Michael Chernow (16:41)
Oh, my gosh. I mean, Good Morning America multiple the Today's show, like, it was nuts. It was nuts. And I'm just here to say I'm not saying it for, like, a sure, you know, I'm saying it like, this is possible. This is possible from a dude who was seconds away from death through heroin and spent 10 years abusing my body and feeling like that I was useless and a piece of. And no one's business. And you know, to, like, this dude who, like, committed to just one fucking thing. I committed to one fucking thing a day at a time. And I was able to just build this thing. And so we opened up five more of these things over the next few years, and all in New York. All New York. And then I wanted to, like, you know, I wanted to reap some of the benefits. And I. I put $20,000 of my own money into this thing that was, like, all I had, you know, And I was like, I want to sell some of my equity so I can see if I can open up another one of these restaurants. And Daniel and I were kind of bumping heads on where to take it out of market. And, you know, we had a massive offer to buy the company. And it was going to change my life, like, in an unbelievably drastic way. And I couldn't convince him and the other guys to do it. So I was like, all right, let me go see if I can. If I can crank one of these things out solo. And so I sold equity. And I like that, Pete. That changed my life financially. Right? Couldn't believe that that happened, you know? And so then I said it. I've got. I've got, like, this confidence now, and I'm like, I'm gonna go out on my own and I'm gonna do another one. And I opened up a sustainable seafood spot called Seymour's, and I did the same thing. I opened it up, smashed it, and it was like New York Magazine number one restaurant in New York City for, like, nine months in a row. And. And we, you know, same thing. Cooking. You know, cooking fish tacos and doing all this shit on tv. And I had. I got a TV show called Food Porn and traveled around the country and shot a lot of tv. Shot, like, you know, just an ungodly amount of tv. And. And I took on a partner because the TV show was, like, taking a lot of My time. And so I was like, all right, I need to, I need a partner who understands how to scale restaurants. And so this dude, Jay Wayne Wright, he was, he was, he was leading this brand, Le Pencoen. They got thousands of restaurants and he opened, he literally, this guy opened up like himself with teams, of course, but he opened up over a thousand restaurants. And he had fallen in love with Seymour's. And he was like, I'm in. If you, if you want, if you want someone to scale this thing with you, I'm in. So I brought him on as my partner and four years in, I told him, I was like, hey, like, if we can build this thing to five to six restaurants, I probably want to sell some equity and go create another one. Because I love that part of it. I love the creative part of it. I love kicking indoors. You know, I don't love being the day to day guy following up with people and being a project manager. I'm the worst project manager. And so, you know, I sold equity there. But like, all the while I went from, like, for me, you know why? I also said in the beginning, like how important fitness was in my life. You know, like it was 10 years of Muay Thai. And then I got into endurance running. I was running these crazy long races. And then someone, once, someone said to me in 2018, hey, have you ever thought about bodybuilding? And I'm like, bodybuilding? I'm like, I'm 160 pounds. Like, what are you talking about? Like, I, you know, and, and they were like, well, you got, you kind of got a frame for it. Like, you should try men's physique bodybuilding. And she was a bikini bodybuilder. And she put the seed in my head. And I went home that night and I like hired a, hired a coach. And for the next five years I just dove into it, you know, and I ended up getting my pro card and competing as a pro. And my, you know, everybody, my wife thought I was crazy. My business partner was like, you are a psycho. And I was just like, I'm just doing the next right thing, you know, like, I'm just doing what I think is right, you know, for my life. And I needed those, I needed to chase after those things. And anyway, 2019, I sold a bunch of equity at Seymour's and the pandemic hit right after I did that. And so I got really lucky timing wise there. This is all because I'm sober, by the way. Yeah, like, like, like there is nothing available in my life. 0 like, not a damn thing. Not a wife, not kids, not fitness, not business, not anything. Without sobriety just would not be possible, you know? And so anyway, five years ago, I had to make a decision because the pandemic hit, and no one was. No one was going to restaurants. Right. Restaurant. And I kind of looked at it, and I was like, holy. Like, my career is over.
