#theroundup with Guest Host Ben Whitlock

00:00Hello, Music City. Welcome to the Nashville Restaurant Radio Roundup presented by Springer Mountain Farms Chicken. My name is Brandon Styll. We are joined with Delia Jo Ramsey. Hey guys. And today our guest host is going to be the president of Mobile Fixture, Ben Whitlock. Welcome, Ben. Hey, how are y'all doing? We're having a blast. So we are trying something new today. We are gonna go live. We are live right now on Facebook. And if you have any questions out there, please feel free to put them in. We are waiting for people to join, but we are just gonna go ahead and start the show because if you're listening to this, you're not watching it. We had a couple of shows in the past couple of weeks with two weeks ago we had Caroline Galzin as our guest host. And then last week we had Craig Shone as our guest host. And we were excited to have him. And while there's not a ton of things happening as far as restaurants go in the city, we had a little bit of news today with phase two.

01:04We're bringing in guest hosts just to kind of add a little bit of fun. And today we are gonna go live. So if you do have questions, please feel free. Jump in there. We'll see if we don't reply as quick as can be. We're kind of just having a good time today. So this week was a big week. We had a birthday week for Miss Delia Jo Ramsey. How was your week? Well, it's been a weird, it started out kind of crappy. And I got back from the beach after like an 11 hour trip back on Saturday, just traffic and like insistence to stop and eat at Cracker Barrel and await. And that was really frustrating. And I got home and then had two flat tires on Monday. And yeah. How do you get two flat tires? What is up with that? How do you, at the same time, did you drive like the wrong way in a parking lot or something? I'm usually like, I'm the most careful driver in the world, but I was upset about something and I was texting and driving and I ran over a curb.

02:07And instantly both tires went to flat and I started crying cause I just had bought new tires two months ago. So then I had to have my car towed to discount. My God. Dang. And they had to order the tires cause my car has like the front and the back have to be two different ones. And so then they had to order it. So then I was carless until today. And it's just, on Tuesday. I don't know. I was like, I had my therapist appointment and it had just been a crap day on Tuesday. And I was like, it's my birthday. Like, I don't like this right now. What is 38? Like, I don't feel, I feel out of my head. I feel weird. And my therapist was like, we're gonna hit reset right now on Tuesday. We hit reset. And the guy that I'm dating had plans for me Tuesday night and actually had a great little surprise party with my family and some of my best friends at a restaurant. I came prime on Tuesday. So that was a great little surprise. They had a cake for me and we had a great meal and great wine.

03:11And it was really cool because last year, my birthday, it was such a hard year. Last year I went and had a beach trip by myself last year. So the great contrast of spending last year alone and then this year finding, the strange thing is most of the people in this room are people I've known less than a year. And to have this support of people that love me was really cool. Wow, that's amazing. How was your dinner at King Prime? It's like a happy ending. It's a happy ending to a shitty day. I know, exactly. It was a great reset. It was amazing. We had a great steak, had a bunch of oysters, had the cotton candy topped bacon. We ate all the things and I've continued to just eat all the things and still eating all the things tonight. What's tonight? Tonight's Bastion. Last night was Catbird Seat and I also got to try the dumplings at Peninsula. I can't stop. This is what I do. I like completely over the top from holidays and I'm miserably full and I probably need like a six-week juice cleanse, but Nashville has some great food right now.

04:18I need two tires and a bunch of juice. Perfect. And probably a personal trainer, because I'm 38. How was the Catbird Seat? It was really, really good. It was weird because you can eat at the counter now because they have a special permit that allows you to eat at the counter and it's now distance between parties, but it was really fantastic. It was great to have Baxter back in Nashville and cooking up a storm. There was a great little tomato course. They kicked off with and stellar meal. Did the wine pairings and it was great. That's awesome. I'm like, so it sounds like you had just a wonderful, wonderful week. Yeah. Bringing in 38. It's birthday month. You know how Leo's go. Your wife's Leo. My, yes. My son turned seven yesterday and my wife has a birthday on Saturday and I booked a meeting Saturday morning from nine to noon.

05:20And we talked this day today and I said, yeah, I've got a meeting from nine to noon. She goes, that's my birthday. And I was like, what a terrible idea. Yeah. Whoever that is, I think he needs to cancel. Caroline. Sorry. Terrible idea. Birthday, I don't know. Yeah, I got that. I'm in the doghouse on that one for sure. Well. So we're going to set Sunday night. That's like the old, that's the other favorite place missing from my list this week. So I'm excited for you to go. I'm super stoked. I'll get into that when I talk about mine. What are you most excited about for the year 38? The ending of 2020. The end of 2020. Turning 39 probably. Yeah, exactly. Just, I don't know. I can return to some sense of normalcy when I can like, eat solo at a bar again and like see my family and some of them won't hug me.

06:24And just the end of all this really. I know there won't be a normal again, but just the end of this global mess. Maybe after December things will feel better. I don't know. We're hoping so. So we have some people that are watching right now. We are live. We're doing the roundup. This show is what we typically put out on Friday. We recorded on Thursday nights to put out Friday, but you're getting to see it live. We got Ben Whitlock with us. If you have comments or questions, please feel free to type them in. I think we can see them. We are, this is kind of a test day. We're seeing what you think. If you like it, click the like button, let us know what you think. And we're trying to try and reply to live comments as we go along. Ben, we have got something that can update with you. How was your week this week? Your wife, tell us what's going on with you. The week so far has been great. I got to go to a new restaurant opening. It feels like it's the first one I've gone to in decades, it feels like. I got to hit up Eastside Bond Me, which we'll talk about later on.

07:24Badass place, great people. That was super exciting. In fact, that was, what was that, Tuesday. I probably was worthless from noon that day until the time I got home that night, just cause I was so excited to actually go to a new opening. Then yesterday hit, which was fun because it's Wednesday and all kinds of exciting things happen. Well, it's also the day before the first day of school. And as you probably know by now, my wife's a teacher and both of my kids are school-age kids. So I wasn't exactly sure what I was coming home to. The poor teachers, they're dealing with the crap that we all dealt with back in mid and late March with the stress of how to deal with COVID and your workplace and your stations and your offices and blah, blah, blah. Well, they're starting to hit it now. So I've got to kind of take a step back and be patient and say, everything's going to be okay and not feel like teachers are overreacting cause they're not.

08:31They're dealing with a bunch of snotty nose kids that want to pinch each other and hit each other and they've got it kind of tough. Anyway, so today was the first day of school and it's 3.40 PM. My wife and kids are home, or at least my wife and my son are home. So I'm curious to see what I'm going to come home to tonight. Hopefully they're going to be in a great mood. Otherwise I'm going to have a big, big bottle of wine waiting in my hands when I do walk in the door. So it's going to be exciting no matter what. We're happy. That's always a good way to welcome her home on the first day anyway. You never know. You know, previous years, this is our 20th, I think this is her 19th or 20th year of teaching. Every year it's, you know, we kind of know what we're getting into the first two or three weeks kind of becomes routine. This year I have no clue of what any of us are going to come home to. So all of you spouses of teachers, I'm with you.

09:33We're going to get through this just as good as the teachers themselves are. You know, it's nice because it's good to hear, I think we talk a lot about restaurant industry. We talk about a lot of people in the hospitality service industry and the other industries are dealing with this too. I've mentioned you, Ben, on multiple occasions. You put a post out that kind of said something similar that said, hey, don't go out to restaurants and act like an idiot and yell at people. And also don't go out to, you know, these teachers are out there really working hard, figuring stuff out, they're all scared. They don't know what's happening either. Before you type out that mean email and go, hey, what are you thinking you're doing? Like, we're all trying to figure it out. Like, let's all collaborate together and be friends here. Let's have a little bit of empathy for the people that are on the front lines. Yeah, you don't need to send the email that says it's a shit show. Trust me, they know it's a shit show, I promise. Yeah, they're fully aware. We're getting a couple of comments here. It's good. How has 2020 impacted the restaurant industry in Nashville or bars?

10:40Very little. No, everything's normal. There's nothing exciting. All is well, I promise. It hasn't, what do you mean? Is there something going on? I mean, devastated is like an understatement at this point, right? I mean, the tornado, the pandemic, it's devastating for the country, like. I think that's a great word, devastation. I mean, this is everybody out there. Thomas Keller just closed his restaurants in New York. He's like, I can't sustain. Without the tours and people coming to New York, Thomas Keller's closing restaurants. I mean, we've had Khalil Arnold on the show and he said, you know, with the 34% tax hike and without the business, we're getting like, I don't know how I'm gonna stay open. No one's safe, yeah. I mean, you look at people like Arnold who has a perpetual line out the door every single day and he's wondering if he's gonna stay open. I mean, that's kind of your benchmark, right? I mean, for people that are just killing it, you go, oh, wow, that's serious.

11:42And they're doing things the right way. So thanks, Darshan, for the question. Keep them coming. That's definitely something that's happening out there. We had a good week. Good week on the- I see Stover's comment, school pizza finger. Dude, I would go for some school pizza. I mean, how good was school pizza back in the day? Did you have the cheese boats or did you have just like, we had these big rectangle pieces of pizza. Is that what you were- Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you can't go wrong with it. Somebody needs to open a restaurant in Nashville that serves nothing but school pizza. There are work concepts in this city, Lauren. I was like, has this been pitched to you yet? No, but I'm telling you, that could be a hit. Yes, so yeah, I'm with you on that. So cool, so we have a bench of, I had a good week this week.

12:43We had some pretty cool, Brian says, he knows a guy who can get the school pizza. He's got it for sale. Yeah, it's school pizza. Brian? Yeah. Brian's new business development at Cisco. Okay. And they definitely have that school pizza if you want to buy it. He's your hookup. There's no doubt. He is your hookup. He's the man. So we had a big week on the show this week. We had Nashville food fan, Kate Davis came on the show and it was a cool episode. I had this idea. She's got like 100,000 followers. She's the first food blogger. And I went, who is she? And I didn't know who she was. Like I was like, I don't know who Kate Dave, I don't know who, it said Kate, you know, is her thing. And I was like, I want to pull the veil off of who this person is. So she's the chief of staff for Ashley Judd.

13:47We now know who Kate Davis is. If you're wondering who Nashville food fan is, I thought she was incredibly vulnerable talking about things that are passionate to her. And it was a great show. If you haven't heard it, please go and listen to it. It was our show on Monday. And then we had a double header. Wednesday and Thursday, we had Jesse Lee Jones, Jesse Lee Cavalcante came on the show and just I thought was a home run of home runs talking to a guy who's just been through everything. I did not mention on the show that he has a book that is his like autobiography, the Jesse Lee Jones story. So if you were interested in what he was talking about, there's so many stories he could tell for just days. At the end of the show, I was like, I just want to have you back on and hear stories about how you went through stuff and playing all these shows and just kind of his life has been amazing. So part one and part two, part two is really powerful. If you are just gonna listen to one of those, you want a lot time for one of them, listen to part two. Part one is really good too. I got more people jumping in here.

14:50I think Ben, you have some fans on the line. Y'all have fans here, look at you. Good to see you Brandon. We got Ben Whitlock is my favorite. Somebody knows a guy who sells equipment, I think. Yeah, the Hank Cantrell comment was not really for me. He works with me. He would steal an order from me in a heartbeat and we work together. It still benefits you, still a fan. Right. Oh, and look at that. That looks like somebody's wife. That would be my wife. That would be my wife, yes. I hope you had a great day. I can't express to you how badly I hope you have a good day. Bye bye. I hope he has one for you at the end of the day and thank you. And Hank says he'd steal a sale from you in a heartbeat. Oh good, this is a lot of fun. I can see what direction this is gonna go. So I will tell you that I'm excited because my wife's birthday is Saturday.

15:51We're taking her out to dinner tonight. We're going to set sun and that's a good lead in because Monday we will have Jason Zygmunt who is the chef of Set Sun on the show. I did not tell him I was coming in tonight and hopefully he's not watching so I can just sneak in and eat and then I can give him my honest feedback live on Monday. It'll be a lot of fun. And Wednesday we will have Tony and Cathy Montuano. If I butchered your names I will have it right for you when they come on the show Wednesday. They are the husband and wife pairing. Tony is a James Beard award winning chef. They ran Spagia in Chicago and she's doing the beverage program. He's the chef at the new Joseph Hotel. Kind of they have many different outposts there but really excited to get to know them and see what they're doing. So that's it. That's how our weeks were. Everybody else, everybody's doing well. We were ready to get into like restaurant talk. Let's do it. Okay.

16:54So many good things are going on in the city. So we've got so we typically start with new openings. This is where Delia jumps in but I'm gonna say I got to speak today with Gracie and Chad who are the owners of Eastside Bond Me and we're gonna play that interview if you're listening to this right now. All right so we are talking about new restaurants that are opening right now and I have Chad and Gracie. Chad Newton, Gracie Nguyen who are the owners of Eastside Bond Me who opened today. How we doing guys? We're hanging in there. We're doing great. We're ready to go. We have people praying for us. I love that. Maybe the best answer I've ever heard. We have people praying for us. Like yep, it's serious. This is about to go down. So all of this kind of coming down to it. You guys have been in the works for a while. How does it feel? Today's the day. Like you're opening to the public. What's going through your...

17:56Yeah, we're excited. I mean, we've been doing pop-ups for the last couple months and this whole last week. We got the restaurant turned over to us in pretty good time so we could do a lot of little soft opening events. So we've been opening for lunch from just like 11 to two to do practice, train with the staff and do all that. So I feel like we're pretty ready. Obviously it's the restaurant business. You never know what to expect on any given day but that's why we love it too. That's why we're still in it after this long end. That's why it's our lives is that we just love hospitality. We love cooking for people and some of that daily nervousness or excitement still happens which is pretty cool. You know what I mean? Oh, it's the absolute best. So you guys have, you're a married couple. How did you guys meet? How long have you guys, did you guys meet in a restaurant? Yep, in a restaurant back in 2001. We worked at a fine dining restaurant in San Francisco for a cooking club called Postrio.

18:56Okay. And then I left for a little bit, came back to San Francisco and we saw each other through a magazine or something and then that's it. Yeah, actually I saw, she's being modest. I saw she was in a chefware catalog like as one of the female chefs modeling chef codes. And it was back then you read the magazine you ordered out of it. You know what I mean? It's hilarious. But to back up a little bit, we were both at Postrio. She was in the kitchen. I was in the front of the house and it was kind of my first big time job. Postrio back in the day was one of the best restaurants in San Francisco and it was just off the hook, crazy. Such a cool restaurant. So many great chefs would come out of there. It was just a really good time. But anyways, she claims she didn't remember me and I remember her because we worked together so briefly. And what I remember is she was probably yelling at me because I was an expert at her food runner. She was in the kitchen along with all the other cool cooks. So then she went to Vegas and then we reconnected in San Francisco years later.

19:58And then it was like fast we moved in with each other and we started working together on the projects and here we are today. Let's talk about what you guys did. That's an awesome story. I absolutely love that. And I wanna tease everybody because we're gonna go into that in depth when we do a full on interview with you two where we spend an hour and I wanna dig deeper into that. That's gonna be a lot of fun. But you guys are open today and people out there wanna know more about Eastside Banh Mi. Let's talk basics. For people who don't know, like what is a Banh Mi? I've never eaten Vietnamese food. What is it? Can you guys give just kind of a breakdown, simplify it for anybody out there who's listening? So a Banh Mi is a Vietnamese sandwich. It was inspired by the French. And typically it is served on a, like a baguette, but a Vietnamese Banh Mi bread is like a baguette, but it's like really light and soft inside, but really crunchy on the outside.

21:02And it comes with a typical mayonnaise butter, the pate, choice of meat, always the pickles, the cucumbers, jalapenos, cilantro. And then to finish off with a dash of Maggie and black pepper. So we wanted to do a take on that, but also using good local ingredients, making everything in-house and making it a really nice 10-inch sandwich. So every, so a Banh Mi loosely translates to bread. And these are your 10-inch sandwiches. Now, you're buying this bread from where? We're actually making it in-house. I like that question. Yeah. But you're not buying, you don't have huge freezers that you're storing all this frozen bread. You, when I first talked to you, Chad, I said, I'd love to get you guys on. He said, Grace, he's just making bread all day. She's just making bread all the time. And so homemade bread that you're doing for all these sandwiches, that's a lot of work.

22:06Oh, it is, it's a lot of work. I've been up super early this morning producing all this bread. But you know what, Chad actually got me the breads, nice bread oven, two of them. So I can be baking 100 loaves at a time. So, you know. It's like, I got you a really nice vacuum cleaner. Yeah, exactly. Well, that is so cool. So meat-wise, so it's bread and you put a meat and you said it's got all the different sides to it. You're doing bowls as well, right? No, I haven't been there yet, but like you're doing bowls. Tell me about the rest of the concept and we'll let you guys get back to it. Because if I'm coming there for the first time, what do I need to know? What are some of the must-knows so I don't sound like it's my first time there? How do you order? Do I need to come prepared with them? Do I need to look at a menu online first? Are there gonna be, is it a menu board? How does the whole process work when you come into E-Cipe on me? Great question. I mean, of course, for folks that wanna kind of research ahead, like we do when we go to restaurants, I mean, you can do that.

23:11Everything is online. Order online. We offer contactless pickup or you have dedicated shelves within the restaurant that you can just come and grab your bag of food or your Bon Me sandwich. But also we do have a giant menu board in the space. It's probably the focal point of the space. As you walk in, you'll see it, you can't miss it. And then we're very happy to walk you through any kind of order or questioning you would have or make recommendations based off of what you like. And yeah, so we do specialize in the sandwiches and the Vietnamese sandwiches. And we have eight of those on the menu, but we also have the three bowls. One of them's a salad bowl, one's a rice noodle bowl, and one is a broken rice bowl. They all kind of come with the great traditional authentic garnishes for awesome Vietnamese food. So you got your pickled vegetables, your peanuts, your fried shallots, all your beautiful picked herbs. And then you pick a protein to go on top and pretty much the proteins are the same ones from the Bon Me sandwiches. So there's a wide array. We do have a lot of vegetarian and vegan options.

24:13The rest of our menu is actually gluten free besides the Bon Me bread. So we're very dietary friendly and allergy friendly. But come down, we'll walk through an order with you or order online if that's your comfort level. I think that's what it's all about these days is however people want to be comfortable in these unique times. So we got you covered in any way. If you want to come down and hang out and order off the menu, great. If you want to place an online order, great. We got you covered. So that would be an experience here. Well, so thank you guys for joining us today. I think that's really good intel. And I want to get into more of just the trials and tribulations that may come with opening a restaurant in the middle of a pandemic. I know that there's a lot of stories there. You so eloquently said, people are praying for us. Like you've got lots of... Following your dream is never easy. Being an entrepreneur is easy. I'd love to learn some of the backstory behind exactly what makes each one of you uniquely excited, the ability to do this.

25:17I mean, this is not something that's easy to do. And I love to hear your stories behind it. We will do that in the coming weeks. Get out there, go open the restaurant with you, nothing but the best of success and luck. Thank you guys for coming on the show today. Thank you, Brandon. We really appreciate it. Thanks everybody. Good to see you. Eastside by me. Okay, and we're back. But one of us here got to go ahead. You've mentioned earlier, Ben, that you were able to do the friends and family. You ate at Eastside by me. Tell us how the experience went. Well, the whole experience with Chad and Gracie has been great. We met back in, I guess, middle of January is when we first connected through an architect here in town. And they've had the shittiest luck since they announced that they were gonna open a restaurant. I think they moved here a week after the tornado. Their restaurant is like right on tornado alley. And then COVID hits. And then they had issues with permitting.

26:18And what's it been? Six months later, they finally opened and they killed it. They knocked it out of the park. Tuesday night, I walked in. Again, I told you I was excited already, but I didn't wanna set any expectation level. And I'm telling you, they killed it. I've seen so many posts on Facebook and Instagram about how good their restaurant is. And it's legit. I mean, it's like Southern, or not Southern California, but San Francisco, Silicon Valley, that kind of food brought to Nashville. I haven't seen anything like that. Not even close to it. It's fantastic. Dilly, have you tried it? Have you been there yet? One of my friends brought me some food when they did one of their pop-ups. And so I got to try a couple of things. But I was thinking earlier, they posted that toasted peanut rice milk with a shot of coffee in it, and it's so good. And you can't get anything like that here and there. I tried the cold noodle salad and one of the subs. I think the one that had the Giffords bologna on it, maybe.

27:21But I haven't been in yet. So you got the first look. It's so good. And we don't get to say this very often. So when we designed the kitchen, the building is about the size of your computer screen. I mean, it's tiny, tiny. It maybe has 35 seats in there, maybe 35 seats. And Chad and I were in the kitchen trying to lay everything out, and it was empty. And he goes, it is a really small kitchen. I said, yeah, we're kind of getting used to this in Nashville. I said, but for some reason, I feel like once we get all the stuff in here, your kitchen's gonna feel bigger. And I kind of said it as a joke because that never ever happens. And I'll be damned. We walked in there Tuesday night and he goes, Ben, I'm not gonna lie to you. I feel like the kitchen's bigger now with all the stuff in here. I said, well, good, it was all because of me. It was 100% because of me. It had nothing to do with you or anybody else. No, I'm just kidding. They were great. They know what they're doing. This is not gonna be their only restaurant around here. They're gonna come up.

28:23They were awesome. He told me in the interview, you guys are gonna hear it anyway, for the people listening right now, he told me in the interview that he saw her in a chefware magazine. We first saw Gracie. He saw her, she was a model in a chefware magazine and he thought like, she's the one. I was like, what? That's a first. I think that's a first that I've heard. Saw her in a chefware magazine and fell in love. I love that. It's for them. Not everybody gets to marry the model of their dreams. So, pretty cool deal. So, just to let you guys know what we're doing here, if you're watching live, you've got the roundup live, which is myself with Delia Jo Ramsey. She's the editor of Eater Nashville and Ben Whitlock, who is the president of Mobile Fixture. Mobile Fixture is a restaurant equipment company who will outfit your kitchen with all of the things, all of the right equipment that you need. He's looking at me like. It's very odd to listen to you. I love it.

29:23This is great. This is fun. This is live. It's interesting. I don't even know. We have a question and I'll tell you that we're gonna get to our segment, which is gonna be the local legend. We're gonna have Stephen Smithing, who's the owner of Mayor Bull Restaurant. He also owns Green Hills Grubby. He's gonna be on the show live here in just a moment, in five minutes. He's gonna come on and talk to us about Mayor Bull, why Mayor Bull has been sustainable, what they're doing right now, and he's gonna join the show live. So, hang out for that. That episode, that segment's gonna be brought to you by Mobile Fixture. Mobile Fixture is a fantastic company. I know who you can call to get the best equipment out there, and his name is Hank. Oh no, I'm sorry. No, call Hank. Please call Hank. Call Hank. It's fine. It's no problem. So, Jennifer Luna asks, what is the next big restaurant trend? And I would say that's a great question for Ben. I can chime in on that too, but what are you seeing out there? What are people, what are, you're seeing all the concepts in what's new.

30:24What are the next big trends? Today, it's just survival. I mean, it's, survived, no, I'll joke inside. It's going back to the QSR, the fast casual order of the counter, take a number, sit down. And I think, I'm probably wrong, I hope I'm not, but I think what you're gonna see is some of these James Beard award-winning chefs and the Michelin-style restaurants that have historically had the five and 10 course meals, you're gonna see a fusion between that and the counter service fast casual where you're gonna go to a Josephine-style restaurant, but you're gonna order at a counter and sit down and you're gonna think it's really weird until they bring your food out and it's just a fantastic experience. I really think that's going to happen. Huh? I said, we know somebody that's done that, the Nicky's.

31:26Yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. They have converted. Now, they had it a little bit easier than some of these, the white linen restaurants are gonna have it, but they converted, I mean, like overnight. They killed it. They did a great job with it too. Yeah. That's what I think the next wave is. I was gonna say something similar, downsizing. I think that something that you could do at a countertop, some of you could do these gigantic restaurants that hold 300 people. I just don't see that being something that people are gonna wanna continue to do. It's gonna, they're gonna downsize. That's a great question to ask our next guest, Steven Smithing, when he comes on the show. We'll continue that conversation here in just a moment for sure. Springer Mountain Farms is a family-owned business nestled in the hills of the Blue Ridge Mountains with over 50 years experience in raising chickens. We exercise great care in all that we do. And our dedication providing our chickens with a quality life and healthy diet results in a healthier, more delicious chicken for you and your family to enjoy.

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33:30Contact them at 615-456-3953 or at www.kurtzhospitality.com. That's K-U-R-T-Z, hospitality.com. All right, what else do we got? What do you guys think it's gonna be? What do you, you know, you guys are just in tune with things as I am. What do you think the next trend is? I mean, I always joke that you look at a bigger city and like, look at that, and that's gonna be us in five years. Cause you know, we got Coke a little late. We got everything a little late, I feel like. But now it's a crapshoot. Like now I think everything has turned on its head because nothing is the same. And I think nothing will ever be the same. So I think like what you said, I think a return to some approachability and affordability is gonna be important because people aren't gonna have the same amount of money to spend on dining out after all of this, unfortunately. I think it's been a gut check. I think this is a gut check for everybody. I think we got into kind of a little bit of a time where everything was just grip it and rip it, man.

34:35Get out there, have fun. Everybody's coming out to eat. We're in the land of plenty, Nashville, Tennessee. Here we go, woo! Build your rooftop. Yeah, I mean, yeah, let's build up three more stories. Let's put some more rooftops in. Hell, man, there's people here. We got this. And I noticed it in 2008. In 2008, everybody got super lean. I mean, we just got super duper lean. And it helped the industry altogether. I mean, we trimmed a little bit of the fat off of everything. And where people were doing frivolous spending and just doing kind of a lot of crazy stuff, a lot of that is just pulled back. I don't know if it's, it's not reducing quality, but it's, I've got a restaurant I'm working with that we've identified a labor number that we need to be at. And it's a lot less than it used to be. People are willing to do a lot more work right now. And I think that you're gonna find people doing two and three jobs. You're gonna find that the labor market's not gonna be, I don't need six people to work the line tonight.

35:35I need three, maybe four on a Friday. And if I got three, I'm gonna start cross-training people to do different jobs because I don't need to keep a staff of 12 people to run a three-person line. And I'm gonna pay those people a little bit more. And I'm gonna, I think the really talented people, the people with high skills are gonna have jobs and we're gonna ask them to do more. They, so I think that you're looking at a different market of workers, honestly. And I think that you're gonna see everybody lean up in a big way. Yep. Anybody out there have any questions? Any out there want to say anything? We're waiting on Stephen. He should be here any moment. Anybody out there close this week, Delia? Anything that we're hearing about? I mean, people have reiterated to me that they saw City Fire's closing. We've talked about it before, but they're like putting in a Walgreens now.

36:36I mean, we've talked about the closings. I haven't gotten any more confirmations of any. Not brought to you by Mobile Fixture. No. Not brought to you by Mobile Fixture. So let's jump into the new mandates. We have today, the mayor announced that we're gonna do a modified phase two. What does that mean? So we're allowed to sit at bars again? No. No. I thought we were allowed to sit at bars again. So the limited, the smaller bars can open with max capacity of 25 people. Still no bar seating. And we now have 30 more minutes because I guess coronavirus doesn't creep into town till 10.30 now. Well, thank goodness. We were, you know. Curfews extended. I wrote this story and I was like, I feel like when I was in high school and I had a really early curfew and I was like, my mom gave me 15 extra minutes. I feel like that today. I was like. That's marvelous.

37:37Well, we are, as you can see on the screen, we have brought in a new guest to the show. Mr. Stephen Smithing, welcome to the roundup. Well, thank you guys. Appreciate y'all having me in. So we do a segment every week called the local legend. And I would say that this segment was written for somebody like yourself, who I would consider to be an absolute local legend. You are the owner of both Mayor Bull Restaurant as well as the Green Hills Grill, which are restaurants that have been around in Nashville since 1990, in 1987, 88 respectively. 85 and 90. 85 for Mayor Bull and 1990 for Green Hills Grill. So these restaurants are amazing examples of restaurants that have really created the culinary scene here in Nashville. So we're excited to have you on, Stephen. Thank you. Hey, we just had a question. Somebody said, what is, what was the actual question? What do you think the next trends are? The big restaurant trends coming to Nashville?

38:39What do you think the next big, we kind of identified, we think that they're going to lean up and we think that they're going to reduce in size, kind of a counter service type things. What do you see the trends going to? Oh, I think number one, smaller restaurants, smaller footprints. Anytime you deal with the real estate market that we're in currently, it's just very difficult to have a lot of space and be able to generate enough people coming through the front door to get it out the other side. I also think you're going to see some different equipment. I mean, there's some pretty fancy equipment out there that takes a lot of time and also some space off of doing different things. I really think there'll be some innovation in that. I think as we look to what really is happening in the marketplace where some of that, certainly younger demographics going to a dine out or go and get their food and take it away or have it delivered, I think in kitchens and in restaurants, doing those two things simultaneously, being able to see feed people inside as well as feed people outside, the equipment necessary and the designs necessary to do that effectively are going to be pretty much pretty important.

39:45Good percent, you guys agree? Yes, yes. I mean, I'm kind of an operations guy, so it's more for me operationally than it is. I'm certainly not going to be the person probably setting the next trend. I like to pay attention to what other people do and say, oh, that looks good. Let's try that. Excellent. So let's get back to, let me ask you a question here. Mayor Bowl has been around forever. How long have you owned Mayor Bowl for? I've owned Mayor Bowl for a little over 13 years. So what is the secret to your success, Stephen? Well, the secret to our success out there is the people that I work with and having some really fantastic people facing the guests and making decisions on their behalf. When you have people that have worked there, I inherited several wonderful crew members when I purchased the restaurant and then I've just had other people who've worked with me in the past come and work with us and then folks who just come out of the blue and do a great job as well.

40:46In fact, I was working with a gentleman, Michael, this afternoon and he hasn't been there a whole lot of long time, but he's doing a great job and owning every minute of it. So it's kind of what you got to do is if you treat the restaurant like you own it, about one day you may. I started as a server at the Green Hills Grill, so I still believe in that kind of thing. Love that. So fundamentals, I mean, really just executing on the things that are important in being mayorable. Good food, do you, tell us a little bit about Mayor Bowl. I mean, I think a lot of people out there are familiar that there was a restaurant Mayor Bowl. I think the question of, isn't that downtown? Tell us a little about what you're doing and tell us a little about your restaurant. Well, as much as they've tried a couple different times to have a downtown Maryland Farms, they've been unable to succeed doing that because I think some of the residency requirements there with the acre lots, they've wanted to sell detached homes on smaller lots, but I'm not an expert in that. We're basically in Maryland Farms, which is right over the line from, I mean, Davidson County ends at Old Hickory Boulevard and Brentwood and Williamson County start at Old Hickory Boulevard and we're about 300 yards into Williamson County in Brentwood.

42:00Obviously that's a big business park out there. We're missing some of the cars that we would see daily. I never thought I would miss that traffic going east every day, but I'd sure love to see a little bit more of it right now. The restaurant's in a big home. It was a manor, it was not a plantation house. It was built to resemble a big old Southern home. It was built in 1942 during the war with supplies that had been saved up prior to that time. So it has some bigger rooms and some better construction techniques than older antebellum houses all had very small rooms because obviously you didn't want to heat too much because not very many people were in there. So we've got some, and we renovated it into a restaurant or I should say Dave Wattell renovated it into a restaurant in 2001. And they've been doing business there since then. We've had to change it a little bit. I mean, Maribor downtown was a big music venue and as much as I love music and would love to figure out how to do that, I've never been very successful at it. And one day I had two business gentlemen come in the front door and they looked at the lounge singer and they said, I want to be as far away from that as possible.

43:02And I understood I was in Brentwood, not downtown Nashville. And that was about the end of the story for the music. It just has never worked especially well but there's not a large contiguous space in there to view it. So we do a lot of different events and when the people next door to your mother's 80th birthday party have a band, it doesn't always do well for your event. I've been there. I'm like, I'm not doing that. I've been at other events. I'm like, golly, that is annoying. So. It's a thing. Seriously. What do you guys got? You guys have a question, Steven? I do. Oh, go ahead. Go ahead, Dilly, go ahead. You go ahead. You hit. Go. It's your birthday. I want to touch on this comment down here asking about Stacey Case's investigation about what other cities are doing for small businesses that Nashville isn't. As far as some cities are allowing restaurants to relax codes so you can use sidewalks and street parking to increase capacity for outdoor dining. And Nashville hasn't really done that. So I'm like wondering as a restaurant owner, would that benefit you?

44:05What are your thoughts on relaxing codes to help restaurant owners and small businesses in that way? Well, while I do understand it's big in Florida and it's hot and humid down there, it's probably better in California where you get the nice Pacific breeze and while it may be hot, it's not that humid. I think that I don't have either restaurant in a place that would abut a street. I have parking lots in front of both of my businesses. I would think that if I wanted to use some of the parking lot and I were to go through the correct channels, I could probably do that in either case because those parking lots are not a capacity because they both have businesses in the buildings as well and those office people are not present. I think it's gone over one, from what I've heard in New York City and in places where they're doing out there, it's helping those economies where they are not allowed to eat inside whatsoever. So I'd rather have that than nothing, that's for sure. That's very true. Yeah, yeah. Ben? Ben? My question was shifting gears back to the labor side where you said a word that, or a couple of words that we try and use a lot and that's owning it.

45:13So your employees, have you found that the good ones have become more loyal and the borderline ones have turned into that loyal employee or are you not seeing that shift in dynamic yet? My restaurants are a little bit different in that that's really what I want out of somebody. I want them to care. That's the first thing I say on my orientation with the staff members is I want you to care and then I tell them why. And basically caring is treating it like you own it. We don't really specialize in people checking in and checking out. Obviously having some young people come into my businesses, more frankly that more so than mature people say, under 30 as opposed to over 30 during COVID. Some of those people, and it may be because they didn't have benefits or they had to find themselves something to do because they weren't in school anymore. But some of those people have stepped in and did an exceptional job. I mean, right from the beginning, they take to training well, they care, they do right for the guests. I mean, obviously a lot of these folks haven't been out of their houses that too long or too, too long.

46:16And that's been beneficial to both businesses. I think on the other side, we've been able to retain most of the people at Mayor Bowler, the people that we needed. And at Green Hills, we have had to do some hiring and the people that we've gotten so far have just done a great job. Now we've noticed a split, I guess, with employees where you really start to see who's all in, who's committed, the ones who are not, they're becoming exposed because if they're just gonna mail it in, then there's plenty of people looking for jobs. So you either own it or you can go somewhere else. It's odd to be in the city and people say that. Because seven months ago, we would have hired any one industry and totally different now. And we've been pretty fortunate. And I'll be honest, there are some people who have stepped up who you wouldn't expect it. You're like, wow, I didn't know those people.

47:16I mean, what we did to go only at Green Hills Grill, some of the crew members who stepped up were the people who I didn't expect. And they said, I wanna work, I just wanna keep working. I wanna work through. And by and large, every person that did that did a fantastic job. I mean, if you wanted to work, you came to work and you did a great job and you took to the training. Obviously we had some systems of operation in place, which need to be tweaked a little bit as we are to go sales 400%. But having those people that wanted to be there and wanted to care about it and work made a huge bit of difference. And as we came back and we've called all of the people back to both of our restaurants because we've needed, some of those young people have gone to college in the last few weeks, we needed some fill in. So some of the employees that had been off for quite a while came back. And with some of them, we've seen great buy-in. And with others, they clearly are annoyed by the fact that they have to be there, which is disappointing to me. I mean, I guess we have to be there, but as I tell them, I'm the only one who can't quit, you can. Which is my favorite line that you ever say. I'm the only one who can't quit.

48:20Well, I still owe people money. If I had the money to just pay it off, maybe I would, but I'm also only 52 and I have children in, my youngest son's in eighth grade. So I'll be working for a while. I'll work past the end of this. I'm hopefully assuming that, should my health continue to be good, but that's the goal. We'll get through it at some point. It's just gonna take a while and try not to run out of money in the meantime. So first of all, Keisha Johns says, hi, Steven. Well, thank you. We are live right now on Facebook and Heath Ballard has asked the question, there are still owners of restaurants here in Alabama that are waiting for the other guy to open the dining room because they're afraid to. Have y'all been seeing that up in Nashville? No, I think all the restaurants that have been able to open, and obviously some of the bars were not able to open. I understand why they've been a little anxious about that, but the restaurants, most all of the restaurants open. We waited one extra month from the beginning of May or actually, I guess the end of April at Maribor to open until June 1st, because we didn't have the faith that people were ready to come out yet.

49:25We thought it was still too early and that turned out to be probably a pretty good move. But no, I think most people are back, but I don't know, Brandon, you talk to people every day in the business. Certainly, if you're in a tourist-centric location and your restaurant is there and there's nobody else there, I could understand that restaurants oftentimes are far more expensive to operate open than they are closed. I mean, there are a few that still are waiting, like Craig that we talked to last week, and someone just said it doesn't make sense to open at a lower capacity. Pelican and Pigs finally coming back, I guess, on next week, the 18th, after this whole time being off. And I know Red Perch Downtown in the arcade just decided they were not gonna open for a little while because no one's downtown. So yeah, I think, like you said, in the tourist areas and in some of the smaller restaurants, it doesn't make sense for them to do it yet. I wish, and maybe those guys talk to each other more, I wish we did a better job of information sharing just amongst ourselves, because I'd love to sit at a table with those people and understand their decisions, because I'm sure they're great decisions and very viable.

50:27But obviously I have large restaurants and it was not hard to separate people, and yet still do covers that would cut in, that would provide income that was a positive and not a negative, so that's why we did it. I think the way that that question is phrased, that there are restaurants waiting for the other guy to open dining rooms because they're afraid to, I don't think that's happening at all. I don't think that's happening anywhere. Jesse Lee Jones was on the show yesterday. He's classified as a restaurant. Robert's Western World is classified as a restaurant because they have fried bologna sandwiches and does his whole thing there. But he's not opening because he doesn't think it's the right thing to do right now. He doesn't think that getting a bunch of people in his tiny building without masks on is good for the disease. Craig is kind of the same way. He's like, I can't do it, I can't do to-go's. I'm not set up to do orders. I'm not gonna open just because I'm in a good position where I have the ability to not open. But he also said, I really believe that people that do open are opening for a reason and it's good that they are.

51:32I mean, if they have to open, if you're gonna have to close your doors or open the restaurant, open the restaurant, do it. But I don't think anybody's afraid, like I'm not, because everybody's just doing it. All the restaurants are open now in some capacity. Generally speaking, I believe that's the case. And if you can do it and still watch out for the health of your staff and for the health of your guests then it makes sense to do it. Obviously we were prepared at Green Hills Grill. We had systems of operation and delivery cars at both restaurants. Obviously without the business park at Mayor Bowl, we knew we weren't going to do much in to-go because we don't do a lot of home to-go there. But at Green Hills Grill, where we do a lot of local to-go and delivery, we had a feeling that that would scale up. So we ran with it and fortunately it did. And when you can increase what you normally do 400% and right now we're running about 30 to 35% of our business in to-go and delivery, that certainly is helping the bottom line tremendously as opposed to Mayor Bowl where we do far less than that. And it's still a little touch and go there.

52:32We could use more people and guests. Anyway. Let's talk about that real quick. If you're listening out there right now, Mayor Bowl is located in Maryland Farms and you are known at Mayor Bowl for a lot of your events. It's a beautiful home and it's on a beautiful property and you've got lots of private dining rooms. How is the event business going right now? I mean, obviously you can't do, I mean, we're in Williamson County so you're not in Davidson County. COVID sleeps longer there, Delia. Yeah, I'm obviously not in charge of the regulations and I don't need to say too much about it. But because we are able to do events there and we do all wear masks and gloves on a daily basis, we're able to have some small bit of business. Not much though. I mean, most of what we do out there is corporate events and corporate business and those events are all gone. They've all canceled through the end of the year at least. We're doing some wedding events and rehearsal dinners. We're doing a memorial service tonight at the restaurant.

53:35So there are still other opportunities that people wanna use it for. The wedding business has been tossed into disarray, needless to say. What are you open to do? I mean, so if I'm out there and I wanna have some sort of a get together but I wanna be socially distant, how are you able to do these events? Let's get the word out that if you wanna do something, you can still do it at Maribol. What are the available options? What do you have? What are the different sizes of the rooms? What can people book right now? Well, we have seven different dining rooms anywhere from two people, obviously up to 60 people. 60 people might be tough to socially distance in there but we also have rooms that you can join together. And while they don't have movable partition walls at a hotel, the rooms also don't look like a hotel. So they have a little bit more charm and decor in there and better light and some things like that. So, and we've got a lot of people like I believe tonight, the event upstairs is using the outdoor patio as well as the rooms, the two rooms upstairs. You're able to get 40 people pretty well spread out in that much space.

54:38And so there's plenty of room to social distance. If you have, I mean, 40 people is a lot of people right now. I mean, especially anywhere in town. I mean, to get 40 people together, they're able to socially distance and not be all on top of each other, right? Yeah, they tend to group up a little bit at events like that anyway. So that seems to be here and there, but yeah. And the tables are situated far enough apart. It works out well. Good. What do you guys got? Ben? I want the chicken salad recipe for Green Hills Grill. I mean, like- That's a pretty simple recipe, but it's a pretty good recipe. Oh, it's- We sell a lot of chicken salad. It's stupid good. Like I live in Murfreesboro and we drive over there just for that. And that used to be a bigger deal than it is now. Now it's like a 20 minute drive. And six months ago, it was an hour and a half drive and it was still worth it then. You know, funny story about the chicken salad because obviously it's not the sexiest dish and it's not the trendiest thing, but it's funny, you know, traveling around the country, you find things that people are famous for that they do well and you just keep doing it well.

55:46And if you try to do that somewhere else, it doesn't really work. People are like, well, why would you want that? When we opened Green Hills Grill, my opening chef, Cassie said, we're not putting that on the menu. And I'm like, what do you mean we're not putting that on the menu? We've sold 20,000 of these this year. And she goes, no, that's not cool at all. And I'm like, well, we're still gonna put it on there. We're gonna see. And she had to go to the store to get chicken tenders that Saturday. The first day we opened, she had to make more. Then she was like, all right, you're right. And it just sold well. I haven't, we haven't changed it. We haven't done much to it, but people love it, it's comfort food. Which is, you know, a lot of what we do too. All right, well, Stephen, we will let you off the hot seat. I have one more question for you and I will tease everybody and I will say, you are going to be a feature guest on Nashville Restaurant Radio, not this coming week, but the following week. You're gonna be on the show and I'm really excited to do a deep dive with you about both restaurants, your history, your thoughts. And I think it's gonna be a lot of fun. Sure, that's great.

56:47We'll have fun. And yeah, we are. We're gonna have a good time. What's in the cards for Maribou going forward? What do you see, you know? Get your crystal ball out and. I'd love to get some visiting chefs here, especially people who aren't really busy or aren't working and haven't come out there and, you know, do a little session or a dinner and kind of co-brand for a little bit. Cause I think it, you kind of need to do it Maribou. I mean, it's in a big old house. At one point I thought I could dumb it down and make it, you know, a little sexier and things like that. But it kind of is what it is, but it's also very good. The service is very good. There's a lot of light. It's a great place for events, but it'd be fun to have somebody come in there and do something. I mean, obviously talking to chefs, if your restaurant is 50 people or you can seat 50 people and we can seat 258, there are things you just can't do for 258 people if you're full that you can do for 41 or 50. And it'd be fun to put together a dinner, you know, 40 or 50 people and have them do some of those fun things. Maybe it would spurn their interest or, you know, kind of get them creatively thinking about, well, maybe there's something scalable, but we could do larger.

57:50Because I think a lot of times we think, well, we would love to do that, except if we have 200 people come to the restaurant order that at the same time, we're not gonna be able to execute it. So it'd be fun to play with some of those things. Plus, I just think getting people, you know, from different areas of town into Brentwood, which certainly has a high income demographic. These people eat out all over Nashville and wherever they wanna eat. In fact, I'll tell you a quick story. I had a guest one time and he said to me, he goes, yeah, we come to your restaurant all the time because you always treat my wife well and you make whatever crazy stuff she wants to make. He goes, but we have this fear of missing alcohol. He goes, every other week we get together with a bunch of couples and we go to the best, the best eater restaurant in Nashville, congratulations. And we try them all out. And I said, well, which one's your favorite? Which one have you been back to again and again and again? He goes, oh, we never go to VM twice. And I thought, well, I probably fed that guy 500 times, which is great. And obviously he has gone back and he went on to say some of the ones that they did like. But those people are everywhere in the communities that I'm able to serve and you know, they're driving and Ubering and going wherever they can to try out everybody's food.

58:52So it'd be fun to kind of bring it back into that area and wet their appetite a little bit and get some of them back out across town. What a hell of an idea. I mean, bring in chefs to your place and kind of, you know, try out their food in a different environment and see if your guests and introduce, you know, it's really introducing the guests that come dine at Mayor Bowl to a new chefs kind of their style and their restaurant. And as well as I think maybe bringing that chefs into your, what a great idea to collaborate. They're just different areas of, you know, different size buildings. So, but you know, and like I said, we'd love to do some of that stuff. It'd be a lot of fun, you know. All right, I've got, thank you so much, Steven Smithing. Really appreciate you coming in and joining us. And we look forward to your interview in a couple of weeks. Sounds great. Thank you. Appreciate it, Brandon. Thanks, Ben. Thanks, Ben. Y'all take care. Bye-bye.

59:56All right, that was awesome. I still gotta get the front one. Yeah, you gotta go check that place out. It's amazing. I gotta go. His places are fantastic. They really are. He's one of those that if you just want a solid meal and you don't wanna take a chance, go to either one of them. They're just, they're perfect. Green Hill's the closest place to my house in Green Hill. So I was there often, so. You know what I love about his restaurants? And I have, you know, intimate knowledge of his restaurants, but like I just, I feel like they're consistent. They don't try and be something that they're not. You know, you go in there and you know what you're gonna get. You get good service and it's memorable and it's not crazy expensive, but it's like, it's good food that you like to eat. You know, it's like, there's not a bunch of just crazy stuff that you don't know what it is. And I think you get a lot of that at Bastion. You get a lot of that at some of these really cool.

01:00:57And I love that. If you're going out for that, I get it. But he kind of makes a very approachable meal that you can come in and eat on a regular basis and afford. And it's got great service, uses the best ingredients. And it's like, it's not over the top, but it's not like, oh, this is all I get. It's like, that's what I expected. And I think for a place that he wants you to go eat multiple times, it's what it is. You know, it's the exact same every single time. And there was something to be said for that. If I want chicken salad, I can drive there. And I know exactly what that chicken salad is gonna taste like every single time. All right, do you guys wanna, Josh Matthews has asked us a question. Wanna jump in there? I think that I figured out how to put the question on the screen, it might cover you up Delia. Oh, there you go. I can put it on this one. Question for the group. Earlier in discussion, everyone seemed to be in agreement regarding the trimming and leaning of current and future restaurants, for the most part.

01:01:59With that said, what is the group's opinion on all the boutique hotel signature and otherwise specialty restaurants that are under construction or beginning in the near future here in Nashville? Delia, I'm gonna lean to you on that one because you are the white limousine. You've been there, you've done that. They're starting, what is your, what is your, here I'll put the question back up there. Yeah. Right over your face, I'll put it back down. I mean, I don't know, like, I worry about how all these places are gonna fill capacity and stay open, but usually they have a great financial backing. It's gonna have an easier time than local restaurant owners. So I'm very confused because I look out my window right now and I still see the cranes and I hear, I wake up to people on the construction of hotel across the street and I'm like, we're still building, but people aren't still coming. I feel very iffy about it.

01:02:59I love the new rooftop bars as much as the next person. I'm going to the white limousine and graduate this weekend for a staycation. So I will support them, but I don't know if people can keep that afloat. How many more hotel rooms are we adding? And people aren't having the money to spend on $20 cocktails anymore. Well, Ben, what's your thoughts? If I had $250 million laying around to build a hotel, I would find a piece of land here today and start building it. You gotta remember the cranes that you see and the construction sites you see, they're not opening anytime soon. They're not blowing and going like they were, but they're not opening for six months, 12 months or 18 months. That's going to be when that's the perfect time to open. Now, if I'm a hotel and I just got my certificate of occupancy in March, yeah, I'm in bad trouble, but these hotel groups, they are licking their chops.

01:04:02Money is cheap right now. Real estate is relatively cheap, still here in Nashville. If they can put a shovel in the ground now, they're gonna do it immediately because they're not opening for two years or three years. I know it's backwards. I know it makes no sense whatsoever. Now is the time to start looking at expanding. It really is, because they're not doing it today. But what do you think, Ben, of the places like the Grand Hyatt and the Joseph that are opening this month and next month? How do you think that's gonna go? So that's two different opinions because the Hyatt is the Hyatt. If they lose a hundred million dollars in their first year, it's a hundred million dollars, but they've got billions and billions of billions behind them. So they're willing to suck it up for a while. They know in the long run, they're going to make a lot of money in that hotel. The Joseph is a little bit different. When is the Joseph, is the Joseph officially open?

01:05:06I think they might be booking rooms now, and then the restaurant opens in two weeks. I tell you what, I will have the answer Wednesday on Nashville Restaurant Radio when I interview Tony and Kathy Montuano of the Joseph Hotel. Go back. Yeah. So I'll give you an example back to the Hyatt. We're doing the restaurant inside the Hyatt, and they're pushing us. They want us to get done as soon as possible. They want to open. They know that they're going to lose money. The hotel is going to lose money for a substantial amount of time. But at the end of the day, they're looking at the long run. They don't care what's going to happen in the next six months. They care what's going to happen in the next six years. And I think that's how most hotel people are. I will tell you guys, and I'm going to tell you, my opinion is very similar to what you just said, Ben. We tend to talk about locally owned and operated restaurants on this show.

01:06:06We tend to talk about people who live in Nashville, who went to a bank, put their house up for collateral, and had a dream, and decided to open a restaurant, employ talented people, and they are creative, and they had menus, and they're having a really tough time right now because PPP helped, but they need people to go out and these restrictions, not being able to sit at the bar, 50% people, it really hurts them. When the question asked earlier, how are restaurants doing, it's been devastating. Now, that's why I keep saying, go eat local. Go eat at local. If you're going to go eat, order takeout, do whatever you can, buy local. When it comes to all these boutique hotels, and restaurants, rooftops, and places, they're all going to be just fine. Because this thing, we will get a vaccine one day. This pandemic is not going to be forever. And when it does end, Nashville's going to have some scars. We're going to have some bruises and bumps and bruises. We're going to go through a little bit of rehab, but then Nashville's going to get back up, and Nashville's going to return to some sort of, I think we're going to get back to where we were.

01:07:12It may take a little longer than we thought, but if you're, like you said, Ben, you put shovels in the ground right now, and a year and a half you want to open, or two years you're going to open, you're looking pretty good. I think there's a lot of sharks out there right now, and I say sharks, and people out there are going, yep, go ahead and close your doors. Oh, I want that place, and that place, and that, people that are looking for cheap real estate, and that's kind of a downside of this whole thing, that there's going to be a lot of people that get rich. If you look at the stock market right now, why is the stock market's had record months? Because people know that this isn't going to be forever. The problem is people think it's not going to be forever, so then we could just go out and party. Like, no, no, no, but right now, there's this, it's a balance you've got to find in everything that you do, and being responsible right now so that we can have a future is very important. Yeah, let me say one last thing about the hotel folks, because we get involved with a few hotels in the city, and in the Southeast. I've learned one thing, those hotel guys are way smarter than any of us.

01:08:17They do their research, they do their demographics, they do all of their pro formas years and years and years before they even put a shovel in the ground, so that by the time the shovel goes in the ground, they don't really care what is going on in the world for the next 18 to 24 months, because by the time they open, they know that by the time they open, they're going to be making money. So it sucks for the Josephs and for the Hyatt's and the Sean Brock restaurants. Yeah, it's going to be painful for a little while, but at the end of the day, they're going to be fine. And again, money is cheap right now. And if the interest rates are as low as they'll ever be, so why not borrow $250 million and build a restaurant? Or excuse me, a hotel, please somebody find a $250 million restaurant. That's going to be one hell of a restaurant. Damn. Let me break the news for you.

01:09:18Great question. Thank you, Josh, for asking that question. So we talked earlier, I'm going to do a little, we've got some great advertisers and people who sponsor this show. One of those people is Mobile Fixture. If you are going to be opening a restaurant, if you're one of those people that are opening a restaurant and you need to outfit your restaurant with the best kitchen equipment that you can possibly find, isn't just, that whole story isn't just buying kitchen equipment. Oh, just go to the website, buy kitchen equipment. You've got to identify what you're going to be cooking. You've got to identify the square footage of your kitchen, where everything's going to be. There's a layout. Hey, if this line, there's a flow to the whole thing. And one of the things that Mobile Fixture does is they will sit with you and consult and identify where everything needs to go, what you need to do. They'll help you set up your entire kitchen, get it installed. I happen to have Ben Whitlock, who's the president of Mobile Fixture right here with us. Am I off base, Ben? Is that what you guys are doing?

01:10:19No, you just keep on going. I can just sit back and listen, this is fine. Well, fantastic. So if you are one of those people who is out there and you are looking to open a restaurant and you want to talk to somebody about your idea, you found a spot, give this guy right there, give him a call and he will be happy to talk to you about what you're doing. Another company who is a great sponsor of this show is Faux and Beaux, front of the house and back of the house, F-O-H and B-O-H.com. We mentioned earlier that there's a lot of people out there looking for jobs and the job market's about to be very interesting. We don't know what kind of stimulus plan's gonna happen, but we do know that Indeed and Monster and just all these different, I don't even know if Monster's even a thing anymore, but posting on post and pray is a method of hiring people. We're just gonna post and pray and hope that somebody lets me know they want a job. Faux and Beaux did it differently. They've taken a kind of a match.com approach where you can go on as a restaurant professional and you can sign up, say, I'm a bartender and this is what I do.

01:11:20You can kind of put your different categories and things that you, the different filters that you prefer when you go to work, put them on there, put a picture of yourself. You can do a profile video. There's no resume. It's just you put a little something about yourself and then restaurants sign up for Faux and Beaux and they can go in, you need a bartender? Cool, I'm gonna go look at, there's over 2,500 people on Faux and Beaux right now. You can pick somebody out and go, oh, I like them. They look like they'd be great. Hit a button that says request interview and immediately you're set up with a bartender. You need servers, you need hosts, you need restaurant managers. Faux and Beaux has it all right now and it is free. So when I say it's free, the clock is ticking. It is free till the end of August. If you go to Faux and Beaux right now as a restaurant, sign up, create your profile. You can hire as many people as you want till the end of August and it's free. After that, it's gonna go back to the pay model and I highly recommend you go do that now. Check out NashvilleRestaurantRadio.com. Click the sponsors tab where you will find links to wonderful companies such as Mobile Fixture, FauxandBeaux.com and I'm saying Mobile Fixture lots of times because I'm just watching Ben's face get red.

01:12:33It's my favorite thing to do today. That's great. Yeah. I'm so excited, it's not Mobile Fixture. I can't express to you how nice it is to hear it say correctly. What, Mobile Fixture? Yeah, it's always been mobile. Everybody says mobile. What, why has it gotta be mobile? It's not mobile, it's mobile, thank you. I think that's the real reason why you guys advertise with us because you just want me to say your name. You can just hear somebody say Mobile Fixture. Yes, yes, it's music to our ears. We like hearing our name. I love it. All right, well, are we gonna be doing a What's the Delia today? What's the Delia? Are we doing one? We have one. Oh, wow, does anybody have, oh, look at Heath Ballard jumping in there to you. He says, build a relationship with Mobile Fixture and they will take care of you. Do your restaurant right.

01:13:35Takes more than clicking a button online. Damn right, Heath. Heath, is that a boy, Heath? Yeah. Does anybody have anything, they wanna know what's the Delia with out there? We've had a crazy week and we would love to know if you guys wanna know what the deal is. What's the Delia with anything? And I will tell you that Super Source, while we're getting into the advertisements, Super Source is a company as well that sponsors the show and they do the What's the Delia segment. And Super Source is a dish machine and chemical company. If you're out there right now and you're reopening and you have a company out there, we had Craig on the show last week and he said that he uses AutoCore and they, for him, was really nice because they stopped charging him while they were closed. While he's closed right now, they're not charging him a dish machine rental, which I thought was fantastic of AutoCore to do. But they're under contract and he can't, that's a whole thing that you're being under contract with these companies.

01:14:35And one thing that Super Source doesn't do is they don't have you sign any sort of a contract. They feel like they have to earn your business every single week. Right now, for our listeners, they are offering you 90 days of a free dish machine rental. So give Jason Ellis a call. Again, if you go to our website at NashvilleRestaurantRadio.com, click the Sponsors tab, go to Super Source, click that button and you will get a link directly to them which will let you get your dish machine for free for 90 days. If anything, let Jason come out to your restaurant and do an audit with you. Just have him say, hey man, we're not gonna use you but I would love for you to tell me what my current company's doing. He'll test your machines. He'll see what level, hey, oh, they've got your machine that you're diluting this to this degree right now. You don't quite need that. I was with him, we did a restaurant. We went in and he goes, yeah, they're using five times the degreaser that you need to be using. And I said, really? And he goes, yeah, these are one gallon containers. And we asked the guy right there, he said, hey, how do you use the degreaser? He goes, oh, we just take the gallons.

01:15:35We just dump the whole gallon on the floor. He goes, you need to use half a cup of degreaser with 10 gallons of water and then put that on the floor and it does the exact same thing. And the guy was like, I'm using five times the degreaser I need to and I go, yeah, I guess so. And we looked at it and went, so the guy every week for his dish machine company comes in and sells him five times the amount of degreaser that anybody else uses. And he's like, yeah, that's what we do. We're just gonna sell you five times. He never said, hey, you're using five times the amount of degreaser you need to use. He just said, no, I'm just gonna sell it to him. So it's kind of cool to have somebody come in who wants to earn your business every week who's not gonna make you- An honest business person. What's that? An honest business person. That's a good person to know. It is a good person to know. And it's one of the things that we like to do on the show with our advertisers is not only just to advertise, we wanna be advocates. We vet them, I go on sales calls with them. I wanna learn everything he does so that I can let you guys know that it's legit, that this guy is doing everything the right way.

01:16:39And we're honored to have SuperSource as a sponsor on the show. So nobody's jumping in with a what's the deal here. Ben, you got anything? What's the deal here? Yeah, it's a restaurant industry. How's that? Yes. What's next for the road construction? I don't get to drive downtown as much anymore because the world ended down there. But now that 440 is open, what's next? It's like, it's disappointing to get on 440 because there's no one lane with a barrel in the middle. It's a little bit disappointing. I kind of miss those days. We miss traffic. You know what I do? What's in that drink you're drinking? Are you drunk? Maybe. Do you miss traffic? I do, I do. Y'all don't understand what it's like.

01:17:40I like looking out my window at 7.05 in the morning and seeing the same car through the same window for 10 minutes without them moving. I really miss seeing that. I will ask a question. I will get in here. What are you guys looking forward to the most after this whole thing's over? We'll just do this and then we'll get this thing going because we're on for an hour and 10 minutes already. What's the thing you guys are, when this whole pandemic is over, they announced, let's just say that they announced tomorrow, we've got a vaccine and in one month, no more coronavirus, it's gone. What's the thing you're looking forward to the most? I mean, I have a superficial like, and then I have a serious one. So firstly, I miss taking my laptop and sitting at a bar and eating dinner by myself at the corner of the bar. So I would think everybody knows that about me by now. So that's like the first like simple everyday thing. But second is hopefully leading to visit my grandmother again. So she's in a memory care and not allowed to have visitors and doesn't have a phone.

01:18:45So I haven't been able to communicate with my grandmother who's my mom's mom since December. So definitely, hopefully she stays healthy and well enough that I can do that again. Oh. Nice. Yeah, went to you on that. Thank you. Well, I'm like, now I feel real shitty for, really wanna go out to a fancy dinner and get a nice hotel room on a high floor, you know, a 42nd floor kind of thing. And now I'm an asshole for wanting to say that. I would like to go see my father because in all honesty, my father is in a long-term care facility as well. I've not seen him since March 8th. I haven't seen him in person since March 8th. So yeah, in all honesty, that's what I look forward to the most is doing that. And the fancy dinners and the nice nights out, date nights. All right, I don't feel as much of an asshole now.

01:19:49Well, I'm going to, I'm gonna be the one-upper right now. I'm sorry. But I just threw caution to the wind and I went to California to see my grandpa because he's 90 years old, he turns 90 next week. And we were gonna go out there for his 90th birthday. And I said, you know what? Let's just go, we took the kids. We took five and six-year-old kids on airplanes across the country. Yeah, we're just throwing caution. We were very careful as best we could possibly be. However, I will tell you this. I got four minutes with my grandfather right when I left. And he's got dementia, he's old, you know, he's 90 years old. And he stopped and he looked at me and he goes, you know, you're always one of my favorites. And I said, what? He goes, no, I've always felt like, you know, you're one of my favorites and this and this. And he kind of said some really special, special things to me.

01:20:50And I got to tell him kind of the same, like, I love you too. I got to, I kissed him on his head and I gave him a big hug. And he was like, I'm so nice to get to know your children. We had this amazing lucid moment for like four and a half minutes where we just had this. It was almost like a goodbye, but it was so special. Like the, I didn't, I couldn't talk for like, I left the house and I just couldn't process it. And just the other day, like I finally was able to like process that conversation. But I got to do that last week. It was one of the most special moments I've had like in my life and not to wake up you guys, but like, I know what you're talking about. Like that feeling of seeing those people is super special. I just want to go to a concert. I just want to go to like an event where there's like loud music and there's people everywhere and a song comes on that I know. And I go, yeah, you know? And like, I just, I sing along to something and I just feel it.

01:21:51That's what I'm waiting on. I want to shake hands without the other person looking awkwardly at me. Like, you know, you're not really sure if you're supposed to shake hands. You don't want to do the fist bump or the elbow. I want to shake someone's hand without it being weird. Amen. There you go. And I want people to know I'm smiling at them because they can't want to have my mask on. I miss that. Yeah. Well, Isinia says, Ben, you got to try driving with Ben on the interstate. That's something, Isinia. She, we work together. Yeah, I think you're laughing in the office next door to me. Fine, Isinia, just get ready. Well, I know your wife has been watching you. Hopefully she didn't reply whether or not she had a good day or not. Hopefully she had a wonderful day. We're going to wrap this. Ben Whitlock, thank you so much for joining the Roundup this week. Delia Jo Ramsey, thank you for joining us again this week.

01:22:51We look forward to seeing you all next week. I kind of like this live thing. We'll do it again live next week. Do it. Do it. We will have a special guest host next week. Mr. Shane Nasby is going to be joining us on the show. He is the pit master and owner of Honeyfire Barbecue in Bellevue. So we will have a barbecue man on next week. And thank you guys so much for joining us. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Oh, you guys both at the same time. What was your, what'd you say Delia? I said Stay Pretty Music City. What'd you say Ben? I said, thanks for having us. Mine wasn't as cool as usual. Well, thanks for being here. Celebrity Spoon Salesman, this is very exciting. Thanks for doing this. And thank you all for listening. Love you guys. See you. Bye.