest on the show, who will help me try to help you. And if you're building something and you need advice, give us a call and you just might be the next guest on the show. Our number is 1-800-433-1298. Leave us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and the issues or questions that you'd like help with. All right, let's get to it. This week, I'm joined by legendary restaurateur Danny Meyer, founder of the Union Square Hospitality Group. Danny, it's great to have you back on the show.

• 6:13Speaker 01

  Thank you, Guy.

• 6:15Guy Raz?

  If any of you listening have ever eaten out in New York City, there's a chance that you know Danny's story. He is the man behind Union Square Cafe, Grand Mercy Tavern, the Modern, and he's the guy who took a single temporary hot dog stand in Madison Square Park and turned it into Shake Shack, which is now a global publicly traded burger empire. Danny, you were last on the show in June of 2020. And for those of you who haven't heard the story, we will put a link to it in the show notes, so check it out. That was a crazy time. The world was sheltering in place and dining rooms were dark, and it certainly felt like a long time ago. I think in 2022, you stepped down to become Executive Chairman of the Union Square Group.

• 7:00Guy Raz?

  So first of all, before we get into that, just kind of give us an update about what's kind of going on in your life right now.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, I actually stepped up to become Executive Chairman. A lot of people thought I was retiring, which could not have been further from the truth.

• 7:13Guy Raz?

  Right.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  And by being Executive Chairman, which was actually a term I had never even heard of before, it gave me the chance to continue to come into work every day, but to spend more of my time on fewer of the things, but those things that uniquely lined up with my gifts. So really, it has to do with the culture of the company, the culinary product of the company, and then all of the creative outlets we have for new businesses. And that's what I spend my time on. Whereas before, I was the guy, you know, hopefully making the trains run on time. I'm just not doing that today.

• 7:47Guy Raz?

  You have a new book out, congrats. What Could Possibly Go Right? A big part of the book is about building and enduring culture and keeping teams aligned. Can you tell us a little bit about how you think about culture?

• 8:02Speaker 01

  I think culture at its most basic is a word to describe how we do things around here. And every company, whether it's intentional or not, every family, every fraternity, sorority, every sports team, there's a way they do things around here. I think the biggest way to build culture is to have a common set of behaviors that everybody in the organization understands that they are responsible for really emanating. So for example, I actually traveled a long way. I used to think that what we really needed was was family values. And we had those in place for about 15 years. And, you know, I wouldn't argue with any of them,

• 8:45Speaker 01

  but they weren't specific to our culture. And the other problem with that guy was that it was disingenuous in retrospect to call them family values because a business is not a family. And I noticed that every time we held someone accountable to the point that there just wasn't going to be a place for them on our team going forward, people would go into deep grief because you don't fire a family member. And so the big transition I had was really evolving from family values to expected behaviors is the shorthand where everybody knows exactly what you're talking about. They know exactly what you're expecting of them. And this is the equation that I figured out is our culture is ultimately

• 9:30Speaker 01

  all of the wanted behaviors that we celebrate actively, minus all of the unwanted behaviors that we tolerate.

• 9:40Guy Raz?

  Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, Reed Hastings has has long had a similar view, right? That a business is not a family and famously has, you know, developed a whole sort of theory of management around this. He was on the show several months ago and we talked about it. So it is, it is interesting, right? And I think that's been evolving in many businesses over the last 10 or 15 years. As you know, hospitality can be an overused term, right? I mean, every, not everybody, but every many restaurant groups talk about hospitality as a, as a key value. And how can I, as a, as a customer, tell in a few

• 10:20Guy Raz?

  minutes whether a restaurant or business genuinely has a culture of hospitality, or if it's just talking about having one?

• 10:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, just look at the staff members when you walk in. If the staff members are focused on doing the job as well as it can be done, and they're having fun with each other, if they check both of those boxes, that joie de vivre, that human energy, is going to become one of the ingredients in your meal as well. I've been to restaurants where everything was technically perfect, but there was no love there. And I don't need to go back to that restaurant. I really want to see both of those boxes checked. By the way, that works for me. I can get on an airplane and watch the two flight attendants pushing the cart up and down the aisle and tell if they're focused on their job. And if they're having fun with each other, they're probably having a playful experience with the passengers.

• 11:13Speaker 01

  And at the end of the day, the real job of that airplane is to get me where I'm supposed to go on time and alive. Get me my luggage back. The stuff that's happening in the airplane is to determine whether that's going to become my favorite airline or not.

• 11:27Guy Raz?

  Yeah. How much is that about management?

• 11:31Speaker 01

  Probably about 120%. And when it's not happening, it's, it's 150% because of management. Management's to take responsibility when it's not working, and I think deserves a lot of the credit when it is working.

• 11:45Guy Raz?

  Yeah.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  We actually have a whole philosophy, which we call having a day one mentality. And it's so crucial. It's the reason that Union Square Cafe is 41 years old, and Gramercy Tavern is 31, and Shake Shack's 22, and the Modern is 22. It's because every day, we ask our teams to imagine that it's day one. Remember the pride you felt when there was not a scratch in the floor, not a smudge on the wine glasses, and every plate that came out of the kitchen was as perfect as you could get it, because you assumed that on any given night, there were three restaurant critics in the audience. And so by taking

• 12:26Speaker 01

  that day one mentality, even at 10 years, or 20 years, or 30 years, or 40 years, it keeps the restaurants fresh and improving. And that's, that's the fun I get out of this.

• 12:38Guy Raz?

  Yeah. Well, Danny, we got some callers waiting to ask some pressing questions. Are you ready to take our first call?

• 12:44Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 12:46Guy Raz?

  All right, let's bring on our first caller. Welcome to the advice line. You're on with Danny Meyer, founder of Union Square Hospitality Group. Please tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just one line about your business, please.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  My name is Janelle Bass. I'm from Louisville, Kentucky. Hello. I am the co-founder of Pony Boy Slingz. We're a bourbon-based canned cocktail that drinks more like a nostalgic soda.

• 13:09Guy Raz?

  Well, thanks for calling in, Janelle. So Pony Boy Slingz, it's a canned alcoholic beverage made with bourbon, but it's like, more like soda. So what do you mean? It's like sweeter, it's easier to drink?

• 13:20Speaker 02

  Yes, all of the above. So Mike, my husband and I created this, and we come from the beverage and bartending industry hospitality background. And we realized in Kentucky, in bourbon country, you know, everyone's drinking bourbon the same, whether it's an Old Fashioned, a Manhattan, or it's on the rocks and neat, which is great. We love that. But as bartenders, we were having a lot more fun playing with the flavors of bourbon and blending them into these light cocktails. And so we have a strawberry, a cream soda, and a tart black cherry.

• 13:56Guy Raz?

  And when you say lighter, are they lower in alcohol?

• 13:59Speaker 02

  So lower than a typical bourbon cocktail, we're 7%. So we're not like at that 30 or 40% that an Old Fashioned would be at.

• 14:07Guy Raz?

  But more like a beer.

• 14:08Speaker 02

  Exactly. We say we're the bourbon option for beer occasion.

• 14:12Guy Raz?

  So when did you, when did you guys launch?

• 14:14Speaker 02

  We launched into market at the very end of 2023. So first full year was in '24.

• 14:21Guy Raz?

  And where are you selling? I mean, alcohol is highly regulated, right? So are you selling mainly in Kentucky right now?

• 14:28Speaker 02

  Yes. So we are in Kentucky. We opened Tennessee last year. We have a distributor here. So we're off-premise, you know, retail, and then we're also in a good amount of on-premise with some bars and restaurants.

• 14:41Guy Raz?

  Awesome. And tell us, tell us what your question is for us.

• 14:45Speaker 02

  So I guess like, at the end of the day, Danny, I just, I love that you're here because there's a lot of synergies, you know, because Mike and I come from the bartending scene. We really cared about what we put into that can. We don't use preservatives. We use real juice. We use local bourbon from Kentucky and bitters. Our conversion rate in store when we do tastings is crazy. It's like between 60 and 70%. People taste it, they buy it. And so it's great. Where we have a little bit of a hiccup, you know, when we're not in the store to be able to do the tastings, and there's the sea of RTDs that you're looking at, you know, how do we get, you know, the person to feel excited about

• 15:29Speaker 02

  trying us with a packaged product like ours? How do we build that sense of hospitality into the company itself when we're not actually there?

• 15:38Guy Raz?

  Okay, so you're in the ready to drink aisle, and how do you build that sense of hospitality into the brand? Okay, Danny, I want to bring you in here. Meet Janelle, Pony Boy Slingz. A great idea, but she's trying to figure out how to build that sense of hospitality into the brand.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  First of all, congratulations. It's exciting starting a new company. My question for you is, who personifies your brand? So when somebody goes up and down the aisle, they've got a can, and I'm sure that the can has really nice label or a nice design to it. Is there any connection with any person? Some incipient brands bring on a celebrity, but you could do it yourselves. I mean, people love a good homemade story.

• 16:23Speaker 02

  I think that that's an interesting question, because Mike and I definitely stepped into creating these, making something that we want to drink. And so we haven't, we don't specifically have a certain, like, celebrity or persona, except for, you know, when we think about our demographic, we do tend to reach the older millennials and Gen X. And it skews slightly more female when, when we do tastings. But it's so hard because we're still so new. And then Tennessee really brought us a bunch of info, too.

• 16:58Guy Raz?

  Janelle, have you guys had, like, Pony Boy parties, or pop-ups, or back-end tastings? You've done those?

• 17:05Speaker 02

  Yes. So we, that is one thing that we love. I mean, that's the thing I miss about bartending, is curating a space. And where you get to sit at my bar, and I get to drive the ship of how you feel for the evening. So with Pony Boy, we do tons of pop-ups and events around Louisville. Mike DJs, we have a 1977 Chevy van we, we park and do tastings out of. So we definitely try to curate a moment and a feeling and a vibe. I mean, our website, our Instagram, it's very retro 70s. When we launched, we decided to go opposite of traditional bourbon in a bottle. And we kind of based it on that Studio 54 feeling

• 17:49Speaker 02

  of like, once you're in the club, everybody's welcome, it's this big party. And so that's kind of the vibe that we took on.

• 17:58Speaker 01

  And when you do the events, which I thought, guys, question was right on the money, you're bringing your vibe to that. And you also create a sense amongst the drinkers that they are part of a community. You're not selling a product. You're selling the opportunity to belong to a community where people like us do things like this. The question is, how do you curate a group of people who say, I am now part of a community that does this thing?

• 18:23Speaker 02

  Exactly. And, you know, we do tons of stuff here in Louisville, and we've got some repeat buys. I mean, our sales are pretty decent for what we've put in. We've, it's just been bootstrapped by us pretty much the whole time. But yeah, just trying to, as it scales to keep going with that feeling, when, you know, we're not in the store, or we're not there to do the pop-up, and for people to, I don't know, just still feel like they're being taken care of.

• 18:51Guy Raz?

  I mean, that's the question here, right? When somebody encounters the product, and neither you or your partner are there, what do you want that person to feel? And the answer to that question is what, what your brand strategy is. So one, one thing I was thinking of, looking at your cans, you're cool. I like the 70s retro feel. But you know, I, I would think about the can as your bartender. Like, that's the, you know, in Louisville, bartenders say, oh, you got to try this amazing thing. It's the, the can initially can sort of be that. I think of Liquid Death. It says murder your thirst on the can. I mean, could you put something cool or unexpected, like, under the tab when you pop it? Or even on the can that says, like, come on, join the party, or come on in, or?

• 19:32Speaker 01

  Pop on the pony.

• 19:33Guy Raz?

  Something like that. You know, you should, you could try to be playful with, because the can, it looks nice, but it's very conventional. It tells the name of the drink and what's in it, and you've got the cool logo. But maybe you can be playful. Danny, you use that word playful. When you know hospitality is working, maybe you try that on the can.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  There's a terrific example in the wine world. Have you heard of Ramona, the canned wine?

• 19:59Speaker 02

  I have, actually, yes.

• 20:01Speaker 01

  So it's a terrific product. It was launched by somebody, someone who used to work for us, named Jordan Salcedo. And she was very specific. She wanted to give women a product that they could drink while guys were chugging the beer. And she did it just a great launch, where when you buy a can of Ramona, you feel like you are with Jordan. So I think that would be a really good case study. Have a look at that one.

• 20:32Guy Raz?

  Yeah, I'm looking at that site now. It looks really cool. The packaging's great. Also, Ollie Pop, you know, a new kind of soda. I mean, but, but you are going for a certain vibe, and I think you can use the can as, as the introduction, as your ambassador. So I would think about that.

• 20:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, I love that. I think that's fantastic. That's a great idea.

• 20:52Guy Raz?

  Janelle Bass, the brand is called Pony Boy Slingz. Good luck. Thanks for calling in.

• 20:56Speaker 02

  Thank you so much for having me. Bye, guys.

• 20:59Guy Raz?

  Thank you.

• 21:01Guy Raz?

  We're going to take a quick break, but when we come back, another caller, another question and another round of advice. I'm Guy Raz. Stick around. You're listening to the advice line on how I built this lab.

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• 26:00Guy Raz?

  Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz, and my guest today is Danny Meyer, founder of Union Square Hospitality Group. And Danny, let's take another call. You ready?

• 26:11Speaker 01

  Let's go.

• 26:12Speaker 03

  Hi there. Thank you for having me. My name is Jade Taylor, and I am the co-founder of Angel Oak Smokehouse. We are a premium salmon smokehouse based in Charleston, South Carolina. And we hope to make it a household name in a category that we believe doesn't really have one right now.

• 26:29Guy Raz?

  Thanks for calling in, Jade. So Angel Oak Smokehouse, this is a, you smoke salmon and sell it from a storefront, online? Where is it sold?

• 26:40Speaker 03

  So right now, we launched 15 months ago, and we are primarily in retail. Our first major retailer was Whole Foods. We launched there in March in the southeast region.

• 26:53Guy Raz?

  And how many products do you sell?

• 26:55Speaker 03

  Right now, we have two. We have our cold smoked salmon, which you know traditionally would go on a bagel. And then we have our hot smoked salmon, which is smokier, more like a piece of salmon you would cook at home.

• 27:06Guy Raz?

  Right, yeah.

• 27:08Speaker 03

  Really flakes beautifully and much more versatile in what you can do with it.

• 27:13Guy Raz?

  Well, are you a chef back? Like, what's your background? How did you get into smoking salmon?

• 27:19Speaker 03

  I am not, no. So the story really starts over 40 years ago with my dad. He was salmon fishing in the north of England. He caught too many, took them home, and he put them in the family bathtub. And when my grandfather found them, he said, "You've got to get rid of them." So my dad smoked them and sold them in the village. He left school at 16 and then ended up building his career around smoking fish. I went to Duke University and studied mechanical engineering. So started my career as an aerospace engineer at Boeing on the 787 Dreamliner. First as a repair engineer and then as a design engineer.

• 27:54Speaker 01

  You could have called it flying fish at that point.

• 27:58Guy Raz?

  Transition to smoking salmon, I love that.

• 28:00Speaker 03

  Smooth transition.

• 28:01Guy Raz?

  And now you said you are in Whole? And how many Whole Foods are you in?

• 28:05Speaker 03

  We're in the southeast region right now. We just launched a couple of months ago. It's 42 stores. We just got a PO this week from Harris Teeter for 20 of their stores. And then next month, we'll be launching in all of Fresh Market's 170 stores.

• 28:21Guy Raz?

  And you say "we," it's you and?

• 28:23Speaker 03

  It's me and my husband.

• 28:25Guy Raz?

  Okay. Before we dive in further, what's your question?

• 28:28Speaker 03

  So Danny, like you, we care deeply about having a consistent, high-quality experience every time for our customers. Should we continue to expand in retail and in food service? Or should we take that leap and go into the direct-to-consumer shipping from our website, knowing that one bad delivery could mean spoiled fish on someone's doorstep, instead of giving them that premium experience that we've worked so hard to build?

• 28:54Guy Raz?

  All right, Danny, Jade is doing premium smoked salmon. They've got some great traction with Whole Foods and retail. Should they go DTC? Should they start to explore that, knowing that there's risks involved?

• 29:06Speaker 01

  Well, first of all, I'm excited to try your product because I grew up hating salmon, mostly because every time I had it, it was overcooked, smelly. Although, the first time I got to try smoked salmon, I loved it. And then, the first time I got to try hot smoked salmon, I loved that, too. So you obviously have a product that is appealing to people. So you have what we call a high-class problem. And now the question is, you know you've got a good thing. You've got a great story. It's fantastic that you're carrying on with your family tradition. That actually makes the salmon taste even better, if you ask me. And you're clearly not concerned, or you don't seem to be concerned,

• 29:50Speaker 01

  about Whole Foods getting a bad shipment. So what's the trouble with selling it in other ways? Like, you are confident that they're going to handle the product the right way, the way you're packaging it. So what is your concern? Is it shipping?

• 30:08Speaker 03

  Correct. It's letting go of that control that, once it leaves our facility, we're dependent on UPS or FedEx getting it to that customer and then reliant on them getting it from their doorstep into the refrigerator.

• 30:22Speaker 01

  Now, have you heard of Goldbelly?

• 30:24Speaker 03

  I have heard of Goldbelly, yeah.

• 30:26Speaker 01

  Because that's a company that we like so much. We invested in it, and they ship daily all kinds of products that I think are even more perishable than yours. They ship my daughter's ice cream. And it was packed, frozen, it arrives frozen. They ship Joe's Stone Crab. They have so many companies that have otherwise perishable products. And all they do is provide the logistics for you so that when it leaves you, it leaves exactly as you want it. You get to bundle on to their incredibly low shipping rates, which means that your customers are not paying some exorbitant higher fee for all the shipping. As you know, so often, that's the biggest cost

• 31:10Speaker 01

  when you get DTC stuff shipped, especially perishable.

• 31:15Guy Raz?

  Yeah, I'm going to take a slightly contrarian view on this one, Danny, because Goldbelly is amazing. They do great stuff. And it may be a great option, whether you decide to do it on your own or with them. But I would say down the road, right? Because right now, you're in 42 Whole Foods, you're in 12 to 15 Harris Teeters, you're barely a year plus and change old. That's pretty great traction, right? And so I guess I would say, do you want to also get into D to C right now before you have solidified those retail outlets? The other thing is, if you want to do it, I would, I would start very limited,

• 31:57Guy Raz?

  a limited geographic experiment and then really track everything. Like, are there repeat orders? You know, that's the most important, because if a customer isn't repeating the order, then you don't have a direct to consumer business. You're just, you're sending, you have an expensive way of sending people salmon that they could go buy at Whole Foods. So I would really wait. And if you want to do it, start small in a small geographic region. That's, that's my feeling. But Danny, you may, you may think differently.

• 32:27Speaker 01

  Well, I think similarly and differently. So I'll try both sides of that coin. The similar thing is that I do agree that it's a good thing to really solidify what's working right now. It's also a really good idea to ask yourself, why do we want to do it? How much growth do you want? What, what are you hoping for? How much growth can you have? I have no idea about how solid your supply of salmon is. I have no idea what would happen if you tripled that or quadrupled that. I have no idea how big your capacity is for smoking. So, you know, the book that I just wrote is called What Could Possibly Go Right? And what happens if it does go really right? Are you going to be prepared for that?

• 33:11Speaker 01

  Is that something you really want? So that's the part of Guy's point of view that I agree with, which is, it's not really about DTC versus in-store versus on-premise. It's really about what are your goals? But then, the contrary point of view, I think it's worth dabbling a little bit with a platform like Goldbelly, because you can do it just one day a week. My daughter's ice cream place called Cafe Pana, she doesn't have capacity or interest in selling more than one or two days a week on Goldbelly. But here's what she's learned.

• 33:52Speaker 01

  She knows that if you, if you don't have it available in your local Whole Foods, because you live in St. Louis, or Cleveland, or Idaho, wherever, you still have an opportunity. She's been able, without adding bricks and mortar, and without adding any capacity, to have a national audience. And she can actually tell you exactly where the most demand is. While she has no interest in opening bricks and mortar in, you know, other cities, if ever she were to, she has built-in data on where there is actually demand beyond anything she could learn if she were just selling at her own place.

• 34:33Speaker 01

  So I like dipping your toe, if, if in fact, you're interested in growing.

• 34:38Speaker 03

  What about the dipping the toes being in more of a B to B model? So there are a lot of these gourmet shops and markets across the country that have been emailing us and would love our product. But again, we don't have large nationwide distribution yet. So they can't get it besides us shipping it to them. So maybe that's how we dip our toes.

• 34:59Speaker 01

  I think that's even smarter. Find one or two places that you would be proud to own yourself, and create a scarcity where everybody else wants it.

• 35:08Guy Raz?

  Yes.

• 35:09Speaker 01

  But only those one or two can get it. And now, all of a sudden, your brand has even more luster to go with it.

• 35:16Guy Raz?

  Yeah, I agree. I mean, look, you've got a lot of leverage. You're in 42 Whole Foods, right? And, and the advantage there is you can also sample in those places, and people can try it. But you've got, you've got some leverage here. If these other smaller grocers want it, I agree with Danny, the scarcity. And also, you want to make sure there's a minimum order there. You don't want to be selling $40 worth of salmon. You want to be selling $250, $300 worth of salmon. Danny, any final words of advice? I think your idea is great. Try Goldbelly, maybe. And Danny, any, any final thoughts?

• 35:49Speaker 01

  Keep smoking.

• 35:51Guy Raz?

  Keep smoking.

• 35:52Speaker 01

  No, it's exciting. It sounds like you guys are off to, off to the races.

• 35:56Guy Raz?

  Yeah. Jade, thanks so much for calling in. Angel Oak Smokehouse in South Carolina. Good luck.

• 36:01Speaker 03

  Thank you so much, both of you.

• 36:02Guy Raz?

  Thank you. All right, we're going to take another quick break, but we'll be right back with another caller. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to The Advice Line, right here on How I Built This Lab.

• 36:28Guy Raz?

  Welcome back to The Advice Line, right here on How I Built This Lab. I'm Guy Raz, and today, I'm taking your calls with the legendary Danny Meyer, founder of Union Square Hospitality Group, and the man behind Shake Shack, and Gramercy Tavern, and Union Square Cafe, and so many restaurants. And let's get back into it and take another call.

• 36:46Speaker 01

  I'm ready.

• 36:48Guy Raz?

  All right, let's bring in our final caller. Welcome to The Advice Line. Please tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just a little bit about your business.

• 36:55Speaker 04

  Hey, Guy, hey, Danny. My name is Barb Ruiz. I'm calling from Carbondale, Colorado, small little town. And my company is called Boos Kus. We're the world's first better-for-you couscous.

• 37:08Guy Raz?

  Thanks for calling in. Because a couscous usually is just, it's like wheat, like tiny wheat, into tiny little grains that you cook like rice. And, and so this is different than that couscous that most of us know of?

• 37:22Speaker 04

  Yeah, great question. Yeah, most people actually think that couscous is a grain, similar to quinoa. So impressive that you know that it's, a regular couscous is actually just semolina flour and water. So it's just pasta. Yeah, our couscous is high in protein and high in fiber. We have 18 grams of protein, 11 grams of fiber per serving. And really importantly, we are only made with three simple natural ingredients. So it's just made out of chickpea flour, lentil flour, and pea flour. So all of that is naturally occurring. We don't use any xanthum gum or any colors.

• 37:54Guy Raz?

  So no wheat at all?

• 37:55Speaker 04

  No wheat at all. It's actually, yeah, gluten-free. And it's been a huge part of our demographic of buyers.

• 38:03Guy Raz?

  That's amazing. How long have you been making this?

• 38:06Speaker 04

  Yeah, so we launched in December of last year. So just, you know, we're under a year old now.

• 38:13Guy Raz?

  And so we, is it you and a team, or just you and the royal we?

• 38:17Speaker 04

  It's me and my co-founder. He's my best friend and kind of adventure partner out in Colorado.

• 38:24Guy Raz?

  Did you guys invent this?

• 38:26Speaker 04

  So yeah, I was born in Israel. That's where the name Barb comes from. And kind of grew up eating couscous, and always loved how quick and easy it is to make, and how versatile it is. You can cook it in about five minutes, which is way faster than rice and pasta. And then you can eat it hot or cold, whether that's on a salad, or, you know, as a rice replacement hot. And yeah, was looking for a better-for-you option, and realized that there wasn't one. Obviously, like on the pasta aisle, there's banza, and brahmi, and gouda, so many options.

• 38:56Guy Raz?

  A lot of heavy protein pastas now, which are great, yeah.

• 38:59Speaker 04

  Exactly, yeah.

• 39:00Guy Raz?

  So how did you invent this? How, you just started playing around with chickpea, and lentil flour, and pea flour?

• 39:05Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's a good question. That could probably be its own separate podcast, because it took us a year and a half. But the short version is, we started in our kitchen, and we tried to infuse protein into regular couscous, failed. And then through a lot of trial and error, we finally landed on our current product and the co-man that we're working with.

• 39:28Guy Raz?

  Yeah, that's a really cool, and tell us, how is the business doing so far?

• 39:32Speaker 04

  So the first half of this year, we were really focused on direct to consumer.

• 39:37Guy Raz?

  Yeah.

• 39:37Speaker 04

  And built a pretty thriving business there. We've shipped over 150,000 boxes. We have a $2 million run rate.

• 39:45Guy Raz?

  Is this self-funded?

• 39:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, all bootstrapped, my co-founder.

• 39:48Guy Raz?

  How did you, how did you reach so many people? How did you have the money to do advertising and all those things?

• 39:53Speaker 04

  Yeah, so we're, we're first order profitable. So the money really went into the inventory. But because we're first order profitable, we're able to kind of keep investing into this marketing engine. And we are doing a small raise now as well, to kind of help with a retail expansion. And we'll be launching into a couple retailers before the end of the year.

• 40:17Guy Raz?

  I love innovative ideas like this. All right, before we dive in for the, what's your question for us?

• 40:21Speaker 04

  Yeah, so we've had a good amount of success on direct to consumer. We're actually starting to have a lot of success in retail. The next logical step is going into food services, and specifically, fast casual restaurants like Kava and Sweetgreen, that already have that kind of build-your-own-bowl with rice and other grains. And we feel that couscous could be a complementary to those other grains, obviously adding more fiber and more protein. Anything that you guys could help with in terms of like bringing those ingredients in? What, what does that decision look like? How can we set ourselves up for success there?

• 40:58Guy Raz?

  All right, Danny, I want to bring you in here. I mean, 18 grams of protein and 11 grams of fiber. Interesting new way of eating couscous. Thoughts, questions, ideas?

• 41:09Speaker 01

  Well, you're on the right track in terms of how everybody wants to eat these days. You know, when you start to see protein showing up in coffee drinks, right? And fiber showing up in soft drinks. You know you're on the right track. And I think it's a great idea that you're doing this. As far as getting into food service, I'm wondering if a good place to start might be, instead of going for the big boys right off the bat? Because they're going to need supply that you may or may not have already. They're going to need some quality assurance. Not that you wouldn't have the quality assurance, but their purchasing departments have so many boxes you have to check.

• 41:51Speaker 01

  I would start with a smaller business, maybe even a onesie or twosie, that already has couscous on their menu. Because then you don't have the added burden of trying to convince the big guys. You know, I don't think Kava has a skew of couscous. Maybe they should, or maybe they will someday, thanks to you. But I would start with someone who already has that on their menu. Learn with them. Get a couple of good victories under your belt. That'll probably lead you to another threesie and foursie. And there's time. I mean, you'll definitely get there. If the product, if it works in places that already have couscous,

• 42:34Speaker 01

  then I think it's a good time to take it to someone where you've got to educate them, even before you sell them.

• 42:42Guy Raz?

  Yeah, I agree. I mean, Danny, you know, this makes me think of what, I mean, it's not a great analogy because Impossible Meat is, you know, it's not doing as well as it was at one point. But, you know, their sort of rollout plan is really interesting. They didn't just all of a sudden start selling it at Safeway. They started with, I think they sent it to like David Chang, you know, and other like high-end chefs and said, hey, here is Impossible Meat. Like, we want you to experiment with this. And that got the brand a lot of attention and buzz. And I agree that you, you know, Kava, Sweetgreen, these kinds of places, they need to know that this works at, you know, at a food service level and it can be

• 43:25Guy Raz?

  cooked quickly and it, and it doesn't get mushy when it's sitting in these large containers and, you know, that people are going down the line. And so there are all these questions they're going to need to answer. And so experimenting small could be interesting. Sending it to chefs could be interesting. But I also think you've got a great thing going, right? You're going to get into stores, you said, maybe. You've got a DTC working. I mean, you're, you're just starting out and you're, you know, you're already hitting, what, close to $2 million in, in sales this year?

• 43:54Speaker 04

  Yeah, yeah, exactly. And yeah, I think really good feedback on starting small. We, we certainly should. And we've had a couple of smaller restaurants reach out, so we should definitely test that out. And I really like the idea of sending it out to chefs. We've done some of that and we've had chefs get really creative and even some creators on, online, you know, make dolmas and make sushi with our couscous. And some of that has gone viral. So yeah, I think it could help both for the food service side and our D2C business. So really appreciate that.

• 44:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I also don't want to understate the part of this. In addition to a Kava or a Sweetgreen trying to figure out if it works for them, I don't want to omit the fact that you have to figure out how it works for you. So as a very young business, scaling is not an automatic thing. You need more people on the team. That, that comes with cultural responsibilities. You need more equipment, that, you need more sourcing. There's just so much as you scale. And I bet you'll get there. I really, I feel confident that you will get there. One of the really cool things, besides hitting the protein and fiber moment, you're also hitting the Mediterranean moment.

• 45:08Speaker 01

  We've never had more interest in Mediterranean cooking in this country. And if you did your homework, there's probably six to 12 pretty well-known chefs around the country who already have couscous on their menu as an ingredient in one way, shape or form. And they can be really good proof points and advocates. I think that's a great strategy.

• 45:32Guy Raz?

  Yeah, we did an episode on the show a couple of months ago about Catalina Crunch, really interesting brand. I think it's worth listening to, you know, and Danny, you know, this, a lot of these small upstart brands are, you know, they find a co-manufacture that can make it and it's a good partnership. And I would also target fitness people, people who are just, you know, vegetarian or non-vegetarian, people just trying to boost their protein intake for workouts.

• 45:58Speaker 04

  Yeah, the, the protein maxing crowd is definitely something that we have been targeting.

• 46:03Guy Raz?

  You throw chicken in there, you've got 40 grams of protein.

• 46:06Speaker 04

  Exactly, yeah. Parents have been loving it for their kids as well. There's no choking hazard. It's high in iron. Yeah, and then, and then the GLP-1 crowd is also loving it because it's high in protein and high in fiber. So we've kind of found a lot of different niches and now trying to double and triple down on them. And Danny, we're actually hiring our first employee in the next month or so. And culture is definitely going to be a piece of that. So I actually just bought your book, so I'm really excited to read it.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 46:35Guy Raz?

  Send him some boost couscous and then he'll send you a signed copy.

• 46:37Speaker 01

  There we go.

• 46:38Speaker 04

  Yeah, it sounds like a fair trade.

• 46:40Speaker 01

  And we'll cut, we'll cut Guy a little commission in the process of both.

• 46:43Guy Raz?

  Absolutely. All right, Barb Bruhiss, the brand is called Boost Couscous. Good luck, man. Thanks for calling in.

• 46:49Speaker 04

  Thanks so much.

• 46:51Guy Raz?

  Cool idea. I love when we get things that people have just invented, created, you know, like, or taken a product in just a completely different approach to it. I like these kinds of, of products.

• 47:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, isn't it fun to walk around a corner and discover a flavor, an idea that you never would have thought of yourself?

• 47:11Guy Raz?

  Totally. Danny, before I let you go, a quick question, which we ask all of our guests, which is, knowing what you know now, after 40-plus years in this business, if you could go back to you when you were starting out, you know, when 27, 28 years old, starting your first restaurant, what advice could you go back and give the young Danny Meyer that might have been helpful for him?

• 47:32Speaker 01

  I think I would tell the young Danny Meyer not to get too upset when the graph goes down because it's always going to come back up again. It might even come back up even higher than the last time. I'll never forget 1987, so two years after I opened Union Square Cafe, I really thought it was the end because we had something called Black Friday. All of a sudden, I said, well, that was a fun two-year career.

• 47:58Guy Raz?

  Yeah.

• 47:58Speaker 01

  And, and then, you know, you go through something like that and then you go through 9/11 and Superstore and Sandy and the Great Recession and of course, the worst one, the pandemic. And you realize that it's a fool's errand to bet that that down dip is not going to come back up. So the root of the word hospitality is hope. And I think we're actually in a business that can actually take pessimism and fear and we can be the antidote to that. So that's what I've learned. And it's like a winemaker. You don't wish a bad vintage on any winemaker, but next one will probably be better.

• 48:34Guy Raz?

  That's Danny Meyer. He's the founder of Union Square Hospitality Group. And by the way, if you haven't heard Danny's original episode, we will definitely put a link to it in the show notes. Go back and check it out. It's a great story. And here's one of my favorite moments from that interview.

• 48:47Speaker 01

  Let's cut right to the chase. This is one of the greatest pieces of advice I got from my, my late grandfather, Irving Harris. He said, you know, stop complaining about problems. He said, problems is the definition of business.

• 49:01Guy Raz?

  Yep.

• 49:02Speaker 01

  The people who do best in business aren't the ones with the least problems or the people who solve their problems better and have more fun doing it with better people.

• 49:14Guy Raz?

  Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. And by the way, please make sure to check out my newsletter. You can sign up for it for free at guyraz.com or on Substack. And of course, if you are working on a business and you'd like to be on this show, send us a one-minute message that tells us a little bit about your business and the questions or issues that you're currently facing, because we would love to try and help you solve them. You can send us a voice memo at [email protected] or call us at 1-800-433-1298. Leave a message there and make sure to tell us how to reach you and we'll put all of this information in the podcast description as well. This episode was produced by Chris Messini with music composed by Ramtin Arablouei.

• 49:58Guy Raz?

  It was edited by John Isabella. Our audio engineer was Jimmy Keely. Our production staff also includes Alex Chung, Carla Estevez, J.C. Howard, Catherine Seifer, Casey Herman, Kerry Thompson, Sam Paulson, Niva Grant, and Elaine Coats. I'm Guy Raz and you've been listening to How I Built This.

• 50:25Guy Raz?

  If you're running a small business and payroll benefits and hiring feel like a lot, you're not alone. And Just Works is ready to help because you don't have to worry when it just works.