Jordan Williams

00:00Welcome 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're coming at you today with a special weekend edition and we're talking to a new friend of mine named Jordan Williams. Jordan is the owner of a company called WEC Nashville which inside of WEC Nashville hosts Neat Mixology and this is a company that he has come up with throughout the pandemic and it's one of those things I tell the story at the beginning of the episode but it's one of these companies that I learned about and I hired him immediately and I said I got to work with you and he said I want to work with you so it worked out really well but I wanted to share what he's doing with all you people out there with the crisis we're having right now with workers and the shortage of workers.

01:18He is he's found a unique solution when it comes to your bar when it comes to how you manage your bar and what you do he's found a way to significantly reduce the time it's going to take for you to be there so I hope that you enjoy this episode. This is the first episode with my new co-host Jen Ichikawa and I'm super excited to share this with you and we've got a really big weekend this weekend Sunday night we are doing Brandon's Book Club at seven o'clock there's a zoom link in the group Brandon's Book Club on Facebook. You can join I'd love to hear your opinion what you learned when you read the five dysfunctions of a team so that zoom call will be live from seven o'clock to eight o'clock love to have you and then at nine o'clock join Jessica Benefield her husband Trey and then we're also going to have Brian and Mikey from the Mockingbird Jessica and Trey obviously from 210 Jack and they're going to be joining us we're going to be talking shift from nine to 11 live on the Nashville restaurant radio Facebook page where it'll be on our YouTube page as well but the link is in the talking shift group in Facebook there's a group called talking shift when it start the conversation love to have you there we're gonna be telling stories this is restaurant stories battle stories or if you want to ask for advice on anything you're gonna have two restaurant owners and a restaurant consultant ready to talk so go make your favorite cocktail sit back relax and hopefully this is something that's gonna be fun and funny and enjoyable and we're just excited to bring it to you we're gonna bring you this episode with Jordan Williams right now but first we're gonna say I just want to tell you about Sharpies bakery their new sponsor and they're celebrating 35 years of delivering fresh baked bread and desserts to your restaurant six days a week with over 130 different types of bread they're way more than just dinner rolls and

03:24burger buns did you know you can actually make custom bread there if you want your own custom bread with your recipe they can make that for you and they will deliver it to you you got you got to have fresh bread it's just one of those things that it makes a difference and they're doing it the right way call Erin Mosso she is at six one five three five six zero eight two two where you can visit on the web at www.sharpies.com that's C-H-A-R-P-I-E-R-S.com if you want to learn more they've got pictures the website's actually very very cool that's Sharpies bakery so just another quick thing to tell you guys we would love it if what however you're listening to this to subscribe subscribe to this and you will get new episodes whenever they release and I tend to just release them on random days so typically Mondays and sometimes Fridays hell even a Saturday so if you are a subscriber you will get the notification first if you are not following us on the social medias my uh nash restaurant radio is Brandon underscore n-r-r and then of course we have at nash restaurant radio we have the talk and shift t-a-l-k-i-n underscore shift podcast follow us all Brandon's book club love you join Brandon's book club but now let's get started in with Jordan Williams all right so we are super excited today to welcome in Jordan Williams and Jordan is the CEO of WEC Nashville and the founder of neat mixology welcome to nash restaurant radio Jordan hey good morning thanks for having me on it's a pleasure to have you on people may be listening is going who is Jordan Williams or they may know your mom may be listening everyone might be listening I don't know but I want to give our listeners a little bit of background because you contacted me and said hey man I love your show I'd love to advertise with you essentially and I said okay I'd like to learn more about your company and kind of talk

05:29to you about it so we met at mare bowl and after 10 minutes of listening to you and what you're doing and just kind of conversation not only did I want you to advertise I signed up and I'm now a customer as and versus doing just a morning like a beginning of a show an on-brand which we will do I wanted to get your story out to my listeners immediately so can you give us like the 90 second elevator speech as to what it is that you do yeah absolutely um you know my mother probably is listening first and foremost so I need to be careful um but we we found a wc earlier this year and we do a lot of different things one of that is neat mixology and that's where you know you and I talked about it mare rules but that is a service of beverage directors I like to call it that comes into your restaurant or bar establishment that serves alcohol and we deep dive into the pnl the data side of things in the background we put together a beverage program for you that makes sense customized to each of our clients all that's based on the data on trends that are going on in the area we also manage your inventory we do the ordering with the distributors on a weekly basis we look at big things things that are coming in things that are maybe going out deals that make sense for you guys train your staff when we when new things are on the menu to make sure there's not a bottle behind the bar that someone's like what is that why is it there I didn't even know it was in the restaurant today and make sure you're firing on all cylinders behind the bar to make all the money you can and god forbid we go into another pandemic and you're really tightened up I'm going into that why we do this is to create more time for the bar manager for the restaurant owners that don't have enough time we all know how valuable staff is right now how limited staff is right now if we can take a few hats off of these managers head and wear a couple of those for them to be an assistant to those guys to function of the restaurant a little more easier on a daily basis and that's why we're here wow okay so

07:33that that's that's amazing because I had this idea so funny I had this idea two months ago that bar managers service managers you have these different managers with titles and they immediately gravitate towards that thing right so if you're if you have a bar manager they immediately walk in and they want to change the house wines and they want to change all the things and make their own cocktails and they're doing the inventory and I just want to take care of the guests my number one goal is just focus on the guests focus on the guests and I feel like when you have a bar manager there's an inordinate amount of time that they spend on the bar when we could typically pivot a little bit and spend more time working with the guests and so I heard this and I went oh wow this is amazing so you're going to do inventory for me you're going to create drink menus because you're going to be all over town working with you're going to create drink menus you're going to do an analysis of my inventory and my pnl and tell me where things are priced appropriately and not and then you're going to do the orders for me which is kind of out of control that you're able to do all of these things which frees up my bar manager to really focus on staff education and creating plans and training and teaching my staff how to sell teaching them the different variables in wine and really digging into the guest experience exactly and that's I think you hit the nail on the head the most important person in each restaurant and bar is the guest and how do you make that experience better you spend a little more time with them and I think with what we're doing like I said you hit the nail on the head right there so I want to tease everybody with that right there so we've teased everybody there you go that's what he does now I'd like to go back and identify what makes you uniquely qualified for this position all right where are you from I'm from northern Indiana originally grew up my entire life in a farm community if you will was not a farmer but I grew up in that area and went to college was an athlete played played baseball in college got out in 2009 which we all know

09:36the recession was awesome to deal with then had a degree that didn't mean anything in 2009 I was sitting in interviews next to guys with 35 years experience willing to work for the same amount I was because nobody had a job and it was it was difficult times for everybody and I found myself I got a phone call from a good friend I grew up in the hospitality industry so know it well but didn't want to go into it at that time got a call from a good friend of mine said hey we're hiring I know you're looking for a job I know you don't want to work in a restaurant but we're hiring so I went down and interview with them and took a job and six months later I was their bar manager I started to learn in inventory at that point and instantly fell in love with the industry overall actually had a it was at a chain restaurant funny enough but had a regular come in almost every day that I worked in the bar and he started teaching me wine because I know anything about wine started teaching me wine different ava's and varietals and just talking about all the differences and all these things in new world old world and it just really opened up my mind to that there's a lot more to just drinking alcohol than you know I had really thought at that time being 21 years old and it really brought out a passion in me in this industry and went from there and went to a martini club went to high-end sports bars and kind of did work every aspect of every kind of bar you can think of moved to Nashville in 2014 so about seven years ago this point worked for the largest hotel one of the largest in the world opera land here everybody's pretty familiar did that for a little bit got my feet wet in Nashville learned the area made a lot of good connections at that point that's when I really dove into my career side I was really starting to take off was there was there one person so when you when you said at that point most people have somebody in their lives that inspires them or that challenges them to a point

11:37to where something clicks and they go oh I was on this this pirate ship a bunch of people were getting drunk after work telling stories to hey I can make this a career usually somebody makes that happen for you how did that happen for you um you know that's a really good question I think that it was that moment when I got out of college I went into restaurants and I was behind a bar for the first time and really really kind of understood what it was uh like the educational piece of it and literally growing up in restaurants my entire life my mother ran hotels uh growing up so I was literally raised in the industry I knew it well and it was one of those things that I never I was around it so much as a child that you almost didn't I didn't want to go into it just because of that and then as soon as I got into it it felt natural felt like I was at home and I think that was when it all kind of came to head that this is what I want to do and I moved to Nashville with that that reasoning that I want to open up restaurants at that time that was my goal wanted to wanted to work in the beverage industry as a beverage director for a restaurant group and Nashville was the place I wanted to do it and that's why I made the jump to move to Nashville uh you know back in 2014 okay you also made another comment that I'm going to jump back you said that when I started doing inventory I kind of fell in love with it yeah I wanted to ask about that too inventory is like the bane of my existence it's I'm I'm kind of a numbers guy um so when when I get the chance to to do things like inventory and really look at data um like the the nerdy side of me comes out a little bit more too um you know it was I was 22 at that time uh just kind of started working in the bar and voluntarily opted to do inventory for the restaurant uh for the alcohol side because I wanted to learn it literally yeah I wasn't even paid to be there it was my day off I came in with the bar manager and helped uh measure out bottles and kegs and input things into the system to do

13:41the ordering and just kind of got a uh an analytical viewpoint of what it looked like to really run a bar at that point and that's when it just things started to align and it just I like it I don't know how to how to explain it more than that I just kind of like doing it you you nail on something that's one of my key traits that I like to hire for and I call it insatiable curiosity is that nothing is work to me if I don't know how to do it it's not oh I have to learn how to do that it's I want to learn how to do that I'm curious about anything I don't know how to do because as I do it I'm gonna just constantly be gaining knowledge so you have that insatiable curiosity of just yeah that's something new I can learn by doing is that how you learn by doing most of the time by doing yeah you can read so much you can look up so many things and so much of it is retained but I think by getting your hands dirty a little bit it you seem to learn a little easier and at least in my case I know my wife always gets a little annoyed we'll be talking about something and I have to look up the answer like I want to know what it is it could be something like how many people were in downtown Nashville on 4th of July you know that it was like that conversation happens like well did we break 400,000 I don't know well let's look it up real quick it's never just a faded conversation for me I like to always have the facts cool so I have a few questions about neat mixology yeah so how did you see bring it on because I feel like this is gonna make I don't know if I want to admit this but I'm pretty sure I have seen them no that's great listen everybody loves that movie it is very much a classic um okay so do you remember the scene where the girls are doing like their opening number and then they realize that like another team is doing their opening number so like they'd hired this guy and he'd gone around and give every team the same so how do you learn the restaurant in order to make a list for them that like makes sense for their clientele and their

15:44vibe and all of that absolutely so the first thing I like to do is have a one-on-one consultation I like to talk to whoever the owner is the bar manager is gonna get a real finger on the pulse of what's going on inside the restaurant what what good things are happening what bad things are happening everything in between I really want to feel like I'm a part of their team in a 30 to 40 minute conversation I know that's a little quick but we would like to walk through to really dive into things that we want to see in the future and all that with that being said now I've kind of got an idea of where their heads at and what they want to see what they want to do then I go back and look at the data for the previous six months I know it's a little bit skewed coming out of pandemic but it does give me a good idea of what's going on what trends are moving up what trends are kind of fading out we also look at trends around the area of that particular restaurant so it's completely customized I really like to nip in the bud to everybody who feels like almost when we talk that it's this cookie cutter menu we're just trying to sell to everybody and that's absolutely not the case I don't think that you know Mayor Bulls and some of our other clients you know like 404 Bar and Grill down in Nolensville area that those menus obviously wouldn't be the same they wouldn't be the same pricing they would look very differently so we like to make sure that we've got a good grasp of what you want out of this program out of a menu and that we're reflecting that in what we do so no that's it's not something that you're taking over see what I first talked about when we'll jump into this with Neat Mixology when I first started talking to you about it I thought it was really versatile because one me where I have a full restaurant that's you know seats 300 people and I have a bar manager who does a fantastic job I don't need to replace him I like to get him you know his priorities to move a little bit if you're able to take care of some of the mundane busy work so to speak when it comes to inventory and you know some of the ordering and drink menu type stuff but you're also really really really

17:48helpful to smaller restaurants that can't afford to have a full bar manager if you're a restaurant that has a GM and a service manager and that's really it and those guys are both tag team and all do inventory this week you do it next week hey who's going to create a drink menu I don't know I mean we're all tapped right now for every single thing this is a really neat opportunity for smaller restaurants to bring on I don't want to say how much it costs but guys I mean unless you want to but this is it's it's incredibly affordable yeah so I will say how much it costs because I want everybody to kind of have a feeling of where we're at first and foremost to preface this we do have what we call founding 55 under the first 55 members that kick off natural forest we do them in every city that we launch these are kind of the the guys that really get our feet wet in the in the area really get us kicked off and we we have them start out at 500 a month which is kind of absurd I think for how much we offer I know there's companies out there that do pieces of what we do that are roughly that same price so I know I know our value is definitely there once we hit that 55 prices will reflect a little bit more of what the market value is to that so if you are interested please jump on the first 55 we're about halfway there right now kicking off about 30 days ago so we're moving quickly but to touch on what you said Brandon a minute ago is you know the the biggest thing is to get satisfaction if we can come in and be an assistant to you and your bar manager you know you're going to get value out of that we're doing you know the inventory and working on cocktail menus with your bar manager or beverage director and it frees them up to do other things that are day-to-day tasks that need to get done and need to be focused on and you know not take away from that let them run that a little bit easier and better at the end of the day and with places that don't have a beverage director or a bar manager or someone with 15-20 years of experience it's hard to really narrow in and

19:53know what to do in certain areas and how to look at things the right way and that's where we come in again to just be an assistant we offer a lot of execution to kill pain points for a lot of different people everybody looks at them a little different way i know with mayor bulls like Brandon kind of said it's uh definitely that time for you're doing the inventory working on the cocktail menu freeing up his managers to teach and be with the guests a little bit more to create that experience i've got guys that that just need help short staffed and don't have time to do the inventory and do the order and do a menu and train the staff on what's going on and know what to charge for things that come in or know of new things that are coming in the market that they should be uh that should be in their their establishment you know one of the things i hear all the time is well this is the way we've been doing it for 20 years great a lot of things have changed in 20 years you know i'm sure that works to an extent but there's a lot of things that uh new products out there that battle old products that make sense for pricing a lot of ways to look at things that can really make it more affordable and more profitable for everybody at the end of the day yeah that is probably my least favorite phrase of like oh well this has worked for forever i mean Brandon has heard me like go on about that forever but i will say like my husband and i bought a restaurant during the pandemic and then with a partner and then also got pregnant with twins so i fully understand the idea of like doing something new during the pandemic how was that for your wife and then you have a young kid as well right yeah so how was that to like start a business during all of that um it's been intense and crazy and fun um it just you know prioritizing your time is the biggest thing you know i've got a wonderful staff that works with me that takes a lot of that weight off my shoulders on a day-to-day basis which is wonderful uh my wife has been very supportive uh to this point so everything's going in the right direction um so she knows i'm just trying to fulfill my dream and my passion to um to do

21:53what i i want to do and be able to help some guys that uh you know quite frankly might not be able to um to help themselves by buying a bar a bar manager a beverage director at six thousand dollars a year um is frankly unheard of um obviously we all know that um so she's very very supportive of everything that's the math per hour yeah yeah i did the math i was like at 160 40 hours a week at the full-time rate 500 a month is three dollars and 12 cents an hour to pay somebody to do all of that that yeah which is what you know a little bit more than a server maybe a bartender makes per hour and you're getting a full team of you know beverage directors we've had over 55 years of experience on our team this isn't our first day doing this so like i said our goal is to help help the guys who might not be able to help themselves um to this level what are the biggest challenges that you face on a day-to-day basis i'm gonna count 55 restaurant how many people do you have working for you and jordan's gonna answer that question right after a quick word from our sponsors hey guys we all know staffing is tough right now and as a small business it's hard to bring on staff if you can't offer insurance this is where complete health partners comes in for a fraction of the price of major medical offer your staff tell a doctor and local urgent care facilities at no cost to them x-rays stitches drug tests common cold and flu tests and now they even have a mobile vaccine unit they're actually looking for businesses to partner with to offer the vaccine at your location so check them out at complete health partners.com or visit them at www.nashvillerestaurantradio.com click the sponsors tab click on the complete health partners or if you want to learn more email them at complete care at complete health partners.com we know you have a lot on your plate right now but what's

23:54spot on you're no longer on your own work with their team use a browser-based web portal to set up front of the house policies monitor operations and staffing assignments with complete customer analytics all with a local dedicated representative that's with 24-7 support pos system third-party delivery integration they kind of have everything you need so build the system that works best for you by contacting Steve Coulson at 615-480-6282 or go to nashvillerestaurantradio.com and click the sponsor tab click on the spot on tab for a special offer just for nashville restaurant radio listeners okay so here's the thing it's impossible to find a linen company who you can trust who you like who you'd recommend and if you're a restaurant right now and you're looking for that company you're unhappy with who you're currently using and you want to start sourcing out but you're waiting for recommendations right now is your lucky day Sightex is a third generation family-owned and operated linen mats and uniformed company they really are the good guys in linen business they're transparent with their pricing they have incredible quality and their service is second-to-none check them out at Sightex-corp.com or give Ross Chandler a call at 270-823-2468 what are the biggest challenges that you face on a day-to-day basis how many people do you have working for you so we've got seven guys right now who work for me and that's you know the way the way things are done now we've got software we've got automations that help streamline what we do we just know how to use them very well and we have a hand on hands-on approach to that so it's not you know Brandon or Jen I'm not going to sell you some software and then say here's how it's going to help you now learn to use it and learn to maximize the use out of it and that that's very hard to do so we we've got software that helps

25:59with P&Ls with ordering with inventory and all these things and we use it ourselves we've got a rep that comes by weekly to do those things for you guys and just make it make it a little easier for for everyone in that way but some of the challenges that we face right now are really kind of explaining what we do you know I think that it's for somebody who who really has been in the industry for a long time and really knows it is like okay cool I see what you do it makes sense the price is there awesome there's a lot of people who Jen like you have have purchased or acquired establishments over the the pandemic that maybe didn't think they would ever be in this industry we've got a client now that she's the managing partner of a restaurant here in town and she's like I don't know anything about the restaurant industry I need help please I don't know what it is and it's it's really getting our services across at this price point some people leery like how are you only charging that much is it is it real it's absolutely real and just kind of you know really explaining what we do that makes sense to these guys and really come across that way so I think that's probably our biggest pain point right now is just spreading the word of what we do you talk a lot about like helping the little guy it sounds like and where does that come from in you like what is that small town indiana I guess oh you know we come from a land of little guys as far as that goes and you know my passion is to I've worked for the little guys I've helped the little guys my entire life I think that the big corporate guys have have enough they've got a big enough market share right now that it's easy for them to come and just throw a bunch of money at a problem it seems to be solved for them and they're able to do that and I watch friends of mine who went through this pandemic and barely made it alive and it's it's one of these things that I just really want to help the guys that are really fighting day to day to to make it who aren't making millions of dollars a year who just do

28:06this because they love what they do and we just want to help them get by a little bit easier so with every business you need basically three things if you're an entrepreneur you need three things right you need to be you need to be able to solve a problem you need lots of cash and you or you gotta be willing to take risks you gotta at least have two of those things right yeah so what of the what were you doing right before you started this and how long has WEC Nashville been been going on have you been working in restaurants starting a business on the side and then like how did that transition happen and can it tell some of that story yeah so um when I moved here in 2014 I was in restaurants had an opportunity to to go into a restaurant group and that's when I really dove into the beverage creation side of thing from scratch really deep dove into everything took their numbers and skyrocketed them which was awesome that's when I got that first big success piece here in Nashville took that became a partner of a restaurant group gm beverage director over them ran that for a couple years decided that's not what I moved down here to do to open restaurants and be a part of a restaurant group wasn't the end for me that wasn't it so I took out of there and decided I wanted to learn the other side of the the other issue on the foot right I wanted to learn distribution and supply so I went into one of the biggest distributors here in Nashville worked for them for two years number one sales rep learned a lot on how distribution worked at that time Ajax Turner okay yep so worked for them for a couple years and really got to learn the back end of things how the distribution world really operated I only saw it from a restaurant perspective and I'm telling you it was way different when I got it got in the door it was it was crazy in a good way but a lot of things I would never have known which I use now in the way I look at things but I never would have known if I didn't do it and took that and then had an opportunity to launch a whiskey company during the pandemic

30:12and we did what was it four thousand six packs so 2009 liter cases in five months of inception over four states and I led the night the nation sales team in driving that that launch and that's when everything kind of came to a head and this idea really stirred up and it's like this is it this is this is finally what I think we're here to do my passion is to do is I love the beverage industry I love the knowledge side of it I love to help people with their beverage industry every bar I go into I try to like just kind of help the bartender out as much as I can right and I realized that traveling around the country for a whiskey company with a small child and a wife was more difficult than starting my own company so that's when I took you know all the savings I had and walked to the end of the cliff and jumped off with the with faith in myself and faith in the guys that I had on my team and and here we are today with this concept that we think is is going to kind of revolutionize the way the bars kind of do business on a regular basis yeah I think it's a very cool concept and it's it's super interesting I know initially when like Brandon was telling me about it I I was the bar manager for Maribel while I was pregnant and so I was like eight months pregnant with twins doing inventory and I was like this is like my personal hell like I would I couldn't bend I couldn't stand on anything and I guess one of the so I would have loved to have somebody come in and do inventory and all of that um and I had help but it was it was rough um so I guess like how do you because I researched a few of the restaurants you worked at like obviously a few of them are like really big names right and I think we know a couple of the same people actually we probably do I've learned that Nashville as large as it's getting the the hospitality circle seems to get smaller and smaller every year yeah it really really really does um and I moved here just a year before you and so I when we moved

32:17here it was very like it wasn't the city that it is you know I have I used to have a skyline necklace and that I lost it but it looks nothing like that anymore um the city's growth over the last I would say like five to six years has really really become something that I don't think any of us could have envisioned so I know when I moved here it was truly on a whim like it was like I'm just gonna go to Nashville I had no like rhyme or reason for that um and obviously fell in love with it so with you when what was your like I don't think you could have foreseen what had happened in the food industry specifically here so yeah um so you know again back in in 2012 2013 um myself and one of my partners here had this idea from Indiana that we're gonna go somewhere in the country we have one open restaurants he's a back house guy in front of house guy it made sense um we worked very well together and we started doing research um and there's no joke in in Fort Wayne Indiana in 2013 we started doing research we're gonna move here in 15 was the goal and we're like where do we go so we started scouring the internet and looking at all these these things and we narrowed it down at that point to Austin Texas and Nashville Tennessee always that's oh we thought that those would be the ones that kind of had the best growth in the industry we wanted to be in um with just a lot of ways we looked at it um and the deciding factor was well Nashville was six hours away from home and Texas was like 26 hours away from home and I'd driven through Nashville a couple times I've been visiting the city since 2007 so I was familiar with it and I absolutely loved Nashville anyway um I kind of persuaded him that Nashville was probably the better option of the two at that point um and he had lived in Texas and what it kind of wanted to go to Austin um so it landed on Nashville and uh yeah I mean that's kind of the the reasoning behind it um just a little bit of research and it was closer to home

34:21yeah so how do you combat like I know when you're talking about like the inventory and the ordering all of that like Marable specifically is a little weird because it's it's a restaurant but it is also an event venue um so are you able to when you look at like the past six months purchases orders stuff like that are you able to do this for event venues as well or are you really wanting it to be restaurant specific or are you good with you know what world do you feel comfortable in yeah um we can do event venues um you know I think it's it's the way it's structured is geared more towards restaurant and bars and I don't want to cut out any venues obviously if it's something we can help with um but if you've got you know if you've got a venue coming a wedding or whatever it is that's got 150 guests and you kind of have an idea of what they're going to want in that I mean it's we can help with that I would feel guilty charging somebody even $500 a month to tell them what to order or do that order for them because it's it's very simple to do that I think so I would I would as far as who our clientele really is I would stick towards restaurant bars but if there are any venues that need help I'm happy to happy to assist and how to look at that for sure yeah Jen keep asking questions I'm looking for a really cool video I want to show um well you worked for the chef and I I did right so that my friend Cody does the um marketing for the chef and I okay he doesn't actually live here anymore she like moved to Florida um but um but I think what I think I is very cool about you and and right now Nashville got a lot of transplants right like we for some reason during the pandemic specifically like had a huge influx from people from California and New York I think because those cities were the most those cities those states were the most shut down um so people were like oh well let's go to Nashville um but I think what Nashville what sets Nashville apart is right before the pandemic hit we had the tornado and the tornado was so just so devastating in so many capacities but what was so incredible and I

36:28wasn't here in 2010 and and Brandon I know you were um when the flood happened is everybody just wanted to help you know it was just how can I be there for my neighbor and I like that that really does seem to be your heart in this of like I just want to help the Nashville community I just want to like Nashville seems to have this the spirit of like let's lift each other up and then we all rise which is beautiful and I feel like you don't get that in a lot of cities and so I just want to get that in a lot of cities and so I know transplants get like a bad name but I'm a transplant too so are you so I just think it's cool to like have to know that a lot of the transplants coming here do you have that that spirit behind them instead of just I want to be in a cool city that's famous for like bachelorettes and country music you know yeah 100% I agree and I think you know for me anyway it's from being from a small town in Indiana which is kind of how we were raised I guess um to think that way but I like to think that we got here a little before all the rest of the transplants so we're kind of like locals now I feel that way too but I think I'm sorry I think it's really cool is I've had so many people on the show that are transplants that have moved from other places and I've had so many chefs who are Nashvilleians I've lived for 33 years right so I've grown up with like me and Jeff Pennington from Pennington's distillery used to live four houses down the street from each other you know we used like tp each other's houses when we were like 15 you know like we are like it's it's growing up throughout the whole thing but I think that as Nashvilleians kind of our responsibility as people in this hospitality industry is to set the example and be kind and welcoming to everybody that comes in from out of town it's when we start feeling like we're like why are you people moving here you're carpet baggers and this whole idea where we start having an attitude towards people moving in that those people are going to start having an attitude back at us when we are welcoming

38:30and we want to invite people into our restaurants and let me let me put my arms around you and welcome to Nashville we're excited that you're here as long as we continue that um kind of that mindset as we go along the people that come here are gonna go oh my gosh this is way cooler than where I came from people are so nice they're just open arms welcoming us into their community and I think that's what makes Nashville great and I think that's what makes our hospitality community in Nashville great is that I think we have a responsibility for the long-time people to welcome everybody in with open arms and it sounds like both of you got that experience okay but I have to back up what the hell is a carpet bagger no I've never heard that before a carpet bagger is somebody who goes from city to city and takes everything they possibly can who just comes in oh Nashville is the hot city I'm gonna come there I'm gonna capitalize on their busyness and then when when I'm when I've used it out then we go to the next city then we go to the next city carpet bagger somebody comes in and just I think I'm right with that I'm gonna google this as you talk because I I still fail to see like where the carpet part comes in you're so funny yeah check it out I've got no comment I have no idea so all right well she's gonna find out what a carpet bagger is what else do you do at WEC Nashville we've talked about the bar the neat mixology piece but what else do you offer so that's our primary focus obviously that's our passion project for sure what we really want to focus on on a day to day organically though we have a couple different other arms of our company Capone's hospitality group is is one of them that we're developing some restaurants who work with some real estate developers around town guys who who do mixed use buildings who have always kind of wanted to be in the restaurant industry but don't know how to do it don't know what they're getting into don't really know how to build it out who to hire like all this kind of thing so we help consult with those guys help put together restaurants for them give them a little bit of ease and how to do this help them staff things the appropriate way

40:36help run their bar obviously put chefs in place that makes sense for those guys and set them up for success I love one thing about Nashville talking about people coming here all the time is it's definitely elevated enforcing competition in this industry and food and beverage and I love to see it and it's just kind of fun to be around all that also the third arm of what we do is called 100 proof beverage company and this is a 100 organic piece of our company that after I did was in distribution and launched a whiskey company that I've had people approach me saying hey would you mind helping kind of guide me in what to do and I'm launching a whiskey I'm launching a vodka I'm local to Nashville I've got Nashville and Tennessee kind of covered but I don't really know how to move forward through the next steps how to get in contact with new states what to do really after this part of it right if you create a vodka here in Nashville organically you want to be in Nashville and this surrounding area that's a pretty easy conversation to have so I've got a lot of friends who I've made over the years that have launched spirit companies or non-alcoholic companies and I help them just kind of naturally organically and strategically plan their their moves regionally to take them from a local Nashville company to statewide to regional distribution help them kind of connect some dots and make sure they're looking at their numbers the right way setting up fob pricing doing tiered discounts and incentives for different distributors and then just helping connect them to the right people that makes sense and see I love all of that I think that what you just said and all these acronyms that we continue to use right as people like fob what does that mean that's freight on board but there's a there's a ton of little things that you learn being in a distributor and working for these

42:38liquor companies that is different from being inside the restaurant and that's one of the things that I I can't stress enough to restaurant owners when it comes to negotiation and really understanding the full industry somebody like yourself can come in and help them can help them because you know the lingo on both sides so many restaurateurs know the one side of being inside the restaurant but once you have that knowledge of working for a distributor and all of the things that go into being in a distributor I think that your ability to negotiate as a restaurant tour expands exponentially so somebody like yourself or even myself coming in I mean myself on the food side of things coming in and speaking that language in layman's terms to a restaurant tour translates really well and I think that's a need that a lot of people don't necessarily know is there and I think that you've kind of capitalized on that you're trying to help people understand that yeah exactly and to take that one step further further too Brandon is that looking at the supplier side of things you know I'll use just a base example here but you know national chain somebody that may have 2,500 locations across the country you know like 30 locations in Nashville sells a lot of wings has when they hit certain numbers with a particular supplier they can then go to that supplier and almost negotiate better pricing which obviously in the state of Tennessee you know we know that whatever pricing is offered to one person has to be offered to everybody but they do it on such ridiculous sized deals that nobody else can afford to buy it so they're strong arming their way into the lowest price in the city by going to let's say you know Tito's just as an example and they sold a thousand cases of Tito's last year and they go in and say hey listen we're going to start buying our our Tito's deals at 100 case drops every time but you're going to knock off three dollars per bottle for that deal and you're going to run it on these months and Tito goes okay cool because you're going to keep selling my stuff

44:39and then every little guy then goes well how the hell am I supposed to compete with that because I can't buy 100 cases at a time I can't afford it I don't know where to store it so us going in as a collective almost as if we're you know a national chain that has a bunch of locations in one area you know we we've got 50 60 70 locations in Nashville and we walk into the distributor supplier and say hey listen here's what we're doing with our guys here's the kind of pricing we'd like to see and here's how we'd like to see it structured we can start to strong arm those those deals a little bit better to give the smaller guy again just a fighting chance against the big guys to be able to compete and make make their margins on things so you just open up a door to something that's really interesting that I was thinking about when you're creating drink menus for people and you're helping them do that is that what you're talking about that how you have the ability to have that negotiating power um a little bit based on what people are ordering a little yeah it's based on what people order right it's how much how much pull through how much so selling you do per establishment and then under our portfolio and our client list how many across the board of that some of that obviously plays into cocktails and pieces like that you know we all know the the buffalo trace deals that that go on you know you got to sell so much of their vodka to get the whiskey and all this stuff so looking at things in a strategic way is also helpful across the board especially if you're trying to get some of the allocated things and hit those numbers that aren't hittable unless you've got high volume high high volume or a ton of locations to try to help help kind of alleviate some of those pains right um you know everybody wants a bottle of weller blantons at the end of the day it seems like those are the big fads right now obviously last few years and they seem to be harder and harder to come by every year um so just kind of helping those guys and not guaranteeing anything obviously because we can't control at the end of the day what the distributor really gets and how those are put together but we have a fighting chance at that point we are going to take one more quick break to hear from our sponsors

46:46when talking about what chefs want really the question is how do they do it no fees no fuel charges no surcharges never this allows you to order as much or as little as you need as often as you need seven day delivery access products every day trimming your waste increasing your valuable shelf life and allowing you fresher product 24 7 customer support call text chat email anytime from anywhere they take a team approach to serving you at 800 600 85 10 or what chefs want dot com they have a very they have very diverse product lines so their chefs have access to thousands of items across many different categories that allow them to receive fresh products daily this type of flexibility helps chefs with the ability to offer and test new menu items with ease they have hundreds of trucks on the road every day to reach their vast market their focus is tight urban areas where groups of restaurants and chefs are located additionally they have trucks from coast to coast bringing products to farms and artisans across the globe you can order through your phone app or online they truly are what chefs want check them out at what chefs want dot com super source is the answer to your dish machine and chemical needs in your restaurant we've got zero minimums and zero contracts so they have to earn your business every single week zero minimums zero they're not going to make you sign a five-year contract even if you lease the dish machine from them it's amazing jason ellis is a hard-working man and he is here to help save you money increase the cleanliness of your dishes and provide the best service in nashville so check them out go to our website at nashville restaurant radio dot com click the sponsors tab find the link for super source and if you sign up there you will get three free months of dish machine rentals

48:50right now you can also check them out at super source dot com or you can call jason ellis directly at 770-337-1143 what do you foresee happening right now i know but because of the pandemic like sourcing has been really difficult because obviously like as much as it i mean the pandemic every single industry in various ways right so like with food there were suddenly no deals with schools no deals with like lunches things like that and so they had a surplus of stuff with like cisco and creation gardens and stuff like that and then when you look at the liquor and beer side of it it was a similar issue right like i remember when we first reopened at maribor and i started ordering certain liquors that i would order were coming in like different size handles because they were like hey we had to market to liquor stores versus to restaurants so we had to package differently and stuff like that and then you know wine too is like a whole other thing because nobody was farming grapes like the grapes weren't getting done the same way so how do you foresee like those do you think these are going to be years long issues that we're going to be dealing with the repercussions of or do you think this is going to be fixed short like what do you foresee in that world um so i'm a big a big supporter and advocate of again obviously the small guys right but the craft distilleries the craft vineyards craft breweries and i think this is their time that they're going to get the opportunity to really step in and fill some of these roles you know i think that some of the larger companies that aren't able to fulfill or focus on a certain area maybe it's off-premise maybe it's big box whatever it may be that these little guys now are going to get more of a chance to come in and replace i know a lot of things that have been hard to get um there are there are adequate and very good um substitutes out there that exist in every category um you just not you may not know what they are they may not be the the name brand you know chanel purse or whatever um but it's a hell of a knockoff and you would never know the difference sure so do you think it's like how do you train the guests though right

50:51like kendall jackson i mean we can't like kendall jackson is one of those that everyone loves and or like tito's even like i want a tito's vodka like tito's and soda got it you know like how do you train the guest then to hey i know you love tito's do you do you personally feel because i feel like everyone has a different answer for this do you tell them about the issue because i personally i'm like they don't need to know how the sausage is made let me just show them something else and see if they like it but i know a lot of people are like no i'll tell you the whole story of sourcing and so you can understand like you know what i'm saying like how do you teach the guests yeah i mean um you know it's us working with the bar staff i think the bar staff is going to do um kind of however they they feel is best with their guests um i think i like to kind of tell the story a little bit personally um i do agree that you don't need to know how the sausage is made if you like it it's fine but at the same time um to just make them aware that there are shortages in areas and you know everything as we all know right now with import and excise taking longer at the borders that that's causing issues as well not only just not farming grapes for wine but there's a lot of a lot of reasons to why things aren't the way they used to be and that's okay and that there are there are other brands that can replace those brands substitute and step in for them for a while that are adequate i think you know if you're a tito's fan there's plenty of other vodkas that are corn-based and gluten-free that will be just fine to to have with your soda your cranberry juice it'll be okay but just kind of explaining that and then offering a an adequate substitute that's going to be just just as similar for what they're used to drinking that most people will probably okay with that i think that people are starting to understand it at the end of the and uh excuse me the end of the day they're still getting their alcohol so they they should be happy yeah um jordan let's let's give some plugs here how do people get a hold of you if they would like to contact you to learn more about wec nashville as well as neat mixology absolutely um any social

52:56media outlet that exists we are on um we've got one of our guys handles that uh 100 and that's awesome um it's at me mixology or at wec nashville either one goes uh goes straight to us obviously send your message send us a message contact us on there um wec nashville.com uh we've got a contact form we've got a bunch of pages on our website that really explain all the avenues uh that we work in and really how that how that goes um you know shoot me an email jordan at wec dot uh nashville dot com um goes directly to my inbox so um if you want to talk to me personally that would be the the quickest and easiest way all right so we've got you on the screen right there at wec nashville at neat mixology wec nashville dot com or jordan at wec nashville dot com to email you lots of ways to get a hold of this if you are out there right now and you need somebody to come in and help you with your bar for a be part of the founding 55 he's halfway there you're getting close you lock you in so the founding 55 at the end of the it's a one year contract you asked for right one year contract at the 500 a month price point uh we do offer 10 if you pay and pay that in full so it saves you a couple bucks at the end of the day there with the founding 55 and these are the only guys who will be grandfathered into that price point for one more uh contract signing after the 12 months at that point we'll be offering a one three and five year contract extension so theoretically if you like what we do the first year you can have us for six years at 500 a month wow it's pretty good deal i think that's a fantastic deal and um let's let's go through some uh i a couple quick questions for you just like to get to know you a little what's your favorite restaurant in nashville oh that's hard um i i like so many um i it was the hardest question to ask anybody i know and then um i love i saw you know

55:02you had nick pelagrino on recently um i i love nick i love manjas um a ton we play bocce with nick over there and i love their friday and saturday night um dinners are out of control also in dinners yeah um but i think that overall um i love fifth and taylor my wife and i like to go there quite a bit um no i was actually i was actually going to say um probably earnest bar and hideaway wow okay cool yeah they're good friends of mine um i've been there uh since day one with them and i think that you know i always have a great time there always have a great service there the drinks are always phenomenal which is usually what i look at first in a restaurant um but the food really steps up and and follows suit with that and um their steak and their korean fried chicken is to die for um so i'm that's i'm gonna lock that answer in for for sure but there are a ton of restaurants that i do love to go to that's for sure all right so jen made a reference to a movie earlier uh what movie was it jen bring it on have you seen it no i have not seen it i'm not gonna see it bring it on okay what is your favorite movie of all time jordan i want to know tommy boy tommy boy yeah i had this discussion last night with my wife um tommy boy hands down yeah i have the fat guy in a little boat right chris farley just has a he just has a direct line to my funny bone man i don't know what it is but that movie just ever since i was younger just gets me i don't know it doesn't so much hurt here or here but like right is there a mark fantastic movie what's your favorite movie i don't know i think my husband i would say big fish but i feel like my husband would say something different and he's always right like whenever i'm

57:04like oh this is my favorite he's like no it's not like this is your favorite i'm like oh that's right that is my favorite but i think big fish is up there i like love a good story i don't think i've seen big fish either okay i saw when it came out but it's been a long time but i remember being pretty good no i lied i know that what he would say he would say a league of their own which like if you guys oh my god that is like an i will stop whatever if it's on tv or whatever like i'll stop whatever i'm doing and just watch that it's so good all right favorite band what's your favorite band jordan um this one's just a no-brainer for me um i heard this song uh song and i believe it was 92 i lived in florida on a ranch the song came on the radio i sang it at my wedding don't ask that story that's a whole nother uh whole nother trail will go down a different time um but garth brooks is hands down my favorite artist um i do have tickets to go see him in a few weeks so i am really excited it'll be like my seventh time seeing him so um yeah not no doubt no question that it's garth brooks what song did you sing at your wedding uh my wife's gonna kill me um it's the only one i knew so i got so i'll give you the the short version of the story as i kind of got pushed on stage um with our band um at our wedding which was not planned at all she still thinks i staged this whole thing right and they and and one of the lead singers said hey what song do you want to sing you're the groom what do you want to sing like sing with us no no i don't i don't sing i'm vocally challenged like it's it's terrible right um so they convinced they convinced me to sing at the wedding and then i realized very quickly what i'd got myself into that i'm not an artist um and i don't know songs without the teleprompter telling me what the words are so the only song i know by heart is the thunder rolls by garth brooks so i sang a song about a husband that cheats on his wife and then he murders him um at my wedding

59:11and my wife was not necessarily the happiest with me but that's the only song i knew so that's my defense so this is a true story i used to work at a catering company um in florida i'm from florida and the bride and groom walked in to this song and we all thought it was a joke but it wasn't me like how do you walk into your wedding with that and me and all the rest yes it wasn't me yes and me and all the other caterers like is that is it a joke like is this real and it was so real like that was truly their like entrance song and i'm like what are they trying to say i have no idea if they're still married but i i would like to think not i think i don't think i would think i don't think i would like to think not yeah like that's not a couple i would like you're gonna make it i'm gonna root for you like that wasn't that wasn't it immediately like wishing these people that they fail i love it their song selection is terrible i hope they ruin your lives i mean unless it was like they were trolling us but then like they should have picked rick roll you know like i just feel like that was an odd choice so that's you say rick rolled and and just a real quick comment on that is i i have a six-year-old son and when we watch movies that are funny now right they they make kids movies that are actually funny um cartoons and how many times i've been rick rolled in cartoons is ridiculous for you to know i love it what's your favorite kid movie that you've watched recently oh man um that's a really hard question we don't watch a ton of movies um we just watched luca the other night oh was that we haven't seen that yet we haven't seen it it's fantastic um the most recent one we watched and that was that was fun is he loves the lion king the re the revert making the lion king was awesome uh but we just went back to the incredibles and the incredibles too uh most recently so that'd probably be my answer right

01:01:12um i love zootopia for what it's worth that came out like five years ago zootopia but um yeah car cars was it for me for a long time the original cars movie i thought was so well done there's so it's so funny there's so many little adult yeah pieces in there the kids won't pick up on i don't know just good stuff oh jordan can't thank you enough for joining us today can't thank you enough for what you do and what you're doing for me and my company uh thank you for coming on the show i can't wait to work with you um in both capacities and one thing that we do every episode is we like to give our guests the final word so you get to take us out today whatever you want to say to the city of nashville whoever's listening as long as you want to talk whatever you want to say uh take us out all right well thank you first and foremost for having me on the show today i really appreciate it um you know we are here to help the little guys help you with whatever it is and we're getting through this this pandemic where i think we're almost towards the end of it obviously nashville's open back up um and it's growing like crazy so everyone in the industry keep your head up there's jobs everywhere um we'll get through this and life will get back to normal and uh yeah have a have a drink in a good week that's all i can all i can really say at this point have a drink in a good week i love it well thank you jordan and we will uh we'll be catching up with you very soon on some on brands at the beginning of our show and uh keep us posted to any new cool innovations that you've got going on awesome sounds good thanks jen thanks brandon appreciate it guys thank you thanks man all right so that was a lot of fun talking to jordan thanks jen for for joining me on the show yeah thanks for having me jordan's great he's super nice i hope that you out there enjoyed listening we look forward to seeing you this sunday night for brandon's book club

01:03:15and then sunday night also where we do a little bit of talk and shift um jen thanks you guys keep lifting each other up out there and i hope that you are being safe love you guys bye