Ownership

Tyler Lechtanski

Owner, Jambox

July 27, 2025 01:16:23

Brandon Styll sits down with Tyler Lechtanski, owner of Jambox, the 80s and 90s music themed sandwich shop with locations inside Fait La Force Brewery and a new standalone in Franklin that opened April 7th. Tyler shares his path from a 13 year career with J.

Episode Summary

Brandon Styll sits down with Tyler Lechtanski, owner of Jambox, the 80s and 90s music themed sandwich shop with locations inside Fait La Force Brewery and a new standalone in Franklin that opened April 7th. Tyler shares his path from a 13 year career with J. Alexander's, where he rose from a Purdue recruit to GM at the original White Bridge location, to partnering with Shane Nasby (Cletus Burgers) on Jambox after Shane pitched the concept and his wife convinced him to take the leap.

The conversation digs into the food itself, including signature jam sandwiches like the Californication and Cranberry Linger, the bread program with Charpiers Bakery, and the operational lessons Tyler is carrying over from fine dining into fast casual. Tyler talks about marketing struggles in Franklin, learning to use AI and social media, balancing labor in a brand new restaurant, and his philosophy that fast casual can deliver both great food and real hospitality.

The episode wraps with reflections on music nostalgia, cassette tapes on the wall, and Tyler's encouragement to stay present and simplify, with an invitation to come visit Jambox in Franklin.

Key Takeaways

  • Jambox is an 80s and 90s music themed sandwich shop with two Nashville area locations, the original inside Fait La Force Brewery and a new spot in Franklin next to Wendy's on Murfreesboro Road
  • Tyler spent 13 years at J. Alexander's, crediting the company with teaching him efficiency, consistency, hospitality and how to expect more from a team, lessons he is now applying to a fast casual concept
  • Bread quality is central to Jambox, and Tyler partners with Charpiers Bakery on a custom Cuban style sub roll after discovering an earlier bread seized up about 45 minutes into a to-go order
  • Marketing has been the biggest surprise challenge, with Tyler estimating only 15 to 20 percent of Franklin knows Jambox is open three months in despite heavy local outreach
  • Tyler is leaning into ChatGPT for menu naming, social posts, and even translating the menu into Spanish to reach guests at the hotel next door
  • Top line sales are the metric Tyler watches most, since variable costs are largely fixed and growing guest count is what actually moves the bottom line
  • Hiring ahead of the volume you want, even when slow, is a deliberate choice so the team is ready when business picks up rather than getting caught flat footed

Chapters

  • 12:16Meet Tyler Lechtanski of JamboxBrandon introduces Tyler, owner of Jambox, and they orient listeners to the two locations at Fait La Force and Franklin.
  • 15:07From Purdue to J. Alexander'sTyler walks through his hospitality path, getting recruited out of Purdue, training in Chicago, and rising to GM at the original White Bridge J. Alexander's.
  • 19:21How Jambox Was BornTyler shares how neighbor Shane Nasby pitched the Jambox concept and how a single 24 hour stretch turned into him giving notice after 13 years.
  • 23:49Decoding the Jambox MenuTyler breaks down the jam sandwich side, the classic hits, and vinyl style pressed sandwiches, including fan favorites like the Californication and Cranberry Linger.
  • 33:58Hospitality in Fast CasualTyler explains why he wants Jambox to deliver both great food and real hospitality, with staff walking sandwiches out and checking on guests.
  • 37:56Charpiers Bread and the To-Go TestTyler describes dialing in a custom Cuban roll with Charpiers after discovering his first bread seized up 45 minutes into delivery orders.
  • 40:54Taste Plate and J. Alexander's DisciplineBrandon and Tyler explain the daily taste plate ritual and how that obsession with consistency now shapes Jambox prep.
  • 47:11Biggest Surprises as a New OwnerTyler names marketing reach and adopting new technology, including AI and social platforms, as the steepest learning curves moving from GM to owner.
  • 49:59Sales, Labor and Building a TeamBrandon and Tyler trade notes on reading a P and L, why driving top line sales solves most problems, and why Tyler is staffing ahead of demand.
  • 58:52Why Local Restaurants Are HardTyler talks about the emotional weight of putting his family on the line, building a shared Jambox team culture, and the case for eating local.
  • 01:00:31The 80s and 90s VibeTyler describes the 225 cassette tape wall, the broken eBay boom box mascot, and how staff personalize uniforms with band tees that match sandwiches.
  • 01:11:58Final Thought, Be PresentTyler closes with a reflection on stepping back, simplifying, and inviting listeners to come experience Jambox in Franklin.

Notable Quotes

"Why can't we have both there. Why can't we have, hey come in, know me, talk to me, know the staff, the people that I have making sandwiches are walking out and checking on tables to make sure that you're actually enjoying it."

Tyler Lechtanski, 18:03

"I owe so much to J. Alexander's and what I was taught. They taught me hospitality and the quality of food and how to treat people and how to work hard and how to expect more out of people."

Tyler Lechtanski, 47:18

"My sandwich is not going to be cheaper than Subway, but you're going to walk out and say wow, that was a great sandwich, or that was a huge sandwich, I got value out of that."

Tyler Lechtanski, 18:41

"Things are so much simpler than we make them, and if we can simplify everything and realize how simple they are, I think everyone can be a little bit happier."

Tyler Lechtanski, 01:13:30

Topics

Jambox Sandwich Shops J. Alexander's Franklin Restaurants Fast Casual Restaurant Marketing Bread Sourcing Hospitality 80s and 90s Nostalgia Restaurant Ownership
Mentioned: Jambox, Fait La Force Brewing, J. Alexander's, Cletus Burgers, Honey Fire, Charpiers Bakery, Subway, Peninsula, Green Hills Grille, Marable, Chago's, Sperry's, Sam's, Brick Tops, Houston's
Full transcript

00:00Hey everyone, we all know running a restaurant is tough. Between managing staff, food costs, and service, who really has time to chase down numbers? That's where Grunberg Accounting comes in. They specialize in bookkeeping and financial consulting for restaurants, bars, and catering businesses with over 10 years of experience helping food service businesses thrive. They will track down your prime costs, identify waste, and improve profitability while turning your numbers into strategy with clear monthly reports and personalized guidance. Already have a CPA? Great, they'll work with them. Need one? They'll introduce you. They handle POS integration, payroll, vendor tracking, and budgeting so you can focus on what matters. From catching unpaid sales tax to inflated food costs, they catch what others miss, giving you real-time financial insight so you can make confident decisions. They're your dedicated partner, not just a bookkeeping service with customizable solutions for every restaurant's unique needs. Let them handle the numbers so you can focus on your team and your guests. Oh yeah, and your food.

01:05Grunberg Accounting, that's g-r-u-m-b-e-r-g accounting.com. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio, the tastiest hour of talk in Music City. Now here's your host, Brandon Styll. Hello Music City and welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. My name is Brandon Styll and I am your host. We are powered by Gordon Food Service and we've got a fun one today. We are talking with Tyler Litansky. He is the owner of Jam Box Sandwich Shop. There's one in Franklin and there's one in the Fate La Force Brewing and he was a former Jay Alexander's guy so we got to get into a lot of operational stuff. We learned all about Jam Box and then I took my family over to Jam Box and it was delicious. Amazing, amazing sandwich. I've been to the one at Fate La Force. We went to the one in Franklin and it was awesome. I love the vibe, love the old school kind of late 80s 90s Jam Box cassette tape kind of vibe and the sandwiches were amazing and I've got kids and the kids loved that they have a kid's menu and it's fantastic.

02:28Definitely recommend it. You'll enjoy this episode. Want to talk to you again? We are doing the NARA Connect. It is August 14th from three to six. It's at the Music City Center and you can register for free right now at naranashville.com. That's N-A-R-A-Nashville.com. NARA of course is the Nashville area restaurant alliance and let me tell you about it because you own a restaurant, you manage a restaurant and you need to focus on hiring. You got to bring people in and then you got to focus on training those people. You got to do team building exercises. You have to work on your culture. You have to understand what your core values are and you've got to lead that way. You've got front of the house. You've got back of the house. You've got to get food. You've got to create food. You've got to do menus. You got to do menu development. You got to have meetings. You got to run the books. You got to make sure all the numbers work. You have to create ideas. You have marketing. You've got to take those ideas, put them into action, make them happen. You've got to get out there. You've got to talk to guests. You've got to build regulars. You've got to deal with open table or resi or whatever you use. You've got a host stand. You've got to make sure that those people are working on it. Then you've got issues. You've got issues with equipment. You've got issues with a tree falling in the front. You've got issues with the bathroom. You've got issues with your dish machine. You got all kinds of things to deal with if you're operating a restaurant and one of the hardest things that takes the most time is dealing with vendors and a lot of people spend a lot of time dealing with vendors because they're not working with vendors that actually care about them. There's a game. There's this game where vendors try and

04:29take advantage of you when you're not looking. Linen companies do this. Dish machine chemical companies do this. Produce company. I mean, so many companies, if you don't have a good relationship, you're buying from multiple different companies because you don't trust anybody. It takes a ton of time. Spreadsheeting is a thing. People will buy from four different broadliners and they will look over the prices every week and spend hours buying the cheapest stuff from whoever they can buy from and this is the way to kill those first five things. The hiring, the training, the building culture, creating great food, trends, going out to eat at other places, going to other cities. These are things you have to do to stay relevant. Marketing, social media, third-party delivery apps. There's so many things you could be focusing on but so many people focus on managing vendors and that is why we created NARA and my job for Green Hills Grill, Marable, and Chagos is I'm the director of operations. So what I do is I manage vendors. I negotiate deals with those vendors and then I set them loose. Here we go. We're in a legally contractual deal.

05:46This is what we've got going on and they all work really well and I've got some really great relationships with my vendors. Through this podcast I've met so many and if you hear an ad on this podcast it is because this is a vendor that I trust. It's a vendor that I probably use and this is something that helps me on a daily basis. So NARA Connect is kind of my version of bringing everybody together. I want to bring all these restaurant tours, independent restaurant tours. Let's get together. Let's hang out. Let's say hi. Let's introduce each other. Share phone numbers. We are better together. A lot of small restaurants can't get the deals that I can get because I have three restaurants that do pretty well. Two restaurants do pretty well. One that's working on it and through the volume that I have I get good deals. So what I've done is I've said, hey look let's bring a bunch of restaurants together. If you're a smaller restaurant you just can't get that deal. That's where the Nashville Area Restaurant Alliance comes into play. We all band together and then I've already pre-negotiated deals. The more restaurants we get on board the better deals we can get. We're going to talk about this on August the 14th from three to six. From three o'clock to four thirty is going to be from three to three thirty. It's just kind of going to be hanging out meeting everybody introducing everybody and then we're going to talk about NARA. I'm going to do some Q&A. This is going to be a benefit for the Giving Kitchen and then we're going to have all these vendors who we're working with and we're talking CNB, Lennon, we're talking Robins Insurance, SuperSource. You get to meet Jason Ellis, Calexo. You get to try the most amazing THC beverage out there. We are going to have all four broad line companies there. So we're going to have GFS, PFG, US Foods, Cisco. We're even going to have Freshpoint, one of our produce companies. These are all companies in which we work with.

07:47Obviously we love GFS and they're our prime vendor here. I use them in all three of my restaurants and they do an amazing job and I highly recommend them to anybody. But you know what? You may have a favorite. So we're not just saying GFS with NARA. We are saying let's put something together to help you and if you need more money, this is how I'm going to help you do it. I put together RFPs. We bid all of your business at one time to all four. No weekly doing this. We're going to do it one big time. I do it for you and I typically can make you a bunch of money. I can reduce your overall cost by several points. I can get you cash up front. I can get you trips to other cities to try food. All the things we're talking about earlier by partnering with one big company and I'm going to explain exactly how we do that with all these different companies. We're going to have volunteer welding Dr. Pezzona from Pezzona MD. Miles hospitality marketing. I have to give a big shout out to Christine Miles because she has been so instrumental in helping me put all of this together in our website and signing up for it and helping. Darian's been working with her and I'm just so thankful to them and I wanted to say thank you to them on the show. We're going to have Adams Keegan. So we have your payroll benefits. HR Chandler James team from Lee and Associates are going to be there. We're going to have multiple more vendors as they continue to sign up.

09:20None of these vendors will have access to anybody until 4 30. This is going to be no salespeople. Everybody hang out for an hour and a half and then you get the choice. You get to go meet these vendors and we already have pre-arranged deals with most of them. If there's not a pre-arranged deal there's a understanding as to what the RFP would look like as to how we're going to save you money and all of this is basically free to you. Cost you nothing. The only time we make money is if we're able to save a bunch of money and that's every time so far. We have saved companies. I can't say names because there's confidentiality but we've got people six figure numbers in high six figure numbers in cash upfront for committing to one company. I've got people trips all kinds of fun things and we're lowering your prices on everyday goods and if you're a small small company we can work out there too. It's not quite the savings but with everybody together we can do some amazing things. So go right now go to NaraNashville.com click the NARA Connect button click register. It's free. We have limited seats available so I do this now. Don't wait. This is something you'll need to do ASAP. All right we're going to get off of talking about NARA Connect for now and let's talk about the Gordon Food Service Show September 17th. It is going to be in Louisville Kentucky and yours truly will be there. I will be there with all the podcast equipment. We'll be doing like we did last year. I will have a table set up and you can come get on the podcast. Love to have you on Nashville Restaurant Radio. You got to come to the GFS show.

11:11It's gonna be a blast and I highly recommend you do because their show is really good. It's not just food. It's all kinds of stuff. They have I mean a little bit it's a restaurant show but it is a GFS show. So contact your GFS representative now and say hey I'd like to come to the show and they will make that happen for you. September 17th it's going to be in Louisville at the AgCenter and it's always a great time. Stay tuned this week as we are going to have Jake Howell on the show. He is going to be here in studio live. He is the James Beard award winning chef over at Peninsula. Just recently won and I've never really met him so this is going to be a fun conversation. I can't wait to get to know him a little bit but stay tuned this week for that episode coming out. We are doing the interview in three days. So big big time. Excited to have this one. I want to have him on the show for a really long time but on the show today yes we're talking with Tyler Lektansky and we're going to jump into that right now. Super excited today to welcome in Tyler Lektansky. He is the owner of Jam Box and you have two locations. One is it still in Fait La Force Brewery? Yes it is. Fait La Force Brewery and you have one in Franklin right off of Royal Oaks and Murfreesboro Road kind of next to Hardee's over there. Yep right next to Wendy's. Right next to Wendy's. Yep. Love it. Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. Thank you. Glad to be here. How you doing? How's your summer going? Summer's going great. I'm restauranting in full bloom. When did you open Franklin? April 7th. April 7th. So you've you're like in your first couple months of a new restaurant. Yeah. How's it going? Oh it's going. It's going. What have you learned in the first three months of opening? Is this your first restaurant opening your first restaurant? Yeah

13:11I mean technically I mean the other location being in Fait La Force it was in its own location but we went through all of the same kind of development and growing pains and introductions. I mean it wasn't a standalone but still bringing people to understanding that there is a food program here. That there is Jam Box. What is Jam Box? Why are we Jam Box and all of the above? But being down in Franklin like it's not anywhere near Nashville and people down here don't usually go up to Nashville very often so where you think you're doing a lot of things marketing wise I've been telling people a lot that even in Franklin in the last three months like I think that 90 percent of Franklin should know that I'm there but I think the reality is is maybe 15 20 percent only know that I'm there and that's crazy. I will tell the the listening audience that we are in Franklin. The studio is in Franklin and as of two hours ago I didn't know that Jam Box was there. See there you go. I mean like I would be probably your primary market of people you'd want to market to and I I've been to the Fait La Force several times and it's delicious but that's because I know Shane and they send me stuff and I go up there and but now I told my wife I go did you know there's a Jam Box right down the street like this is amazing like we gotta go check it out their sandwiches are really good and she's like what's Jam Box and we have kids and like it's we're your primary demographic. See and that makes me feel great because when you're when you open up and it's just a blast of people like crazy and then school let out and a lot of people went on vacation and I'm like okay is this is this the normal now we slowed down a little bit but then last week we started to pick it up a little bit and that's kind of when my brain starts thinking like is our marketing actually reaching how do we reach more people and the fact that you say that makes me feel so good that means that even just two miles down the road three miles down the road there's still people that have no idea that I'm right over there so lots of market to tap into well hopefully people hear this and they'll now know that you're there so let's let's we just jump right in like this is how we do sometimes tell me your background um how long you've been in

15:12Nashville I've been in Nashville a little over 10 years yeah we um where you from I'm originally from South Bend Indiana I went to Purdue University for hospitality got recruited out of Purdue to join Jay Alexander's restaurants and that was the one in Chicago I trained there and worked there for a couple years and that's 2013 came down to the Franklin location was in Nashville for probably about five years working in the Cool Springs Jay Alexander's got an opportunity to be an AGM of Jay Alexander's in Columbus Ohio went up there for a year then came back down to Nashville and got a GM spot at the White Bridge location the OG yeah the original AOA OG the original do you still say AOA do you say AOA at Jambox you know after 13 years with the company I thought that it would be a hard habit to break because during those years like I would say it to my mom I'd say it to my wife I just I couldn't imagine breaking AOA AOA dishes weird like it took a week like I I was shocked as soon as I stepped out and took the suit off it was like what's AOA that's gone yeah and now I'm trying to embrace herd so I'm I still don't know if I have a new phrase for it but every once in a while it peaks out there and I just like spit out AOA but I I yeah I I worked at my first restaurant job was Jay Alexander's in 1997 at White Bridge awesome and hand tied bow ties crazy AOA full hands in full hands out yeah I learned so much from that experience and I don't think I learned anything about hospitality nothing about hosting hospitality what I learned was efficiency and how to be consistent every single day I agree I mean I'll even tell you and people ask me about like do I miss Jay Alexander's or am I happy that I made this move and I am very excited for the

17:14future and I'm excited to see what I can do but like I owe so much to Jay Alexander's and what I was taught I agree with the efficiency and just it's learning like how to do it the right way and I feel like a lot of people don't think that out a lot of things especially in restaurant are all about costs and all about making it easy because it's a hard industry but hospitality goes a long way and I think even in Nashville so many restaurants pop up and I feel like someone opens a restaurant because they have a great product but they don't think about how we make people feel at the same way and it's that chicken and the egg concept where what's more important do you want to feel good in the restaurant because the staff is really hospitable and they make you feel welcome or does the food need to be great and unfortunately I feel like most restaurants do one or the other but the great ones do both and that's something I really push on Jambox and I think that the fast casual has such an opportunity to do everyone thinks oh fast casual they think corporate they think franchise where it's just this cookie cutter concept where I can come in the food's cheap the service is cheap in and out but why can't we have both there why can't we have hey come in know me talk to me know the staff the people that I have making sandwiches are walking out and checking on tables to make sure that you're actually enjoying it and I care about one the layers of my sandwiches what comes in my sandwiches and making sure that we're giving you value because for me money is important in the idea that if you're going to come my sandwich is not going to be cheaper than Subway but you're going to walk out and say wow that was a great sandwich or that was a huge sandwich I got value out of that and I think that's what's important well and the experience means a lot too yeah I mean the fact that people if you know somebody's name and they come in and they have a favorite and you make it and it's delicious and they leave they're feeling nourished versus full yeah which is a different feeling one is feeling whole and one is feeling I drove through a thing and I ate food real fast and I don't need to eat again for four hours survival that's one thing but an experience is completely

19:17different I love that way of talking about consistency and great food with an experience getting them both right so is that the main goal with Jambox how did Jambox start your first location in Fate La Force tell me the origin story of Jambox so Shane Nasby who has Cletus Burgers and he just opened up one in Bellevue but he has one over off of Elm Hill Pike as well he was my neighbor a few years ago you live in Bellevue I did I lived in Bellevue right across the street from Shane Riverwalk huh yep Riverwalk and you know I used to live in Boone Trace so okay I know exactly where you are Shane and I were neighbors back in the day yeah so I mean Shane when he jumped into Honeyfire and started developing that and putting that in Bellevue I was sitting with him talking he was asking me about just Jay Alexander's related questions restaurant related questions and I kind of watched his restaurant experience grow and he really wanted me to join his like join forces and I think the two of us are really compatible and I think we both have the same idea we like to do things just a little differently we like to do food differently different flavors different textures so I mean over the years he's thrown a few ideas out to me but I had a really great thing going at Jay Alexander's and I really liked it and I just I loved it I loved how I felt I loved the brand and everything like that but one thing that I was missing is I really just wanted to grow beyond and I really I have two kids now and I really want to get to the ability where I love restaurants I love what I do but I also want a little bit of freedom to take that time back so where I don't mind being in the restaurant a lot I don't want to miss any opportunities in the future and I know those are coming so how old are your kids uh almost five Liam's almost five and then Avery is going to be two and a half in August boy and a girl two boys two boys okay I wasn't sure yeah so that's kind of the idea but Shane threw a couple ideas out at me and I've turned them down left and right I'm like okay I this is so great um but then just at one point he brought Jambox to me and kind of an outline form and he he was actually let me take that back he told me that he was going to open

21:18up a burger place and a sandwich shop in the same week and I go or in the same year and I was like oh that's crazy and he gave me the outline of Jambox and we're just sitting there and I hadn't talked to him probably in four months and he just turns me he goes you should do this like this is the one I was like no sandwich shop no this isn't it um and truly within 24 hours the whole thing took off so I met him at I think 9 a.m. at the Bellevue location where Cletus was still being developed and uh we talked about it and he goes just go home and think about it so I went home and he texted me again he goes hey meet me and my wife we're gonna go to Fait La Force let's meet today and I had never been to Fait La Force hadn't heard about it walked up the steps and I'm like this isn't me I'm not Nashville like this I'm not a brewery this is I can't this isn't it and he showed me the space and in my mind we were going to be out front we were going to kind of share the space and I was going to look like a subway but that wasn't the case I was going to be in the brewery behind the door and again I'm a front of house person I am out front face suit and again I'm telling myself nope this isn't going to happen and we sat down at the table and they just talked about it and Shane's he has so many great ideas and he is very passionate about his ideas and he completely sold my wife on it and Alyssa is like Tyler why not like what's the risk here like you've done so great we've we're in a good spot like why not take this shot this is that opportunity so we stood up from the table and I got in the car and I'm like are you serious like is this really are we doing this jam box she's like yeah let's do it I'm like okay and like everything lined up my boss was in town the very next day and I just I walked up to him and I walked it out it was an emotional hey 13 years but I really need to take this opportunity and then probably like 30 minutes later I called Shane and I was like I just put in my notice so and we're doing eight weeks I'm out and this is this is going and he was shocked like I remember

23:20just silent and then a yell but that's kind of how Jambox went off so he had this outline of Jambox and in the 80s 90s theme and the fun textures with the sandwiches which I'm totally into and then we sat down and just redesigned the menu some of them on there are collaborations between the two of us some of them are completely Shane and some of them are completely me but we started out Jambox last June just celebrated a or one year last week and the concept is that we're playing off the 80s 90s music so all of our all of our sandwiches have a different song or lyric to them and then all of the sandwiches when we started had a different type of jam on them but as we kind of grew and progressed we wanted to give a little opportunity to sandwiches and we didn't want to steer people away if they were weirded out by jam or scared to try it so as we developed the menu here like now with the new location in Franklin I have the menu completely divided so I've got jam sandwiches and I've got regular sandwiches and I tell a lot of people coming in for the first time it's like if you're scared of the jam sandwiches try one of my non jam sandwiches they're going to blow you away and then they'll gain a little bit of trust for you to trust my other side so so it's pretty easily labeled on the menu it says sandwiches that jam and your sandwiches like californication peaches for me the cranberry linger orange crush purple rain all eyes on cheese and then you have mixed tape greens then the classic hit sandwiches you've got the plain jane's addiction the sammy hagar club the post balone I like that the post baloney that's a fun one tomato swift eye of the tiger the hero and I like the you have like vinyl it says vinyl style which is pressed sandwiches I assume that is in a panini press type thing and you have mambo number five the I like the tuna turner wrap one of my favorites uh grilled pimento toe a little uh toto I like that m cheese hammer wrap which commonly gets

25:27mispronounced as a french term I get the m chase hammer a lot um so I might be adding another letter on to that just to make sure that people get my m cheese hammer reference but it's funny um yeah which of course if you're out there you don't know who mc hammer is yeah m cheese m cheese hammer wrap honey smoked ham swiss cheese and peach jam the grilled pimento toe house made pimento cheese red hot chili pepper jam did you have a basis like when you created these sandwiches and I just let me just say this about shane he's there's a handful of people in town that I love that I think are not only amazing at what they do at their craft at everything that are visionaries but their heart matches their skill and he and angela I mean the whole family everybody shane's one of those guys that I would put in that I don't want to say he's like the because there's a bunch of really great people in nashville but shane is definitely one of those people who I would trust with my children I think he's an amazing guy he's an amazing father he's an amazing businessman what he did at honey fire was absolutely amazing I'm so glad that he got out of that to do his own thing that cletus in Bellevue is one of the coolest restaurants in the city it's an experience I'm a 90s nostalgic guy right I'm a gen xer zennial and I think we're right right around the same age but like he's just doing some amazing things so yeah coming up with this idea I can totally see a shane idea here who makes the food like does he make the sandwiches like the ideas for the sandwiches because there's some really unique stuff going on here was there a baseline for it hey we're going to take a quick break to hear a word from our sponsors running a restaurant is tough staff turnover rising cost and the

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29:33seven percent alcohol by volume that's kind of the sweet spot for a real drink it's made with real bourbon real juice no preservative zero artificial flavors or colors full flavor this is not for the basic it is designed for those in between moments pre-shift hangs post-service wind downs brunch coolers patio sips golf carts if you have a patio anything for a happy hour this is absolutely perfect and all you have to do is just chill it pop it and giddy up it's premium it's legit and is made by bartenders for people who actually care about quality cocktails oh and if you want to start carrying it pony boy slings is distributed by best brands so reach out to your rep and ask for it by name pony boy slings real bourbon real juice real good colexo is an art and design collective of bipoc lgbtq women and allies focused on creating delightful drinking opportunities for all focusing on quality taste and experience we delight humankind by creating delicious and health conscious drinking experiences that shift perspectives encouraging real life connection to ourselves and our communities cheers this is what colexo says on their website they have three amazing flavors they have the cucumber citron five milligrams of hemp derived thc citrus rose which also has five milligrams of hemp derived thc and they have my personal favorite the semi tropic it has five milligrams of hemp derived thc as well these products are available by ellipman brothers if you'd like to order for your restaurant or if you want to go try them yourself you can visit drink colexo.co or you can pick them up at killjoy in east nashville this is an amazing company they're not some conglomerate who's jumping into the thc game they are a craft thc beverage company work just like you and i this is their only focus this is the only product

31:37that they make so they put 100 of their detail and love into it please enjoy responsibly very excited to be partnering with c&b linen if you know me it's my number one topic of conversation is linen companies and how shady linen companies can be i 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 at a 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 it's just absolutely amazing if you're looking for a linen company you can trust who wants to earn your business every single week go back and listen to our episode with jason cruise the owner of c&b linen hear it from his straight from his mouth exactly what they do or you give them a call at 931722 7616 or you can dm me at brandon still on instagram for my exclusive pricing through the nashville area restaurant alliance nara for short who makes the food like does he make the sandwiches like the ideas for the sandwiches because there's some really unique stuff going

33:41on here was there a baseline for it so if you look at the jam side of the menu he had a couple lined out for me and californication is definitely a collaboration on our end which is pulled chicken pepper jack cheese jalapeno slaw Doritos and red hot chili pepper jam yeah that's definitely the favorite people walk in and they'll say well what are your favorites and i was like well californication is definitely everyone draws to it they like the spicy jam they like the Doritos Doritos are on a sandwich that's crazy and 90 percent of people from franklin are from california anyway so they're like hell yeah man that's like my jam exactly um peaches for me and orange crush those are some really big favorites that are all the brainchild of shane the the classic ones are actually ones that i developed as features and they went well because i was trying to create some sandwiches that were not jam that other people could go and italian such a big sandwich for me when i go out to eat dude that's my that's my jam that's my jam so i was like how do i not have an italian on this menu so that's that's when i started developing all of those i think the hero is one of the favorites as well but any of the ones that don't have jam on it were features at fatal force at one time that were crowd favorites and we brought over to that side so yeah and i mean the sandwich making is fun because even i'm going to start rolling out some new features next week in franklin now that we've kind of settled and everything's going in the right direction there but what's the response you're getting from people there love it i mean i'm getting people walk in they love the feel they love the environment we're playing 80s and 90s music we have 80s and 90s music videos playing in the background i've got murals on the wall everything is just like i love diving full vibe head first into a theme yeah yeah even the bathrooms have murals they have all of our sandwiches artists in there and exciting but then they get the food and the same thing and i had a guy just tell me the other day that works for a um one of the food vendors that came in and tried it for the first time he goes love your theme love your idea but most people don't follow through with the food being

35:42awesome and it really is awesome so we always check in and make sure that everyone's enjoying their food and just say hey tell a few people spread the word we need more people to know that we're here because i really think this is going to be a great spot in franklin i'm excited well i now that i know what's there you're going to see you're going to see me all the time because i love good local places here in town and i would love to come support you man and love the sandwiches look at every sandwich i've had because i get to go to the friends and family when you first opened at fate la force and you had like every sandwich out and you got to try bites of every sandwich there wasn't one even the egg it was like an egg a scrambled egg sandwich or something that was the humpty dance the humpty dance strawberry jam egg salad bacon ham and cheese and that was such a good brunch sandwich yeah i definitely bring that back for a feature in franklin but we did get rid of the egg salad concept for a little while but yeah that one's it's unique and franklin's not known for being very progressive okay like people like what they like yeah you're gonna sell a lot of heroes you're gonna sell a lot of the clubs those kind of things are people receptive to like jam on sandwiches here in town they are i mean i've i obviously myself as the owner but even my staff like we're really good about walking in and recognizing that people are new because 90 of the people walking in every day are new so we we walk them through the menu and we tell them our favorites and we even have one right now the cranberry linger which is turkey cheddar bacon it has an alabama white slaw on it potato chips and cranberry jam and we joke that that's kind of the gateway sub where it's like okay if you're looking at if you're looking at these and you're not sure if you want to jump to the jam side try that one i mean it's the cranberry on the turkey is very subtle a lot of people like cranberry mayo as it is so it's such a good way and it's like try that one you're gonna like it then it'll lead you into more and that's just kind of how it is i mean people will even say well i'm gonna be boring today and get the plain jane which is turkey or ham lettuce tomato jane's addiction plain jane's addiction yeah um but that one's just a basic sub and when i say basic like i don't really mean

37:47basic but it's it's kind of your standard and people are like i come back here just for that one i don't i like plain but your plane is delicious so where's your bread come from my my bread comes from charpies bakery oh i like to hear that they're so good i love working with them uh tomorrow tomorrow is fantastic and she's really good because they have so many different types of breads one it's great that i get it every day so i get fresh bread and i mean most people are saying you know the sandwich is great but the bread is phenomenal but even when it comes to features like i just called her up um yesterday and i said hey what do you recommend for these ingredients and then she sends me a couple samples and all of a sudden we have a fun bread their focaccia is out of this world and i wish i could just put every sandwich on the focaccia it's that good but that's what the game plan is is we have a great cuban sub roll that we use for our sandwiches it's really soft it holds really well it reheats really well for people that take leftovers but then when it comes to like our features like let's bring in some fun breads and i honestly couldn't do it better even if i baked it people are like well if you get bigger will you bake your own bread not sure because charpies is they have such a phenomenal product um wow could you do that again um they're a sponsor of the show and i love it erin and mosso and tomorrow they're all just amazing people and they do such a great job and so many people are buying frozen bread yeah and they're it's like dude you can get this delivered every day all three of my restaurants use charpies yeah every every burger that we sell is on a fresh roll that came in that day and the burger is number one thing we sell at the greenhouse grill so i just that's cool to hear i love hearing in the wild for me like with my sandwiches when we talk about value like i want them to be big sandwiches i want them to stand out in pictures and i want people to crave them so when we were looking at bread it needed to be soft it needed to be large but the larger you get with bread the more dense it gets and that's something i didn't want so when we look through i feel like a hundred different types of bread and we finally got to this that was important it's like i have this big sandwich this big sub sandwich but you don't

39:50want to lose the toppings because you have such thick bread yeah and the funny thing is the first bread we use from sharpies i didn't even realize but it actually got tough after about 45 minutes with the ingredients so where i was making these sandwiches and sending them to go people loved them in house but they were getting them to go and i was getting a lot of complaints about how bad the sandwiches were and i'm just thinking these people are crazy like i'm getting such good feedback so what i ended up doing was i made a few sandwiches i cut them into fifths and i was eating one every hour and i saw very quickly with my first bread that right up just based off the ingredients that were used to make the bread that after about 45 minutes the bread kind of seized up so i worked with her and she gave me a couple different samples and we kind of modified and made our own and now that bread even six hours later is still super soft a bit soggy with our ingredients at that point of course like the to-go complaints went away but that's something i wouldn't have thought of who would think about eating their product three hours or even an hour later but that's how door dash and uber works i mean you put your order in you get it about 45 minutes after it's made so it's got to be the great even then so yes i've eaten my sandwiches three four five hours in advance now that's that's you got to do stuff like that i mean it's interesting because i know at jail xander's they do taste plate yep you know every single day 10 30 10 10 10 o'clock to 10 30 or 10 to 10 20 every day for 13 years i did that yeah phenomenal still great tell me about that and then my next question is going to be what experience did you take from jail xander's that's helped you the most in owning your own restaurant but for most people that don't understand what taste plate is because i i had a conversation with a guy named bob tappin do you know bob tappin no bob tappin used to be um kind of director of operations at brick tops and he was at houston's and they do that as well and then he also now he's at sperries and sam's oh cool and they do taste plate every day at sperries and we were talking about the other day how important

41:51this is what is taste plate well so with restaurants like these and especially as you listing off those i know they're the exact same you're making you're making all of your your food from scratch so you're bringing in these raw products and you're making them the way they need to be made but as the chef the chef is not making every product so everything needs to be tasted to make sure that it's right i mean you want if you accidentally put sugar where salt needed to be or if something has a three-day shelf life and it's on its second day but it's turning quicker than it needs to we want to catch the problem before the guest does and that's the idea of taste plate is all the products that were made this morning we want to make sure that they were made correctly there are so many wheels turning at one time in a restaurant of high volume like that even a slower one but you want to make sure that what the guest is getting and what they're spending their money on is exactly what you want so for 20 minutes every single day you just taste a little bit of every part of the menu broken down into its small form i mean that can be anywhere from a ranch dressing that was made to the quality of the meat and just making sure that the meat is being aged properly that we're getting it right incorrectly that the salad greens were cut in the right form consistency is so important for people and that's why that's important so yeah taste plate all the way down starting off with pizzas to salads to dressings to i mean side items all the way down to desserts and yeah it's it's a lot i mean that's the 10 to 10 do you not eat breakfast so that you can yeah you have to prepare for that that is breakfast i mean because that's got to be like a lot of food to start a day going into the shift and i remember a lot of a lot of guests being like so we hear you do this taste plate like can we be guest chefs there and i'm like yeah why not like you got to complete the whole taste plate but we can we can set something up like that and people think it's this grand uh this grand event which it's vital in the restaurant because do you do that a jam box i don't um for everything but there are things like the things that we do make every single day

43:54like for the most part well i shouldn't say that i don't i mean we taste and test everything that we produce but it's not like if i'm slicing my meat i will taste one off of each of the off of each of the um loins what they call like the the meat things yeah um and yeah when we don't know what they're called either after we finish each dressing but i don't need to make an event of it because we're so small where me or one other person have our hands on everything so that's what that's the difference but truly i mean and the cool thing is is i've learned about portion control and i've learned about like volume control and we're not a very busy restaurant right at this point but i already kind of know i want my stuff to turn really quick we want to be making stuff daily if not every other day so that we can keep this great product for everyone that's coming into jam box so that's kind of a nice thing too i love it no i mean do you have any regrets or you do miss jays do you miss that volume do you miss i like stimulus i love chaos i'm a guy that is in hell in a slow restaurant like in a restaurant that's not busy i'm like ah i need to break something so i have something to fix like i'm a busy restaurant friday night three deep at the bar hour wait shit going on everywhere i'm in heaven like that is my mother's day valentine's oh god bring it like let's go yes all my favorites i mean just people dread it like just it's so fun and that's how i am i like volume so where franklin is franklin gives me a lot of the things that i missed from jays so in franklin we get lunch pops where i mean we get a nice little push and we get to i get to fight to have low ticket times and get these sandwiches out in a fast where people are thinking now these sandwiches are going to take 10 to 15 minutes and we get them out in three or four minutes to them i mean seeing that i get the ability to walk around the seven eight tables that i have and ask people how their food is and it sometimes

45:56it's really quick and everything is great sometimes we might need to fix something or sometimes it turns into a 15 minute conversation where we just develop a rapport so the things that i miss from jay alexander's like i'm getting i'm getting already but i think it's because i'm bringing them to myself um do i have any regrets no i think jay alexander's taught me so much and everything that i kind of do moving forward they are going to be the basis for that and they taught me hospitality and the quality of food and how to treat people and how to work hard and how to expect more out of people um so all those things are great and where i don't want to call them a stepping stone at all i think that's just a chapter in my life that that ended and this is this is next so i mean i owe so much to them but i can't say that i regret it it's because this is this is going towards my next goal 100 and we'll see where that leads that's so exciting it is that's so exciting um all right let me i have a list of questions here for you all right let's have like whole pages of questions you do uh what is the biggest operational challenge you didn't expect from moving from gm to owner uh the two things the two things that have been very difficult um the biggest thing is marketing it's something that i never had to do at jay alexander's because i used to have someone that would joke and say what would you do if people just stopped coming in tomorrow and i'd always laugh at him and i'd say that's not going to happen like this restaurant is so busy here i mean we're just not going to stop doing what we're doing the right way so now starting up a new company like i said where i think that i'm doing so much and i'm throwing all of this information about jam box into the world my reach is only so far my arms are only so long and it's just kind of crazy to think like we are in franklin we're blasting the internet we're in the newspaper we're on the news and still most of franklin doesn't know we're here

48:01we're on murphysboro road where 25 000 cars pass us a day but they're not looking for jam box i mean we're right there we're yelling hey we're here come eat sandwiches but it's that's crazy so the marketing aspect i'm growing quickly on um and technology is the other thing i mean jay alexander's just as i was leaving really took a huge technology jump um but before we were in all the older systems and just kind of doing it one way and that was he touch yeah and it's i mean doing it that way was perfectly fine because you didn't know any better but now like i threw myself out into a different world i'm not in that level of anything anymore and here we are and so i'm really just trying to embrace ai and trying to embrace any form of technology utilizing instagram and facebook which i really never used um and just trying to figure out how to utilize that to my advantage and to jam box's advantage and really to everyone else's advantage to say hey you need to come try this out because i think you're going to like it so those are those are two big things that have been tough how are you utilizing ai in your restaurant um right now uh answering questions so i mean i utilize i have a i have a few people that i like to reach out to and ask questions but when it comes to restaurants like if they're in the same boat as i am i'm using a little bit ai to get some related information there um utilizing it for some of my posts utilizing it for some ideas when i'm stuck on a name of a sandwich i kind of put in some where my ideas are and where my direction is going but it's pretty cool like especially with chat gbt that i have a section that's just jam it's called jam box support and i mean literally anything i'm trying to the hotel next to us has a lot of people that stay there um that speak predominantly spanish so i had it completely translate my menu to spanish so that i could drop menus over there in hopes that i could bring some more people in where it's just a walking distance um so yeah just learning as i go really with that well it's relatively new technology but there's so many what's the number one report that you like to look at like what's the report that gauges how do you

50:04know if you're being successful besides profitability i mean i'm always looking at sales and i'm always looking at my labor cost those are the two really i i feel like i have a good um i think i have a good thumb pulse or thumb on the pulse of my food cost right now so that one's kind of the least of my worries right now that's something i can worry about in the future a little bit but labor costs and just driving those sales because if the more sales you have the easier everything else is if everything's a percentage then drive that top line sales line and all of a sudden everything else can fall into place every time i look at a pnl with one of my gms or another manager and i go before we look at this i'm going to tell you right now i'm going to tell you the answer because every single month we look at a pnl and i go down food cost liquor beer wine labor and that's 60 right there and then you have all the controllables yeah and i go at the end of the day we're going to get to the very bottom and there's going to be a number and every single time i go increase sales and that number will grow yeah because we're we're airtight and we've negotiated every single thing at the end of the day just get more sales more sales volume volume volume volume make every guest a repeat guest is is what i tell that's our number one mission every day and i go we can spend an inordinate amount of time on all these little details and managing linens to this little thing and it's like that's important there's a big negotiation we get the linens down but like wasting linens yeah that that's gonna save you yeah 50 a week or 30 a week you know like if you focus that time on building relationships people and bringing those people back that's going to drive your number like almost every time i go yeah get more sales more guest count is the number one thing and that's in and out and that's in and out of the restaurant i mean that's the people coming in but that's also the people that are taking care of your people and i think that's important 100 because i think that when you look at when you look at your pnl you have variable

52:04costs and you have fixed costs but in my mind a lot of those variable costs are already fixed yeah you can move them a little bit of a percentage but like so when i'm doing my pnl every week i'm looking at it and it's like i've pretty much type pre-typed numbers in that are going to be there so i have an idea it's like okay i gotta hit the sales number because if i can do an extra if i can do an extra couple thousand my food cost is not going to go up a ton my labor is not going to go up at all because with these people but i also at the same time when we're slower i really can't cut labor one because i need these i've guaranteed these people that i was going to give them full time and that's important to me to keep my promise but also we're so new that tomorrow we could double our sales and if i'm not staffed for it those people coming in are like they're just not ready for volume yet and that's not what i want to be so i'm in these stages where i need to spend money and let's just say waste it a little bit well you just touched on a big thing that the general guest doesn't understand is that this is this is this is when people say oh restaurants that's hard i i tend to go i mean i guess to the average person it's hard but this is what i do every day i understand how hard it is i know every day waking up that i have no freaking clue what's going to happen today and that i could be pulled in 14 different ways and somebody could choke in the restaurant there could be a fire i'm ready i'm ready for my phone rings and i'm like here we go like i just know so it's not hard to me per se because it's a mindset but when people say it's hard what i envision hard is i put everything on the line my family kids i'm opening a new business i want people to know about it i put my heart and soul into creating something that i want everybody to love sometimes we're busy sometimes we're not i have labor i have to pay for this building i have to pay for the food i don't know if you're gonna come i need you guys to come eat

54:08here come try it because this is how i'm able to support everybody and i want to do this for the community i want to create a place that the community is going to love you're going to come in you're going to enjoy it you're going to feel better for being here i'm making good food with quality ingredients come try it and i have to manage labor and i have to continue paying these people and i have to like maybe busy day it might not be busy today might yeah but when you go to subway down the street this is why i say eat local yeah because when you go to subway you're sending money to somebody in you know a different country when you could be supporting tyler and his family and all the people that work there who are also locals that live in the area like that's why local is so important yeah hey we're going to take a quick break to hear a word from our sponsors hey i'm matthew clements with robin's insurance agency you know before i got into insurance i worked in the hospitality space so i do understand firsthand how tough it can be to keep things running smoothly now i love to help business owners like you protect what you've built whether it's a restaurant bar hotel catering operation i know the risks you're up against and how to cover them properly this isn't a one-size-fits-all coverage i'm going to help you find a policy that actually fits your operation your staff and your budget so you can focus on serving guests not stressing about what ifs it's an ever-changing market anything could go wrong if you want to work with someone who knows hospitality from the insides and out reach out to me call my cell phone 863-409-9372 or go to robinsins.com charpies bakery is a locally owned and family operated wholesale bakery providing bread to nashville's best eateries they've been operating in nashville since 1986 providing high quality fresh bread daily for restaurants catering companies hospitals and universities their bread is free from preservatives and artificial additives learn more at charpies.com that's

56:10c-h-a-r-p-i-e-r-s.com or you can give erin mosso a call directly her number 615-319-6453 that's charpies bakery y'all today we are talking as always about super source and you know one cool thing about super source is did you know that they develop most of their cleaning products and chemicals in their in-house facility they're environmentally conscious and only use dyes that are safe for the employees and the environment they carry a number of products for keeping your dishes flatware services floors restrooms laundry basically your entire facility clean bright and smelling and feeling new this is just one of the many reasons super source is taking over this city for dish machine and chemicals you need to call jason ellis his number 770-337-1143 and he would love it if you give him a call and let him come down and just check out your operation meet him say hi see if there's any way he can help he is here to help you succeed that's jason ellis was super source 770-337-1143 black sheep tequila it shares six exclusive styles with the oldest released tequila with a line of six artisanal handcrafted luxury tequilas labor intensive old world handcrafted process produces a single estate small batch line of tequilas for perfect flavor and balance no salt no lime required a true flight black sheep tequila cultivates highland blue weber agave that requires seven to ten years to reach full maturity under the brilliant sunshine as done in the old world approach black sheep tequila continues the handcrafted heritage so much so that they have won double gold at the world san francisco world spirits competition

58:11this is the best tequila in the world and their headquarters is nashville tennessee so these guys are amazing they're doing amazing product everybody i've tasted on has said this is the best tequila i've ever had there's zero burn it is just delicious you need to call your ajax turner rep today they have a brand new amogrande which is their their entry level line so you can have the best tequila in the world as your well yes this is a true thing so pick it up it find liquor stores everywhere look for black sheep tequila or order it today through ajax turner and that's why this industry is so damn hard yeah i mean it's in you know being a being a new business owner and being a local business owner i mean i constantly am fighting with myself internally to be like well we should i i could do this by myself right now like we are slow enough like during these hours like i could be here by myself just paying myself and nobody else but like i can't because that's not how you build business i can't assume that we're going to be slow every day i walk in there saying we're going to be busier today and i amp up the staff for that and we find ways that all of us are a little bought in i mean we have a small team but that's kind of the idea is that together we're going to build this this isn't going to be tyler's jam box this is going to be our jam box and that's what i sold them on when i hired them too i don't know what's happening to me i want this jam box just to be a phenomenal fun experience that people can come in we have fun at work there's no pressures it's exciting and here we are but this could be something that turns into five locations 20 locations 100 locations who knows but right now these are the important parts together i don't know you know we with going from faint la force to the franklin location and operating both of them at the same time it's a lot right now so i just i don't right now i want to focus and just make what we have successful i want it to be fun i want to enjoy coming to work every day i want to make a little bit of money and i

01:00:11want to be able to have that free time if i have to break away to do a family event that i can that i don't feel pressured that i have to be at work or be in have to miss it because i have to be at work but i mean we'll see or you can come do a podcast if you need to yeah yeah and come hang out and talk about the business and work on the business and and then i'm gonna head to the business and then i'm gonna be there and knock it out so i like your shirt though that jam box shirt is really cool thank you ai helped me develop this one really yeah yeah it's a it's got like an old boom box with a bunch of jam splattered all over or behind it yep jam box sandwich i was out like the uniform for people to wear uh this these i have a few of these shirts we have for jam box i always tell them that i gave them all a different type of jam box logoed shirt but if they want to wear any type of band t or music related to kind of give their own personality to it they can do that too which is kind of funny because a few people have come in with shirts that are matching to the sandwiches i've got one guy that gave he wears the purple rain shirt and i'm like that's a great sandwich dude you can't you can't hire for that that's amazing that's like a thing like i'm gonna wear the shirts of the sandwiches there you go that's badass who's your favorite band of all time how old are you uh 36 36 okay so you're a millennial but you're i'm on the edge you're 89 when i 89 yeah okay when i uh growing up my mom was in the country my dad listened to rock and roll so whoever's car i was in i had an interesting mix yeah but whoever's car i was in was really what it was kind of pushing for both sides so garth brooks heard a lot of that uh in the 90s and then in my dad's i mean he loved him he liked led zeppelin okay um i remember i was big with kiss um really yeah there was a i think it was johnny bravo cartoon he had a saying that was from a kiss lyric and i just said it a lot when i was little was the same i'm trying i can't think of what it was i can't remember but i remember

01:02:15being with my dad and my uncle and they're like what did you just say i want to rock and roll all night no no it wasn't a it wasn't a it wasn't a common one it was just one from like one of the middle of their songs and they're like that's a kiss lyric and then they showed me and i mean at that age face paint cool uh yeah i mean all the above so i remember kiss was a big influence at that point but then kind of moving on as being a millennial love i love to usher usher i'm a big fan of if you walk into jam box the personal touch i have in there when you're ordering a sandwich if you look to the right there's a line of music there and that's the opening um the opening strokes to usher yeah so most people don't know that but that's my eat town there i that's on my workout playlist it should be and every time i'm in them like yeah i get i get after it man i think it was the most played song in 2000 to 2010 it hit some kind of award for that but oh yeah good one and everyone knows it everybody knows it yeah that's a good one okay so usher so 80s and 90s music isn't necessarily i mean i guess that's kind of your jam that's right when you were kind of growing up yeah and i mean to put myself in like if i i mean i was definitely as i'm watching some of these music videos i like to play more of the 80s rock bands um especially during the lunch crowd you're talking hair metal like poison deaf leopard all the above cinderella warrant warrant yeah so all those videos are kind of playing but like when i'm opening up i usually have the 90s hits on there more 90s pop because that was big so in sync and britney spears all of those kind of doing that thing towards the end i mean that was that was what was popular when i was in middle school ish but yeah still love i mean it's funny because now listening to them i will on my run playlists i now will hear another one that i've forgotten about from the 80s and now i have big hair bands mixed in there with a little bit of hip hop and some high energy country while

01:04:16i'm running and it's kind of funny so if you like it it's you know same thing with like that cleetus the music nostalgia of walking in and seeing yeah all this 80s and 90s stuff so if that's your generation this open a conversation with somebody talk about that come in talk about music i mean i love talking about music music i could talk about music for hours on end anything with film or movies is it just all music sticking with them the the music for now jam box really sticking towards the the cassette tape kind of rolling with that theme on it i mean in there we i created this cool um picture of cassette tapes it took 225 cassette tapes that we put on the wall we framed it um i didn't realize how many people would stand there and stare at it looking for specific bands so where it was very difficult to get 225 cassette tapes a lot of them are just blank cassette tapes so now as i get mx yeah so now as i get some relevant ones i will just pop those off and replace them and put some new ones on i just got a bruce springsteen up there i just got a um uh what was the last one i just put on there i can't remember but i'm putting some new ones in there because now i see people are doing that plus we have three jam boxes in the store and it's kind of cool to see while people are waiting to get their sandwich i hear them saying to each other that's the one i had yeah that's the sony one i had that that one over there that one is and i always tell them shane when he sold me this idea of jam box he had bought um one of those jam boxes and he's like this is our mascot and he got it off ebay for 75 bucks broken and it just it's funny because it's just it's a good story with it but like that's it's hard to come by when i was i have a i have an old ford ranger truck yeah that's sitting outside and it has a tape player in it oh gee i think it's stock from 1999 has a tape player in it and when i was a freshman in high school me and my buddy brian loved pearl jam like loved pearl jam and he would make these live and

01:06:19rare pearl jam albums this is like 94 right 93 94 you're you're very young at this time but he would make these like unplugged and random stuff from like the early early 90s and he would make the cassette case so he'd get like these three by five cards he would cut them exactly like the shape and then he would go to like magazines and he would put pearl jam and he would cut out like live almost like a ransom note and then he would type out the the actual songs live from where they were and he made these little jackets cool and these live and rare tapes and they were the coolest thing because it was like from the jeremy single from london it had yellow lead better on it so he got this yellow lead better and then there was a live version and then dirty frank and all these other songs i just i remember being a freshman high school these are so cool he called me about three or four years ago and he goes hey do you remember those live and rare tapes that i made yeah those are the best because i found them cool because i don't have a tape player and i go i have one so i have all these original from when i was a freshman to high school live and rare cassette tapes whenever i drive my truck i listen to them and it's it's really cool it's like it brings back all these memories and nostalgia is huge yeah it's a long story to say i love tape feeling i mean that's and that's what we're trying to do is i mean i think everyone should be trying to provide an experience and i think that's what people want now i mean it's not people don't go out to eat just to eat you're not eating for survival if you want to do that you go to the grocery store and do it yourself but you're coming out for an experience no matter what it is and i think that's cool but kind of going with what you're saying another thing that has come into multiple conversations for me are people just kind of talking about the development and how yeah i mean we listen to cassette tapes do you even know what a cassette tape is and then it turns into you know yeah we went to cds and we had the cds and the walkman in our pocket and

01:08:25i mean this just imagining that giant cd player carrying it around and even i remember one of the first cars that i bought i grabbed my cds out of the glove box and i put them in the new car and i didn't even think about it but there's no cd didn't have a cd player like that's wild if you wanted to have the cd changer in your car some people had it under their seat and they had the really fancy and it's like a 10 disc changer really cool like and it would and now you just stream everything i mean you used to have to go and go to the tape store or go to the uh go get your cds and pull them out of the the wrap and that was exciting and you'd have the stuff in the little booklet and now everything is streamed and and that's okay that's cool i love that i can get anything that's really neat i'm a big fan of streaming music i think i think generation x and and boomers like but there's a there's a whole thing they talked about how messed up it's been because you had to buy records and you had to have this huge rec collection and then you had eight tracks and then you had cassette tapes and then you had cds and now gen z just gets to oh apple music spotify i have everything and it's like i had to buy my collection four freaking times how much money i spent on music in my life and now these kids just get to stream it yeah i can listen to whatever i want the day it comes out i have it like you never camped out at sam goody overnight because the new pearl jam album was coming in i mean that was it you couldn't buy tickets i remember i saw pearl jam in 1994 at murphy center that's my favorite band if you can't tell yeah and we camped out overnight to be the first one in line at ticketmaster to buy tickets to get in there was no online sales there was no pre-sale there was no it was just you had to camp out and literally be the first person in line to get that ticket i would honestly rather camp out than sit in the queue and tap my phone as fast as i can just to get denied i have i have spent the night in the snow for a concert before i wanted to do

01:10:30it in college one time and that was it it did we did not expect what concert it was well it was for kid cutty okay because that was when i was in college but it was just a friend of i like hey let's go get some try and get some front row tickets and we were waiting in line and this is in indiana but it wasn't supposed to snow like it wasn't it didn't seem like it was gonna be that cold and we got a light dusting but yeah we stayed overnight and did you get front row we got front row yeah it was exciting it was a fun story yeah that's amazing that's just how was the show it was great it's funny uh who was it he was um who is his irrelevant anymore but bob was his opener and i thought he did a better job than the actual performance which stinks to say but um i mean again it's about the experience the experience of that show i'll never forget because we waited out it snowed on us we got tickets first thing in the morning when it opened at seven or eight o'clock and then the show itself i mean it didn't even matter how it was because that experience kind of made the whole thing and but you know i love it when an opening band is better than the main act honestly because you feel like you're on to something or that we saw young the giant play and milky chance open form and i was excited to see milky chance i like milky chance but milky chance like rocked my face off and i was like that was the best damn performance young the giant was great i enjoyed the show but like milk i was so blunt because i had no expectations i love it when i have no expectations and somebody way over delivers there you go it's the best okay we're at our time dude it's been so nice having you here thank you for coming in and talking about jam box and just you know shooting the breeze with me for a little while thanks for and uh we do one final thing it's the gordon food service final thought so you get to take us out man whatever you want to say you're speaking to the audience you can say what literally whatever you want you take us out put you on the spot go uh you know in in enjoy life everything you know if you think things are hard don't worry about it like we're gonna figure it out i think that when

01:12:32you're in the moment a lot of people have told me to be present and i am learning how to be more present because in the restaurant industry it is hard because everything is moving a mile a minute but being present is very important and when you take a step back from everything that you're in and all the things that you're doing i think you realize how great things are even when you're having a terrible day and when everything's on fire and you're trying to put one out at a time and they just keep getting on fire like take a step back and realize the accomplishment of the day whether you worked eight hours whether you work 12 hour a day a 14 hour day or even if you're just at home like so many things are going and so much is expected out of all of us no matter what your role is and i think that since i've i've changed and i've taken on this new this new role and this new opportunity i've been able to look at things differently world differently family differently work differently and where before i was working so hard but when i stepped out of it i didn't realize how hard i was working and i was working really hard and things are so much simpler than we make them and if we can simplify everything and realize how simple they are i think everyone can be a little bit happier so don't forget jam boxes in franklin please come see jam box we're going to give you a great sandwich we're going to make you feel nostalgic we've got some great art in there it's just a great experience and come say hi um yeah that's what i got i'm gonna give you a round of applause at that one man that was fantastic i don't i don't reply to the final ones but i loved that final thought appreciate it um tyler thank you for joining us today and i hope that i wish you all the best of success there and you will see me and my family i'm looking forward to jam box for sure cool everybody big thank you to tyler lektanski for joining us in studio for uh this episode of nashville restaurant radio i loved that final thought live in the moment it's so important to just get out of this grind more time with

01:14:41your family more time focusing on the things that help your business and to go back to the initial talk about the nashville area restaurant alliance that's what i want to do this is what i do the business side of this thing negotiating these deals for you saving you money saving you time i want to help you get that time back and we're gonna do it we're gonna do it again thank you to tyler what a great final thought just just amazing and i would like for you to go again nara nashville.com click the nara connect button and register we're gonna run out of seats so i want to make sure that you get your spot if you are an owner if you're a general manager if you're an executive chef i'd love to have you here so uh music city center august 14th we will see you there everybody gets a free t-shirt you'll get one of these snazzy nara t-shirts i got two different kinds one that says nashville area restaurant alliance one that just says nara across the front we're gonna have giveaways i've got some custom nike's that we're gonna be giving away as door prizes lots of fun stuff guys they're just gonna keep having more things and of course the giving kitchen we are excited to be raising money you will not have to pay any money towards giving kitchen all of the vendors who are going to be there are making a donation to the giving kitchen and we hope to present them with a check so uh they're going to be our charity of choice for the nashville area restaurant alliance and we're going to be donating to them often so we're very excited to have them there thank you for listening today we hope that you guys are being safe love you guys bye