Brandon Styll launches Nashville Restaurant Radio with an unplanned first episode prompted by the rapidly unfolding COVID-19 crisis. He shares the origin story of the show, an idea he had at 21 while waiting tables and bartending, and frames the podcast as a forum for...
Brandon Styll launches Nashville Restaurant Radio with an unplanned first episode prompted by the rapidly unfolding COVID-19 crisis. He shares the origin story of the show, an idea he had at 21 while waiting tables and bartending, and frames the podcast as a forum for Nashville's restaurant community to share stories, ideas, and conversations.
The bulk of the episode tackles the question every Nashville operator was wrestling with in mid-March 2020: what should restaurants actually do as the Final Four cancels, sports leagues shut down, and guests stop coming through the door. Brandon walks through specific operational responses he is hearing about, from single-serve menus and condiments to ramped-up curbside and delivery, and warns that to-go supplies will be the next toilet paper.
He also raises a more uncomfortable question relayed from a recent conversation: are restaurants being responsible by posting we are sanitized, come dine with us messages, or should they be telling guests to stay home. Brandon invites listeners to weigh in on the Facebook page and promises a follow-up episode Monday.
"I don't think you put a message out there at all because I think you shut up. We've never experienced this. We don't know what's going to happen."
Brandon Styll (relaying a colleague), 11:23
"The to-go supplies are going to go pretty quick, and it's going to be the next toilet paper and hand sanitizer."
Brandon Styll, 10:49
"Should we be telling people to stay away from our restaurants. Stay home. Let's try and smash the curve, so to speak."
Brandon Styll, 12:46
"When you have a staff that somebody comes into work and they don't have any symptoms, but they're with people all night long, and all of a sudden everybody gets sick and you've got to close your doors, what are you going to do?"
Brandon Styll, 14:44
00:00Well, good afternoon, Restaurant World. My name is Brandon Styll, and I'll be your host today for Nashville Restaurant Radio. This is a new show that I was starting and was going to start in a week or two, but with this new outbreak and all the excitement that's happening in the past couple of weeks, I thought I would go ahead and put out an episode today. So thanks for joining me, and wow, I am so excited to be joining you guys right here right now. This is a dream of mine that I thought about when I was 21 years old, and we didn't have the opportunity to do podcasts or anything fun like that, but I had this dream of creating a radio station that people like me and people like my friends and people in this business could listen to. It was all-inclusive. It could be kind of an everything show. So that's what we're going to do here today, and we're going to start this off. I'm going to give you a little bit of backstory on me about this idea and what this is going to be.
01:00Again, thanks for joining me here today. So this idea began when I was 21 years old, I was waiting tables, bartending in the Nashville area, and I went to MTSU in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and I would go out after work like we do. I got in this business because I like to take care of people. I also like cash. I like the people that I worked with. I felt like the community was just amazing, and we would go out after work. You'd make a bunch of money, then you'd go out drinking, and we'd tell stories. We would share kind of in all of the crazy, beautiful dysfunction that this business was. We'd sit around and we'd have beers, we'd do shots, and we would tell about the guy at table 24 that wanted 19 different subs, and then they wanted bread for the entire table with waters, and the two little women that wanted a bowl of lemons and a bunch of sugar packets. They wanted to make their own lemonade, and we clearly sold lemonade, but that's what they wanted to do.
02:01There was a bit of joy in just kind of sharing some of this stuff, and I thought, hey, if there was a radio station that we could listen to, we could call in and tell these stories. I remember I worked at a restaurant in Brentwood, Tennessee, and one night, and there was a girl there for her 18th birthday, and her dad apparently had hired a male stripper, and the guy brought a little boombox in, and he turned it on, and started to get on the table, and Naomi Judd was there with her husband, and she walked towards the bathroom and tapped the guy on the shoulder and was like, this is inappropriate, but the guy saw that it was Naomi Judd, flipped out, fell on the ground, called the police, said that she assaulted him. It was a whole comical event, but the news found out, but if you weren't there, if you didn't know, how do you know that? So I thought, how fun would it be to have a medium for everybody to do that? So that's what this is. This is Nashville Restaurant Radio, a radio station that we can listen to. We're going to be interviewing chefs, we're going to be interviewing general managers, we're going to be interviewing vendors, we're going to be interviewing guests, we're going to be interviewing social media marketing people, we're going to have ideas, we're going to bring up conversations.
03:10If you have topics that you want to talk about, please go to our Facebook page at facebook.com forward slash Nashville Restaurant Radio. And from there, we'll be able to start conversations, continue conversations. I just really want to make this a forum where we can, as a Nashville restaurant community, can get together. I'm going to make this podcast fun, share our voice. Something that has a really cool intro and there's music and fun sound effects, we're going to do all of that. But right now, this is the inaugural episode because here in Nashville, we've had a tragedy. We've had a tornado the week before last, which has taken out a bunch of our restaurants, a bunch of our brethren are hurting right now. Everybody's pitching in. Nashville as a city is just absolutely freaking amazing. We've pulled together, we're doing what we can, and on top of that, now we have this coronavirus that is taking over the country.
04:11And the reason why I'm doing this podcast today is I really wanted to get out there, just all this stuff that's in my brain. I've got so many things going on inside my brain that I just want to share. And I'm not putting out my opinions because I'm right, not putting out my opinions because I think you should do what I do, but because I've been in this business for 25 years and I've worked with some really brilliant people. I've been in over a thousand kitchens in Nashville, Knoxville, Memphis, Huntsville, Florence, Decatur, Bowling Green, Louisville, kind of been all over the place. And I'm not sure that any of us have seen any of this. But if I get this out there, I'm hoping that some of my brilliant chefs and restaurant owners that I've worked with are going to chime in. And hopefully we can all share in this so that we can figure out how we can take care of our guests in a better way. The Final Four is canceled. Disneyland is closed. Disney World is closed.
05:12There's no spring training. The baseball season is on hold. I turned on the TV last night. No, there's no Preds game on. I was depressed. There's no NBA basketball. There's no concerts. There's nothing out there right now. And what's next? I think we're all confused. Yesterday, it became real. Yesterday, it became a situation that every single one of us had to start pivoting. We had to figure out what we're going to do. So I own a company. It's called New Light Hospitality Solutions. And what I do is I'm a restaurant consultant. So I work with restaurants to help them increase operational efficiency. Right. So if you're a restaurant owner, what I do is I come in and I just help game plan. I put some stuff together. I kind of on demand operations management. So I've got some great clients in town. And one of the things I've been working on is just brainstorming with them what we can possibly do, what our response is going to be and what we need to do. So I wanted to go over kind of some of that brainstorming session.
06:13And I've talked to some marketing gurus, some social media marketing guys. And I just wanted we had some good, lively conversation that I wanted to bring up. So, again, this conversation needs to be I'd love to have you put your comments in. I'd like to do another podcast on Monday. So it's Friday today, Monday. I want to come back. I'd love to talk about what you have to say. I love to talk about what you're doing out there. So send me put some comments in there. I want to hear them. Let's go back and forth. Let's start a debate. So, again, this is this is to help you. Is there something that you haven't thought of? Is there something we need to be doing? What are we doing? What is your staff doing? This is this is a whole crazy thing. So if you're an independent restaurateur, you're a restaurant. What are you doing right now? Are your sales down because sales right now across the board are starting to drop. People are scared. People don't want to. People are panicking.
07:14Now, me personally, I'm not I'm not scared. I'm not panicking. I don't want to panic. I'm a healthy 41 year old male who, you know, apparently this thing 80 percent of the time doesn't. It's kind of like getting the flu. That doesn't mean I'm out licking sidewalks and, you know, licking my hands and high fiving people. I have a responsibility to not do that. I've kind of been at home a lot. But also, you know, I recognize that what the CDC is saying is wash your hands. Don't go out and don't go out on large gatherings and be irresponsible. If you've got a cold, if you've got a cough, stay home. Don't go out. Don't spread this thing. So us as restaurants, what do you do? All of a sudden, people aren't coming in. We're getting slower. And I've seen lots of responses from people. I've of course have social media and I'm looking at people posting. We are monitoring the situation as best we possibly can.
08:18We are sanitizing every single thing. We've increased our sanitation. We're doing all the things we need to do. Come dine with us. Come on out. We're the greatest, cleanest restaurant in the world. You should come out and eat with us. OK, it's one way to do it. Put that out there on social media, let everybody know what you're doing. That's very general. I've seen some very general posts. And then I've seen some very specific posts. I've seen some people go out there posting. We are specifically wiping down every single menu. We've got rid of our menus and we're using single serve menus. We're throwing the menus away after you use them. We're getting rid of salt and pepper shakers. We're going to single serve salt, single serve pepper. No more sugar caddies. No more communal ketchup, mustard, you know, oil and vinegar at the table. It's all going to be on demand if we're going to put butcher paper down in between every single person that dines. We're going to change out every single tablecloth.
09:21Absolutely. All of those things are a must. One of the things I'm really recommending is ramping up what you're doing for your to go and delivery program. So if people aren't coming in to dine inside your building, put it out there, get out there as fast as you can that you need to be doing delivery and to go. And that's the safest thing. I really feel like if you are a responsible operator, you're going to be putting out a we have curbside to go. Don't come in the restaurant. I mean, I'm a big fan of another topic we're going to talk about in just a moment. I won't delve into that yet. But some other things that people are doing is they are they're going to single serve cutlery. They're doing paper plates. We're doing paper towels because this thing is transmitted through surfaces. So every time somebody sits down at your table, you completely clean that entire surface, give them a brand new surface to dine from.
10:23And all those things are awesome. I think those are things we need to be pivoting towards. And I think with the recent weather issues, it's going to make it more challenging because I know that the local warehouse for Cisco is down. And that's a challenge. I know those guys. My heart goes out to all of you over there. I know they're working their tail off to get this thing done. But the to go supplies are going to go pretty quick. And it's going to be the next toilet paper and hand sanitizer, I believe, is to go items and single serve items inside this restaurant. In the city, and that's all the things that we need to be doing to take care of our guests right now. But I think that the bigger question and again, I'm bringing this stuff up because I want to open the the the dialogue in the conversation I had today with somebody as I was discussing, what should we do in response to what message should we put out there? And this person said, I don't think you put a message out there at all because I think you shut up.
11:27And I said, what? He goes, we've never experienced this. We don't know what's going to happen. We need to do absolutely nothing. And we do absolutely nothing. We can wait and see what happens this week. And let's wait. I think all the people that are out there, this is what the person said. I think all the people that are out there putting all of these grand statements on Facebook and putting out this big message that, hey, you need to come dine here is good and all. But what are you doing? Why are you doing that? Because you're just putting something out there on paper, on social media that somebody is going to screenshot that somebody you're giving people a chance to come back at you and go, there's mass hysteria. The CDC is saying, stay away from large gatherings. And what do you do? You're telling people, no, it's fine. Don't listen to CDC. Come out to us. We wash our hands now, which is interesting because, yeah, we wash our hands. We've always washed our hands. But should we go against what every major sports team is doing, what every major person is doing?
12:31Should we be telling people to stay away from our restaurants? Should we be telling people right now? Should we be responsible to what this nation is saying? And should we say, don't come eat inside of our building? Stay home. Let's let's try and smash the flat and the curve, so to speak. Let's try and stop this thing from spreading. Are we being selfish by thinking that if we wash our hands and we put out there that we're the cleanest, that if we hold these gatherings, if we have a bunch of people come into our building, are we doing the responsible thing? And I thought about that and I thought, no, no, we got we got to have people come out. People need to have their entertainment dollar needs to be spent. People are going to go crazy at home. You've got to come out. And there's going to be somebody who's going to try and capitalize on this. Are you doing the right thing?
13:33So that's a big deal. That's something that I want everybody out there to think about. I'd love to hear your comments on that. Should we be posting on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram, these massive notes that say we have everybody here is safe, certified. We're sanitizing every square inch of our restaurant. We are seating tables six feet apart from each other. And we're doing all of these things. Please come out and gather in our locations. Is that what we should be doing? Are we kind of part of the problem? I don't know. So this is this is what I want to ask you out there. I want to know what you're doing. I'd like to open the conversation because you got a lot of people out there that don't know what to expect. And my thoughts are, if you're asking me, is that in the next coming weeks, they're going to tell you that restaurants are going to have mandatory curfews. I think it's going to get worse before it gets better. I think that servers and people in the industry are going to start coming down with this virus.
14:38I think it's going to continue to spread, hopefully at a slower rate now, because we're not having these large gatherings. But when you have a staff that somebody comes into work and they don't have any symptoms, but they're with people all night long and they're around everybody and all of a sudden everybody gets sick that works with you and you've got to close your doors. What are you going to do? And I mean, those are the things that we've got to start planning for. We've got to start figuring out what we're going to do in those situations, how to mitigate that. I know everybody out there is. I know that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to mitigate that. And that's just part of the gamble. But is there something else we can do? Is there? Can we can we ramp up delivery? Can we close the doors and say, if you'd like to come down here, we're doing to go, can we do everything? Can we do to go? Can we do online ordering? Can we deliver every single possible thing that we've got? We've got to be doing something along those lines. So I ask this because I'd like for you to go to our Facebook page.
15:40I'd like to hear what you're doing. I'd like to hear your side of the story. Should we be posting on Facebook? Should we wait a week? Should we tell people if you are sick, do not come to my restaurant? If you have a cold, if you have a sniffle, if you're sneezing, do not come to my restaurant because I don't want to get anybody sick. Or do we close the doors? Do you post? Do you bring in all the single serve items? Are you a bartender? Are you a server? Do you work at the front door? Are you a busboy? What is your title? What do you do? And what are you doing? Do you have ideas? Sometimes the management, sometimes the owners, we go through and we make all these plans, but there's so many ideas out there that everybody has. So hopefully I've created a forum for everybody to do that and not wanting to create any kind of panic, not wanting to create any hysteria, but did want to open up a conversation that I know a lot of people are having together.
16:44They're having together inside their four walls and they're wondering whether or not they're doing the right thing. And hopefully there's something here that you can take away. Hopefully there's been something that's helped you think of a better way that we can all get through this together. So again, looking forward to what you have to say and I hope you all be safe out there. And if you like this podcast, I'd love it if you'd share it. Many people can hear this and we're going to have a lot more of these. I'm going to start doing a weekly podcast and like I said, I can't wait to have my amazing friends that are in this community here in Nashville come in and talk with all of you about their story, what's hot, what they feel like is their secret sauce. And I just can't wait to share that with you. So please share, like on the Facebook page, go comment and get out there and be safe. Love you guys. Bye.