#theroundup 2-19-24

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02:09Welcome 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 will be joined shortly with our co-host Caroline Galzin for this very special edition of The Roundup. Yes, The Roundup. We are back. This episode, if you are unfamiliar, is where Caroline and I just talk. We just kind of catch up. We both run very busy lives and there's a lot of things happening in this industry and a lot of times we'll sit in the studio and talk and I go, we should just record this. So that's what this is. We go around and we talk about hot topics that are going on in the city. New restaurant openings, closures, what's hot, what's not. We talk about our own restaurants. It's just a fun episode that we do to kind of round up what's been going on in our lives and this is the episode today. This is a fun one. We talk about everything. It's not super duper long but it's good.

03:30It's always good to just to hang out and talk to Caroline. But I need your help out there. You'll notice that the cover art for this episode is it's just like a picture of me. It's nothing special. I would love a really cool roundup hashtag the roundup cover art for this episode. For these type of episodes, if you're good out there, I'd love to do kind of a contest of some kind. If you are like digital design and graphics, if you want to create a artwork for when we do the roundup, I would love to have artwork for this. Also, if you're a musician, I am looking to redo the intro to this podcast. My Welcome to Nashville Restaurant Radio. We want to redo that. So if you're a musician out there and you want to write a new intro to the show, we'll use it. I would love to have some musician out there do an intro to Nashville Restaurant Radio. I like the heavy, like that hard, you know, maybe I'm a Howard Stern guy and that's what he does and so I copy him. But if you want to come up with something different, I'm down. We would love to love to do this. So I don't have a lot to talk about today.

04:48Hopefully you had a great Valentine's Day and hopefully you've got, hopefully made a ton of money and everything worked out really well. We talk about that today on the episode. Where are the people? Where are all the people and what are you doing out there to increase sales? There's a lot of that conversation today in this episode. So hopefully you enjoy it, but we are going to, let's get started with that. I don't want to wait any longer. Let's do it. The Roundup. Great. Hi. Here we are. Okay. The Roundup. Super excited today to welcome in Caroline Galzin. It's me. I'm back. I forgot to do an intro for this show. We haven't done a Roundup in a long time. I think we're doing it now. I think we're doing the intro right now. This is the intro? This is it. Fantastic. Yeah. Hi everybody. Welcome to the Roundup. We haven't done a Roundup in a long time.

05:50What is a Roundup? Roundup is where we just kind of like do a like hot topics, just like what's in the news, what's going on around town, just kind of like a what's happening episode. Um, what's happening with you, Brandon? Oh my gosh. I'm still, I'm still trying to figure out how to do three restaurants. Okay. And we, um, we moved GMs. Our GM from Maribor went over to Chagos and our GM from Chagos, who used to be the GM at Maribor, went back to Maribor. Now that's quite a switch of concepts that they're running kind of from fine dining to casual. Yeah. Yeah. How's it going? We just did it. Just did it. It's brand new. And I think I'm really excited about it. We were in Chagos. We had no idea what to expect. And we figured it would just be slammed and all this stuff. And then it's just different. And I think you have to look at personalities and people. And we just felt like we could put the right person in the right place. And it's always a tough, that's one of those tough decisions you make doing what I do or what you do is having to be able to say, Hey, I'm going to, this is going to work better than how do you go to those people and say, I'm going to uproot everything that you do. And I'm going to movie to a new side of town and a whole new staff. And is that cool? And to have people that were like, yeah, no, let's try it out, man. I'm all about it to see the vision and to start executing it. But that's been a lot of time and energy and just thoughts and preparation to make that happen. Sure. And so that's, that's kind of what I've been doing in my world. We'll stay tuned to hear how that's going. I'm pretty sure it's going to be great. So and what's going on around town, Brandon? What are our hot topics right now? So we have some James Beard nominees. Yes. Since the last time we talked, three of them of kisser, kisser before was for kisser. Um, and then, um, D Andrews bakery were best new

07:56restaurant and the best outstanding bakery. Then two best chefs were Trevor and Arnold mint. That's right. My next door neighbor got nominated for a James Beard ward. Who's your neighbor? Oh, at Chagos directly next door to us at Chagos. Yeah, I, I love Arnold's restaurant. I really do. That's a go-to for me and Tony for his delicious night. It's excellent. And they, what I love about it too, is they have so many great things on the menu that like, you can always go and get your favorites, but they are always mixing it up and always keeping it fresh. So I say, I say very well deserved and really just, I think it's so lovely to see the way that Arnold and his sister are carrying on their family legacy in that neighborhood. I think it's great. It is great. And Anna, Arnold's sister is super sweet. She's super amazing and I love being neighbors with them. Honestly, even there it's, they're really excited. Cause like we have another bar next door to us. And so we, um, they've just been lovely. They're lovely to work with. Lovely. It's nice to see them on a regular basis. Just stop by and say hi and you know, the whole thing.

09:06So a former James Beard nominee, uh, Andy Little just, it was just announced that he is the director of culinary for strategic hospitality. Yes, that is a big news item. And I texted Max Goldberg the other day and I said, so you were in studio three weeks ago and he goes, we have some big things on the rise and I go, give me something. And I go, you couldn't have nothing. You give me nothing on this. And he goes, yeah, well, you know, that's a, it's a big gap. It's so great. I love that for all of them. It is. I don't know. I mean, I, I, they posted a picture of their team and I was just looking at like their leadership team and I was like, God bless. How do you fail with that team? I mean, it's, it's, it's impressive. I didn't know that they needed that many people. Oh yeah. I mean, think about how many places they're running. Director of airports, director of hospitality, director of operations, director of this. It was like, man, there's a lot of people in there.

10:08And you realize how many, how hard Jordan's job is to wrangle everything and keep it all in place. Jordan is really one of the most impressive people I know. Truly. I said this in the interview with Max. I was like, I don't, Jordan has just been like the, she's so kind and she's just the nicest person. She has, and you know, I've spent enough time with her over the years that she really is that nice. It's not, you know, it's not just a professional thing. We should have Jordan on the show. I have thought about that. That would be a great interview. Let's get her in here. I've asked her many times. And let me say too, not only does she do so much for strategic, she's really involved with Lidam as well. I don't know where she finds the time or how she does it. Let's have her in the show just so she can give me some, some energy tips. Let's do it. Jordan, you're on the clock. We're going to get you in here to do a show because we have, we, we love you. There's been, there's been some new restaurants that have opened.

11:11Have you been to Tio fun yet? No, but I really want to go. I love those guys and it looks like such an awesome spot. I did not make it over to the friends and family for that. And I'm like kicking myself because it looks amazing. I'm just looking over Eater Nashville's top. What is this thing right here? It is the hottest new restaurants in February, 2024. What do you think they are? Oh God. I mean, definitely Tio fun. I would say Rob Higgins places, a supper club, jar, those spots, those just open bungalow 10. Yup. We're going to have Rob on the show. Yes, we're going to have Rob on the show. I think next week we're going to have Rob on the show. I love what he's doing in Hillsborough Village. I do too. He's, he's a great operator. They've got Sabel's. Are you familiar with Sabel's? Oh, actually, yes, I am. Sabel's? Somebody who, somebody who used to work with us, worked there, I think, when, kind of helped them get open.

12:17They opened it back in September. Mark, Matt Minold and Stephanie Sabeli opened this 21 and over Inglewood bar back in September. It's a new one. Bad idea. Have you been to bad idea yet? I haven't, but I, it's, it's definitely at the top of the list. Have you been? I did. I did go to the friends and family on this one. And Alex Birch was there pouring wine, doing the, I was, it was one of those times where I genuinely hated the fact that I'm an alcoholic, where he was pouring this wine for, I brought a friend who was a general manager of Maribol and I brought him in. He was trying the wine and I was just smelling it, which is never a good idea. Cause when it's really good, you're like, Oh, this is delicious. And you know, you can't drink it. Cool ass place. It's in like an old church. And he has two like private dining rooms in the back, which were like green rooms for, I don't know what they're, it's, it's a really neat, beautiful spot. The food was good.

13:18Drinks were good. I enjoyed my Pellegrino or definitely at the top of the list for me. You know, I don't get out that much, but you went to Joe Muir, didn't you? I did actually. And, and I just say, I don't get out that much, but I have been to Joe Muir. We were going to a show at Marathon and wanted to have a martini and a snack before the show. So we bopped by, I thought it was cool. It was a vibe. I mean, you definitely have to be into that kind of scene. It's got like very like Vegas steakhouse Sinatra throwback type of vibes. But, but I liked it. I liked it. What's your favorite, like if you're going out, like what's your favorite place to go eat? Like if you're Yolan, zero questions, it's not, listen, it's not the everyday place, it's not in the budget, but I don't even have to think about it. It's, I think it's one of the best restaurants in the country. Not only at Nashville. I do not disagree. Not one ounce of meat disagrees. Phenomenal. Phenomenal. Yolan. But if you're just going to go out, it's Tuesday night and you're just kind of hungry and you want to go eat, like what's your favorite type of food?

14:25Um, you know what? Oh God, I really, I hate to say this, but I'm going to be honest. I hate to say this because I can't point to an independent place that is serving this style of cuisine. Chewies? No. No, I can think of lots of great independent Mexican places. Mas Tacos, I go all the time. Actually. I still go to Mas Tacos. I love it. My favorite style of food to eat is tapas. I love Spanish and I love tapas. So, um, if I just am like looking for just a go-to, I love to go off tapas with that said, um, I, you know, I was at the beginning of those saying international market, we go there a lot. That's a good, that's a go-to for us. Um, and it's not so much a dinner place, but the bar side of Bastion, Bastion nachos are a dinner for me. Bastion nachos. That's a common, that's a common meal for me. So, and I do a lot of DoorDash probably more than I should. And my go-to DoorDash is, uh, one of two things, otaku ramen and Greco.

15:31Those are my top two DoorDashes. I love it. So I don't, I've never do DoorDash. I don't, I don't do anything. I don't do any of those things. Did you take out ever? No. Do you cook every night? No. Well, how, what do you, what do you just eat at the restaurant? Yeah. I'll either eat at the restaurant or my wife will make something or I'll pick up sushi. We go to like Eastern peak or there's a, um, another local place right on the street that does, uh, sushi and so she'll call and we'll pick up like Panera for the kids and then I'll go pick up sushi. The Hawaii roll is my favorite over it. Okay. Speaking of sushi, I have a little bit of insider knowledge about a new concept that is coming to Nashville next year, allegedly, um, is, uh, lettuce entertain you is bringing their sushi son concept to Nashville, allegedly. Um, Lettuce entertain you. Yeah. So lettuce is the company that owns Maggiano's. They're probably nationally most well-known for Maggiano's, but they also have, they have a ton of places.

16:34They have, um, Shaw's is one of their concepts. If you're familiar with. I'm not Shaw's. It's a, um, it's like a steak and seafood kind of seafood, heavy steak and seafood kind of throwback of I B, um, they're based out of Chicago. Um, but they're pretty big operators. And even though they're a big corporation, they're really good operators. They have great concepts. Um, their restaurants are good. They're consistent. And, uh, Tony and I have a joke when we're in Chicago and, uh, where we usually stay is very close to the sushi son in river North. And, uh, we always say, Oh, there's this secret little neighborhood, hidden gem sushi place that, that I've got a, that you've got to check out, you know, nobody knows about it. It's this kind of just a little, a little haunt, my favorite little neighborhood haunt sushi son. Now that's our dumb joke. It's, it's, it's a huge corporate, but it's still, but it is, it's really good. It's really, really good. So I don't know if you, did you verify the layer cake news because Harper steakhouse is now open and that is done by, um, milkshake concepts, which Emron shake was on the show.

17:46He's the owner and he owned layer cake. So I saw somebody post on Facebook yesterday that layer cake is closed. That they got a reservation email saying, we're canceling your reservation cause we're closed. So, yeah, that's what I heard. So that's a pretty big deal. That's a huge deal. It's a big place downtown. Um, we don't hear about big places downtown closing very often. You don't hear about that. I wonder if they just have a different concept they're going to put in there. It's the same thing. They're just going to change it. That's certainly possible. I'm not saying why they closed. I just said that it seems that they are for the moment closed. I don't know if this is a permanent closure, maybe it's a temporary thing. Maybe they're doing some updates, renovations. I mean, you know, it is February. Maybe they're sprucing up for summer business. You know, now's a great time to close and do maintenance and repairs. I know a lot of places do that this time of year. It's a thing. So we're not, I don't have knowledge that they have closed for good, but they were closed the other day for whatever the thing was.

18:47Okay. Yeah. The supper club looks really cool. I'm looking at pictures of her right now. On in Hillsborough. Yeah. It looks awesome. It looks really cool. I'm excited for Hillsborough village to have some good local places to go and hang out again. Cause it just, well, there's Fido, of course, of course, Fido. And then there's, I guess there's like, uh, what's the, uh, the Whirlies have biscuit love, biscuit love. There's a biscuit love right there too. And then now there's the supper club and then the bungalow tent. Cabana was such a really cool place. When it first opened, never made it to Cabana. You never made it to Cabana. I did not. Do you know what it was? No. Okay. I know of it and I've been past the building, but do you know about the Cabanas? No, I was not here in the Cabana times. Okay. So when you walk in, there's like a big open bar, big rectangular bar. And then all the way down the left side, there's a hallway that goes all the way to the back of the building and all on the left, there were Cabana's and there were these big, huge booths that were like half moon booths.

19:56And then there was a curtain you could close and there's a little TV in there. So you could rent a Cabana. Oh, that's cute. So you'd go sit and like have dinner, but like your own private Cabana of where everybody can hang out and do your own thing. But it was all along this walkway. So if you want to leave it open and have your Cabana, people come by. And it was like a whole thing. And in the back area back there, there's this huge open air dining spot. There's a huge bar. You could put like a club back there. And that's what they've done with Jar. Smart. So there's think Jar is like the whole backside of it. And I think it's just I'm glad that somebody has repurposed it and made it cool again. So I have a little bit of a confession. I originally thought that Supper Club and Bungalow and Jar were going to be. On that strip by the Belcourt Theater. Yeah, but it's I know now that that's not where it is. What what? That's always been local restaurants on that strip as well.

20:59Yeah, it used to be a place called the Trace. The Supper Club used to a place called the Trace. I'm dating myself, but the Trace and Cabana and Sunset were like a triple headed monster right there. You go hang out all night long. You could go to dinner at sunset, go afterwards for drinks at Cabana or Trace or have dinner at Trace and go to Cabana. Cabana was like the after you had dinner, go there. And there was like party music in the back. New Year's was really cool there. Every year we would do New Year's at Cabana. I used to live in Hillsborough Village, so it was like that was my backyard. So when you can walk somewhere, this is before the days of Uber. We're talking 12 years ago. It was you wanted to go late night to the place you could walk to. And we could walk there, so it was a whole thing. Sure. Oh, the good old days. Hillsborough Village, you could walk to bars that you wanted to go to. All right. What else we got here? Um, let's take a quick break to hear a word from our sponsors and we will jump right back in at what chefs want.

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25:23And then, you know, certainly not that that's been resolved. But I think a lot of restaurants fell in line and made changes because of that. Right. I think that last summer, we talked about this kind of, you know, ad nauseam on this show. It was tipping and tipping culture, you know, and I don't think that conversation's completely gone away, but it seems to have died down a little bit. At least on this show, it has. We've listen, we've exhausted the topic onto the next. So now what do you think is the what do you think is the topic to shore of of hospitality? I can tell you what it is for me. Tell me. Manufacturing sales. OK, elaborate. Well, I think there's so much you can do to manage operations. Right. So there's two different theories. And I look at it like kitchen labor. Right. Do you have a percentage of kitchen labor you try and stick by? We have an overall labor percentage that we try to say. It's a percentage of what? Of my sales. Right.

26:24So there's two things you can do when it comes to that. Your sales are down. You can reduce your labor, send people home, do all that stuff. Or what's the other antidote? You increase sales. I think so many people have been focused on how do we react to what the market conditions are, that we've been focused on managing everything down, down, down, down, down to reflect what it is. And I'm saying let's spend that same time and energy and focus on getting new business. Growing sales. Let's grow the sales. Because look, these are employees that we want to pay a little wage that I want them to. I don't want to just start reducing their hours and cutting their hours doesn't help them. I'd rather spend that time and energy on building sales. So that's been my everyday thought is how do we increase sales? And not just give shit away. I'm talking about profitable sales. How do you build sales organically or not just organically, but how do you go out and get it?

27:31And so that's been my every single week brainstorming new ideas and ways. And I think that we're figuring stuff out. You got a great new idea? No, I think that we, giving back to you, it's focusing on your community. You know, we have done really well at Green Hills Grill and Mirror Bowl because our community shows up so strong. Yeah. You guys stay very consistent. We stay very consistent because I'm not waiting for tourists. I'm not waiting for the next thing for people to figure us out. Like we serve the people we serve and they love it and we love them. And so can we add to that or can we double down on that? And a lot of those are coming in the form of like, do you guys do that? I know you guys do this for your community, but like spirit nights? Oh, yeah, we we work a lot throughout the year and over the years with Sylvan Park Elementary, who's close to our neighborhood. We work with their PTA to do. We'll do a Sylvan Park Elementary pizza night where you come in and like a dollar from every pizza will go back to the PTA.

28:33And we have done spirit night, that kind of stuff. So, yeah, for sure. We try and do that every Monday night at Green Hills Grill. We do a different school or charity or something. We donate 10 percent of all of our sales. It's a good idea. And so that's just one of those little things like if we can find one night of the week that we can give back to the community. And it's not just the people that you bring in. It's every single guest that dines. So if you live in the Green Hills area and you're wondering where to go eat on Monday night, you go, oh, well, Monday night I'm in Green Hills. Let's go to the grill because we'll be helping a school. Ten percent of our sales at the grill goes towards whoever they're helping tonight. And we can try and have one every single Monday night. And I think families stay really engaged in those as well, you know. Well, I mean, A, you get to give back to the schools and B, the schools do marketing for you. Right. So getting new butts and seats, getting new people to come try your food. If you have a new thing, then the schools are bringing their entire group of people into your restaurant.

29:34You're introducing a lot of new people at the restaurant and you're able to help them. So like it's a win win all the way around. So that's something that we're focusing on in all three restaurants. It's a little more difficult at Maribol because you're like, hey, come out for dinner. And, you know, it's typically a little more expensive for just a family of four to come eat. So I'm thinking like brunches. We have like Sunday nights. We just reopened Sunday nights. It's another big one for us. There's reopened Sunday nights at Maribol. And so we're doing a different menu on Sunday nights, like a little more of a chill laid back menu. So we're working on different things, but stuff like that. We've toyed around with the idea of doing like maybe a like a weekday dinner deal type of thing. You know, we quit doing $10 Tuesday a while ago, which I will say was our most successful promotion. But we prices have gone up so much. Our cost of goods has gone up so much that we had to switch it to a $15 Tuesday. And that just really never hit for us. But we also, you know, couldn't couldn't do the $10 Tuesday anymore.

30:36Things have gotten too expensive. And, you know, I kind of think that for us, to me, at least it seems that that is the topic du jour in hospitality is the price of things. I feel like I'm hearing so much in the world in the general conversation around restaurants right now about prices and about how much things cost. And there was a article in Bon Appetit a couple of weeks ago that said high prices have taken the joy out of dining in restaurants. And I thought it was a really interesting article. And we actually put up a survey on our Nicky's Instagram to our customers. And we said, are you dining out less because of high prices? Not not at Nicky's specifically, but just in general. In general, are you are you going out less because it's too expensive? And overwhelmingly, more than 90 percent of we got a lot of responses. More than 90 percent of people responded and said, yes, I'm dining out less because of prices.

31:39We followed it up by saying, if you're dining out less for another reason, what is the other reason? And I really only got like two responses to that. And they were both women who said, I just had a baby, but I can't wait to go back out. So, you know, that's kind of an outlier. That's not a is anybody still concerned with covid? No, no, that was not on anybody's radar. I was concerned about going out in public. I still like once every month or two, I feel like this is our first time out since covid. Really? Oh, not me. People are still testing and testing the waters. No, no, we don't see that at all. So we we have, you know, of course, it's January, February. You see that big slowdown. But we're always looking for for what's new and for what's next. So we have decided I think we're going to try something a little bit unprecedented for for Nikki, something that we've never done before. And it's a little nerve wracking because it is kind of a big leap. You know, we I don't have a drum roll.

32:41I'm waiting for no, no, no, no drum roll. No, no, it's not that big of a deal. But, you know, we I feel like we've taken some big leaps in the past and it's worked out well for us. You know, so during the pandemic, we switched to counter service. That was a huge leap, but it worked out well. And over the summer, we eliminated tipping and we instituted a service charge. And fortunately, that has worked out well. But at the time, it felt like a huge gamble. It was a scary leap to take. So we've decided we're going to take another big leap and try for for the first time since we open the restaurant, we are going to lower menu prices. The public loves it. Very excited about that. You're going to lower prices. We are going to lower prices. And our prices, our cost of goods sold has not gone down. Let me be clear.

33:41We are not lowering prices because we have had prices lowered. I thought you were going to say we have GFS now and they're doing such a damage. We're lowering all of our prices. Well, I will say Gordon is doing a great job for us. That's that's not it. But but our you know, our food costs have not gone down. But our hope is that by lowering prices on some of our favorite menu items, some of our most popular menu items, we will begin to see some of our customers more frequently because they think a lot of people are saving up to dine out as opposed to dining out several times a week like they used to. So our hope is that the appeal of the lower prices will allow people to dine out and come in more frequently. You know, we're a neighborhood restaurant. So well, I don't know. Stay tuned. We'll see how that works out. So you're we're doing the same thing. You're trying to get more people in the building. That's the thing is like your while pricing is a massive issue.

34:45Really, the under the the issue here is guest counts. Yes. That's the big issue to me right now is guest counts. Where is everybody going? And if they're staying home, that's one thing. But I mean, there's enough people going out. If I could get people from I feel I feel like we're doing we did OK for Valentine's reservations. But I do feel like it was slower this year than it has been in recent years. It wasn't that thing of like we're sold out. We're packed. Everybody's calling trying to get a table and we don't have one. And I feel like I'm hearing that from other people, too. Did you guys see a little kind of like a less a little less energy around Valentine's or I know your places are so consistent. So I feel like that's a hard question. It's about it's about the same. Yeah. You know, we're really creatures that people come. These type days are made for us. Right. For Marable, specifically like Valentine's Day, fancy restaurant and a home.

35:48Like this is we're made like for this sort of thing. The Monday through Thursday business. Now, we I was anticipating more business on the weekends surrounding Valentine's Day, and I didn't see that. I mean, maybe there was a slight uptick, but I mean, we were consistent with last year sales across the board. And I was wondering if we would get a boost the week on bookend both weekends around the Valentine's in the middle of the week. Which one's busier before or after? Before. OK, see, I and I couldn't decide this year because Valentine's on Wednesday. I couldn't decide was it the before or the after. But I feel like Super Bowl being that Valentine Valentine Saturday really kind of took the air out of it a little bit. It did. Well, obviously, Sunday was we closed. Oh, yeah, we're we're close. Yeah, it's not a thing. And you see this back now. The weekend after might be the way to go. Weekend after thing, you know, Valentine's Day, we're recording this right before Valentine's Day. This will come out the weekend right after.

36:51So I think I think it's the weekend after Valentine's Day is where you really want to focus. Yeah, I don't know. Remains to be seen, I guess. It feels like a weird start to the year. So I'm really hoping that this this gamble we're taking with lowering prices pays off. But I feel I'm hesitating now because obviously we're in a podcast. You can't see it. But I feel like when I first said that you made a face, Brandon. So I feel like you don't think this is a good idea. I listen, bring people in the building. But I stand here as a firm believer in raising your prices. I stand here as a firm believer that the general public decides too much how much people charge for their food. And there's a math problem that goes to this. You have to decide how much money you how much profit you need to make in order. There's overhead, there's labor, there's all these other things you have to know what your cost is in the food. And then you have to charge appropriately. So when the squeaky wheel, it's not the situation.

37:52Maybe it is a situation squeaky wheel gets the oil kind of a thing. It's like it doesn't matter how much people complain about prices or they raise your hand go, this is too expensive. It's all relative. And maybe the world is too expensive. But when you lower prices, I think I don't want to send the message that, hey, we can all lower our prices. We're just being greedy out there. Look what Nicky's done. And maybe you're the first person to jump in. I think it might be brilliant. But I think it's a double-edged sword from when you're looking at the entire scope of this industry. So many people out there already have their prices so low that they don't like they need to raise their prices because they're just they feel like this all the time. You guys did a really good job of maintaining the market and getting what you need to get and not being afraid of that. So I think that for you coming back and saying, hey, look, we're going to lower some prices on the big as a we love our community kind of a thing. We're going to take less of a margin. And if we get three times the people that come out and they're able to come into Nicky's and break bread and be together, then it makes sense to us because at the end of the day, it'll be the same.

39:00So if we lower our prices and we see three times the volume, then it makes sense. And we get to have more people in the building and it's happy and my staff makes more. That makes all the sense in the world. People hearing this going, oh, if I just lower my prices and then all of a sudden the trend, if you're starting a trend of people trying to lower their prices, that could be dangerous because some people don't have the ability to lower their prices right now. Totally. And I'll be honest, like we don't have the ability to lower our prices right now. We really don't. But we also I don't know, I just sometimes I think this is probably not the best business strategy, but sometimes we just feel this like stagnant energy and we feel a need to like shake it up. You know what I mean? Yeah. And sometimes that that that leap, that kind of big thing that is just going to shake up the energy. And listen, here's the thing. The reality is we're going to give this a try. We've only got a few weeks until we do our spring menu change. And if it doesn't hit in the first couple of weeks, then we're probably not going to be able to maintain those prices once we do the spring menu change.

40:03But I'm hopeful. When will this start? Can we announce it right now on the show that you're doing this? I don't know exactly. Yes, by the time this airs, it will have when is this airing Monday? Monday. Yeah, it will. I think it's launching this weekend. OK, so Valentine's weekend, the weekend after Valentine's. The 17th and 18th. We're planning on launching the 17th and 18th. Yeah. OK, so this will be out on the 19th. Yeah. So go to Nicky's tonight and go experience a little bit more affordable menu. And let's see what we've done. A lot of things that we we never thought we would do. And and really we have had success with most of those things. And I look back in the earlier days of the restaurant when we did the things that. Kind of on paper felt like seemed like the right thing to do. Didn't pay off for us the way that the things that I don't know were kind of outside the box have worked.

41:03So maybe that just goes to show I have no fucking idea what I'm doing. So when I don't trust my instincts. You know what you're doing so well. Do you know what you're doing so much? You're expanding into a new space. I read in the paper the other day that you have a new event space. We tell us all about this. I will. Sorry to make the show. The Nicky show. But hey, why don't you take what? Wait one minute before you do this. Let's take one more break to hear from our sponsors and you can tell us all about it right when we get back from this break. Hey, guys, let's talk about the nation's brewing and more importantly, fat bottom brewery. Founded in 2012 in East Nashmore, the old fluffo mattress building that is fat bottom. Their tap room is in the nations. They are one of the OG Nashville breweries. They are the beer next door. They pride ourselves on making true to style approachable beers that everyone can enjoy. And let me tell you, you're in for a treat this February because they have a new beer, the hazel hazy IPA.

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44:12Sharpier's 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 sharpiers.com. That's C-H-A-R-P-I-E-R-S dot com. Or you can give Erin Mosso a call directly. Her number is 615-319-6453. That's Sharpier's Bakery. Space, I read in the paper the other day that you have a new event space. Will you tell us all about this? I will. Sorry to make this show, the Nicky show, but we just announced our new project, the Maxwell Room, which is our new private events venue. Why is it called the Maxwell Room? Does it just sound fancy? Well, I thought it sounded very nice.

45:12It sounds a little more elegant, right, without being stuffy. But you know, everything at Nicky is just kind of based on family. Nicky is my brother-in-law, Enrico, our oven, is Tony's grandfather. We've got family photos on the wall. So Maxwell is my nephew, who just turned one. Oh. Yeah, Tony's brother, Chris, and our sister-in-law, Andrea. It's their son, Maxwell. He's our first nephew in the Galzim family. Nice. So we wanted to keep the family tradition alive. And I think that it sounds really nice. I think it's got a good ring to it. It really does. Although I will say, being in Nashville, I've gotten quite a few emails inquiring about the Maxwell House. So that's just going to happen. But it is the Maxwell Room. Yeah, but it's adjacent to Nicky's. But it's its own completely private space. It's got its own entrance, its own everything. And we can accommodate 80 seated and 100 for cocktail. And we are booking up. I will tell you, here's the craziest thing. We had a really slow January.

46:14February's picking up a little bit. But just kind of our day-to-day business has cooled off a little bit. But our events business is going nuts. Maybe everybody's doing events this year and they're saving their money for that. I don't know. But our event business is same. Great. Yeah. Over at Maribor. People I feel like people are back to doing events now even more than that first like post pandemic. Boom. Do you know what we get? I get a ton of people who are shocked that we call them back. Mm hmm. Like, I guess so many people and we use a company, they're not a sponsor, but Triple Seat is who we use to book everything. And they're fantastic. It makes it so much easier. But we get back to people like the day that they submit an inquisition where they're like, hey, we're curious about this day. Like, we call them back immediately and we're excited that they want to do the party with us. And you'd be shocked. And how many people are like, I can't get people to call me back.

47:15Listen, I am not a gatekeeper by any means. But the one place where I do not like to share my information and trade secrets is with how we do events internally. But I will go for sure say that we hear that more than anything is I think that part of the reason we book so many events is because I am Johnny on the spot responding to event inquiries. I mean, truly. And I hear that from a lot of people. I reached out to so many people. Can't believe you got back to me so fast. I haven't heard back from half of these people. Yeah. You know, so that that is a big that's a huge key to success for us. So if you're out there and you have an event business, call people back. And if you're out there and you don't have an event business, but you want one, I'm available for consulting. If you want those nuggets of information, you can have them, but they're not free for a price for a price. So share them all with you. Yeah, but event business is good.

48:16And you're right. It is. I think customer services is a huge part of it. People don't expect service anymore. I think that, you know, kind of we were talking about the hot topic is pricing. But I do feel like service and hospitality is also a big piece of that conversation that I'm hearing a lot. People aren't going out because it's too expensive. People aren't going out because it's mediocre. People aren't going out because it's, you know, people aren't friendly anymore. So we we have, you know, that's another kind of thing we're doing this year. It's not a splashy announcement, but internally we're really, really kind of digging in deeper with some staff training and hospitality training and trying to make sure that those standards are elevated in the new year. Yeah. In the book, Unraised Hospitality, which I think I try and bring up in every interview, he says like luxury and indulgence is completely different than thoughtfulness. You know, if you have a guest come in, it's their anniversary, you can easily buy them a bottle of or a bottle of whatever you want to and then give them caviar.

49:18And that's a very nice gesture. I'll take it. But identifying what type of cake they had at their wedding and giving them a customized cake at the end of their meal with that type of cake, if it's a red velvet and then with their name on it. And like, hey, we found out that at your wedding, you guys had red velvet cakes. We wanted to make you your very like that could be a tenth the price, but it means so much more. Just being thoughtful, thoughtful is everything. And I think that we get so caught up every day in the act of just doing and, oh, they want something for free that it's there's a there's a whole mind shift set that says, how do we just be authentic and make these people really happy? So what are some things can we learn if we listen and we learn about them? We can probably do something pretty custom. You know, I share a you know, Canva, the like graphic design thing. So I share a Canva account with all of my managers at the restaurant. And I went into Canva the other day to make something.

50:19And I saw where somebody had made a birthday card that said, like, happy birthday from Nicky's and it had their name on it. And it wasn't from a private event. And I didn't even know about this. But I guess just one of my managers decided kind of on the fly, found out it was somebody's birthday and like went in real quick, printed out a birthday card and like gave it to them with our logo. I'm like, it's just the best. It's the best. That's the end of my event secrets. OK, I'm just joking. No, not my. That's not really an event. Last thing I know we got to get going here. Rosemary and Beauty Queen had a fire. Oh, God. Yes, that's right. Now, I will say, luckily, it looks like their entire building did not burn down, but they have not been able to operate. This is a pretty devastating. Oh, look pretty bad. Yeah. The fire was pretty bad. Yeah. I believe that just a couple of nights ago, there was an event that was held to help them raise money. I saw a Charlotte Miller post about that. There's been a lot of restaurants that have been reaching out to help out. There's a GoFundMe you can help their staff at.

51:20I'm sure they'll get insurance money and all that stuff. I think in the meantime, they're just trying to figure it out. It's not like the it's not like you have a fire and then the insurance company shows up the next day with a check. You know how long that takes? I know people who are still waiting on insurance checks from the tornado. From the past tornado or like. No, no, no, no, the 2020 tornado, the 2020 tornado. Yeah. How about this? I'm still waiting on a check from the IRS for my ERTC from 2020. Still waiting. Wow. Oh, yeah. I know several people who just got it like last summer. I don't know anybody else who hasn't gotten it yet, though, except for me. Lucky me. Well. And it's a large. I'll know next time you show up skipping that you got it. That's for sure. All right. Well, hey, fun and prompt to episode today, just talking about what's happening out there in the community.

52:21If you have ideas as to what we should be talking about here on the roundup, just tag us, tag us in your post on Instagram or use the hashtag the roundup and hashtag the roundup. And I will see except follow that hashtag. And if you have a news topic, something you want us to talk about, I want to get back to doing this episode once a month where we have topics and maybe bring in a guest that talks about it. And we had a lot of fun last year talking about tipping and all the things. And do you like playing the game at the end of the episodes? Are those fun? Sometimes yes and sometimes no. All right. Depends. I like it. We'll try to make it all the time. We should have like a secret code word when it's like it's time to play a game. Mistletoe. You know, if this studio had Mistletoe. Oh. All right. Well, Carolyn, thanks for it's always good to see you. And I'm glad that you are here back. Excited about your new event space.

53:22Can't wait to learn more about it. Thank you. All right. Talk to you guys later. And thank you for listening today. If you wanted to submit a email to me with a new jingle for the intro to the show, please send it to Brandon at new light hospitality dot com. You can also send anything if you come up with a design for the cover for the roundup. We would love that once the hashtag the roundup and then a way I can put a date in there because then the roundup is going to be this will be hashtag the roundup to 1924. So if I would be able to adjust it, I just got to add a date, whatever else you think could be in there. Be really cool. That's all I got. Thank you guys for listening. We're going to be back next week. The brand new episode with Rob Higgins. He is the owner of the Supper Club. He's also the owner of bungalow 10 and Jar over in Hillsborough Village. This is a fun conversation.

54:23I cannot wait to share it next Monday. You got it. Guys hope that you're being safe out there. Love you guys. Bye.