Robin and Jennifer-Owners

00:00Hey guys, welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. We're going to start today's episode off with a conversation about Shared Spirits. Shared Spirits is a website where you can send somebody a drink, right? It's a marketplace. All these restaurants are on there. You add the drinks that you want on there, then people can send somebody in to buy a drink there. Let me tell you, Shared Spirits is starting a new program where they're doing happy hours. They are buying drinks at your restaurant and sending people to your restaurant. They're going to create these little happy hours that have drinks that expire. So they're going to buy 20 drinks, send 20 people into your restaurant to enjoy those drinks. They're fully paid for. We're not asking you to discount anything. We just want to put butts in seats. We want to share this technology with everybody. There's one problem. There's about 50 restaurants right now that are on the website. We need more restaurants to build the marketplace. Second best part is it's free. And it takes like 10 minutes to set the entire thing up to start sending people to your restaurant.

01:04So if you're one of those restaurants out there that wants to build your bar business, you want to add some more people into your restaurant, this is it for you. You can reach out to Justin Maestas or you can go to SharedSpirits.com. Guys, this is an amazing technology. Justin's going to be coming on the podcast here very soon to explain everything about it. But if you want to be in this marketplace and you want to send a bunch of people to your restaurant to pay full price for your drinks, the tip is included. It is the coolest technology. Go to SharedSpirits.com. Today, you'll thank me later. 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.

02:05My name is Brandon Styll and I am your host. We are powered by Gordon Food Service and I am so excited today because we are talking with Jennifer and Robin and they are the duo behind Homegrown Tap Room and Kitchen. Amazing NARA members who I have just absolutely fallen in love with. They are the epitome of exactly why we do so many things that we do over here. The reason behind why we started NARA, they keep looking for these things and they keep coming up. Just the most amazing people. I cannot wait to share this story. This is about an hour long conversation where we talk about what they do, why they do it, the people that mean the most to them, there's laughter, there's tears, there's all this stuff. And if you are ever wondering like why you support local, this is the interview that will make you understand why we do this.

03:08Because this is way more than a business to them. This is their life. This is their lifestyle. This is everything and I just, I love it. I cannot wait to share it with you. Another place that does something similar to that and I want to give mad recognition to another NARA member who is one of the most amazing people I know. Julio Hernandez and Chepa and the whole team over at Maiz de la Vida National Recognition USA Today named them one of the best restaurants in America in 2026. This isn't a local blog. This is a national mainstream validation. The kind of move, the kind of thing that moves the needle for our entire city. It puts Nashville on the map for everybody sees this. Just an amazing job by Julio and team. Their food is fantastic. I had lunch there the other day.

04:08And it was just the flavors that you get at Maiz de la Vida are beyond. And I want to give a shout out. If you want an interesting listen, I like to turn things around back to me. Julio Hernandez, executive chef, Nectar Urban Cantina from May 5th, 2020. May 5th Cinco de Mayo also Julio's birthday by the way is the time that he came on Nashville. First time he was on Nashville Restaurant Radio 2020 where he announced he was going to be doing Maiz de la Vida. So go back and listen to that episode. If you want to hear him announce to the world that I'm going to start this thing and the reason why he started it. He wanted to bring authentic next to mal corn tortillas to everybody. And he wanted it exactly like they did in Mexico. And it is blown up six years later. Here we are national recognition. James Beard nomination Michelin guide recognition. He's crushing. I think he won best chef in Nashville in the meet in the Nashville scene readers poll.

05:12I mean the guy is absolutely crushing it and I'm so proud of him and his entire team. I just wanted to give him a big shout out at the beginning of this episode coming up this week. You've all seen it in the news. I'm not not paying attention to it. Tom Morales came out and he said hey this new tax assessment that's going to change his taxes from 120 to 600 thousand dollars a year could put Acme feed and seed under and then Kerry Bringle came on and did a video. If you haven't seen it go to peg leg porkers Instagram page and you can see him speaking about it. Well I reached out to both Tom and to Kerry. Kerry said yeah, let's do it. So we're going to bring Kerry Bringle on like this week sometime. We don't have an exact time for it. But this week I'm going to go to peg leg porker. We I'm going to sit down with Kerry Bringle and I'm going to go to break this down for me. I think the mayor's comments. I've also reached out to the mayor. I've asked him to come on to the show have not heard back from the mayor. But I have heard back from Tom.

06:13Tom said he would be happy to come on early March and Kerry's going to come on this week. So our next episode will probably be Kerry Bringle breaking down this entire tax thing just like he did back in 2020 2020. He references is in the video. He said hey look I I did a video back in 2020 and you can go listen to that. I believe that was on March 18th 2020 where I said just break this down or maybe it was another one. There was a couple videos a couple episodes I did with Kerry back in the day. I did have him on March 18th 2020. I'm looking to see if I can find the other one. By the way if you've never listened to our episode with Tom Morales from May the 20th the next thing it was a my God. I put a lot of episodes out back then May 20th 2020 was my first interview with Tom Morales and it was unbelievable. Just such an amazing conversation with that guy. If you want to learn more about him and who he is go listen to that.

07:16I'm trying to find this other Kerry Bringle conversation that I had where you can kind of go back and listen to him talk about the tax issue in the middle of the pandemic when they raised it. It was on September 27th 2020. You'll find the Kerry Bringle episode where he references it in his video. He says back in 2020. I made a big thing. This was part of that September 27th 2020 big episodes. So if you want to learn more about that that is going to be coming up very very shortly. This is not something that NARA really does NARA is here. So it's interesting because people have reached out and said hey can NARA get involved with this. That's what really what the Greater Nashville Hospitality Association does. That's what the Tennessee Hospitality Association does. What we do in this world is where Tom talks about hey look we had 120,000 now at 600,000. We're not making that much money. I help you make that much money. I go in and I'll help you negotiate all of your everything to where that won't be as tough of a hit and I'll bet you I could over there with his locations.

08:27I could help them save a lot of money and I'm working on that. So that's where we do it. It's not a matter. I don't I don't lobby for people. I'm not on Capitol Hill seeing what I can do talking to tax assessors, but where they're charging your money I can help you make more money and that is what we're doing all over the place. We're doing some deals right now. I mean literally hundreds of thousands of dollars we're making for people and it feels so good and people are blown away. They're like I had no idea dude like this is insane. So if you want to learn more about that, please reach out. I have a contest today. If you go and follow at Nara Nashville on Instagram today, we're giving away four tickets to the Nashville SC match tomorrow. So go do that. If you're not if you're already following Nara just tag somebody who you'd want to take with you or share it in your stories and we would love to get you involved. There are four seats their second row right behind the net and we would love to have you go. It is the CONCAFA, CONCAF, CONCACAF Championship Series.

09:28We're playing the Athletico Ottawa tomorrow. Amazing games guys. These are so much fun to go to Nashville SC games. Supporting our local team is a lot of fun and I'm happy to to give these tickets away for tomorrow night. With that being said, let's jump in. We've got Jennifer and Robin. They are the owners of Homegrown Taproom and Kitchen. You are listening to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Super excited today to welcome in our guests. We have Jennifer and Robin and they are the owners of the Homegrown Taproom in Donaldson. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. The crowd is very excited. The crowd is very excited. Yes, I have little tricks that I like to play during the show.

10:29Welcome in guys. Thanks for making the drive. Yeah, thanks for having us. How are we doing today? We're doing very well. Sun's shining. It's a lovely day. Sun is shining and one of the questions I ask people when they come in I go how you doing? I don't mean that like as in just like a regular greeting like mental state. Where are you at? How are you doing today? We'll start with you Robin. I'm doing pretty good today. I feel like. You know, there's the there's there's the good things and then there's always the other things that are in the back of your mind that how am I going to solve for that? But I will. Do you just remain? Are you just are you a positive person like throughout the day? Are you an optimist? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. What about you, Jennifer? Negative. So the yin and yang. Yeah, yes. You thought it was yin and yang, didn't you? I did. I'd never heard yang. I was in an interview a long time ago with Hal Holden Bache and Chris Winters who is with White Squirrel Farms and he was explaining to me the difference between the minerals he puts on each side of the plants to make them happy.

11:42Yeah, and I and I said, oh, it's kind of like a yin and yang. He goes, that's right. It is like a yin and yang. And I said, oh, did you just passive aggressively correct me on yin and yang? It was a really funny moment. So I just had to throw that out there. You had nothing inside joke. Jennifer, how are you doing? I'm doing well. You're doing well. Yep. Okay. Yeah. You know, we're working through stuff. You guys have an awesome restaurant. It is a locally owned tap room. The vibes are amazing in there. Tell me how this thing started. Let's hear your 90 second or maybe make it longer. But tell us the story of homegrown tap room. Whoever wants to start you would think that after 10 years, we would have it distilled to 90 seconds, but I don't think we do. When Robin and I met I lived in East Nashville and she spent a lot of her time at my house. And then when we decided to I don't know consummate the relationship, I guess I moved to Donaldson and you know, no offense to the 37214 now in 2026, but in you know, 20 what 2008 there was not a lot going on and I just thought I'd move to hell because you know, I couldn't walk to three crow anymore.

13:02I couldn't walk to be on the edge. I couldn't couldn't walk anywhere. He had to drive everywhere. So we did, you know, Uber lift back and forth East Nashville all the time. And one night we were leaving teapack and wanted to just have a nightcap just a little drink after the show. So where do you want to go? You want to go to three crow? No, man, I can't want to I don't want to have to fight all that traffic and park and blah blah. Is there anything we can do closer to home in Donaldson? Well, no, there wasn't. I mean not what we were looking for. There was you know, we could find a bar. I got that. Excuse me, but yeah, there was not really anywhere, you know, to go and just linger over a cocktail and you know, relive the show that we just saw. So we sat around and complained about it enough in our garage till we just decided we'd do it ourselves because if we didn't somebody else would and then I'd just be complaining about it.

14:06What did you do as a profession during this time? Interestingly enough. I sold Kenny's farmhouse cheese at farmers markets, which is how I met. You mentioned how well gone, you know, I met all these chefs and farmers and we really got on board with the local food movement, the slow food movement. And so that's that's what we wanted to do. Crap. We were into craft beer. Thanks to Lana's Hall. We just. It just needed to be a place. There was a necessity. There was a there was a place that you guys lived. There wasn't like the local tap room, right? The the the cheers. I guess you would say if you my audience would understand that reference. Yes. And so you found the need like it was where you lived and you loved that neighborhood feel like you had in East Nashville. And so you said let's bring it out here. Let's do it.

15:06What is that? What does that process look like Robin? Hmm. What's the first thing you had to do? Write a business plan and get some money. And since that's what I do for a living in the consulting firm, I help companies sell business through proposals and so in writing their stories and writing their stories. So I said, well, I mean if we're going to do this, we can sit around bitch about it or we can do it. I kind of know how to run a business. So I got down to it and wrote the business plan hired a consultant. I'm big on if I don't know what I'm doing. I hire somebody to tell me how to do it, which is the same way we felt about the restaurant, right? Neither one of us been in the restaurant or bar business before. And so I'm like, well, you know, I know how to run a business. We can just hire for everything. We don't know right just hire really smart people to help us set this thing up and we'll figure it out. So yeah, it was right.

16:07The business plan go get the SBA loan find a location. Yeah. And so that's how we that's how we started. How'd you you found a really cool spot? I love your spot. I think it's an amazing spot. Tell me the story of like finding the location and what you had to do to kind of get it going and we beat the bushes and Donaldson to try to find the right place and truth be told, you know, we we put a bid on a building and Robin cried the entire day after we did that because it wasn't right. It wasn't right. It was far too expensive far too much space. So we didn't get that thankfully and oh, sorry. We there was a there's just a here. This place is vacant go look at it. So we did it happen to be in Donaldson Plaza and you know, we probably would have been open six months earlier if I hadn't drugged my feet because I didn't want to be in a strip mall. It just didn't it didn't it wasn't the vibe we were going for sure.

17:10I mean, no, but when we when we walked into the place, it was our vibe. It was it was February. It's cold outside. There was no heat in that in that section, but it was warm in there because sunsets in the West and it's warm the place and it just it was awesome. I mean, I can't I can't really explain the feeling about, you know, the feeling when you walk in when you when you strike gold kind of. Yeah, you know exactly. It's talking about you just it's like all of a sudden. It's like, yes, this is the spot. Yeah, this is it. This is feels like a hug. It felt like a hug. Yeah, it did. And you know, there was there was a little bit of working with our councilman to Jeff Syracuse, big beer guy. Right. And so he learned we were going to do this in our neighborhood, you know, and so he met with us, of course, at the sauce at the saucer, you know, right.

18:10And that was downtown right next to Union Station. There was the flying saucer. Yeah, the flying saucer. All right. He says shout out to the Corby boys who had their plates on the wall. And so he said, man, I'm so excited about this. I want to share with you what, you know, our plans are for Donaldson. And so we met him there, got a beer in the seat next to him. He pulls up this giant book, puts it on the table and he's like, well, here's our urban design overlay plans for Donaldson. And this area right here is going to be the new walkable downtown Donaldson area. There's going to be apartments. We're going to put a library there. There's going to be, you know, across the street is the music city star station, right? The only train we have in town. Yeah. And he goes, and there's going to be development over there. And so, you know, telling us all of these things and we're like, okay, cool.

19:15That that'll be good. That's helpful. That's helpful because it's not on the main drag of Lebanon road. It's on old Lebanon road, which is just a little offshoot. So not getting that main visibility from the main drag. But this is the area where it's happening. And so all that happened every bit of it. I mean, they're still there. They haven't started on by the train station. They've done a lot, but there's going to be even more. You know, Nashville's terrible about transit. So that's the last thing. But yeah, all of that stuff has happened. Wow. Well, what did yeah, just everything kind of happens for I'm a big fan of things happen for a reason. Like, you know, I'm a prior guy, not necessarily just to the energy of the world. That's a personal thing for me, but like I'm an AA guy. So I'm like a higher power. I give it away to this higher power and I just say whatever it'll work out.

20:17Like it's okay. Like everything happens for a reason and it sounds like that's what's going on here. We said free for a long time. The universe is telling us something and it's a hot time. We listen and so here we are. You just celebrated 10 years at that location. Where did that time go? Yeah, what have it so for two women who've never ran restaurants who wanted to open a really cool kind of craft beer pub in Donaldson somewhere that they could go that was a little closer. What have you learned? Running a restaurant is tough staff turnover rising cost and the endless tasks that bog you down and take you away from what you love. Let Adams Keegan lighten that load their privately held Tennessee based restaurant and hospitality focused outsourced HR payroll and benefits firm. The team at Adams Keegan removes the administrative burdens of HR administration payroll benefits management garnishments unemployment claims compliance 401k and so much more from their proprietary HR IS platform to seamless payroll and competitive benefits that keep your team smiling.

21:27They've got you covered Adams Keegan let you focus on what you do best creating unforgettable dining experiences while they handle the rest essentially think of Adams Keegan as your back office HR department right here in Music City. One of the many things I love about Adams Keegan is that unlike big publicly traded companies out there. They have an incredibly high standard of customer service and that that's what we all need is really good customer service in these areas. They don't give you a 1-800 number and make you fill out an IT ticket submission. They surround every client with a team of experts all based right here in Tennessee. You can call them today at 615-627-0821 or visit Adams Keegan.com that's A-D-A-M-S-K-E-E-G-A-N.com for your free HR consultation and see how they can create a customized solution to help your restaurant thrive. SuperSource develops and distributes high quality cleaning products and supplies as well as delivers wear wash housekeeping laundry programs and food service training.

22:31They partner with restaurants, golf and country clubs, hotels and resorts, schools, universities and health care institutions. Save time and money and reduce inventory by utilizing their high quality products and engaging with their highly trained service specialists. If you're looking for wholesale cleaning products like dish machines in Nashville, Tennessee, they have you covered. Listen guys, this is way more than a dish machine and chemical company. They do not make you sign a contract. They earn your business every single week and let me tell you I will personally vouch for Jason Ellis and his entire team over at SuperSource. If you want a dish machine and chemical company like this give them a call 770-337-1143 and if you are a member of the Nashville Area Restaurant Alliance, make sure you tell them that you get the special NARA pricing. Very excited to be partnering with C&B Linen. If you know me, it's my number one topic of conversation is linen companies and how shady linen companies can be.

23:33I am just disgusted with how the business practices work in this industry, which is why I was so excited when I found C&B Linen. They're out of Waynesboro, Tennessee and they don't charge any fees. So the linen price that you have, whatever that first linen price is, that's your price. And so you may say well every year they must raise the price on this seven-year contract, right? No, because they don't do any contracts. There's no gas fees. There's no clean green service fees. There's no replacement cost. There's nothing the only price you pay is the price that you pay for the actual product. I know it's too good to be true. No contracts. They do formats. They'll make custom formats for you. They do fresh linens cleaning supplies and guys. I just did a tour of their facility and it is immaculate. It is state-of-the-art. I'm going to post pictures on my Instagram. You can go find them and you can see how absolutely gorgeous this is to the point that they even wash and sanitize every one of their used laundry carts.

24:40It's just absolutely amazing. If you're looking for a linen company, you can trust who wants to earn your business every single week go back and listen to our episode with Jason Cruz, the owner of CMB Lenny here from his straight from his mouth exactly what they do or you give him a call at 9 3 1 7 2 2 76 16 or you can DM me at Brandon still on Instagram for my exclusive pricing through the Nashville area restaurant Alliance. What have you learned? I'm probably going to cry as we talk about this. We've learned that the neighborhood loves us. Yeah, and you know, we learned what we hoped was true, which is we're not the only one that needed this and I say need because it's it's more than I want. You know, it was every other cool neighborhood in the Nashville area had their pub and Donaldson, you know didn't have this type of pub, you know with the craft beer, you know, and ten years ago craft beer was at the height of its popularity.

25:47And so and having, you know made so many friends through her work at the farmers markets, you know in the beer world in the restaurant world in the farming community and you know, we were all a part of that and you know, we eat and drink for fun and so we know the experience we like and pretty sure other people wanted that same thing. So it's like, you know, just don't be an asshole do, you know deliver the kind of experience you would want and treat people treat people right, you know, I think sometimes you can know too much about restaurants going into a restaurant and then you can know well, I mean to where you almost have these preconceived notion you do it in a cookie cutter kind of a way then you have the way that's just authentic and genuine and the reason why I do everything I do right now is because these local restaurants are the fabric of the community and this is where the community comes to celebrate to mourn to do so many things just in the really the word I would use is to connect and you facilitated that.

26:58Yeah, you know, I was going to interject during the business plan discussion a lot of kids 10 years ago. Well at 15 years ago, I guess at this point we were having babies and wanting to, you know, put down their roots. They couldn't do it in East Nashville anymore or you know other, you know, downtown because of price because they were getting priced out. Sure. You come to type in all over Nashville. They could come to Donaldson 10 or 12 years ago and get three bedroom two bath house on a decent size lot and raise their family there. And so that was kind of an angle for our business plan. They came to Dawson and we built it for them and for us. So you've learned how much the community how much the community means how much this place means to the community. Yes, it almost sounds like the community means more to to you like this is something that's almost like I remember interviewing Margot McCormick was like the second interview I ever did on this podcast and she said we're about to close for COVID.

28:05This is like March. It was on St. Patrick's Day of 2020 and she goes about to close and she goes, I don't know what my staff's going to do. This is our she goes. This is our love language. She goes acts of service like I create food for my community and that's how I give love and when people enjoy it and they have a great time is how I receive love as well as most of the people that dine here and work here and if we don't have this for any period of time, she says I'm worried about people and it feels like that's a very similar vibe that you have going on. Yeah, that's definitely Jennifer. You know, she she gives love through food, you know, and it's it's really important for her. Like she likes to she never eats first like she always wants you to try her food first, you know, and she waits for you as well as I am. I just sit down and start start going.

29:05Yeah, and you know, it took me a while to notice that that's what was happening, you know, and so yeah, that is definitely how she expresses love and she she really gets a lot out of that. So I mean, she's kind of made for the restaurant business when it comes to hospitality and her ability to, you know, her unique gifts of. Expression and she said she's a witty as personally now and she has a really unique way of just remembering everybody and their kids and their families and things that are happening in their life in just, you know, brief moments like that. And I'm like, how do you remember all that, you know, and so it's a gift. It's a gift. Well, this is what I talked about when I talk about go eat local, you know, like supporting this makes the community stronger and this is everything to you guys.

30:16Like you go to an Applebee's. It's not the what it's just a cookie cutter thing. Like every time that you go to a chain restaurant, you're not supporting people like yourselves and that's the thing that like drives me every day is restaurants like yours. I absolutely love it. So what what's the experience like if I've never been to the homegrown tap room and kitchen. I walk in the door and I have been there and I know the answer to this question, but I'm for our listeners. Why haven't you been here listeners? Yeah. Well, tell them what they're missing. What is the vibe like? Tell me what you're going to get when you walk in. What does it feel like? What do people need to know? You know, this is going to sound silly, but when we were talking about the color scheme, one of my fondest memories from childhood is Winnie the Pooh on the Disney hour that used to be on I think Sunday nights or whatever in the honey tree and the warmth in the color of the when he was in he was in a beehive.

31:21I guess eating honey and that was the thing I wanted. I wanted that color in there. So so that's what you'll see. It's that warm yellow honey yellow and then just look around. There's 24 taps of craft beer. There's you know, a hundred places for people to sit on the ceiling. We got flags. I don't know where that idea came from. It was mine, but I mean we got all these flags. It's a representation of the stickers on a fridge, right? You just translated it to the flags on the ceiling. Yeah. So, I mean there's everything on the ceiling from a rainbow flag to a widespread panic to, you know, Titans and in the soccer team. So anyway, you just walk in and then there's a big bar and there's my overly friendly staff who are just wanting to be helpful and just come on in and have a seat and you guys have a beer garden in the back. Yes, that COVID baby that has dartboards and it's just a real light airy kind of a spot.

32:24We had wanted an outdoor spot for a long time, but we couldn't we couldn't convince the landlord to let us build a deck off the back of the building. They were like, it's not not doing anything for us. So, they came to us after a business moved out next door and said, hey, how about we do this? We'll demo it. We'll put in some garage doors. We'll put in some skylights. We'll paint it, primer it and you guys just finish it up. Okay. So there we go. There it is. So we have a beer pavilion if you're going to be a beer pavilion. Jennifer wouldn't call me that. She wouldn't let me call it that though. And I'm like, but technically it's a pavilion. There's plants out there. So it's a garden. There's plants. Well, so I, you know, my compromise is okay. Then I get to come up with the picture on the wall, you know, which is like we're sitting on the broad side of a barn, you know, and even that, you know, and drawing that out and with our logo, of course in the middle, but photo ops and then Jennifer adds to that, you know, the flowers that we put around the bottom of the painting.

33:37They need to be native Tennessee flowers, you know, and then we got an artist to come in and paint that on the wall for us. So when you're in there, you feel like you're sitting in a garden on the side of a bar. We hope. Yeah, but it's a really cool aesthetic and I think this is really fun. Just kind of talking about how you do these things because I think these are these are things that I think about when I go out to eat and I go, I wonder why they decided these flowers. I wonder why they decided this. I wonder because every single thing is intentional. It's not like there's much of accidents and you have a if you walk back into the bar, you've got a really cool like cabinet that has a bunch of mugs. Tell me about your mug club mug club in a nutshell 20 ounce pours for a 16 ounce price. You know, you get your own mug and that's the thing. Your mug stays in a cabinet on the wall. And so, you know how you go to your an adult you've moved out you go back home to see your parents you open the cabinet door and get your favorite glass that you drank out of mine was one of those Star Wars glasses from like Hardee's I think back in the day and that's that's the feeling that I want our mug club members to have come in open the cabinet door.

34:55It's creaks a little and set it back down. It's in the same place every time. It's yours. It's you know, how many people do you have in the mug club? That's a good question. I want to say can I phone a friend? I need to call we can we can ask the crowd. I want to say. Couple hundred maybe maybe we're wow, maybe I'm trying to because I'm thinking about the cabinets were designed to hold X amount of mugs and we have two cabinets so they're not all the way full. So that's why I'm saying maybe you have a limit of how many people can have a mug. No, we just how long does it take to get the mug because the mugs are really cool and they're custom like your whatever name whatever name if it's your nickname or if it's what I came we're not going to say her name. But you can put it on there and it will be your mug. Yep. The mugs are thrown by my lifelong friend Helen Hooper Hurst in East Nashville.

36:01Her mother was a potter grandmother was a potter. She's a potter that just does beautiful work. So naturally I said hey you want to throw these mugs for us and she does so we you know when somebody joins will wait till we have a couple, you know, I don't want to just throw in one mug at a time. But which you know, she'll do it and get it back to us and in the meantime we have blanks that a mug club member can use until their mug gets here and it's like their little trophy. They love their mugs. Yeah. Yeah. What's the sometimes they take it home when they want a new mug. I want to change the name on my mug. Can I take this one home? Of course. Yeah, during COVID what's the cost of it? What does it cost to be a mug club member? It's a hundred and forty a hundred forty forty nine something like that forty nine a year. So, you know, twelve bucks a month to get an extra four ounces of beer for every beer that you drink. Plus we throw them a party every we try to we have activity. We try to have activities every quarter the mug club parties.

37:03Yeah, the most recent was the Super Bowl party and we just we just put out some food. This time it was tachos, which is there's a story behind tachos, but this time it was tachos and we'll give them a couple of couple of beers and sometimes they'll go on field trips. You know, we'll go out to Yazoo or we'll go to Black Abbey and, you know, yeah, it's like the faint divorce, right? Yeah. Sorry. So now Jackalope, right? Yeah, now Jackalope. So yeah, so we get to take them out and it's really just building that community and most of the most of the original mug club members were the people that were, you know, outside peeking in while we were building out the space, you know, they were waiting, you know, because we weren't the only ones who wanted a really cool pub in town. Apparently. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So tachos. I'm I have a little bit of information, but these are nachos made with tater tots. Yeah. Yeah. Right.

38:04What's the story? It was a it was a idea that I like that. It was a high idea. I have never heard that before and I fucking love it. Homegrown was a high idea. I mean all of this was a high idea. I don't know how I've never heard that before, but I've had a lot of high ideas, some really good ones and some really bad ones. Yes. But I mean it was so and Robin was just hammering on it. We got to do this at the restaurant. We got to do this restaurant. Okay. Okay. So that's our thing we do. So you made tachos. Yeah. Did you make up the name tachos? I don't know. Or is that like a thing out there that we is it a thing? Yeah, we've learned there are no original ideas. Yeah. I mean, so yeah, repurposed improved. It's a thing somewhere. It's a thing at homegrown now. So how many beers do you have on draft 24 you got like Miller Highlife or do you have any domestic Pilsners?

39:06Is it all craft beer all craft? I walked out of a meeting with our accountant early in the business because they suggested that we start putting on Bud Light and I was like I'm leaving and I did I think they were both Robin and the accountant were were both she really doing that. She's really walking out. Yes, I am. She's taking a stand. Yeah. Now do you sell like a bottle of Bud Light? Nope. So no domestics. No, I mean I'm just saying like I got you mass produced correct. We have partnered with East Nashville Brew Works to have a house beer. It's called homegrown roots. You're hearing it here first and it's what we call a yellow beer. Easy drinker. Yeah, it's light lager. Yeah, it's Tennessee Sipper. Yeah. Okay, but it's made by Tennessee Brew Works. Correct. I love it. No, East Nashville. East Nashville Brew Works. Sorry, East Nashville Brew Works makes your home grown roots and is that available?

40:09When is that available? We've got it on the wall now. So now it's available now. Yeah, it's available. You heard it here first the tap handles beautiful made by our good friend Steven Piper. It's awesome. It kind of Eckert it kind of anchors our tap wall like the the middle 37214 the middle 76 or seven taps like our Nashville centric and then the other ones we are regional national brands. You know, I love about the vibe in there and I could have kind of told you this without seeing this but like you have it on the wall and it says we believe in you have this we believe in like who are we right and it says we believe in diversity community equal rights science, which is my favorite I believe in science like come on. We have to say that. Yeah, like we believe in math 2 plus 2 always equals 4 here in most circles.

41:15No, it's not an equal 7 like stop beer with flavor. We just discussed that kindness inclusion individuality social justice good food connection empathy magic and you that one almost makes me cry good. We do not tolerate racism hatred or cruelty. That's right. I mean, don't be a step and don't be a dick. Don't be a dick. It's a very simple how simple can it be and it's one of those things that if you recall how horrible some people were during covid and so that's when we had to say things like that and take a stand for I mean the way that people would argue with us about wearing a mask about wearing a mask. You know, it's just ridiculous.

42:16What you know, it's like there's a mandate. We're a business where you have to do it. It's not subjective like there's a mask mandate when you sit down you can take the mask off if you walk around like this is what it needs to be and it's like nobody likes wearing a mask. It's not like I'm cool. It's not our rules. It's not our rules. It's we need to keep each other safe, you know and care about each other. Although it doesn't seem to be a problem now for people wearing masks in certain situations. Yeah, right and where I'm all the time in the airport. Yeah. Well, no, I'm talking about certain federal people that wear masks that don't seem to have a problem wearing masks. Now, it's fine. We wear masks all the time. Like how do you breathe? I don't understand how you how are you doing? This is amazing. You can all wear masks all day long and no problem. No problem, but it's a thing. Yeah, I'm not trying to get political. I just during covid. There was one of our regulars that came in and absolutely reamed the bartender that was working and I think I he might have been early Mug Club member maybe for some reason.

43:28I had his email address, but not his phone number. So I shot him an email. I was like man, I wouldn't want you come talk to me about this. I never never heard from him. I've never seen him again. You know, it just I'm really hesitant to call people out because I'm in the service industry service, you know, you can be who you are what you are, but man, you know, sometimes when you when you pick on my staff when you're it's just a dick. I'm going to call you out. So I have I have some like your we believe in I believe in emotional tranquility at work, which is freedom from emotional stress while you're at work the the the fear of what's going to happen. If I fail is the greatest fear like and I never wanted people make it's okay to make mistakes like make mistakes all day long. We'll talk about him. We'll coach you through and we'll learn don't make the same mistake five times but like, you know, it's okay if you make you mess up just raise your hand and go I think I screwed up like, okay. Well, let's fix it. It's okay.

44:28Like this is a restaurant. That's what happens and so I have this, you know, we want to make every guest a repeat guest but there are non-negotiables. Yes, that the bottom line there the the racism hatred and cruelty. Those are not I don't care if you ever come back in my belly. If you're going to be racist if you're going to be hateful if you're going to be cruel to people if you're going to be misogynistic if you're going to be any of those things get the fuck out right. Like I don't need I don't want you to come back. Hey guys today. We are talking about Robins insurance and restaurants carry a very unique set of risks. We can customize a menu of insurance solutions to meet your specific needs reviewing the options and developing a plan for restaurant insurance coverage is a perfect recipe. Every restaurant owner has heard the statistics about how tough it is to survive and thrive in the business but getting adequate insurance at least gives you a fighting chance to mitigate some of those risks. It's well worth considering a custom-built restaurant insurance policy as it'll not only make life simpler but it may even overcome some risk.

45:30You haven't even considered for example, you'll usually want to cover risk to property such as the building and equipment along with liability to customers and staff, right? Yeah, that's easy. But remember there's an important difference between general liability such as a customer slipping on a spoiled drink and a professional liability such as about a food poisoning from bad food or inadequate preparation. Other elements that are easily overlooked include the risk of fraud and data theft that come with handling cash and card payments the risk of spoiled food. You have to throw away if there's a power outage or refrigerator failure and the risk of lost business. If you close for repairs after a fire protect your restaurant business by contacting them today. It's so easy and when any of those situations happen what you don't want to do is get and dial an 800 number and be put on hold to talk to somebody you have to explain your business to that is why you call Matthew Clements Matthew Clements at Robbins Insurance when any of those scenarios happen you pick up the phone you dial 863-409-9372 Matthew answers goes.

46:32How can I help you? You tell him your problem. He's your friend. You know him. Why would you not have an agent that you work with every single day any of these situations right here? You need guidance. You need support and Matthew Clements and his team at Robbins Insurance are there to provide it. You should call today. I'm going to put that number down one more time. That's 863-409-9372 call Matthew Clements today. Are you one of those people who's always on the hunt for the next restaurant location you open any sweet deals on retail space that may come your way when I be proactive and have the market experts out there working for you the retail team at Lee and Associates led by Miller Chandler and Megan Glaser is your go-to for all things commercial real estate in Middle Tennessee. They're located downtown in the heart of it all in the Batman building Miller is a Tennessee native. So, you know, he knows the neighborhoods and demographics and Megan is a California transplant who brings fresh perspective as she fully embraces the music City culture.

47:39They use the best prop tech like Placer AI and Esri to analyze the data while also leveraging their own industry knowledge and relationships to find and negotiate a killer deal for you. If you're one of those people and you'd like to get a hold of them their office number is 615-751-2340 or better yet you can call them directly to get your conversation started on your next restaurant location. You can reach Miller Chandler at 615-473-2452 or Megan Glaser at 760-846-6193. That is the retail team at Lee and Associates. Give them a call today. You can also visit them at theretailteam.com So I've been visiting a lot of restaurants recently and one of the comments I hear a lot as well. We just post online we do marketing ourselves and guys you need to speak with a professional and that is where Miles hospitality marketing comes in. She works exclusively with independent restaurants and small hospitality groups helping you build a smarter more strategic marketing plan without hiring a full-time team.

48:50The best part owner Christine Miles brings over 25 years of restaurant marketing experience to the table. She's worked with everyone from beloved neighborhood spots to national chains and she knows what works in real-world restaurants. So whether you need help branding digital marketing social media are just figuring out what actually is worth your time. Miles hospitality marketing gets it from quick wins to long-term growth. They offer everything from graphic design to full fractional CMO services. Check them out at mileshm.com. That's m-y-l-l-s-h-m.com. Mention Nashville Restaurant Radio and receive a free hour consultation. Miles hospitality marketing because your marketing should work as hard as you do. Customers not always right and we've had we've had experiences like that where you know being that local home town hometown pub. We have a bunch of regulars right and that sit around the bar and when someone's not acting right they they are not afraid to call them out. Our homies got they do have our back and you know there's been customers who became regulars, but they became irritants to everybody else because they weren't you know, that's nice.

50:04You know, and nice way to put it became irritants to others others. Yes, you know, and eventually it you know, they were they weren't they weren't self-policed out. Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yeah, they were they were kind of run out of there. So you've mentioned the homies. Let's talk about the whole who are we referencing? We're talking about the homies anybody that knows and loves homegrown taproom and kitchen Donaldson, Tennessee is a homegrown homie. You're a homie homegrown homies. Yeah, that's the name of our softball team too. You guys play you guys have like a restaurant league or like just a it's not the restaurant league anymore. We don't play in the restaurant league and I really don't know how it came along one of our one of my bartenders was like hey, you know, he's athletic guy and so he started a team last year and you know, we're not great but it's a team. It's and it's cool, you know, you have to work there to be on the team. No, just be a homie.

51:06Just be a homie. Just be a homie that can hit it out of the park. You won't play I can hit bombs homies that can I can hit bombs. I'm a pitcher though. Nice. And if you need a pitcher I was I was gonna be hard to get around you. Holy cow. You're a big target. Yeah, we had a we had a we used to have a restaurant league in Marble. We had so much fun. It was like the best time. Just getting out there hanging out drinking some beers playing softball and I spring night like nothing better. Right. I'm really looking forward to it this year. Well, I'll volunteer myself if you want another player on the team. I don't have a team. I'm like, oh, I'm dying to get out there and do something like that. See how I just self invited myself into being a homie. Yeah, you're in. I'm jealous. I want to be a homie. How do you do it? So anybody out there if you come in and you go to homegrown taproom and kitchen and you want to feel like you belong if you're anybody who doesn't feel like they belong you're tired of going to different chains or different restaurants.

52:07There is a place if you're in the Donaldson area that will welcome you with open arms that has really good craft beer and tell me about the food. What are we we know we have tachos. Tachos are a special so we don't we don't have those all the time. But the food is so at the beginning we just wanted to have enough food to keep people alive. Barely and so it's a beer place that also does food. Yes, that's how it started. That's not where we are. Okay, how it started, you know, it was it was even that was a lot of feedback from our homies like man, you got your food is good. I wish you'd make more because there's not a lot, you know, just kind of snacks. Yeah. And so that led to a much broader menu, which I said, okay, you know, we're like, okay, great, but no more than you know, eight and a half by 11 piece of paper, you know, like we're not doing a Cheesecake Factory book factory.

53:09Now we have gone to a legal size. It keeps growing. Yeah, yeah. It's free that we grew up. It's what you're familiar with that, you know, that's home. I call it love and mash good food. People likes to be good food. People like to eat. Yeah. Yes. I mean, you don't you don't have to say octopus on the menu or anything. Soup, salad, sandwiches, burgers, you know, it's it's what you comfort trays Mac and cheese. Yeah, what's your what's your mom would make but better because she didn't have to shots fired. Yeah, but yeah, I mean, it's it's so it's evolved into into, you know, really good food. Like Robin said, we eat and drink for fun. So if we're going to eat and drink at our own place, let's make it fun. Yeah, that's really good. It's really good. I love it. There was something which is what attracted diners drive-ins and dives. Oh, you had Guy Fieri in there. We did what what was that experience like fun. He brought Manit Shahan with him and she's just so cute.

54:11I want to put her in my pocket and she amazing. She's a fireball of energy. Yeah, I don't know how she does it. She's just yeah, but it was it was cool. You know, we closed for a day and a half. I think and they came in and filmed and we cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. It's very clean in there. I like to look when I'm in somewhere at all the vents and all the little things and I'm like, it was all spotless. You guys didn't clean before I came in, did you? No, because it looked really it was really well maintained things. It was really important to me, you know, because the thing that can kill a really good vibe is a really nasty bathroom, right? Or you or you look over at the window and there's you know, food splattered, you know, right that can just ruin it. So that happened to me recently at a restaurant. Yeah, I was gonna say it has for us. I embarrassed the crap out of my wife when I walked out and I told the manager I was like hey over in that booth.

55:14It's really kind of gross. Like there's a lot of stuff on the wall and he was like, oh, I was like, yeah, I'm gonna do that. She was like, oh my God, honey, stop it. I was like, if I was if I was a manager and I missed that somehow I would want so I don't want another guest to see that I get over and clean it like I a restaurant guy. I want to help him out. It wasn't a critique. I wasn't not going to go online and say anything about it. I better just going to say it on the podcast. I'm not saying where it was. I'm just saying I told the manager and I'm my wife's like I cannot take you anywhere. I'm like, I just want to help like I'm sorry. Helpy Hoperton is like stop it. You guys do a lot of fun things like you have the darts. You have the great beer. You've got really good food, but you also do live music and you do trivia night. Tell me about some of the theme nights that you guys do there. Well, just run down the list real quick. Tuesdays are two for ones Wednesday. We do a dollar off pints and wine and canned cocktails.

56:17Thursday is trivia. That's awesome. We get a really we've got a really strong following for trivia and it's just fun that we do it from 7 to 9 is great. Yeah, we do it from 7 to 9. We used to do it from 8 to 10, but it's too late for Donaldson. So 7 to 9 on Thursdays just a great time Fridays music. We've got a regular we've kind of got a regular lineup, you know, first Friday, second Friday, third Friday tonight. Does it matter that I say that probably now? Yeah, no, I put it out today. It'll be fine. But I mean every Friday. So who is to people know when this was recorded by that when who's playing tonight tonight? Cicil Reed band Jill Cicil, Amy Reed and Liz Fickalora, a trio beautiful harmonies a couple of guitars and some percussion. It's just a lot of fun there once a month there there once a month and then Saturdays. We are not set in stone. But this coming Saturday, we've got local songwriters Shelley Tackett and Annie Moser and Tackett's Tackett's a good friend of ours and played, you know, Shelly and Annie played our grand opening, which is really cool.

57:32Yeah, so we do music usually Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Irish on Sunday means an Irish on Sunday. And the first our first musician was a Donaldson native who walked in really short, really older gentleman comes walking shuffling through the door when we first opened and comes up to us and says, hey, I would love to play if you guys are doing music and and we're like, well, absolutely. And he says, okay, well, I'm Roland white and we're like like legendary Roland white Roland white the Roland Bluegrass Hall of Fame. Yeah. And we're like, yes, sir. Absolutely. How often do you want to play every hour on the hour? What do you want to do here? So he was cool. Yeah. So Roland was awesome for many years. It was Roland and you know, he and his wife, they they teach others so they would bring a gang of of them.

58:37And that's how we started with music every Wednesday night was and Diane Diane continues Bluegrass Wednesdays. Yeah, Roland has has moved on but she continues that so that's how that kind of started. I we've got a we got a lot of I have a musical band friends. Yeah, I have a musical background. So when we had that opportunity to build the the beer garden, I'm like, yes, we could do more live music, you know, because we want to support the community. We pay our musicians, you know, and so we wanted to create a space like that and we originally we were just doing it in the dining room just kind of off in the corner and that was that was fine except we couldn't do like full bands, you know, it was more singer-songwriter tour, which is perfect for the vibe in there. It is correct. Yeah, then a gentleman named Bob Tigert came along and he's got a he plays he's a ukulele professional and he's got a band Bob's your uncle's the name of the band and they have played the last Friday of every month for I want to say nine eight or nine years.

59:51It's just awesome. We love them. They I mean Bob's just such a genuinely thoughtful nice caring man and he's got a good following and he brings, you know, I got to say I didn't know that there was such a ukulele community, but but there is and they're awesome. And so yeah that Bob's Bob's Bob's one of our foundations. I just love everything about all of this like it's just so perfect and I thought about the things that we forgot about like, you know, when you're talking about the vibe, you know, like we have a game cabinet, which was my grandmother's, you know, growing, you know, growing up as I want to play like Monopoly. You've got yeah, we got like different board games we were there the other night and we got all the decks of cards out of the cabinet and made sure that there's 52 cards in each day and the light fixture over the bar over the end of the bar.

01:00:51Jennifer and her best friend Chris built you out of a door out of an old door and you know, hung that up there and it's really cool. The menu the handy homo in his trusty sidekick lesbian. I love that. And on the menu, you know, it's like it's my grandmother's potato salad, you know, my mom's chicken salad and her mom's chicken salad, you know, and so, you know, that homegrown is kind of weaved into every everything. What are some of the people give it? Let's do some shout outs. Yeah, people that work there that are special that make this place what it is. I'm trying to make her cry again. Yeah, let's see how this works. I can't I can't not mention the people that got us here great because they're not all with us anymore. We know you can't keep him forever. Right, right. We're just a stepping stone. Yeah. Angie Morland was a chef with us for seven or eight years.

01:01:55So she got us she got us. Settled, you know, she got got us to where we need to be and the consistency and the efficiency. And so there's that and we couldn't do it without her. I mean right now I'm because I think so in the moment I'm thinking about Sonia Reynolds. She's been with us for probably seven years on and off, you know, always leaves on good terms and always realizes that the grass isn't green. Yeah, you know, I did a little analysis and our our servers our servers do very well. And that's it's it's because of them and it's because of the community, you know, and they just even the first crop right because we had to hire we had to hire the people who knew what they were doing because we clearly did not. Right. And so that first crop of my babies. Yeah, you know the originals.

01:02:58Tiana. Yeah. Bryson, Kayla, Bryson, Julia. Yeah, it was something really special about that and cat cat, you know, right. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, it was and they helped us all. Jesse, you know, helped us all stand that up and get it rolling. And we were we just had so much fun in those first few years and did a lot of things wrong. Like, hey, so our party, you know, for Christmas is we're just going to hang out at homegrown open the tap. So let's go to town, you know, and that was and we had a chili cook, a chili cook off. And yeah, it was it was it was a lot of fun until someone, you know, overindulged in the bathroom. It was like, OK, all right. Made bad decisions. All right. Let's switch it up. Let's do something else. All you can drink water while you're here. This is open taps, you know, speaking of not alcohol, you guys have a really great non-alcohol selection in the form of THC beverages.

01:04:08You guys kill joy awards. You just won an award for the best. Like one of the I don't know if it's the best one of the best THC selections. What's that been like as a business selling THC? Have you gotten people that are just getting high as hell and like passing out or like, no, what's that been like? I mean. You know, when you when you partake, you kind of you kind of calm, you know, so so there hasn't been any kind of raucous. Behavior because of it, I mean, but that's the same with same with craft beer people, you know, you don't go to a craft beer bar and just get shit faced and you don't want to get don't have liquor like you don't have like bottles of liquor, but you do have canned wine and cocktails. But I just, you know, I don't know. I guess maybe I'm part of a major trend. I just don't drink anymore. Like I used to nobody does and you know, it's that's that's what it's trending toward, you know, is alcohol is poison.

01:05:15It is THC is the Lord's lettuce, if you will, right? It's it's helpful man. It doesn't hurt you. Yeah, so does not as I think it's much better than alcohol. For sure. How are you supposed to have ideas if you're not correct? Hi, that can't happen. Exactly. And who doesn't want you for you and happiness and people laughing? You know, that's the difference between you know, someone who's coming in to get a bucket of beer or rounds of shots that wasn't exactly what we wanted to create and the only way that you can really impact who comes in your front door is what you offer. And being part of that craft beer crowd that was those are the people that talk to each other care about each other, you know, tend to I'm generalizing but you know, they create community and that's like if that's if that's all we offer then that's what we're going to get and that's exactly what we got.

01:06:23If your leadership team is not on the same page and you are constantly having these long meetings and you're not getting traction. This is your opportunity today. I'm talking about the entrepreneurial operating system EOS. Yes. It is based around the book by Gino Wickman and traction. We use it at our restaurants. They use it at frothy monkey. They use it at at least barbecue. They use it at Carrington Row Germantown Cafe Park Cafe. Lots of restaurants are using it because it helps and let me tell you today Justin Cook is a great facilitator Justin helps business owners and their leadership teams implement the entrepreneurial operating system, which is a set of simple practical tools disciplines to help you get better at three things vision traction and to be healthy vision is getting you and your leadership team 100% on the same page with who you are where you're going and how you're going to get there traction is helping your leaders become more disciplined and accountable to execute on the right things that will make your vision become reality because a lot of times you're doing a lot of stuff but not the right stuff healthy is helping your leaders become a healthy functional cohesive leadership team because unfortunately leaders don't function well as a team if you start with the leaders the rest of the organization will follow and you'll get to a point to where you entire team is crystal clear on vision everywhere you look people are executing the things that make your vision come true and it's a great healthy fun place to work if that resonates with you you can email Justin right now at Justin dot cook at eosworldwide.com or you can call him 615-336-7133 to see if EOS is a right fit for you. He will come down and do an initial kind of introduction and ask you a bunch of questions.

01:08:10It is totally free. Definitely call Justin today. I love it. Well, I just there's a there's still a stigma around THC or marijuana, you know, the devil's lettuce is I think people would call it. I like the Lord's lettuce. It's better. That's right. But I think it's different now. I think the back in the day you get a dime bag or something you get a quarter and you get this compressed wheat. You don't know what it is. It's just this come from under somebody swag. You would smoke you'd roll a joint and it was you would get really high. But I love today that I can come in and if I if I want a five milligram drink or two million drink or 10 million, I know what I can handle. I know what it is. Like I don't really get high. That's not I don't get high. I'll say that but there's a I take a very low dose THC with my ADHD medicine, which allows me to I don't get high off it, but it locks me in.

01:09:11It's a sativa two and a half milligram and I take it in the morning like it's something that I do and then at nighttime if I need like a CBN or something I can do a two and a half milligram CBN with melatonin or something that gets me to sleep like that's medicinal and that's something that you can do that's controlled because if it was legal and it is technically legal if you're getting the THC Delta 9 in a can, you know exactly what you're getting. It's not like you're going into a bar and you're getting a joint and you're hoping that it's something that doesn't just get you wasted like it's very specific. I want to do a five milligram drink that activates in 10 minutes and then it lasts for two hours. You can do those things and which I think the stigma of what's going to happen to you, you know, what's going to happen. Yeah, you don't have a good time and for me, I'm going to be more present. You know, I'm a box you in for me. I'm able to totally lock in exactly hyper focus hyper focus, you know, it's my it's it is my Ritalin.

01:10:18It is like because I can't take Ritalin. I had a heart issue and I can't take any kind of amphetamine. So I have to take like this other drug that paired with the THC kind of access Ritalin right for me, right, which helps me get it. Yeah, otherwise I'm all over the place. Sending out scheduling invites and things. It's like hey, that was the wrong day and the wrong thing like, oh, regard and again, wasn't calling you out. Just helping you out, man. Dude, it's my my ADHD is strong like it and I have to like Medicaid or I am a mess. Yeah, and like me it's a thing. All right. Well guys, I have I think of all the conversations I have on this show and what I try and portray as local and how we're supporting local and why you should go support. Look, I think you guys have like completely personified what it means to have a locally owned and operated establishment that is here for the community.

01:11:25Everything is about the community and it's my favorite thing. Thank you. That means a lot to us stronger restaurants stronger community. That's kind of our tagline at Nara and I just I absolutely love what you're doing and I'm so excited that you guys came down to spend the time to kind of tell your story. I don't know if you're a listen to the podcast. We do one final thing. I'm gonna try to cry again. Okay, not hard. We do the Gordon food service final thought the Gordon food service final thought is where you guys get to take us out. Whatever you want to say who to whoever you want to say it to as long as you want to speak. There's no time limit. I'm not going to respond. This is just a your final thought whatever you want to say to the community of people who are listening right now. You go first. We'll start with you Robin as nominated by Jennifer. She's exactly exactly.

01:12:27I'm almost going to get all of my sound effects in here. Man, I just want people to know that all those things that you read off that we believe it's authentic. It's true. It's not just it's not it's not because we're branding, you know, and it's not just something you say it's something we live and it's something we feel and you know the community that we've created there we've gotten just as much back from them as they've given to us. That's pretty sweet. Thank you homies. I love that. Thank you Robin. So what is it Gordon food service final thought final thought my final thought is just a big thank you heartfelt to everyone who has gotten us here.

01:13:28I'm to the neighborhood and to our staff past and present. Kevin and Evan are killing it and here's to ten more years. Cheers. Did great. Thank you great, you know, I can tell you just love so hard and you love so deeply people community connections. You're in the right business doing you're doing the right thing. This some sometimes the restaurant business people find it and sometimes it finds them and the right people who genuinely have hospitality and that level of love for everybody else land here and they're like people ask me why did you get in the restaurant industry like they were my people. Yeah, I've tried other things and other worlds and then I got here and I was like this is the pirate ship.

01:14:28I want to be on this is this is it and you're you're you're right there and I love that so much. Thank you guys so much for coming in today and sharing your story and everything. It's just it's a pretty special and I hope they are out there listening goes to visit the home grown taproom and kitchen. It's right there in Donaldson. Google it find it 2720 old Lebanon Road 37214 that's what I was looking for. You're very perceptive. Thank you Jennifer go visit the home room home grown taproom join the Mug Club go see some live music go play around a darts and and become a homie. Yeah, come along. Come on homies. I love it. Thank you guys. Have a wonderful rest of your day. Thank you too. All right. Thank you so much to Robin and Jennifer for joining us today. I told you that episode was just like I don't know it was cool being in the room to this is when people say hey do you do interviews via zoom I go I can I don't like to I want you sitting in front of me and watching Jennifer talk about the people who died in there watching her talk about the homegrown homies the tears and hand her tissues in the middle of the interview her she loves so hard and just being in the room seeing her eyes well up and talking with Robin like that's what this is about.

01:15:53I love doing this show and I know I Jim Myers. I'm we're still in holding pattern there, but I'm going to keep doing them in the meantime. So I'm happy to be here and I love you guys and I hope that you are being safe out there and love you guys. Bye.