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- [00:01]
A
Hey folks, Jeff Berman here. Exciting news. Applications are now open for the Masters of Scale Summit. It's happening October 20th through October 22nd in San Francisco and it is a really special event. Please join our curated community of founders, innovators and leaders shaping the future. Expect ideas that challenge your assumptions and connections that move your business and and maybe even your life forward. It's an experience that can change literally everything. Apply now@mastersofscale.com apply26 that's mastersofscale.com apply26
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B
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- [02:06]
C
I'm going to open my restaurant. I'm gonna do it. I'll never give up. And when I tell myself that and it's a human condition, right, the subconscious believes what you tell it. And that's where I could get that fuel to keep working hard. Still does today too.
- [02:30]
A
This is Masters of Scale. I'm Jeff Berman, your host this week on the show Todd Graves. Todd is the founder and co CEO of Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers. He blitzscaled his fast food concept into a brand worth billions and is well known both for its deliciously simple menu and its refreshingly friendly staff. We talked about how he perfected the recipe for success, why he thinks restaurants should be wary of private equity, and much, much more. It is a tasty conversation.
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D
Stay tuned. Todd welcome to Masters of Scale.
- [03:05]
C
Thank you for having me here, I'm
- [03:06]
D
thrilled to have you. I discovered raising canes in, I want to say 2022, after you opened in El Segundo in LA, and for my now 16 year old, and I had absolutely changed our chicken eating habits. So thank you. Fired. Talk to you and. And get into the story. Let's start at the start. Where did the inspiration for raising canes come from?
- [03:29]
C
It really started as a kid. You know, I was always entrepreneurial. I was the kid that did the lemonade stands in the neighborhood and then, you know, cut people's grass for $5 and just always thought around business. And when I started working, you know, high school years, I worked in the restaurant business. And I did that because I like to cook with my mother. Like, food like, was, you know, for me is expression of love. You know, spending time with my mother cooking Cajun food, like, let's say a gumbo, right? Or my grandmother made me a pie. And so I'm like, you know, my first job, go work in the restaurants. And I like the pace, I like the meat. Of a gratification of cooking something and then serving it to somebody and them being happy. Right. And working with teams, things like that. So for me, during college, you know, I was trying to consider what I was going to do, and, you know, that entrepreneurial streak, you know, went back in me, and I'm like, you know what? I want to open a restaurant, and I want to open it when I get out of college. And I had no idea how hard that would be at that point. But that was a dream. It was just a natural thing for me to go into, do the food business. And when I was in college and if you remember back in these days, this is 1994. Back then, it was like, ground meat was bad for you. Beef was bad, and chicken and fish was good for you. But chicken became the number one protein. And I could see. And I grew up, Louisiana, on fried chicken, right? But it's all bone fried chicken. And during that time I was college, people started eating the boneless chicken. Whether it was chains like Chili's having that sauce or it was going to mom and pops. And I was like, man, this is gonna be the next thing.
- [04:52]
D
Yeah. So, okay, so you're a college Student in the 90s, you had this idea, start working on a business plan. Back then I had a partner when
- [04:59]
C
I started the business, and he had one more year of college and he enrolled in business classes and we took a business planning class. Couldn't actually go to the class But I actually wrote that business plan with him for that class and man, he was good. Cause I knew the business. Right? I mean, it was a well done business plan that he presented, but. And ended up getting the worst grade in the class. Why?
- [05:19]
D
What was the response?
- [05:20]
C
Actually, I was really glad it was the worst grade because it motivated me. But the professor said the plan's exceptional. I mean, I knew details. I knew exactly. I knew what our aprons would cost to get washed. Right. And so because I worked in the business, but he said, you know, you didn't follow the concept and understand the industry. And at that point, quick service restaurants like McDonald's is adding menu items. They're worried about a veto vote. One person in the car doesn't want something, you know, from that restaurant, then they can go to another restaurant that has more variety. So they're adding variety and they're also adding healthy menu items. They're adding salads and wraps and things like that. So he said, overall the plan was good, but you didn't hit what the industry's doing. So that's why I did it. And you know, I was like, you know what, I'm going to use that as motivation because I knew that point. You go to a place because it's craveable food and you're going to go there and even though it has 100 different menu items, you're going to get what you really like. And I'm like being an execute on one thing and do it better than anybody else is going to be a recipe for success. And it ended up being there. Look, it's In N Out Burgers. Done it since 1948. And I didn't have that as a model then, but I just had that intuitive sense that serving something craveable people will come back for.
- [06:34]
D
We have so many entrepreneurs on masters of scale who hear 100 no's before they get their first yes. The first no sounds like it was a professor saying this is the worst grade in the class. For this reason. I appreciate the instinct was there, but. But to go launch a business takes more than instinct. There's a lot that goes into that. Where do you think that conviction came from? Not just to believe it and feel it, but to follow through on it.
- [06:57]
C
Yeah. So I was like one of these nerds in college. I was part of the entrepreneurial club and would read business magazines reading the paper. And what I saw was a lot of people that had really good ideas that they were passionate about. Never go and get it done because it's so hard to start a business, right? And so it's like, if I want to do this, and this is my dream to go in my own restaurant, I got to be committed, like to success or eventually failure, whatever it is, but never stop till I get it done. Took that business plan to every bank in town, you know, bought a cheap suit and, you know, cheap briefcase and went in and presented the plan. And no after, no after, no nice enough, right? But then they also give me some advice like, hey, why don't you, you don't have any money, why don't you get a college degree, why don't you work in the industry for 10 years and then you can do that. And whether, you know, you know, it's the best thing for an entrepreneur to be told, hey, I don't think this is going to work because it just use that as fuel. You want to get a chip on your shoulder, you're like, I believe this, I'm going to do this. And you know, to back that up, you know, when I couldn't get any money, I'm like, I'm going to go to work and work as long as it takes for me to fund the restaurant myself. And so I got a job through a friend of a friend working as a boilermaker, which is turnaround, ship working, refineries, one in El Segundo and the other one in Torrance in LA. And that's when I came out to LA and worked hard, 90 hour weeks, California, you get some double time in there. It's a great way to make money if you want to work hard. And met a guy there, interesting, named Wild Bill Tolar. Okay, Wild Bill, everybody had nicknames there and mine was Hollywood, which is a whole nother story. But Wild Bill's like, man, you're not afraid of hard work. And I know you have this chicken finger dream. He's like, you should come with me, come up to Alaska and I'll introduce you, show you around and you can work the Alaskan fishing trade, catching sockeye salmon with gill netting. And he says, you'll get a job on the boat. You're determined, he said, that's going to make some real money. So now it's dangerous. The hours are incredibly hard, but you can make some good money. So sure enough, called a plane to Anchorage, float plane. King salmon hitchhiked to Knack Knack and spent that summer commercial fishing in Alaska.
- [09:07]
D
So a guy named Hollywood, nickname Hollywood, goes up to Alaska to start doing commercial fishing, which to say it's dangerous and to say that the hours are tough and the working conditions are rough is an understatement. I mean, this is one of the toughest jobs in the world.
- [09:20]
C
It is, yeah.
- [09:21]
D
How'd you manage it?
- [09:22]
C
You get about four hours of sleep at night and that's 30 minutes here, an hour here, 20 hour days. Just like working hard, hard manual labor. Boats are filling up with fish and captains don't want to go to the tender boat and you might sink. And boats are ramming each other. National Geographic helicopters going over, medical evac, helicopters are going. It was this insane deal and I was just like, I'm doing this, I'm fueling my chicken finger dream. Nothing's going to stop me. But that resolve, having that resolve is what kept me going and then eventually opening up.
- [09:54]
D
And you were telling everyone your why you were telling, I'm here because I'm going to make enough money to go open my restaurant.
- [10:00]
C
That's right. That's right.
- [10:01]
A
Wow.
- [10:01]
D
And do you think that there's something psychological when you say it out loud that commits yourself to it?
- [10:07]
A
Is there a psychological insight there?
- [10:09]
C
It absolutely is for me. And so being able to say, I'm going to open my restaurant, I'm going to do it, I'm not going to stop until I do. Nothing's going to ever stop me for this. I'll never quit, I'll never give up. And when I tell myself that, and it's a human condition. Right. The subconscious believes what you tell it. Right. And the brain believes it. And that's where I could get that fuel to keep working hard and to do it, and still does today too. Right. And so, you know, you can choose your mood during the day. You get up in the morning and say, hey, I'm going to have a great day. Or you can get up and go, oh my gosh, this is going to be a tough day. Right. And whatever you say is pretty much right.
- [10:43]
D
By the end of that Alaskan summer, how much had you saved up that point?
- [10:46]
C
About maybe like 40 to 60 grand at that point, which was significant money and enough for me to, to get the project rolling. And so, and also this point too is I was able to get a small group of preferred investors because they'd seen, you know, it had been, you know, roughly two years to where when I opened it up, they were like, you know what? You are committed to this, you know, little $5,000, $10,000, some of them bowler makers, some of them Alaskan fisher people. You know, my bookie who invested in cash was little five $10,000 increments and. And then got a small SBA loan. And since I had that equity side of it and I had to live off of two of them because I had the money I made, I had to live off that were painters. I was like five bucks an hour or whatever we were doing. And I was able to open up. I secured a place in the north gates of lsu, right. It's old dilapidated building. The. The Roker was a great guy, Red Reynolds. And he said, I believe he'd actually like told the landlord to Lou Larboard. She was like 96 years old and said, Todd, it was all kind of college concept. It just was in a year out, he's like, he will make a long term thing that we can just wait for him. So let's just wait for it. But going in, I wanted to be prudent, right, and have a. I didn't have a ton of money going in to renovate this place. So I just learned what to do, right? Learned how to do plumbing, I learned how to do contracting work, things like that. And then bringing the experts when we really needed, you know, electrician things I couldn't do. So figure that out. Same with going to the restaurant. I knew the restaurant business, but I've never gone out to h. Hire people. Never done these things before is so I'd learn it.
- [12:09]
D
Was there a piece of advice you got from someone who'd been there, done that before that was particularly instrumental in this phase of the process?
- [12:17]
C
You know, not at that point because to be honest with you, I had a lot of bad examples. So when, you know, working in restaurants, you know, high school and college, the restaurant business was. It was more militant. It was do this, do that, no music going in the kitchens. There wasn't a semblance of having fun or teamwork. It was, you know, it was the yes chef type of deal. And so I knew what I didn't want. You know what I mean? I knew I wanted people to wear casual uniforms, just a raising cane shirt, jeans, shorts, whatever. I wanted people to listen to music. I wanted them to have fun but taking pride while they worked and did those things. So those types of things helped me on doing that. So like a lot of these restaurateurs were just not good people people. There were good culture people. So. But look, National Restaurant association gave us a lot of good things on like actually the formats on how to do. How to do templates for scheduling and things like that. And then I reached out to the restaurateurs I did respect in Baton Rouge and being like, hey, man, how are you getting good people? And what are some incentives? You go and do it. My wife, who I started dating back then, was a McDonald's franchisee. So we spent a lot of our time just talking about, you know, how do you motivate the crew, how do you salt your fries, things like that.
- [13:28]
D
Was there a point where there was. There was an inflection where you said, oh, we. We've got this. We. We really have this right now.
- [13:34]
C
Luckily, we made money from the first month, right? I said 30 bucks. Then we started doing well, and actually, we had so much success that I opened my second location 18 months later, got a full SBA loan, 18 months on that, and construction from the ground up on this building. And so I was always fortunate that we were making money and doing it. So I never had the it's not going to work moment. I had the look. I'm just hoping I keep this energy going because I was working nonstop and doing it and doing that, and I need to get other people to come help me and do this. But the thing that was the inflection point, when do it work. I thought this was just a college concept, right? Opened my first location, one side of campus, the second, the other side. But that other location had traffic flow of not just students, right? So now I'm having mom and dad pick up food on the way home from work. I got T ball teams on Saturday, church groups on Sunday, and, you know, business people come in for lunch. And then I'm like, wait a minute. This isn't just college concept. I think this can work. And that's when I got the bug, man. I was like, I'm enjoying this. I'm figuring things out. I'm enjoying having teams build, and I'm enjoying this, man. I'm like, I want to go. I love serving customers. And I was able to start doing a few things in the LSU community. And I got that bug, man. I wanted to grow, and I never thought that would be that. But that point, I was like. And that's where the vision was from. That point was like, as many raising canes I can do in the world. That's what I want to do.
- [14:52]
D
I know you have skewed a franchise model, and I'm keen to hear about that theory of growth and scale. Maybe we can enter some of that through. How do you come into a community and really get to know it? So you're serving their needs and not serving your own objectives first.
- [15:06]
C
For us, it's hiring local people and so hiring local leaders and being there now we send our crews to go help get this, you know, established, bring in the cultural things, the training and things like that. But hiring local leaders and people that are intrinsically motivated and meaning, you know, they want to take care of the crew and they want to create great opportunities for them and they want to give back to the community. And it's actually seen, you can see it all the time in the restaurant business is in most restaurant business chains are into doing community things. You can tell the ones that are into it and the ones that are not into it. You can tell the ones that are into their crew are really not into the crew.
- [15:38]
D
Why didn't you go the franchise route as you look to start scaling outside of either side of the LSU franchise?
- [15:44]
C
When I started, I did start with franchisees and my idea was going to be that I'd be mostly company, maybe 60% company and about 40% franchised. Right. And that was going with strong restaurant operators that have the same intrinsic values, crew, people, community and those sorts of things. And we did well with them. They were great franchisees and they cared about. They just didn't operate as well as us. And so let's say we're rated our company restaurants 95 out of 100. They run it like 85 at 100, which is really good because most franchisees are 65 out of 100. I would say that 5, 10% difference drove me crazy. You know, and it's also the efficiency. So with working with those franchisees, it's their business and they care about it. But like maybe we have a new training program, a way to get faster and drive through things. It was such a talk into certain things. No, we like to do it this way. And did it I. That I spent more time on convincing versus moving forward on things that I knew that worked. Right. But for me, it's an expression of my family, you know what I mean? We want to do a good job and do that. So we bought them back. They're happy to. And I'm like 100% company restaurant operations.
- [16:49]
D
How many restaurants now?
- [16:50]
C
We're almost at a thousand right now.
- [16:53]
D
We're in an era where whether it's private equity or it is, you know, simply like squeezing out every last penny to achieve the best returns for that quarter and appease the market or appease investors. And there are a lot of companies, a lot of companies that are doing this to the detriment of the well being of their team members or Their crew members, you've taken a bit of a different approach. Just talk a little bit about how you've approached building a team at a thousand and growing number of locations around the world.
- [17:24]
C
But I want to be the brand known for not as craveable chicken finger meals. Great crew, cool culture, active community involvement. Right. Guides everything I do. And it's timeless. It's like those are the basics, right? If you want a great crew, you treat your crew right and you do those things and you have the culture, you power the people that can assimilate that culture, which is a culture of appreciation. So for me, as, look, I feel like God made me good at chicken fingers to help people. It's my purpose, right? So I have purpose. That's why I continue to grow this. And if you have that purpose, then you're going to take care of your crew, you're going to take care of your communities. And if you, if you can't execute on that, then you're not executing on vision, then the whole idea is over. The reason why I try to talk these business founders into not selling the private equity is. And look, they're not all bad. And so I'm not talking about all of them, but a lot of them are. And look, if you have investors, if you have shareholders that their concern is what financial return I'm going to get, then things go bad because people are not, they're caught in that deal. If you're, if you're, if you're private equity and you need to be out of this deal in three to five years, that's your goal. When you're out and sold, made your money, there's still people that are running these restaurants whose lives are just as important as yours. Their families are just as important. And now you're gone. And the next people come in might come down, hacked down again, and you just see when it happens, you know, and so there's a few out there that I've seen in our space, restaurant space, that, that do a good job and they take care of the people most of the time, these other ones don't because it's not what they're talking about in the boardroom. Right. So let me give you one example.
- [18:53]
A
Yeah.
- [18:53]
C
So, you know, different CFO types and different people and different advice. So something as simple as this, if you're sitting in a boardroom and you're talking about CFOs, and they're like, here's these 15 things I can cut to to make it cheaper, right? I mean, to make us more profitable. You know, the music system we have, it's number one top music system has all these choices. This one we can say we can do half that amount for the music system. And it has the basics, da da da. Well then they implement that and they implement from a boardroom not being in the kitchens. And the reason why the crew members love it is they have the newest music and they can jam where they go and they're happier than they're doing now. They don't have that music. They're listening to old music they don't like. Their attitude goes down, they're not quite as happy. Customer service not as good. Speed goes down. All those little cuts like there's 15 things go right. We can get our sauce made at a commissary. Commissary keeps up quality, we can save 50%. Another slash. There's death by a thousand cuts in that deal. It happens over and over again. Most of the time, that's what happens.
- [19:47]
A
Still ahead, more with Todd Graves on whether he's ever tempted to expand his menu, why he brought in a co CEO and much more. The very best founders I know are brilliant at building systems. They connect teams, they remove bottlenecks, and they eliminate single points of failure. And yet, when it comes to their own wealth, most are running a disconnected stack. A tax accountant here, an estate attorney there, a wealth manager who doesn't talk to either one of them. Creative planning was built to fix exactly that. One integrated team of tax professionals, estate planners, investment specialists, all coordinated by a dedicated wealth manager who sees your full financial picture and keeps every piece working together. Proactive tax efficiency, estate strategy, investments all under one roof. Creative planning where wealth works together. Learn more@creativeplanning.com Masters of scale
- [20:54]
B
Whether you rent or own, your housing payment is probably your biggest bill of the month. So here's something worth noting. Built is the membership that actually rewards you for it. Every housing payment earns you points that you can redeem toward travel with partners like United, along with stays at Hyatt hotels, Lyft rides, Amazon.com purchases and more. And the neighborhood concierge feature can make restaurant reservations, book fitness classes and find you local spots, all while racking up rewards at 45,000 plus merchant partners. So whether you're paying rent or paying a mortgage, Bilt works for both. Join the membership for where youe live@joinbuilt.com scale that's J O I N B I L T.com scale humans will never be more intelligent than AI.
- [21:45]
D
There's going to be two types of companies.
- [21:46]
C
Those who are great at AI and
- [21:48]
A
those that went out of business because they weren't.
- [21:50]
B
How do we build a future that is human centered?
- [21:55]
E
I'm Rana El Kalyubi and on my podcast Pioneers of AI, we answer that question and so many more. As an AI scientist, entrepreneur and investor, I know what is takes to build AI that works for everyone. Every week I sit down with the pioneers shaping our future and we take you behind the scenes of the AI that's transforming our lives. Find Pioneers of AI wherever you tune in.
- [22:25]
A
Welcome back to Masters of Scale. You can find this conversation and much more on our YouTube channel and be sure to check out the link in the show notes to subscribe to our newsletter.
- [22:37]
D
You all are known for your marketing. It's, it's exceptional. The product is phenomenal. My youngest and I especially are massive fans of the product. In this world of, you know, we are deluged with marketing messages non stop. How are you generating the ideas and having the courage of conviction to go after non obvious plays that actually break through.
- [23:03]
C
So starting off being an entrepreneur, another great thing is you learn marketing and you learn it how you get great impressions, cost per impression, right? Because it's like you don't have the money to do it. So around lsu, I started doing the LSU radio, you know, and getting them to do that. But I'd meet the DJs and be like bring them food and they talk about and got it good in with them. And then when I was able to afford, you know, billboards, tv, things like that added. So in my business, quick service restaurants, you have to be top of mind, right? You need to see the billboard on the way to lunch because at lunch everybody says hey, what do we want today? Oh, Canes, right? It's that, that, it's that speaking it like I'm speaking it here on the radio, see the television night four. So that's a really important part of the deal, right? But there's so many of those messages in that. So for me it's being literally in the moment when something is going to happen. We may be a part of it, right? So Cynthia Rivo, she at the Oscars going for the triple. She goes to Cane's afterwards, she wins, she goes there, she gets this amazing shot and she's a cac and she's a friend, right? She gets that shot, right? And it's like after the super bowl it's going to be having the quarterback from either team with the winning team, but doing it Immediately after, like doing Saquon two days after the super bowl last year. Going into it, it's timely. I like tapping into celebrities fan bases, right? And so that's an obvious thing. And then customers comes loyal because hey, Saquon loves it, right? And he's friends with Todd. But having that in real time is to me so important. When it's the top of people's minds, right? And it's in the press and it's going and doing it. So just anything you can be creative, right? So fashion week and teams like what my idea. The team's like, hey, let's do a cane's fashion show. We're not taking stuff seriously, but we like this designer. We can do cane sauce dress and da da da, da da. And we did it, you know, the day before, like Wednesday and Thursday cranked up and we had all the press cane because it was something different, right. And so we were also part of that and hit a different group, hit the fashion world group and got that different dealers. So for me is like if I think about doing my job for my crew, right, it's like how do I get them more sales and we stay relevant and do things because it means their bonuses and what people can make and you know, all that good stuff that goes with that. So I just push myself constantly to do that. So I run our marketing. Marketing for a founder obviously is a very personal thing. It's also, it's a slippery slope being top of mind all the time and doing so much because you can flip and not be cool, right? You can pick the wrong person. You know, it's, you know, somebody that might not be a genuine Kaniac, it might be somebody that later gets in trouble for things. So it's, it's that deal. It just takes quite a bit to do it. But the activations are great.
- [25:33]
D
Well, and celebrities so often misused. And it does strike me that the celebrities you work with truly are cainecs. I mean they love the. You can feel that from them. It's fun. It's not so serious. It's a good time, right? Snoop working at a drive thru, like who doesn't want to hang out with that? That's a good time.
- [25:53]
C
It is. And people want to see their heroes doing something like that. Work a drive through. It's just the humanization of it. And, and then like someone like Snoop's so funny with doing it and he's just so clever. And the crew loves it, the customers love it. It's a really fun way. So actually Snoop's the one that I broke into doing the celebrity drive through with. And you know, we help each other business. We've been friends for a long time. And he literally called, hey, man, what can we do? What do you want to do? What's going on? I said, where are you? He's, I'm about to be in Little Rock. I do a show. I was like, man, you know what? I've been wanting to do someone in the drive thru. If you do it, I know I can get everybody after it. And he's like, what are you talking about? I was like, just, just go in and work canes, man, and put secret cameras out. He had a blast doing it. And after he did it, I was able to say, hey, with different, you know, different people, I'm like, hey, Snoop did it. You got to do it now. But you hit on a really good point. Is just the whole being a brand ambassador. They have to be CACs. And so it starts with that. And you know, I think a lot of brands do it really, really well. Some don't though. They end up getting somebody. Then you, you can see through. People have so much messages now, marketing messages. They can see through things that aren't genuine in two seconds. You know, it's like, like, then it's. Then it hurts the brand. Right.
- [26:57]
D
I want to go back to the professor who gave the business plan to B minus. Because the other element here, beyond customers seeking a range of options and what have you is supply chain risk. Right? I mean, you know, God forbid, knock wood, we are, you know, one bad bird flew away from a really bad quarter or year for you and for your customers. How do you think about managing for that kind of risk when you've got such a limited menu?
- [27:24]
C
Yeah, so for me, well, one's just redundancy within the products you have, right? It was take out bird flu. Anything like that was just, you know, look at it. So it's, you know, use most of the, the poultry providers. Everybody can do it, right? Like fries. We get fries made to our specs by several different fry companies. Like in the beginning when I couldn't get that redundancy. Look, if they had a fire at the plant and couldn't give me potatoes, I'd have to change the product that I was doing, still get fries and then do that. So it was redundancy in all our suppliers. Plus it keeps everybody honest. We have really good vendor partners, so it's nothing they don't. But it's, you know, good competition. Healthy competition is always a Good thing. So as far as like protein, let's take a bird flute and that sort of thing. Chicken is a extraordinarily resilient protein. The poultry houses are on and stay up, up to date and do it. I just don't see that there'd be, you know, something that would go in with the first bird flu. It happened in China, I think KFC cells went down maybe 20% for a period of time and then bounced right back. And it was studying those different things. So for me is you have, you know, we do fresh chicken but we have frozen supply to get us through any kind of outbreak. So we still have that going. So long term lead times on the frozen supply on that deal is. But ultimately if people just stop eating chicken, then I'd be extinct. I would absolutely be extinct. I wouldn't start serving steak fingers or something like that. I'd be like, it's time for me to hang this up.
- [28:41]
D
Yeah, I think we're at low risk there. I love the simplicity of your menu. I have to imagine that certainly outsiders have advised to diversify the menu. Have you, has there been a point where you've really questioned this and thought about adding a new item that goes beyond your core?
- [28:57]
C
Well, you know, thank God that I'm just hard headed, you know what I mean and not listen. And so from the get go I just do this product, this, you know, serving that one thing, right? If you try to be all things to all people, you're not serving any of them. Well, right, so doing one thing. And so if you break down our concept, it's cravel food served with fast food speed and convenience, right? So if you have to do with fast food speed and convenience, then you gotta be fast. And if you want to start craveable food, you have to do it homemade style and do that. So it comes down to the simplest procedure to get that food through, right? And so I can do it all basically scratch cooking because I have just that many. Outside of that, it's the customers coming in and the customers come to the order window. I mean look, they don't look at the menu board, they pull up to the speaker. I'll take a box combo, no slaw, extra toast, da da da. Everybody's got their order, it doesn't take extra time to do it, right? So people like, man, you know, you know, Texas gotta add barbecue sauce, cream, gravy. I'm like, I hear you. But it would come up to the window and they go, ah, you know what? I don't Know if I want that cream gravy or I want that look, you're getting cane sauce, and you're gonna like it, you know, and you're gonna do that. And you train people to go, not on those extra choices. If you had spicy, you know, people like, you should do hot chicken. And that deal is, once again, it would be slower from the cooking procedure because we don't hold food. So how much are you going to estimate for each one of those type of orders? Then they're gonna come up and go, ah, you know what? I'm change that to spicy. Even the window, you know, come up and do that stuff. All those seconds matter. So I knew the concept, but, yeah, I've got. Had quite a few suggestions. Not as many now. Not as many now. But even when we went to the Middle east, we kept the product exactly the same. We kept the same thing. And there was a lot of talk there about there's another sauce they have there. It's like a mayo base and garlic and all this stuff. It's the most popular sauce. I'm like, they will come to love cane sauce, and we got to stick to our guns. And sure enough, they love cane sauce as much as that other sauce I
- [30:50]
D
got, because it's awesome.
- [30:52]
C
Because it's good.
- [30:52]
D
Yeah. You are now Shark Tank famous. Not pitched your business there, but having having the role of a shark, how do you think for you as a CEO, about your personal brand and how that helps build the business globally?
- [31:08]
C
So I grew up seeing Dave Thomas on the commercials for Wendy's. And for me, it was like, wow, there's really a person. It's not a corporation. And that guy cares about the quality of the food, and that guy's making the decision. So from young kids seeing that. So right now it's even more important because there's a lack of founders in the restaurant space. And that's because they sell to private equity. And so we did something different. So I believe that when people see, hey, this guy and his family cares about quality, they care about food safety, they care about those things, it just gives me another advantage over other competitors that just don't have that.
- [31:42]
D
Yeah. Strikes me you seem to really enjoy doing it also.
- [31:45]
C
I do, I do. It's just something when you're happy about and do it. And I can actually do it okay, a little bit of acting, but, like, it's. I get to have fun with people like, you know, Peter Billingsley, you know, and, you know, the Ralphie and like to get to actually do a commercial with him and he wrote him and all that stuff. But I could actually be a little bit of that. Part of that deal was really fun. I'm acting with Peter Billingsley, you know, one of my heroes. And same with everybody else and that. Doing stuff with Snoop Dogg and actually having him do that, it's like fun. It's like when I did Arch Manning and Usmeyer, but like Cooper Manning wrote the scripts, you know, and he's like, todd, you're going to do this. And Archie's one of my heroes. It's a blast. And for me is I do take off time. So it's not like I don't have fun and do things like that. But for me, it's like work productivity. So I can actually go goof off doing that and have fun. And I know it's productive. So I can spend half the day with Kirk Herbstreet shooting commercials with our dogs. Cause I'm like, I don't feel guilty about, like, I should be answering those questions, you know, I should be in a meeting right now.
- [32:41]
D
So your original co founder left, but eventually brought in a co CEO to the business. Can you share what happened there?
- [32:48]
C
When I was thinking about my skill sets. Right. And good operator, good marketer. Okay. It okay. Finance, when I say okay, just barely okay. A lot of the components, supply chain that you hit on, that's so important, just okay at those things. And so I'm like, like talking to the business people and I'm like, I want to bring in a CO CEO. And they're like, don't do it. CO CEOs, who do they answer to? Who's in charge? And then that sort of thing is. And they're like, why do you want to do that? And I'm like, I want somebody that has like the title of co CEO, that they know that I trust them to handle all these things and to supplement the things that I'm not good at. But to work together as a team. Right. And so my co CEO right now, AJ has been with me for 10 years. He is better at me than all those components that went. Including operations. Right. But I know the fundamentals. I had to build all those things up where I can add value. Operations, I can still add good value. I don't have to worry about finance and banking and supply chain. I get the right when I test products and make sure we're staying up there. But I can spend very little time on that. Where I can spend it on operations, crew resources, right. Culture that's going well. And the Marketing end of it. And AJ has the pride that I'm co CEO with Todd. Right. Like I'm not. Some people call it president. I mean EVPs and all these different things. It's like when it comes down to it, Tottenham and I make. We have to be able to make the decisions for the company. And he's intrinsically motivated because he's there. So for the model for me works because we're symbiotic. It's the respect out of it. My goal is to eventually, when AJ is at the right time to become CEO, full CEO to where when I'm chairman, You know, I'm chairman now, but I'm so much in the weeds sometimes. I won't look at globally what the business is doing to add value everywhere. Right. Sometimes it gets whack a mole for me and I think I'll be even better at chairman, not, not in the details less, but be more global on what's constantly going on. Bringing that to the team, looking at it. I'll have more time to get some other advice right. From other people more than I do now and things like that. So. But the co CEO is a. It's been a great model for me.
- [34:53]
D
As we sit here in the first quarter of 2026, there is not a company in the world that isn't thinking about artificial intelligence. How are you approaching the integration technologies into the business?
- [35:07]
C
Yeah. So for us, one is just starting on, you know, how do we get information quicker and get it compiled quicker and doing it and also keeping the people thinking and saying, hey, look, I, I could, I could have chat GBT that myself. You know what I mean? Like, let's use that stuff, which use it to make our decisions. But we're doing that to get better decisions and done. We use it right now too, as like a prediction for the future. Right. So right now we use all the technology you can and drive this, right? Handhelds, great systems. If all this stuff to go faster is what's coming up with robotics, how quickly is it going to come up? And so I want to keep the human touch as we go, but I do believe, you know, someday you will have all, you know, robot restaurants serving food, doing it. And I'm going to use that as a competitive advantage. So one a lot of my competitors and, and I would never mention any, but not have the friendliest crew, right. Not the best experience when you go there because they're not being treated right, by the way. It's really not their fault. It's. They're not Being treated right. But in the future, when you have robots doing that, robots can be friendly every time. So, right, you can look at this from Keynes going, oh man, we're going to lose that friendliness component with our crew, that competitive advantage. But no, I think people are going to go, hey, look, there's a real person back in that kitchen cooking. There's a real person at the counter doing it. So I'm not planning to replace crew members with robots.
- [36:20]
D
It'll be a while, if ever.
- [36:23]
C
Exactly. Huh.
- [36:24]
D
We're in a moment that is incredibly exciting and also daunting for young people as they are are coming out of college or otherwise entering the workforce. If there's a 21 year old, soon to be Georgia graduate who bumps into you and says, you know, what's one piece of advice? What should I be thinking about? What should I take away from a conversation with you? What are you telling them?
- [36:48]
C
You have to be good at what you're doing, right? I was good the restaurant business. I couldn't have been professional quarterback and things like that. So that was not my dream to do that. But I knew I was good at the restaurant. But whatever you want to go into, be good at it, it and make sure you're passionate about it. Then it's going to be so hard, you can't even believe it's going to go. So be committed to do it, then go in. And when you start business or whatever your field you go into, treat people well. If you treat people well, then things will always do well. And I think this generation has even more opportunity than we've had in recent years. Because if you're a go getter, I think some points, you know, I love the younger generation, but sometimes in some areas, people getting more soft, you know, and think of different things. The old work ethic, you know, we had to work, you know, it's like these things is for people that want to go out there and get after it. I think they're gonna just smoke it. And people will follow good leaders. Being aggressive for what you want to do, working hard, doing those great values while you're taking care of people and doing those things, I think, I think that's a great opportunity for young ones out there right now. I tell my kids right now too, my kids, one's, my daughter graduated two years ago from lsu. She works in the business. My son's graduating from SMU this year. He did business for to understand they're coming to the business. I'm like, you can come in immediately and start adding value, right? And come in and like, go for it.
- [38:09]
D
Perfect place to wrap. Thanks for being with us.
- [38:11]
C
I appreciate it. Enjoy the conversation.
- [38:13]
D
Thank you.
- [38:15]
A
Thanks again to Todd Graves for joining us. Todd's tenacity is inspiring. His story is a testament to what's possible if you live by your principles, take care of your people, and stay incredibly focused on your goals. It also doesn't hurt if your signature dipping sauce is darn delicious. Every drop is worth the dime. Todd, take my money, please.
- [38:39]
D
You already have.
- [38:41]
A
I'm Jeff Berman.
- [38:42]
D
Thank you for listening.
- [38:47]
C
Foreign.
- [38:54]
F
Hey listeners, Bob here. If you listen to Rapid Response on Masters of Scale, you may be missing half the show because every Friday we release a second Rapid Response exclusively in the Rapid Response feed. The guests and topics are just as compelling and timely, from Ford CEO to NASA's administrator to the Lessons from the Devil Wears Production. It takes about 10 seconds to find. Just search Rapid Response wherever you listen to podcasts and hit follow to make sure you never miss an episode. I hope to see you there.
- [39:32]
A
Masters of Scale is a Wait, what? Original Our executive producer is Eve Trow.
- [39:38]
D
Our senior producer is Tricia Bobita.
- [39:40]
A
Associate producer is Masha Makatanina. Senior talent executive is Stephanie Stern. Mixing and mastering by Aaron Bastinelli and Brian Pugh. Original music by Ryan Holiday. Our head of podcasts is lital molad. Visit mastersofscale.com to find the transcript for this episode and to subscribe to our newsletter. And please make sure to check out our YouTube channel.