Carey Bringle

00:00Very excited to be partnering with C&B Linen. If you know me it's my number one topic of conversation is linen companies and how shady linen companies can be. I have just disgusted with how the business practices work in this industry which is why I was so excited when I found C&B Linen. They're out of Waynesboro, Tennessee and they don't charge any fees. So the linen price that you have, whatever that first linen price is, that's your price. And so you may say well every year they must raise the price on this seven-year contract, right? No, because they don't do any contracts. There's no gas fees, there's no clean green service fees, there's no replacement cost, there's nothing. The only price you pay is the price that you pay for the actual product. I know it's too good to be true. No contracts. They do formats. They'll make custom formats for you. They do fresh linens, cleaning supplies and guys I just did a tour of their facility and it is immaculate. It is state-of-the-art. I'm gonna post pictures on my Instagram. You can go find them and you can see how absolutely gorgeous this is to the point that they even wash and sanitize every one of their used laundry carts. It's just absolutely amazing. If you're looking for a linen company you can trust, who wants to earn your business every single week, go back and listen to our episode with Jason Cruz, the owner of CNBLenny. Hear it from his, straight from his mouth, exactly what they do. Or you give them a call at 931-722-7616 or you can DM me at Brandon Styll on Instagram for my exclusive pricing through the Nashville Area Restaurant Alliance.

01:50Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio, the tastiest hour of talk in Music City. Now here's your host, Brandon Styll. Hello Music City and welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. My name is Brandon Styll and I am your host. We are powered by Gordon Food Service and we've got another big one for you today. We have got the incomparable Kerry Bringle, the Peg Leg Porker himself. I went down to Peg Leg Porker and we sat in his upstairs residence and had this conversation, which is a similar conversation to one that we had in 2020 when there was another huge property tax increase when Mayor Cooper was in office. This whole tax increase thing, I wanted to get to the bottom of it and I didn't, I don't know, I don't own a business downtown, right? So I'm not assessed for this sort of stuff and I think I understand it but I really wanted to get somebody who lived down, who owns a business downtown. Kerry owns the dirt and he's not just a renter, he owns the property and he has very strong opinions and I wanted to hear him and so we went to him and it was on March 17th which coincidentally is his birthday and this was a no-holds-barred interview. I mean we had the conversation and this wasn't a conversation where I was there to argue with him. I wasn't there to come back at him and say, hey man you made a bunch of money on your building so why do you care? Like I actually did ask that but I I really wanted him to be able to say everything that he wanted to say and I think he did and I think it's polarizing and I think that hopefully this will help you understand the mindset of a local restaurant owner in the downtown area because you know the last episode with Nick Guidry where he's closing the

03:54restaurant because of this tax thing, I think you're gonna see a lot more restaurants in this position. Stay tuned after the interview because I'm gonna start doing Brandon's final thought at the end of it, kind of what I think about all of this and today I'm going to lead that off. The Gordon Food Service, Brandon's final thought. I want to say while we were there waiting for Carrie we walked next door to Love's Alibi which is a really cool, I think they also have Love in Exile but Love's Alibi which is right there right next door to Peg Leg Porker. I want to give a shout out to Jordan over there, nice talking with him. Really cool spot over there if you want to go catch a really good drink. I actually saw them last night at the bartender bash. They were making some really cool cocktails. That was a really fun event for somebody who doesn't drink. Just watching everybody get lit around you was kind of comical and fun. I highly recommend trying that sometime. In the vein of all of our costs are rising, one of the things Nick said was insurance is going up, everything's going up and you know what? He's not wrong. Everything is going up and I want to tell you, you need to call Matthew Clements. Robin's Insurance is the company that will help you. If your insurance is going up you need to call Matthew because let me tell you why. Matthew actually worked in restaurants.

05:22He understands the business. He understands insurance. He acts kind of like as a translator between operators and underwriters. Kind of like when I work at the restaurant I act as a translator between the vendors and the restaurant because I speak both those languages. He speaks the language of underwriters and operators. He makes sure that your story is told correctly and the coverage is built around how you actually operate. The result is more effective coverage. More often he can get competitive pricing without the surprises and if you're a Nashville restaurant owner I know you don't like surprises. Plus you need a guy to have a guy who lives in Nashville who knows Nashville restaurants. Who's a restaurant guy who's gonna learn what you do and explain that to the underwriters to get you the best deal. Most policies in Nashville for society insurance. If you're using society and you're not using Matthew Clements you need to give him a call. His number is 863-409-9372. He answers the phone and all you got to do is say hey man I'd love to see a quote. Can we get a quote? He'll come by. He'll meet you. You can you can tell him all about your restaurant. I bet you he can save you money. He's a great NARA member. He actually cares about your restaurant. Highly recommend and if you're just a general person out there and you need car insurance or whatever it is give him a call too. I mean he has all kinds of insurance. He bids it around and gets really great deals. Homeowner's insurance, car insurance, anything. He can do it all. So that is Robin's insurance and I am so excited to get you right in to this episode with Kerry Bringle. You are listening to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Super excited today to welcome you to another episode of Nashville Restaurant Radio. We are joined today with the man, the myth, the legend, the birthday boy, Kerry Bringle. Welcome in Kerry. Thank you. Well thank you for having us in to your place. Yeah no problem. You got big birthday plans today? I've taken it pretty easy today so I've been working all day. So we do on

07:23birthday. I had phone calls all morning and so I'm just having family over to the house tonight. We're just having my wife's cooking for me, my wife and son. Nice. Well that sounds lovely. I say thank you for taking the time for me today. It was six years ago today that I recorded my very first podcast live in person in this building on your birthday. So I've taken up two of the last six years of your special day for me and my silly little podcast. We just did a podcast of the day with Nick Guidry from Pelican and Pig and they just closed their doors and they cited the main reason as the tax increase that they experienced for their property taxes. Tom Morales famously came out and said hey look our property taxes have gone up five hundred thousand. It was four hundred seventy five thousand dollars and that's unsustainable for us and what we're doing. That's gonna put us out of business. And then you made a video where you said hey this this is real guys like and please share this like people need to know this and then I reached out to you and I said five years six years ago you broke this down for me like I was four years old because we had a similar thing right in the middle of the pandemic Mayor Cooper raised all the taxes and I said will you will you help me understand again what the hell is going on because you first of all you own the dirt yes for your properties. I do and like you said I brought this up five or six years ago when Cooper you know and the City Council did a 34% tax increase and you know I started sounding the alarm bell then and you know some people you know notice some people were on the same page like Khalil Arnold and Rose Arnold and they got it they were in the same boat they'd had the same thing happen and you know some other small businesses got it and I tried to be a voice for small business and say this is

09:25a problem and it's only gonna get worse and unfortunately not many people did much about it it got a lot of attention I had a lot of business leaders reach out you wrote an op-ed but oh yeah I wrote an open letter to the mayor and yeah City Council and you know it's funny that that I had a lot of business leaders that said hey you know this need to be said I'm glad you said it and it opened the eyes of a lot of my customers who had no idea the burden that small business gets placed on it and you know they thought well my taxes went up you know three four hundred bucks and I was like well mine have gone up 700% in ten years and or at the time in eight years and they were like are you kidding me and I said I'm not kidding you here are the numbers. I wish I was. Then I had I had some City Council members reach out on social media you know trying to lambast me I had this was five years ago six years ago currently no this was during the Cooper administration okay then I had a former editor of of the scene you know write an article trying to call me a liar which was a hundred percent bullshit you can read the tax record you can see it's public information I was not saying anything I couldn't back up and I did back it up yeah but you have some people that want to look and this guy who was it was you know trying to lambast me online and write an article against me you know was paying $1,600 on his on his house and his you know his taxes didn't go up you know where they went up slightly you know we're talking about I went from 99 hundred at Pegleg to seventy five thousand and now I think we're at seventy seven thousand and you know the question is what is your fair share how much of the public service do I use how much you know am I using the roads how much am I using the library

11:26the public resources the bus all of that what is you know and people want to say well you're a greedy business owner your property is gone up in value you're gonna make all this money well yeah I'll make that money if I sell but you know what I won't make if I sell if I'm taxed the hell out of by my local government then by the time I sell I've got a net loss or I've got a break even I didn't make the money for the time and the effort and the money that I pumped into the neighborhood and into the economy so you're being taxed on potential future gains which is bullshit it's no way to tax and you know I'm of the mindset that you ought to be taxed on what you pay for a property and then when they when the taxes need to be increased if you sell that property and you make a big profit then great you're gonna pay taxes on that profit but the new owner will come in understanding exactly what the tax burden is based off of what the tax rate is and what they pay for the property so it's not a shock to anybody then people say well you ought to you ought to account for this in business you know you should know you're gonna get increases there is zero business in America that plans for a 700 percent tax increase or in the case of the assessments on Broadway this year four and five hundred percent tax increases you know on their business you don't plan for that you can't plan for that and businesses that rent are not immune because 99 percent of them have what's called a triple net lease which means the renter is responsible for the taxes and that's the situation that Tom is in and I like Tom we're friends I'm good friends with his daughter as well they're great people we are on opposite sides of the political aisle he wanted Freddie I didn't want Freddie you know

13:29and and so this is a Freddie thing it's not it's not necessarily a Freddie thing Freddie has to sign off on it it's a William Vivian Wilholt is the office the City Council you know has to approve tax increases and people will say well it's got nothing to do with Freddie he can't do anything about it look this is all all bullshit when Freddie when Freddie wanted his transit plan you know plan passed he put pressure on the council and on business leaders to try and get his transit plan passed which is by the way not a transit plan at all it's a walk bike plan it actually has made traffic worse and it's it is Freddie's pet project and and so you know but but Freddie can influence this and can we can I pause you for a second I want to go back I feel like we started in in 2020 and what was happening then yeah and then we fast forwarded into now and we're I want I want to stay on track a little bit problem which I'm always the one doing the other side understand and that's why that's why I want to talk to you today back then you talked about TIFF it's TIFF a thing yes I don't remember what TIFF tax tax incentive funding tax incentive funding so back then if I if I'm thinking correctly you said okay so we have a we want to grow as a city right now we're inviting these huge companies the Amazons of the world some of these I don't know if it was big hotels or whoever it was we wanted these Oracle we want these big companies so we're offering them to pay less taxes or no taxes for X amount of time because they're gonna bring a bunch of jobs high-paying jobs that are gonna then those people will buy houses and they will pay taxes and all these things right but then what they do is they say okay we're gonna raise the taxes on small businesses that we can bring in these big businesses and to your point back there like this is bullshit why why am I doing this TIFF may actually be a tax incremental financing I forget the acronym what

15:34TIFF is typically used for in cities across the United States is to incentivize businesses to come into blighted areas of town and set up shop and bring their economic value and bring jobs and help clean up those areas sure that's a great thing it's just like opportunity zones that were in the first Trump administration they were and I think they were introduced by Tim Scott they were a brilliant brilliant move on the part of that administration to uplift areas of the country that were blighted or underserved and you could take capital gains and you can put it into an opportunity zone and when you did that it would shield your capital gains and if you started a business there as long as you keep that business there for 10 years your the worth of the business and the gain on the business could be shielded as well from capital gains tax same thing with TIFF with with TIFF funding or incentives in cities it was meant for blighted areas for for areas that were not mainstream areas Nashville in our quest to be the its city made several deals with TIFF right in the heart of our downtown it was not blighted it was not in bad shape we gave our conventions our old Convention Center which is now the fifth and Broadway building I think we sold it for five to eight million dollars think about that that's a I could buy that building yeah I mean you know and you kind of wish you had at this point and then the city turned around and built a I think 30 million dollar parking garage for that building so we pretty much gave

17:34it away it was developed it's a beautiful development it's thriving that's great but you know the value of it now I think it's sold two years back for eight hundred million dollars and so now was that possible with the old Convention Center well no but why did we give these incentives in the heart of our city when they were meant for other areas and and so you know then we see and look I'm all for Amazon coming I'm all for Oracle coming you know we do companies we appreciate them coming and being here but at what point do you say I'm willing to sacrifice my small businesses in my community to get large corporations coming into town I think that's the question right the large corporations want to come here because of the small businesses in this community we're gonna jump into that statement and more when we return right after these words are you one of those people who's always on the hunt for the next restaurant location you open any sweet deals on retail space that may come your way why not be proactive and have the market experts out there working for you the retail team at Lee and Associates led by Miller Chandler and Megan Glazier is your go-to for all things commercial real estate in Middle Tennessee they're located downtown in the heart of it all in the Batman building Miller is a Tennessee native so you know he knows the neighborhoods and demographics and Megan is a California transplant who brings fresh perspective as she fully embraces the music city culture they use the best prop tech like place or AI and as read to a net analyze the data while also leveraging their own industry knowledge and relationships to find and negotiate a killer deal for you if you're one of those people and you'd like to get a hold of them their office number is 615-751-2340 or better yet you can call them directly to get your

19:39conversation started on your next restaurant location you can reach Miller Chandler at 615-473-2452 or Megan Glazier at 760-846-6193 that is the retail team at Lee and Associates give them a call today you can also visit them at the retail team dot-com running a restaurant is tough staff turnover rising cost and the endless tasks that bog you down and take you away from what you love let Adams Keegan lighten that load they're privately held Tennessee based restaurant and hospitality focused outsourced HR payroll and benefits firm the team at Adams Keegan removes the administrative burdens of HR administration payroll benefits management garnishments unemployment claims compliance 401k and so much more from their proprietary HR IS platform to seamless payroll and competitive benefits that keep your team smiling they've got you covered Adams Keegan lets you focus on what you do best creating unforgettable dining experiences while they handle the rest essentially think of Adams Keegan as your back office HR department right here in Music City one of the many things I love that Adams Keegan is that unlike big publicly traded companies out there they have an incredibly high standard of customer service and that that's what we all need is really good customer service in these areas they don't give you a 1-800 number and make you fill out an IT ticket submission they surround every client with a team of experts all based right here in Tennessee you can call them today at 615-627-0821 or visit Adams Keegan dot-com that's A-D-A-M-S-K-E-E-G-A-N dot-com for your free HR consultation and see how they can create a customized solution to help your restaurant thrive Sharpier's Bakery is a locally owned and family operated wholesale bakery providing bread to Nashville's best eateries they have operated in Nashville since 1986 yes next year will be 40 years they providing high quality fresh

21:46bread daily for restaurants catering companies hospitals and universities the bread is also free from any preservatives and artificial flavors they're right off of White Bridge Road Erin Mosso and her team been doing this for a long time you know what I love about them is that they're local and they care they care about your business that's like the number one thing you're gonna hear me talk about is do they care about your business and I 100% believe that they do if you would like to be working with the bakery that cares about your business give them a call 615-356-0872 that's 615-356-0872 now you can always visit them at Sharpier's dot-com that's C-H-A-R-P-I-E-R-S dot-com and they have pictures of all of the bread that they can have for you and contact information go check them out Sharpier's Bakery Super Source develops and distributes high quality cleaning products and supplies as well as delivers wear wash housekeeping laundry programs and food service training they partner with restaurants golf and country clubs hotels and resorts schools universities and health care institutions save time and money and reduce inventory by utilizing their high quality products and engaging with their highly trained service specialists if you're looking for wholesale cleaning products like dish machines in Nashville Tennessee they have you covered listen guys this is way more than a dish machine and chemical company they do not make you sign a contract they earn your business every single week and let me tell you I will personally vouch for Jason Ellis and his entire team over at Super Source if you want a dish machine and chemical company like this give them a call 770-337-1143 and if you are a member of the Nashville area restaurant alliance make sure you tell them that you get the special NARA pricing at what point do you say I'm willing to sacrifice my small businesses in my

23:49community to get large corporations coming into town I think that's the question right the large corporations want to come here because of the small businesses in this community explain that why what what does that makes why do large because they're paying their taxes well not just because of that but I mean the character of Nashville was built around small businesses it was built around independent honky-tonks down on Broadway and bars and restaurants and that's what this city was built on we had a meeting three culture very friendly very business friendly no state income tax these businesses wanted to be here one because of the environment that the state had put forth for businesses to be attracted to the state of Tennessee they wanted to be in Nashville because it was up and coming it was a good quality of life for their young employees and so it was a lot of reason for him to come to Nashville without getting an incentive we gave a lot of incentive and not to say that that they would have come here without any incentive but did we have to give away as much as we did and I've talked with the former economic advisor who made a lot of those deals and you know I think it was Matt Wilshire when he was running for mayor I talked with Matt about it and he was like Carrie I helped make some of those deals and he goes you know at the time we thought it was the right thing to do okay great fair enough but remember when Cooper took office Nashville was in such bad shape financially that the state comptroller said if you can't get your city and your house in order I am going to take it over I'm of the opinion I wish the state comptroller had taken it over I told Cooper in a meeting with him I think you should declare bankruptcy for the city restructure get rid of some of these deals that you did that weren't

25:53that weren't you you didn't do them and start with a clean slate that's what Detroit did they're now thriving economically and have been but when we're in worse shape financially than Memphis then that's a problem for Nashville and that's what we were and Cooper said if I do this tax increase this is going to solve the problem and for a minute it did it was painful but it did and we had a surplus and so the question is where is all the money going and where has it gone and why do we need so much more so that brings us to current day current day current day Nashville and everything I hear is that tourism is down the tour people are not coming that downtown as much as they did yes and I don't know for what reason do you have any idea why this is it the economy is it what do you think's going on well here's the deal we're paying all these taxes our city is less safe our schools are not any better our roads are worse than they've ever been and traffic is worse than it's ever been I'm finally on board with the traffic sucking traffic sucks and this transit plan is creating all these bike lanes on roads that don't have room for them they're putting up all these pylons that people are just running over there about $150 a piece every time they have to be replaced and and then they're putting up all these speed humps all over the city and they've taken things like the roundabout up at Domombrium which was already getting backed up at rush hour probably a quarter of a mile and they've narrowed it down to one lane for a bike lane and now the traffic is backed up for at least a half a mile and so they've taken problems and they've said we need to throw a bike lane at it or a

27:55bunch more crosswalks and you know that's our transit plan what they've tried to do is social engineer people out of driving downtown and Nashville don't like it overwhelmingly finally in the last two weeks Diana is gone from in dot and she came up with a lot of this stuff and every business leader in downtown will tell you that Diana had to go and we've been begging Freddie to let her go for a year and she's finally out did he let her go or she was on she resigned so so and and what a lot of people don't know so here's another part of the problem along with these massive tax increases what they've done to downtown businesses and you may or may not know this 90 probably 98 percent of native Nashvilleians or Nashvilleians in general do not know this fact they have taken our they have taken the street parking and they have weaponized it and so where it used to be that you had metered parking until six o'clock at night and then it was free after six and on the weekends it was free now it's metered 24-7 they took the price of a parking ticket from $24 to $90 and then they created zones in downtown and for example in this zone right here if you come to my lunch and you spend two hours eating lunch at Peg leg with a friend and then you leave the zone and you come back and you want to go see a show at Rudy's jazz room and say it's four or five hours after the allotted time in the zone per the 24-hour period which I think is four hours after that second

30:01two hours you're locked out of the meter system you can't even extend your parking past that additional two hours so you have a certain number of hours in the zone and once you hit that number of hours even if you're willing to pay for your car to sit there for 24 hours you cannot do it you can't move your car to another spot within the zone you have to be outside the zone or go to a private parking lot and most Nashvillians don't even know that they've done this yeah I have no idea I had no idea I've had customers that were sitting here having drinks enjoying their time having fun wanted to stay another two hours went to go pay the meter they were locked out they had to leave and this is what they've done to the small businesses in Nashville downtown they tried to take away all the loading zones for the restaurants on Broadway now how are those guys supposed to get food deliveries you understand this oh yeah I understand this there's zero way they can get food deliveries if they got a worry that the Cisco truck loading zone you tell me Brandon I will see this I sent Freddie a message the other day and I said and I'm very casual at that mayor O'Connell more formal and I said hey look I would love to know because in my opinion I'm not in his meetings I don't know what he's talking I live in my own little world I do all my own little stuff and today I really this is all really interesting think this is the reason why I came here today because I know your opinion but I also know that you know what's going on I don't live a business downtown I don't know how that works and I think that we're hearing a lot of different sound bites in different pieces and that's what people are taking and that's why I want to do like a long form Carrie explain everything as the way that you know it and if people are out there going why is he not arguing this that's not what I'm here today to do I'm here today to get

32:03your take on exactly what is because you know you're no bullshit you're gonna say what you feel and you're you're in the know you own a business downtown yes and so that to me qualifies you to know a hundred times more than me or 99% of the people who live in this so I'll give you another example they had their you know walk back and walk back Nashville day or whatever where families are supposed to get together they've got a route through downtown they're gonna shut down the streets from you know 10 in the morning until 2 in the afternoon and the route went right here in front of peg leg now they were on I think the first one they did was like on a Saturday we talked with them to try and to make sure that our people would have access to parking but you know it really inconvenienced a lot of things instead of doing one like they did last year this year they decided to do four or five oh and they did them on Sundays one one Sunday a month they they came down Glee Street and pretty much they fit now we weren't open on Sunday at the time we are now they shut down the street it went down 11th Avenue and shut down the street you know I went around Pine Street shut down the street in front of biscuit love down 11th Avenue what this is this is it like a race is it just a day where you're supposed to get out and bike or a scooter with your family whoever in downtown Nashville without having cars in the way without having cars in the way which then what the fuck are the bike lanes for I mean you can do it every day there's a bike lane everywhere now so why do you need to shut down the street but that's what they did so although we were closed on Sunday what happened was in dot came along on Friday at about two or three o'clock and put cones down the entire street Friday and

34:09Saturday are my two busiest days they put cones all down the street on all the metered parking and now the cone had a little sign on it it was about a little bit bigger than an index card that said closed for and they had Sunday's date on it how many but they put them on the street oh yeah not on the sidewalk on the street how many people do you think parked in those spots on Friday and Saturday I'm gonna say zero zero because they're not gonna read that little card with the date on it they see the cone this says no parking they don't want to get told so they don't park there so for two full days I've got no parking on the street because the city has chosen to do that on Friday and they said well we don't have the employees on Sunday to do it bullshit on Sunday they came and they put barriers like in my in the road beside the restaurant well they don't have to have cars in the way when that happened so if they could get well in advance of it nobody's leaving the car there for two days well in advance of it at the expense of my business yes with my tax dollars so if when you hear the frustration from the downtown business owner and the small business owner this is why things like this matter they really do matter so why did the taxes so let's let's fast-forward to today and we're gonna get to what is going on right now right after these words from our sponsors very excited to be partnering with C&B linen if you know me it's my number one topic of conversation is linen companies and how shady linen companies can be I have just discussed it with how the business practices work in this industry which is why I was so excited when I found C&B linen they're out of Waynesboro Tennessee and they

36:14don't charge any fees so the linen price that you have whatever that first linen price is that's your price and so you may say well every year they must raise the price on this seven-year contract right no because they don't do any contracts there's no gas fees there's no clean green service fees there's no replacement cost there's nothing the only price you pay is the price that you pay for the actual product I know it's too good to be true no contracts they do formats they'll make custom formats for you they do fresh linens cleaning supplies and guys I just did a tour of their facility and it is immaculate it is state-of-the-art I'm gonna post pictures on my Instagram you can go find them and you can see how absolutely gorgeous this is to the point that they even wash and sanitize every one of their used laundry carts it's just absolutely amazing if you're looking for a linen company you can trust who wants to earn your business every single week go back and listen to our episode with Jason Cruz the owner of C&B linen hear it from his straight from his mouth exactly what they do or you give him a call at nine three one seven two two seventy six sixteen or you can DM me at Brandon still on Instagram for my exclusive pricing through the Nashville area restaurant Alliance so I've been visiting a lot of restaurants recently and one of the comments I hear a lot as well we just post online we do marketing ourselves and guys you need to speak with a professional and that is where miles hospitality marketing comes in she works exclusively with independent restaurants and small hospitality groups helping you build a smarter more strategic marketing plan without hiring a full-time team the best part owner Christine miles brings over 25 years of restaurant marketing experience to the table she's worked with everyone from beloved neighborhood spots to national chains and she knows what works in real

38:14world restaurants so whether you need help branding digital marketing social media or just figuring out what actually is worth your time miles hospitality marketing gets it from quick wins to long-term growth they offer everything from graphic design to full fractional CMO services check them out at miles HM calm that's my LLS HM calm mention Nashville restaurant radio and receive a free hour consultation miles hospitality marketing because your marketing should work as hard as you do if you're a restaurant owner looking for a new low-risk way to drive traffic and incremental revenue you need to hear about shared spirits shared spirits is a marketplace where guests purchase drinks online and then come into your restaurant to redeem them think of it as a prepaid beverage demand that shows up at your door you guess repeat guests and zero guesswork for restaurants this isn't discounting or deal-chasing you control what you offer how it's redeemed and when it's available shared spirits helps turn online purchases into real butts in seats giving guests a reason to choose your place next it's especially powerful during slower periods off nights or as a way to introduce new guests to your bar program without changing your menu or compromising your brand if you want a smarter way to bring people through the door increase bar traffic and create moments that convert into loyal regulars shared spirits is worth a look meet your guests before they even walk in with shared spirits sign up at shared spirits.com if your leadership team is not on the same page and you are constantly having these long meetings and you're not getting traction this is your opportunity today I'm talking about the entrepreneurial operating system EOS yes it is based around the book by Gino Wickman and traction we use it at our restaurants they use it at frothy monkey they use it at at least barbecue they use it at Carrington Row Germantown Cafe Park Cafe lots of restaurants are using it because it helps and let me tell you today Justin Cook is a great

40:18facilitator Justin helps business owners and their leadership teams implement the entrepreneurial operating system which is a set of simple practical tools disciplines to help you get better at three things vision traction and to be healthy vision is getting you and your leadership team 100% on the same page with who you are where you're going and how you're going to get there traction is helping your leaders become more disciplined and accountable to execute on the right things that will make your vision become reality because a lot of times you're doing a lot of stuff but not the right stuff healthy is helping your leaders become a healthy functional cohesive leadership team because unfortunately leaders don't function well as a team if you start with the leaders the rest of the organization will follow and you'll get to a point to where your entire team is crystal clear on vision everywhere you look people are executing the things that make your vision come true and it's a great healthy fun place to work if that resonates with you you can email Justin right now at Justin.cook at EOSworldwide.com or you can call him 615-336-7133 to see if EOS is a right fit for you he will come down and do an initial kind of introduction and ask you a bunch of questions it is totally free definitely call Justin today Tom Morales comes out and says hey it went from a hundred and twenty five thousand a six hundred thousand right so 475 if it went up 700% back in 2020 and then 2026 it's going up it was over the years it wasn't in just one year for over the year for you for me it went up over the years it was the 34% increase I think it was back then what was the what was the increase that we saw so the way this works is there's a tax assessor who comes out basically they do appraisals of the building yes and right so let's just say your building here hypothetically is worth a million dollars right and if it's worth a million dollars then you pay X percent of a

42:20million dollars right but if you paid last year building for the million dollars and an assessor came in and said whoa your building is now worth five million dollars yes then you have to pay five times the taxes from before because now your building's worth has gone way up that's correct and so that's where you said earlier well people are telling me well shit your building is worth five million dollars what are you complaining about you just got a four million dollar payday on that and you're saying well no if I sell it but I don't plan on selling it doesn't mean anything me now but I have to pay taxes on what it could be worth in the future now Tom owns he owns Acme feed and seed the business but he does not own the building of Acme but he is in a triple net lease and a triple net lease they pass along property taxes cams insurance and insurance right that's the triple net on top of the actual lease so in this particular situation I think the question is if I'm the owner of that building can I split that with him I mean if I'm the owner of the building of Acme and I've just got this assessment and now my building is worth 25 million dollars and I bought it for five million dollars and I'm like wow this is incredible I just made a ton of money hey I'm gonna is that is that just greed or where does that come from where does and that ecosystem who should pay that the guy who signed the triple net lease unfortunately but I mean that's when you sign a triple net lease you know that that's a possibility you don't ever imagine that the city would come and do that with an assessment it's insane and in 36 states there's caps on this Tennessee is one of the it may be more than 36 states Tennessee is one of the few states in the country I think there's eight states that don't have a cap that doesn't have a cap yeah so in other states they would say yeah that's great that it's worth a lot more you can't raise the taxes like that you can't do that dramatic hockey stick on a business

44:21you know because they're gonna go out of business and so should is the landlord greedy in times case no the landlord's not greedy the landlord took a chance he bought that building you know he had to go find a tenant he had to make concessions or do build out for that tenant you know the landlord's not greedy he took a chance you know and he speculated on that real estate and it'll pay off for him at some point and he was smart to get a triple net lease so that he doesn't bear that tax burden but and that's just capitalism that's not greed the problem is the assessors one my whole thing is that I think that the basis of what our property taxes are based on is incorrect because it is a basis that's rooted in potential future profits it's a very speculative play it's not fact-based whereas if I paid X amount and my taxes are based on last paid price that's a very factual amount that's what that building was worth when we set the tax standard for it that's what the city expected to go off of it's just like if you have if you had Tesla stock at 40 bucks and the city comes along and they say you know I'm a pretty good stock picker I think you made a great play Brandon I tell you what at Tesla stock I think is undervalued I think it's really worth $400 I know you only paid 40 for it but it's really worth 400 now now I'm gonna tax you on that game that's what they're doing and you know and why are they doing that now why are they've always

46:24done that is it a new financial situation that we're in that we're having to do this because when when the mayor was asked about it I think that the kind of the answer was some people are gonna go out of business that's that's business because somebody if Tom goes out of business at ACME somebody will buy that building and somebody will put you know the Ella Langley bar there and it's gonna be some and somebody will pay those taxes so he's kind of like okay great this is commerce no yeah listen you're gonna have people that vehemently disagree with me and and the way that I think we ought to be taxed that's okay most of them that will criticize me haven't speculated on real estate or bought their own damn building or started their own fucking business okay so all the noise I got last time wasn't a single peer of mine they were all just birds parroting the same bullshit from their political point of view that Kerry Bringle is a greedy owner and doesn't want to pay his fair share in taxes if they saw the check that I had to write for the taxes between all the properties that I own they would they would be stupid not to say Kerry Bringle pays more than his fair share of taxes and and so it's a fundamental belief that we're taxed based on the wrong basis that's my argument and I was I went on Capitol Hill the other day and argued for a tax bill that would put a cap on things but I think it to be honest I think it's a little too little a little too late and what's happened down on Broadway so that people understand is that you have business owners like Layla who I think owns her building she does and you know Layla went in and took a bold chance on Broadway 30 years ago she and her husband bought that building you know they oh they started their bar they split then she kept it or got it in the divorce whatever but she owns that building she owns that business she's

48:28been operating down there for 30 years she probably paid 25 to 50 thousand dollars for that five five thousand yeah Robert sold it to her yeah so five thousand yeah maxed out her credit card I mean you look it was a huge chance for her means she maxed out everything she had to get that well 100% you look at tootsies I mean it was purchased for what 20,000 yeah you know and so so but Broadway was a cesspool you know they took a chance they really took a major chance they said I'm gonna plant my flag here in the middle of this filth which it was at the time and I'm gonna try and make a go of it and I'm gonna put a business in here I'm gonna try and attract customers to an area that they don't want to go and let's see how we do well you know she wrote it out for probably 20 years before she saw a boom and then you know finally they see a boom in the last 10 15 years and then you got all these celebrities coming down there doing these bars and then you have these outside investors that have said oh wow it's hot and these celebrity bars are making a bunch of money now I'm willing to pay you know 30 million 40 million 60 million dollars for a building and you know Layla's like great my hard work and my persistence of 30 years of grinding it out and will finally pay off for me yeah will finally pay off for me after 30 years of hard work you know when I go to retire I'm in good shape but the city comes along and goes oh well pretty good over there you're doing pretty good over there let me snatch some of that from you and so you know she gets it's it's she and other owners downtown pumped millions into that street they paid for the infrastructure through sales tax through

50:28liquor tax through assessments from the water department from NES they paid for that stuff and when you build out a building before I started the oasis I paid $60,000 in fees to the city and the various utilities before I could put a shovel in the ground okay so don't let anybody tell you well the city's building out the infrastructure and you know small business owner benefits from that that's the argument I get here in the Gulch well the city built out the Gulch and Kerry's gotten all the benefits that is a hundred percent bullshit Market Street built out most of the Gulch Joe Baker and and Jay Turner and they built out a ton they helped pay for infrastructure I helped pay for infrastructure I came down here when it was blighted Linus came down here with Yazoo when it was blighted you know the building he went in was a was a porno store strip bar whatever and you know we turned a neighborhood around and that was done through spending millions of dollars creating you know hundreds of jobs contributing to the sales tax base contributing to the employment tax contributing to all the infrastructure we did that private business did that the city did not and so I want people to be clear that you know business builds out cities cities don't just randomly put in infrastructure if it's not needed and so and then you turn and then to turn around and get punished for creating economic prosperity is the kick in the in the pants I mean that's the kick is when you get punished for creating an environment of economic prosperity that benefits the city it benefits the other citizens of the city in a bit offense your community and we wanted to do that we're the risk takers

52:33we're the entrepreneurs we've got the nutsack to do it not everybody does and and with that comes the fact that we could lose every single dime that we put in and so when this when your own city which you have propped up which I certainly have represented our city all across the world and you're a native I'm from Nashville born and raised here yeah I have represented us in every state in the country and in a lot of countries around the world and touted the benefits of Nashville and how much I love this city and have worked with the CVC to promote this city and so for the city to turn around and just try and snatch your money like it's no big deal is it is a big deal I can see that perspective I totally I can I can see that perspective and I don't again I'm not here to argue that perspective by any means I think that just hearing that perspective in a long-form way for everybody who's listening who loves restaurants in this town what does it mean for the overall good of Nashville where do you see Nashville in five years if this if nothing changes and then what can we do as a society as Nashvilleans to exact change well talk to your well first of all in 2027 the council should shrink from 42 43 members down to 20 that will help as long as we have the right people on the council but people need to think long and hard before they vote for somebody to represent them on the council what is important to your council for anybody that you vote for you should know what that person's policies are a hundred percent and this is not a partisan issue this is both sides of the aisle like I said Tom and I don't see out of politics but you know

54:36we do agree on small businesses on the character of Nashville and what we need to continue to thrive you know I had council members I had one from East Nashville another one I forget who she was and they came after me basically saying I don't want to pay my fair share let me tell you when your council goes after a small business and says they don't want to pay their fair share dump that council member they are no good for your community because they will run the businesses that you care about out of business and chances are it's because they don't run a business and they don't understand the economics you know it I got attacked by that what's his that handlebar mustache guy in East Nashville looks like he's riding one of those big wheel bikes to work every day or something I don't know front wheel like that's who that was the first one that came after me on social media and you know basically saying I don't want to pay my fair share and I turned around and posed the question to him what about the businesses in your community are you willing to let your small mom and pop businesses die because of this tax grab and you know Nick and Audrey is a great example so we've used to do business with Nick and Audrey on a daily basis they made our pies for us as soon as they opened up slow hand yeah we started doing business with them and they made our fried pies for us and did for years and they grew that business from a small little shop across from Cummings Station I think they had a like a truck yep they had we started doing business with them when they had that small little shop across from Cummings Station it was teeny they ground it out they busted their butt they made product for other people as well as selling at their retail front and then they grew that they were able to open up Pelican and Pig then they were able to open up some other businesses and so when you see a fellow business owner that

56:37grounded out just like you did succumb to these taxes and have to close one of their shops that was critically acclaimed that was a great part of the neighborhood that they worked very hard to put together it grinds your every last nerve it is a total kick in the pants it is and you that is one of many that will go down I have already gotten calls from people that said of all different types of businesses now I'm not just talking about restaurants that have said Carrie you know I saw your video I've read your articles unfortunately my business is not gonna make it we're gonna have to close and that's sad and so in the five years from now in Nashville you'll have fewer independents you'll have a lot more corporate a lot more big VC backed restaurant groups a lot more groups from out-of-state and you know where those dollars go when they make profit out-of-state out-of-state they don't stay here and you know my tax dollars stay here Nick and Audrey's tax dollars stay here now business partners with fat belly they stay here I mean we invest in our community through charity through our taxes through our housing you know our profits stay here and they get turned in the community but when you start running people like us out of business then you know and and let me tell you and there's a point and I've seen some a lot of my peers do it and there's a point where the independent guy says screw Nashville screw Davidson County because we got other counties outside of Davidson that are business friendly that are tax friendly that are begging people to come out there they're

58:40begging every time I write a letter or or make a video I get other cities that are saying bring it here we won't do this to you have their places in Lebanon Lebanon they're staying Murfreesboro all I mean they're all dying for bit for small businesses well I I don't think you're wrong I keep seeing every week another you know large restaurant group coming to Nashville and I see the Tennessean right and we're so excited that this whatever is coming here and it's like to what cost I mean great but like independent restaurants are the soul of this town and my I mean obviously music is a major part of it but I don't know how much of that soul we have we have very few independents left truly independent there's a lot of locals but independently owned and operated as a different thing and I don't necessarily want to delay you're one of those yeah who owns the actual property there's not other investors yep if you would like to hear Kerry talk about that he's been on the show many times yeah I loved your story about just talking to Khalil and Rose about buy your fucking building like just buy it and if you can do it do it and what you did to buy this building in your house I loved your story about your house like I couldn't afford that I bought the damn house paid it off yeah there's a lot of respect for doing that a lot of people don't do that and that's what you're referencing right yeah no like you said there's very few true independents left in this town there are a lot of locally owned but a lot of them are backed by restaurant groups or investor groups and that's great that's fine most of those their money's gonna stay in the community I don't have anything against somebody having that business model but when you talk about a family that owns a business that doesn't have investors doesn't have backers we are few and far

01:00:42between now they are almost non-existent who else is there besides like Rose and Khalil, Jeremy Palmer and Green Hills with Corner Pub, you know there's there's others I mean you know somebody like I think Silver Sands you know is an independent you got others out there that that are truly family owned and operated independent so I can't I can't name them all but there's not your head there's only like a few that I can name yeah I mean and and I know there's more that I know that I deal with but but it's just fewer and fewer I can't it's hard for me to even remember or know who is truly that way anymore the town's huge now I mean you think about all the different areas Jack Cawthon would be one you know and then there's a Jesse Lee I think he's a full owner of Roberts isn't he I think so Jesse Lee Jones and his wife and Layla yeah Layla's story she was on the show and she told me that I don't know if you know this about her and I'll tell you just in case she didn't know because I thought is probably the most amazing story that I've ever heard on the show right besides Charlie Nelson's story about figuring out how he yeah did the Nelson's Brothers just anyway she was busking on the street with her husband and she went into Robert's and they were really busy and so she just started waiting she couldn't get a drink so she just started waiting tables yeah she didn't even work there she started waiting tables and at the end of the shift Robert said who are you and she goes I'm Layla I work here now and that was it then she started working at Roberts and then is on New Year's Eve at like 2 o'clock in the afternoon the band didn't show up and he goes Layla you're on if you want to play you're on so she put a band together and she got to play at 2 o'clock and she played every day from there's like 49 days straight yeah

01:02:42before he said and she worked at Layla at Roberts he said hey I want you to go run the Bluegrass Inn which is next door yeah and so she she's like well do I still get to play he goes yeah you be that you be the general manager over there you seem like you own the place it's good go over there you be the general manager and then you can play whatever you want because you're gonna be the judge so she played every night and was the general manager and then one day he goes I'm tired of doing both of these give me five grand for all then and it's yours yeah she was like are you kidding me so she went to the bank and she got every credit card she had maxed out every cash advance she could get to get five thousand dollars and walked in and hand it to him and he was like okay it's yours and she was like oh my god I'm a business owner like but like the story of how you got a bit like but that's unbelievable that's a lot of work that's a lot of work to get there that's hustle again she hustled she grounded out she had the determination the grit she had what it took most people don't have it no and she she is one of a kind yeah I need to get her back on the show we need to have a conversation with her yeah okay Carrie I normally do like an hour long we're like 40 45 minutes in yeah it's your birthday I want you to be able to go spend time with your family yeah thank you thank you for everything that you just explained and hopefully people listening to this will know they'll go that makes a lot more sense now now I kind of see what a business owner downtown is thinking and what goes through his brain that's what I wanted to portray if the mayor wants to come on and give me his side of the story because there's he's got a lot of meetings he's got a lot of things he's got going on I would love to hear that he's been on the show before I would love to have Freddie O'Connell and I don't hate Freddie just so you know we used to serve on the G bid together and so I don't hate Freddie O'Connell I just want to hear his perspective yeah well because there's things I don't know here there's there's something missing the the thing is that they got with

01:04:46this assessment they got actively over aggressive it will come back to bite the city because the appeals process is going to take 18 to 20 months because they're so backed up they have so many people appealing this time you have houses that were assessed at higher than what they closed on the week before and so you know it's so aggressive that what's gonna happen is when some of these appeals hit and they win their appeals then the city's gonna have a big bill to turn around and pay back to people and it's not gonna be pretty all right that sounded a lot like a Gordon food service final thought which is how we end the show every single week I can't edit this and add that right before what you just now said if you like or do you have a Gordon food service final thought that you would like to share with the entire listening audience whatever you want to say as long as you want to say it go yeah my final thought would be this for for the people that want to make the argument of you've benefited from downtown you've had this big boom you guys are just greedy you guys you know have had this whole huge surge and you've benefited from it all hey guess what we worked hard for this we helped make this downtown active and vibrant and so that argument doesn't hold water with me I took a chance in a blighted neighborhood Layla took a chance on a blighted street most of the owners did we've we've grounded out we've put in our time we've worked hard to say that we're greedy or that we don't care about our employees or that we don't want to pay our fair share are not true statements go and meet the

01:06:48owners come and meet me talk to me talk to my staff talk to Layla staff talk to staff you know that's not who we are we're just trying to make a living and taking a chance and following our dream and we've been fortunate enough to have great teams to be alongside us to do that and have great customers that have come and shown up so that we can do it but this isn't a greed thing this is a rational way to run a city thing and and it's about the city having fiscal responsibility you got to manage your budget at your house I got to manage mine at mine the city needs to manage their budget and right now they're not all right Carrie Bringle thank you very much for your time today as always thank you for being a supporter of the show all these years thank you for being my first live interview and at this today my last live interview your book ending it right now enjoy the rest of your birthday and thank you again all right thank you so much to Carrie Bringle for coming on the show today I really appreciate your comments I did promise you that we would have a Brandon's final thought and that is what we are going to do right now we're gonna call this the Gordon's food service final thought kind of my take on what you just heard and this is this is kind of what I think Nashville has changed a lot this used to feel like a big small town kind of handshake deals relationships people who knew each other and restaurants were built by people who loved hospitality loved their regulars loved their craft and it doesn't seem to be the game anymore now you've got national groups coming in with VPs of purchasing VPs of operations negotiating everything at scale they have leverage they have systems and they have discipline a lot of independent

01:08:49restaurants they're still operating like it's old Nashville and here's the truth and it's not comfortable you're not just competing on food and experience anymore you're competing on business intelligence costs are up across the board food insurance repairs everything and every time you raise your prices people complain that's the environment and it's not changing so the question becomes what part do you play in a result you don't want because I've seen it operators overpaying trusting vendors they shouldn't trust not negotiating not leveraging their buying power that's fixable that's exactly what NARA does we help in the rest independent restaurants compete kind of like these big guys better pricing better partnerships better leverage and it's not just a tax situation it's not just oh we've been assessed and our taxes are going up if you're not doing all those other things also maybe the taxes don't kill you and we've got to stop operating like we're old Nashville because this is new Nashville so you've got a choice adapt to the new Nashville or get squeezed out by it it's kind of my take on this and it's tough it's not not what you want to hear but it is if you're if you're struggling and you want to look at those other things I'm happy to talk to you this we're doing this across the board a lot of people right now and it's helping a lot of people hit us up Nara Nashville on Instagram or you can message me Brandon at Nara Nashville and I will will help you out if I can all right guys I hope you're being safe out there love you guys bye