Caroline Galzin

00:00Here we are, 2022. Not only 2022, we're 10 days in to 2022. And I know what you've been saying. We're gonna wait until the new year to get all these things done. Let's get through the holidays. Let's get through the holidays. Well, here we are. It's a brand new year. It's time to dig out those old contracts. Look and see how much longer you have to deal with your corporate company who comes in and does your dish machine. You get to keep paying them high costs. You know what? Now is the time to identify when that is to give Jason Ellis over at SuperSource a call. Now is the time to look at your linen contract. To identify how much longer we have to deal with these jokers coming in and never leaving me enough linens. Or, hey, I'll come back later. Oh, I promise I'll take care of it. You need to work with professionals. You need to work with people who are local and regional. And that's why Cytex is here for you too. We've got four companies we're gonna tell you about today that these are the companies you need to be using. You want to be successful. You want to be more profitable. Cytex and SuperSource are two companies you need to call today. Go to our website, NashvilleRestaurantRadio.com.

01:13Click the sponsors tab and you will find a link to both Cytex and SuperSource. Give them a call today. They can help you. They can answer any questions you might have. Start 2022 off on a profitable note and call SuperSource and Cytex today. Welcome 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. I am joined today on today's episode with Jen Ichikawa and I am so excited to have her here in 2022 and I want to say thank you. A heartfelt thank you for all of the kind notes that were sent to me about our last episode and I wanted to say I thought Jen did just such an amazing job. Her comments, everything she did in that episode was really really good but I would just appreciate the support from everybody out there. I'm excited to do our next episode in February but today, today we are talking with Caroline Galzin. She is the owner at Nicky's Coalfired and Nicky's Coalfired Bagels. She is a, she's an amazing person, amazing human and we talked about her a lot on this show and today she joins us from Orange Beach, Alabama where her and her husband are quarantining safely and we get to get caught up. Last time we talked was on July the 5th, 2020, smack dab in the middle of the first wave of this crazy pandemic and now we are just

03:13catching up all of the things that she's been up to and all the innovation. I just feel like they are some of the people who are really intentional with everything that they do and I love picking her brain because she just thinks of things. She's one of those people who's thinking six months ahead all the time and I just love that. I do, I try and do the same thing. I think she is like above all in just how far ahead she's able to see what's gonna happen and just has a plan for it and I'm such an honor to have her on the show today so I hope that you guys enjoy that. Hey if 2022, here we go, if you will do us a favor we would love for you to tell your friends about us. If you listen to this podcast tell somebody. We would love the word of mouth. We don't do a ton of advertising around here. It is all about you telling somebody, hey I really dig this show and let somebody else know. If you like the show follow us on Instagram at Nashville underscore restaurant underscore radio or follow me on Instagram. That's Brandon underscore NRR. We also have Jen Ichikawa underscore NRR and we are also on Twitter. We are on Facebook and TikTok. Man we had a video on TikTok that we filmed at the restaurant. It's got like over 600,000 views. It's absolutely insane. Jules filling up a water out of the coffee machine which was totally fun to film and we're always thinking about more ideas. Moving into a studio in February we've got lots of cool things going on. So without further ado we're just gonna jump right in today on a Monday with Caroline Galzin. All right we are super excited today to welcome in Caroline Galzin. How you doing Caroline? I'm good. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. How is the

05:16New Year treating you so far? Well let's see. My New Year promptly started with a COVID quarantine. So I am in COVID quarantine currently but I'm not sick at all. Tony's been a little sick but today is should be the last day of our quarantine. We'll see. We'll see how it goes and we actually just came down to our family house in Alabama because we got tired of looking at the same four walls in Nashville so we figured we'd look at different walls in a different state. Nice. Well so you're essentially at the beach? I'm at the beach but it's definitely not what one would typically hope for out of a beach experience. Geographically I'm at the beach. Mentally nowhere near the beach. Okay so help me envision because in Nashville we just had like seven inches of snow and it's currently 54 degrees and pouring rain. What are you experiencing in Alabama?

06:26Well it is a beautiful day and it is 70 degrees here in an orange beach so definitely have that going for me. Well I yeah I'm going to St. Martin next week so I'm really excited about that. Amazing. Good for you. We had speaking of COVID quarantine my wife her father got sick and we had to cancel our trip for her 40th birthday in August so we rescheduled for this week. I think everybody out there is having COVID issues like this this Omicron variant we had to close our restaurant for four days missing New Year's Eve service and and every we have like a dozen people come back from the holidays with just like oh yeah I have this this COVID now parents have it I have it everybody's got it. Did you have you guys had to close your restaurant at all? We had to close on Tuesday which is normally when we do our big like ten dollar pizza night and then we had to close on Thursday and Friday for the snow and we had a really great private event this week. We hosted Bobby Bones and his wife Kaitlyn for Kaitlyn's surprise 30th birthday party on Wednesday um so it was a little bit of nail biting to try to get through that event it was like if we only do one thing this week please God make sure we don't have to cancel this event and fortunately we did it it was the only day during the week that we were able to stay open and Tony and I couldn't be there but our team absolutely knocked it out of the park and did a great job and I think they have a lot of fun so that was our favor but fortunately no we haven't had to close otherwise and you know it's just kind of day by day right now it's it's at a point where I feel like I can't get worked up or stressed about it you just have to roll with it you know yeah that's that's it I mean it's really a everybody mask up I think that there's a weird responsibility that people have if

08:27you work in restaurants when you go home like right now with this variant being so strong it's almost like hey look we're gonna close for a week and we're gonna have a big COVID party everybody come get it and they will all come back to work I mean because it's just basically like a head cold now right it's not like the worst thing it's like people are dying people have been vaccinated and or when you leave work try not to go places that you know not wearing a mask go to concerts and things because you come back to work and you affect so many other people right I mean I will say that I feel so strongly about that has worked in our favor is we have we have not dropped the mask mandate for our employees I want to say maybe like in June and July for a little bit we let employees take masks off but once Delta hit we said everybody has to wear a mask all the time at work and we have not wavered from that we're very very strict about it I know it's not necessarily everybody's preference but I do attribute that to a lot of our success with not having to close because we've never had an outbreak at work anybody who's gotten sick has gotten sick outside of work which you know it's just inevitable for some people but it has made things a little bit easier I think for us I hope at some point this year we'll be able to get rid of it but you know everybody's pretty used to it now mm-hmm so Jane what happens every time I want to take a mask away I say no nobody inevitably gets it later like I just I've been super anti let's not mostly I I just because I know our staff and they're great but they all hang out with each other like they're all besties they all go to like the same Titans game or the same party or the same bar the same whatever don't like if one of them gets it everybody's gonna get it and I just don't hang out with anybody so it's not even like like I'm just such a homebody like you were

10:28like this is not anyone's idea the beach I'm like I bet it's mine like I'm gonna be in a scenic area just not in the scene it you know um she's a home buddy yeah totally so anyway every time he's like maybe the keys are going down no mass I'm like I mean at this point it's you know listen we're always putting health and safety first I feel like we have always done that this whole time you know we followed every CDC guideline that's kind of our policy at work is whatever the CDC is saying but you know at this point it's as much of a business decision as anything I think you you know say hey we have to try and mitigate closed days due to lack of staff so that's a big deal I mean when you have to close the restaurant nobody makes money I mean exactly sorry I was gonna say we do have some sick pay but you know it's kind of as much as we can offer it's not a ton of sick pay it's not government sponsored like it was right it's definitely challenging for our team so we want to you know not close as much as possible I did though I will mention you know we've shared with our staff and for anybody else who may be listening I got an email from Giving Kitchen this week saying hey we saw you were closed a few days we have special COVID relief for any employees who are outside so for any restaurant food service worker anywhere who has been affected by COVID giving please visit Giving Kitchen because they have rent relief they have utility bill relief all sorts of help for restaurant employees who which is a lot right now unfortunately yeah that's absolutely incredible well Caroline I listened yesterday I took some time and I listened to the last time we were on the show and it was in July July 5th of 2020 oh boy you and Tony came on the show and

12:31I feel like that was 11 years ago that really does feel like a different it's well one because that's the first time I'm like actually got to talk to you guys ever like it was like we were meeting each other live on the show yes had we met in person yet no no we had not like I came to the restaurant a couple days later just to kind of and like I feel like I've known you so much but we probably had a what a hundred conversations and then there was there was like 24 straight episodes where I referenced you or Tony I think that was right like it was me and Delia were kept doing shows like you know Caroline and Tony Caroline and Tony Caroline and Tony and then you guys have just since that day I want to go back a little bit we had I got so many comments from when you guys were on the show when you guys had the realization you had we went into and you guys got home and you said we're not happy we're not happy with the amount of time we're spending you went you said you went to Charleston and you had a bad time like it wasn't fun because we were there and we just were anxious and nothing was right and you you decided we were gonna change everything and you came up with this priorities list that you're gonna have going forward and you changed the way in which you led and I was so impressed by that and you said we're reopening here now as a fast casual kind of a concept limiting the amount of touches we're going to a tip pool where all of our servers are shared the whole restaurant is now on this like tip credit and back of house is making more but front of the house now can work kitchen ships and all these amazing things and since that day since we talked in July I feel like there's been a hundred more things that you've been involved with can you catch us up

14:32on some of the what have you been up to and let's break some of it down and just talk about it because I know that you have been tirelessly working for this community and I'll thank you in advance well thank you that for your very nice words I really appreciate that um yeah I do feel like a lot of my time last year was was spent devoted to action for hospitality which you know I was in a leadership role alongside some wonderful ladies Marsha Masulia, Diana Barton and Jordan Carroll all were in leadership roles alongside me and we it was hard I feel like we tried to get a lot of things done you know we had lots of successes and lots of failures too kind of the the last big effort I feel like we were making was to advocate for employees getting vaccines you know if you take it all the way back to this time last year which truly feels like a hundred years ago what we were doing was we found out that every state in the United States with the exception of four states were following the CDC recommended guideline for a vaccine rollout well guess what was one of the four states that said that said we're gonna make up our own rules and we're going to make you know do our own mess it up so the original plan that Tennessee came up with the vaccine rollout for restaurant employees there was there was no category for restaurant employees or as it was defined by the CDC essential workers that was a phase two for the national plan and was a phase

16:38general population for Tennessee so essentially once the vaccines are open to everyone in the general population that's when essential workers restaurant grocery food service can get their vaccines we really did a lot of digging and research and trying to figure out why that may be that didn't make sense to any of us and the answer that we got essentially you know I won't name names but the answer we got from the decision-makers was that restaurants have been operating safely this entire time and if we say that restaurant workers need to get vaccinated then we're going back on everything we've been saying last year which is that restaurants can operate safely so so you know I it's such backwards logic to me basically they were saying hey we'll have egg on our face if we now say restaurant workers deserve to get vaccinated because we've been saying oh restaurants are no problem it's fine we can all operate safely so I felt like a real kind of flap in the face after after a hard year yeah fortunately you know it came to politics that yeah it's ridiculous but you know it really let me know how our leaders feel about me as a restaurant employee it's a restaurant owner about my staff my team my my peers I'm very disappointed did you learn anything about the whole politics of all this stuff like did you did your skin get tougher are you are you I was a president of my HOA one time no no bearing to anything you're talking about but just like everybody in every section of the neighborhood all wanted to lobby for their own needs we have a green space here and we want this and we don't have that but we want a dog park and we want a pool and we want this is like all this is like 300 houses this place and you kind of had to make decisions based

18:40upon every single person what was best for the greater good but it taught me a lot about how politics works and some of the pressure these people are under anything you can take out of that experience that made you stronger or better or more jaded you know I am somebody who you know I feel like first of all when I when I agreed to take on a leadership role with action for hospitality I really made a resolve to myself that I was going to act in in what I thought was the interest of the group and I definitely had moments where what I was hearing from the group was different than my own opinion on things but that's what I went with you know I really I I'm somebody who I'm probably too much of an optimist but I've always been very interested in politics I've always been very up-to-date on politics ever since I was younger it's always been an interest of mine and I you know and somebody who kind of believes that things are supposed to work a certain way and you know they definitely don't work that way but I kind of took that optimism with me hey here's how it should be done so here's how I'm going to do it um I that's difficult to do mm-hmm it it wasn't it wasn't um it wasn't because it just I don't know it made me feel like I was doing the right thing I don't I'm somebody who I get anxiety about like getting in trouble I'm gonna do the wrong thing I don't know why I just have like I was born with a guilty conscience um so to me I I wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing I did never want somebody to come back to me and say hey we told you this but you did this instead you know I never wanted to be the person who felt like I was going behind the back of people that I agreed to represent and you know um you know unfortunately the thing that I really learned is that you're you know this is probably no shock to anyone but there's just so much kind of rubbing of elbows

20:46and who's friends with who and who's in with this person and who's in with that person at the state level that there are some really really really old and system I'm not the person to do that I wish I was maybe if I was independently wealthy and didn't have a business to run I'd take that on but refund it would be fun um it's just I don't know it's it's quite distasteful all of it it she referenced that you did that in the almost in the past tense action Tennessee action for hospitality where do they stand today so over the summer Tennessee action for hospitality combined forces with giving kitchen who I mentioned earlier of course they have to plug giving kitchen but we got to a point where we felt like what we had been working on had come to an end not come to an end but was transitioning into something different everybody who is super involved in leadership roles especially myself was starting to get busy again with our businesses we were no longer able to take things on to be as effective as we'd like to be you know I think that there will always still be a place for our network of action for hospitality a lot of the people who were involved with action for hospitality have now stepped up to be great advocates for giving kitchen specifically Marsha Masulia is is now working with giving kitchen and we felt like the network that we had in the fundraising we did would would best be allocated to giving kitchen and they really have stepped up to the plate they've seen me touch me a lot even though I have completely stepped down I'm no longer you know involved in any sort of official capacity other than being a great cheerleader for giving kitchen all the time but but they're

22:51already in our community they're already doing work like I said they just they said hey we saw on Instagram that you were closed how can we help they're here and they're making it happen so that's awesome we are big fans of the giving kitchen here and try and promote them as much as I can because they're when I first started this thing I really wanted to figure out some nonprofit arm of Nashville restaurant radio where we could continue to help people in the industry and they're doing that and they're amazing and now Big Table has come to town too are you familiar with them oh no I'm not big table is here Jen can tell you a little bit about them they're incredible they started on the west coast so where their first like non-west city and they said they chose Nashville because they saw that Nashville had just this like heart for giving to each other especially after the 2020 tornado and everything that's happened in Nashville proper the bombing all of that and so anyway what they do is um they take recommendations of people so like you can say hey there I have an employee or my friend is in the restaurant industry and they're really struggling with X Y or Z and then they find ways to help that individual and they really build relationships so they do and then every what is it every quarter they do like a big dinner maybe two times a year it's either two or four times a year they do like a big dinner and it's a big table it's I mean bigger than you think like we both had an idea 45 people yeah we got an idea of like how large it was and then we were able to go to the last one in December and it's it's massive and so you know it was it was just really cool it's a lot of people that they helped and then people that you know want to help that want to help the organization and it's it's really impressive and the guy that was not in the industry he just noticed he kind of saw like the least of these I guess in restaurants and they were like well who helped you and it's like well this bartender helps me when I need to get to work and well who helps the

24:51bartender well the pastry chef when he needs it you know and they were like okay so this is just happening within the community how can we help the community which I think was such a cool goal and so we're big fans of theirs that's awesome I'm gonna have to look them up there well it's you know I feel pretty darn fortunate here in Nashville to have two companies two nonprofits in town that work they work together almost in tandem so they can go check out the giving kitchen or here or there and they're they're great hold on there's also core which I like love mentioning because I have kids and it's children of restaurant employees so it's people that if you know whether or not they're legal or not which is a big thing too is they'll help the kids so if the parents are going through maybe whatever yeah whatever or the kids are going through that they're there to help the kids in that I used to volunteer with them and they're also incredible so that's another we've got a lot in Nashville that's like really here to help so that's it things come out of a pandemic sometimes you know one of my favorite things to come out of a pandemic coal fired bagels that's that's probably one of my favorite things too tell us how that happened because when last time we talked there was no such thing as Nikki's coal fired bagels how did this come about so there's a guy named Rob Kane Rob was the founder and one of the owners of bare naked bagel which was a business in Nashville several years ago they started as a food truck and then they had a brick-and-mortar for a little while in Midtown and Tony and I were always huge huge fans of bare naked bagel we didn't know them at all but just we would you know anytime we saw their truck around the farmers market we would go to their store in Hillsborough Village we just thought they had the best bagels we were obsessed sadly they closed shortly after they closed we were hiring a prep cook and Rob reached out to us and said hey I just you know left my business but I'm looking for something part-time you know I think he

26:53was looking at maybe decompress a little bit which I completely understand I would love a chance to decompress from my business and just work part-time sometimes so Rob came in and we said hey you know who you are we love your bagels would you try making bagels here and bake them in our pizza oven just for fun to see what that would look like well this was at the end of February of 2020 and we ran a few test runs and we said those are delicious and then of course we all know what happened next so when we reopened and decided we were gonna do this fast casual model that didn't really it didn't make sense for our brunch service and quite frankly our brunch service was something that we always struggled with I don't feel like an Italian restaurant a pizzeria is really always gonna be a smash for brunch and we tried a few different iterations of our menu and it was always impossible to staff and I feel like we were always just briefly even on brunch and it just really didn't make sense so we thought hey what if we open a bagel shop it's super easy we can run it with two people you know let's sell bagels to go you know everybody's doing to go food at that time you know pick up pantry food that sort of thing when we were trying everything during the pandemic and that's that's really where it came from we did a couple of pop-up shops our longest running pop-up was in 12 South we did that for a little over a year in the insert shop here space and then Jeremy Barlow yes we love Jeremy he was so good to us over the last year to share his space with us he's such a great guy he did a pop-up sled shop this week severe park was doing you know all the field sledding in severe park and he opened up a ski lodge type things like hey I'm doing tomato tomato soup and sandwiches and cold beer come by pick them up while you're sledding love it a pre sled shop I think but he's like a whole while you're out snow snow skiing

28:57or sledding come by I'll make you sandwiches I just love that guy that's so fun I love and he doesn't do any of that he's just kind of like sometimes he'll wake up one day and be like let's make chocolate chip cookies and sell them you know and his first cream concept is really full and really delicious if you haven't been you've got to go check it out I have I do need to go but yeah things just started to really ramp up for us at the end of the year at Mickey's and we just decided it would be best to kind of allocate all of our resources to what's happening actually in in the building in the nations so we're doing a bagel shop it's kind of replaced our brunch service at Nikki's permanently it's every Saturday and Sunday from 9 to 1 we've expanded the menu a little bit beyond bagels so there's a few other things we got the bar open it's actually open as we're talking right now but I'm not there it's open on Monday morning I guess everybody knows this is recorded on Sunday the show comes out Sunday night so there you go so Saturday and Sundays you can get bagels at Nikki's coal-fired bagel shop which is replacing your brunch that's right I watched it YouTube so like I love YouTube and Tik Tok I like getting these crazy worlds with them and I got in bagel talk somehow and I know it's a weird place and they were talking about like the water the water is like the thing and how there's a bakery in LA that's like bringing in water from Manhattan to make Manhattan style bagels so I've heard that I don't know if this is true but I feel like somebody told me that H&H bagels in Midtown brings in water from New Jersey to make their bagels. Wild. I don't know if they do maybe I made that up but I feel like somebody told me that. I just love that commitment. It's quite a commitment. We use good old Nashville's best and we think it's wonderful. Cumberland punch baby. Yeah yes. Well you

31:04got you know we have Nashville hot chicken at least barbecues now doing Nashville style barbecue they want to have like their own Nashville Memphis style candy they want Nashville style barbecue that's what they're doing you could do Nashville style coal-fired bagels. I mean I do feel like Nashville has quite the budding bagel scene over the last year we have a lot of people making bagels a lot of really good bagels out there. Okay what is your favorite bagel that is not a Nicky's coal-fired bagel? In Nashville. And we're gonna leave you with that tease while we take a break to continue the conversation about 2022 and you turning over a new leaf. One of the companies that will help you every single day is what chefs want and while they continue to grow and add more product lines in cities one thing that remains true is that they still remain small in the world of they want to focus on independently owned and operated restaurants and how they can help you. I mean it's in their name they are what chefs want so they're delivering seven days a week they have no minimums so you can order one avocado if that's what you need they want to be there to help you they have 24-7 support so it's not a you must call me before four o'clock you 24-7 that's 24 hours day seven days a week they are here for you they have an amazingly diverse lineup every chef in this city knows if you want the stuff that's tough to find and you want it next day you call what chefs want so they are here for you go to Nashville restaurant radio comm click on the what chefs want tab and start sign up an account get going right now it's 2022 what are you waiting on the other company I want to tell you about is another fantastic local company Aaron Mosso and everybody over at sharpies bakery guys if you're looking for local

33:08bakery who can deliver to you every single day be this is the company 36 years they have been delivering fresh baked bread and desserts to you to the back door of your restaurants same thing guys go check them out sharpies dot-com where you can see a list of all the different breads it's over 200 breads that they're making right now or go to Nashville restaurant radio comm click the sponsors tab again you can find all of these amazing companies that sponsor this show again we do not take one dollar from restaurants we want to support the restaurants out there and these are the companies that want to support you so there's four super source Cytex what chefs want and sharpies bakery that is a that is a heck of a foursome for you to start off 2022 get with these companies and let's start a profitable new year definitely bagel shop downtown those guys are great they make really delicious bagels super fun sandwiches just the nicest nicest people and they're they're good bagel friends so I'm not eating my own bagels which is rare I'm eating definitely eating a the bagel shop bagel shop bagel where is the bagel shop of their it's in the Fairlane Hotel it's in the lobby of the Fairlane Hotel it's actually quite a beautiful lobby and shop area that they have as well so if you're looking for and I believe they're open every day during the week so don't quote me on that but look at their Instagram and and payment visit if you haven't nice so what have you done in your restaurant to make it you said you're just blowing up over there and you had to focus all of your resources to it what do you attribute that to what's did you think it's just that the town is back and I think that for us there's three three things that I'm gonna attribute it to right now one

35:12is we have been waiting for such a long time for the nation's to finally get there and five years in we're still not there yet but we do feel closer than ever to whatever there is you know Pringle's smoking Oasis just open they're great neighbors bringing a lot of wonderful attention to the neighborhood Jenny's ice cream opened earlier this year which I feel like is a kind of a you know marker of things to come hopefully it just there's there's starting to be more of an energy in the neighborhood that feels like what we've been waiting for so that's part of it another part is that we were on an episode of diner striving and dives at the end of November mid-November so we definitely saw a lot of this from that and then she was on it too yeah yeah my husband and I own soy bistro it's in Brentwood yes that's right oh my gosh did you film the same times we've filmed we thought this big August okay so they couldn't tell us like who else they were going to go see and they gave us like a they were the blah blah blah chicken and I still don't know what chicken place they went to so my understanding is that while they were here they were doing like a huge blowout of filming they were filming like eight places in Nashville but they were also filming the show guys three games no it was um guys guys chance guys big chance where they get but they guys grocery games too in Spring Hill because they were talking about how like we're in Brentwood and that was like really far they were like you guys are so far from everything else that we're doing oh interesting and then they were like four hours for a kill is that close by and I was like no so we ended up not being the furthest but yeah that's great I didn't

37:19actually see your episode so now I'm gonna go back and watch it yes you had a watch party at your place we did have a watch party it was it was bonkers we actually out of that night we kind of made some major retooling to our front of house operations which I'm grateful for because then the third thing that I'm attributing being so busy to is in December we did a Christmas pop-up called st. Nicky's yes and we did crazy Christmas decorations and I really underestimated what a Christmas pop-up will do for your business we broke sales records every single day for ten days in a row in December it was bananas I'm talking like all-time history of the restaurant sales records numbers that we've only done before on New Year's Eve like it was it was one but it was great so now I don't know what to expect in January but I do feel like we're very set up for success going into the new year I think we as a team because we were so busy and so slammed every day in December we've gotten so much better I think we've really refined operations I think we've really kind of been able to hone in on the very very best to operate I'm somebody who I feel like you're like this too Braden I get really obsessive about okay here's this thing and here's how we're doing it works but is there a way to really really laser focus and make it even better and then once we get it focused how do we make it even better than that you know I get a little crazy about those things so I feel like that summer which feels like going into the new year yeah I even no matter how

39:22great this shift is like even if it's like wow we had a $30,000 night and it was great I'm gonna give attaboys and high fives and I'm gonna be the guy that's like guys we killed it however I feel like our execution could have been better at this this this is I want to end every day a little bit better than I was the day before and I think and I need one of my things I'm challenging myself to do is to stop doing that it's so much and be in the moment and let people know who put together a really big massive effort that they did a fantastic job I don't want to be the guy that's like yay okay now get back to work like I want to be the guy that's able to celebrate those moments and be like wow you really went above and beyond what you did today for those tables and everything in the building I just want to give high fives but also how do we get better how do we get better than what that was and I think it's that that kind of sets you apart in somebody you never sit there and go oh well we did great let's just stay right here then we'll be good because then you take your pedal your foot off the gas and before you know it you're coasting and you fall asleep and what happened where did we go off track like we let off the gas we I don't know that's my thing I'm sure you're probably I think for me too a big part of that like hey how can we like really dial this thing in has also for us particularly with you know having now a year under our belt of this new operating model of where is it okay to let go of focus on certain things that maybe we would have been focused on before where is it okay you know I feel like some of it has for me because prior to Nikki's my work history really is more of a fine dining background I quite frankly if I was applying for a front of house job today I'd be a lot more comfortable in Miraballs than I would

41:25at Nikki's just that's my personal wheelhouse so for me there are a lot of things that I had to let go of and say if a customer is gonna be disappointed about this thing then that just has to be okay for example you know we have some people that were really great regulars of Nikki's before and now we still see them from time to time but not as much and it's because they've expressed to us they do not like the service model and I have to be okay with that because I can't do things differently to please just one person or you know last weekend we had a customer come in for brunch and we only have our front dining room open for brunch and it's so we can have minimal staff there and you know enough to have both dining rooms open but it's just not right now and there was a guy who came in and he was really bent out of shape because he wanted to sit in the big dining room in the past and maybe accommodated that and said well of course sir whatever you want go in there you know let me set you up let me take care of it and we said no and just had to let him be disappointed about that you know there's there's certain things if we want to be just kind of running on autopilot in a really great way that we that we just have to let go of you know you mentioned Edley's earlier Will from Edley's is somebody who before we switched over to this model was was generous enough to give me some of his time to have a conversation with him about their model because I knew that that's how I wanted to do it was you know that experience when I go into Edley's I thought that they did a really nice job of being very consistent with that experience and he gave me some good advice you know and some of those questions I asked him were well what if there's a line out the door and it's raining he said you know essentially I'm paraphrasing but basically people can see it's raining and if there's a line out the door and then they have a decision to make you know it's not up to me I can't control the weather I can't make my room bigger you know things like that yeah I was gonna say I so I live in

43:33the reviews world like I do the marketing all that and so I live in reviews and I see all of these and there are certain ones like I was in a move the other day and reading one and I was like I can't respond to this right now because it came out snarky but there are certain things that I have truly just stopped responding about because I can't it's not a controllable thing and it's not at any point constructive feedback then and it's like okay if you don't like the decor of our restaurant you do not have to come here but I am absolutely not going to change the wallpaper because John doesn't like it like right I think what's hard you know you mentioned earlier like the way just the transition the vaccine rollout what they did for essential workers and I feel specifically right now with hospital staff and then restaurants we were all regarded as heroes as this like essential worker thank you so much for coming in and now it's gone back to I think what it was before like well why aren't you catering to me why aren't you doing this for me and it's that attitude I mean I read all these things that horrible things that hospital workers are now going through with this woman like spit on a nurse because she wasn't vaxxed and this woman was like I'm so sorry like you have to wear a mask you know what I mean and you read stories like that and it just gets like no no we were your heroes 12 months ago we came to work for you to make sure to make you comfortable to give you a sense of normalcy to now that like me attitude how do you not live there because I you said you're like you're naturally pretty optimistic and I I'm an anagram for I'm not and I just like can sometimes live in that world of like this is too much negativity all at once yeah setting boundaries has been everything these last few months you know I kicked two people out of the restaurant at the front door last month because they were very rude to me and these are people that I probably would have tried to appease in the past but listen I'm making it sound a lot easier than it is I was internally like just having a meltdown however I've set a boundary with

45:38myself that this is my restaurant this is my home if there's this big global conversation about you know restaurant employees deserve to have certain work conditions where they're treated well they're treated with kindness and respect that's not just for employees it's for owners and managers as well and that includes me I deserve to be in a workspace where I'm not treated poorly where I'm not subject to abuse from customers just as much as anyone else so if somebody comes into the door and right off the bat is using rude abusive language it's trying to get in my personal space because they can't have their way and they want to throw a temper tantrum then I don't have a space for you but somebody probably would have tried to make happy and accommodate in the past and I don't do that anymore listen people are gonna be snappy sometimes not everybody's that friendly every time they come in the door and that's fine we put up with that but but there's a line that it crosses and when it crosses that line then you gotta go so I was so impressed going back to our first interview you guys made a decision so that you always you know we didn't really discern what what your politics were or who you were we your dollar counted in here like you just come on in and eat and over the pandemic and through this election cycle you kind of made a decision that you were gonna stand up for who we are and we're gonna stand up for people do the right thing and I think that that changed a lot for you in your mind I think that when when that kind of worked when you said I'm gonna not only stand up for myself but I'm gonna stand up for others who can't necessarily stand up for themselves and that's who we are and if you don't like that don't fucking eat here and I thought that was an amazing moment I don't feel like Tony and I have ever been super private about our personal beliefs about things but you know there is that conversation about as a business owner how political do you

47:41want to be and I think that there's a difference between showing showing your politics and being exclusionary and showing your politics and being inclusive and I think that our personal values are very inclusive and if there's someone who doesn't agree with that and they're offended by that then I can't help you you know with that said I will say particularly after Triple D aired we got a lot of new customers and you know you can just tell by the t-shirts that people are wearing or the things on people's hats what side of the aisle they're probably on but I welcome those customers as much as I welcome anyone you know I don't really care for the message that's on your hat perhaps it doesn't align with my personal values and you may not agree with the trans pride flag that we fly at our front door but you know if you can come in here and be respectful to me and to my team members that's the key and then I'm going to treat you with respect it's got to be I think for too long in the industry it was kind of a one-way street it's got to be a an agreement we've got together here and honestly it's a pizzeria none of this should be that controversial none of this should be that common eat some pizza let's have a good time and go home yeah we struggle with that too we are we meaning soy bistro because we're all so fast casual like you come in and you order at the counter and we're our front of house is all high school kids that's it like that's big that and then like my mom works there too that's it so you know if somebody does get rude to especially like a high school kid who's like here after school like this is not this is likely not their career they're just it's a good place for kids to work my husband is quick quick to be like no no

49:47absolutely not and he's very vocal about that and that's triple D has been like a huge blessing and then also there's a lot of new that comes with it because it isn't our regulars it isn't these kids parents anymore it's just the Brentwood community it's a whole new community that doesn't know us and doesn't know who we are and and yeah that's it's it's a transition for sure and it's like I said huge blessing but even online it's a totally different world with who's following us now and things we post we have to be like more aware of because there's more people seeing I mean I think there's a great way to be an example to listen I might I might sound like a liberal asshole for saying this tonight I can swear on here but you know we have some people that I know are coming from surrounding counties from surrounding communities to visit Nicky's since we aired on Triple D and perhaps you know there's restaurants in their communities the places they're used to going don't display their politics you know don't have so much visibility about you know different communities that they are in support of so if they can maybe in their mind that's you know something that's that's monstrous or scary or you know they just haven't been that exposed to and if they can come to my restaurant and see all of these things that you know maybe in their mind they don't agree with but then they have such a great experience and see how nice and wonderful we are you know maybe that's a maybe that's a little wedge to change somebody's mind about something yeah is let me ask you you used to come but we're there is for having like a pride flag at your front door is that politics or is that just humanity I don't know to me that's not political at all I don't feel like that should be a political statement that's just saying we're good humans and we care about everybody and we're we're proud of that and we want anybody who might not feel included everywhere to know that this is a safe place for you

51:47and we're welcoming you that's not a hey look I'm liberal or hey I'm this that's saying I'm a human who recognizes other humans and you're welcome here like that's and that you're right it's not it's not to me it's not political it has been politicized yes um you know I also want to be careful about you know I think that sometimes people can interpret things like that as performative and for us the reason that we display those flags is because for for a few reasons one we have we're community of employees um you know we have customers we have lots of people who visit us that feel safe that feel happy that feel more comfortable in our environment when they see those flags when they see those things displayed the other thing is unfortunately our state has politicized those things particularly with the nonsense over the bathroom bills that our governor is trying to pull so it's very important for us that if people in the trans community are coming to Nicky's that they see those flags and they know this is not a place where anyone working here at least is gonna make me feel uncomfortable in a public space which I think is really really important yeah and the bare minimum right like I mean it's the bare minimum is somebody's not gonna be mean to you for what you look like and yeah you are you know it's it's uh that's something that Tony and I both feel really strongly yeah well all right what am I missing Caroline what am I missing what else you got going on anything fun we are personal milestones anything really neat that we need to cover I mean I hope it's not another year and a half before you come back on the show but wow I mean give me breaking news that we can announce right now on this show breaking news I don't know I

53:50mean second location coming soon um not imminently but you know Tony and I definitely have a goal for this year that we want to be working on new projects you know we we have a couple of ideas for things that that we'd like to pursue that you know that's kind of our goal for 2020 I think that we needed the last couple of years to hit reset you know and and get things running well with Nicky's by no means are we out of this pandemic at all but I do feel like we're starting to see the light at the end of the time but it hasn't previously so we feel like this is a year that all of the work we put into having things running smoothly and these is gonna pay off and and we can start to focus our attention on some new projects so we're excited and hopeful who knows what the year holds um you know that's that's kind of it I wish I had something more fun or exciting to tell you guys but I'm ducking COVID quarantine you know what just the fact that you're you're happy healthy and you're doing all right and you and Tony are doing your thing you had a wonderful holiday season that's that's awesome the work that you've done with action for hospitality for this community is is to be commended the amount I know that that took a ton of time and energy I don't think you've realized that that's volunteer work you know people a lot of people say eat local or support local like would you put your money where your mouth is when you walk the talk when you spend the amount of time that you spent working for something that doesn't necessarily just benefit you it's been if in the entire community I mean that's just that's just huge and I I think that we're a lucky town to get you guys here from Chicago and you decided to stay and I love that you got roots here now

55:52and you can look forward to a wonderful future with the Galzans here in our city all right Jen anything else you want to touch on no I have to go to Nicky's I actually haven't been yet like I said I never go anywhere I haven't been to soy bistro either but I have to tell you we have some good friends in and they rave about you every chance that they got so we need to yeah I have to admit that I tried to go to Nicky's a couple weeks ago I remember I was dropping off those toys remember I was dropping off toys you guys had a family that lost and we brought some my kids my poor my sweet children there's a family that had our house burned down close to them over there and they were saying bring some toys and these kids were an angel tree family and they lost all of those presents also really sad it was fire meet so we do an angel tree with cockerel school which is elementary school in the nations we've gotten really friendly with their school counselor and we take every opportunity we handed to work with them so we do an angel tree every year for Christmas and it was like four days after everyone had done the angel tree gift drop off this poor family had a fire and lost everything it was quite sad and you and your very sweet kids brought by some Bakugan's fuck oh no they were they were Beyblades which I found out what that was I thought Beyblades were roller blades no Beyblades are these little like though that's like a top like a spinning top and there's these little things you pull them and then they spin and they have battles there's like three different sections of them you can mix and match them and you put them together and there's like a big it's like a bucket like a bus tub but you put them in and they battle back and forth and

57:54when one of them breaks apart or dies the other one wins my kids are really big into it but when I was reading your stories and they were in the room it said that they needed there's an 11 year old and that whatever it went through the different kids and what they need and one of them was Beyblades and I was like hey boys there's a family that lost all of their toys lost their house lost everything and one of the kids really wants Beyblades and they both went to their room and they they have a ton of they were they're pretty blessed children and they came in and they just started going through all their Beyblades and like well dad can we give them these can we give them these can we give them these and they went through the whole thing and I was just sitting there and I was like oh my god like my heart was just like I was I was proud but I was also just like they're just so sweet these children and so we're like yeah we'll give them to him so we were gonna go take some over there and we got some you know the little things for them and we were gonna eat at Nicky's there was an hour and a half wait you texted me and I was stuck on expo and one of those moments I couldn't know my phone for like two hours you guys are very sweet the last thing last thing I want to do is come in and get any kind of preferential treatment we were just a if we're gonna be there we'd love to eat but like an hour and a half I would never ever say put me to the front of the line or anything along those lines I mean you guys are killing it the last thing you need is some I would be the difficult guy at the front like go get this tall guy here who wants special treatment I will come back another time I was excited you guys are busy we went to rock and dough down the street we stayed in the nations went to rock and dough and one of my best friends my childhood best friends was waiting tables there and he got to wait on us so it's really fortuitous we got to catch up with him and hit a really good hit a dude playing music on stage was really we had a really fun time so nice one Carolyn just you know to Brandon referenced St. Nicky's a lot because we were talking about like what we want to do for mirror bowl and it was Mary Bowles smart we are gonna do it next year the whole month we are doing it because we

59:56decorate the house to the nines like Christmas before yeah I mean every single room and I'm like next year we are merry M-E-R-R-Y we're gonna cross we're gonna have a new logos as Mary Bowles and we're gonna make it a Brentwood Christmas tradition that you go eat there and I want to just be lunch dinner every day this is that we had a record month record month never in the history of the restaurant we know we did I go but next year we're gonna have any how do you I just can't be happy with record all-time record month I'm like no no no next year we'll start marketing in August and we'll start yeah it's it's honestly I can't I can't tell you how great it was for us it was awesome well it was a really cool concept and I think a lot of doing really neat things but you guys have always been on the forefront of innovation and recognizing what's going on and I love you all right so last thing we do here every show you get to take us out I do yeah you say whatever you want to say as long as you want to say it this is kind of your Jerry's final thought for the episode oh my god we did last time last time we were on the show we did a game we played the new open game remember that the newlywed game with you and so we don't have that this time so now you get to just take us out the final whatever you want to say as long as you for as long as you want to say it the the floor is yours you're speaking to Nashville go oh my gosh okay I will just say that you know I think during the pandemic we really stepped up as a community and even though things are hopefully gonna get more back to normal this year let's not forget how good we were to each other during that time and let's keep that kindness and goodness flowing into this new year and beyond and thank you perfect see you nailed it right there okay you did great

01:02:00Carolina's awesome catching up with you thank you guys look forward to you guys all going to Nicky's and going to soy bistro you got to commit dessert over bowl fine we'll be there it's fun enjoy your time at the beach hopefully your kovat quarantine ends up good and you guys stay safe and healthy we look forward to safe trip back to Nashville thank you Caroline happy new year again thanks guys thank you so much great to see you both you too all right there it is Caroline gals and thank you so much for joining us on Nashville restaurant radio and thank you the listener for listening to this episode big shout out to bagel shop I'm gonna have to go try bagel shop bagels now check it out that's fantastic we are looking for recommendations if you have somebody you'd love to have on this show if you think you have somebody very interesting that you want to nominate to be on Nashville restaurant radio unsung heroes is what we're looking for we're looking for people that don't necessarily get the credit I want to hear their story so send me an email at Brandon at Nashville restaurant radio comm or to Jen jen at Nashville restaurant radio comm and we would love to explore unique conversations Jen's looking to do a kind of a side project where she's going to be interviewing some ensign unsung heroes in our market so anybody who's out there who's just really hustling doing a hell of a job we want to meet them we want to share their stories and again thank you so much for listening go tell a friend about us if you can and we hope that you guys are being safe and we love you guys bye