Building a Successful Restaurant | LoL #14

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:19:13
Seth
My dad comes in and he's so angry. He's like, what's going on over here? People getting their food, it's a mess. And he stops everything. Pulls me out of the kitchen to have a conversation with, like, what the heck is going on? And I have anxiety, like dial to 11 because I'm trying to take this food out. My dad pulls me out of the kitchen.

00:00:19:14 - 00:00:33:13
Seth
We go around to the back. It's crazy. There was a line of people like, it takes me all the way to the back. I have no idea what the employees were doing at the time. The Kobe Bryant just got pulled off the court, but okay guys, keep playing, right? I'm going, I'm going. Go have a private meeting in the locker room with this guy right now.

00:00:33:18 - 00:00:50:12
Seth
No idea to this day what the employees are doing. He was came in super hot and angry. And then he pulls out his pocket and he had gone to the register and he's like, look at this. I was like, dad, why are you so mad? It's crazy. Like, I don't know. I'm not mad at me more. You guys did $800 tonight.

00:00:50:13 - 00:00:58:02
Seth
It's incredible. Great job. Wasn't. I thought he was gonna, like, kill me. You know, he's taking me to the back of the building.

00:00:58:04 - 00:01:07:15
Steph
Everything you just described is exactly transferrable to every business owner that we talked to. So those are some golden nuggets in there, guys.

00:01:07:17 - 00:01:31:17
Shane
Welcome to Lords of Learning. I'm Shane Pearson with my co-hosts Brian Cancelliere and Stephanie Dunn. And today we're going to go from spreadsheets to spatulas with a family that's turned a hole in the wall on a Wahoo into a growing restaurant brand with over 14 locations and soon to be more. Our guest today is none other than Seth, the whole man Hannah, man.

00:01:31:17 - 00:01:34:18
Seth
Who busted out the whole.

00:01:34:20 - 00:01:39:11
Shane
Seven Brothers Burgers in particular. Seth, great to have you on, buddy.

00:01:39:13 - 00:01:44:14
Seth
Glad to be here. Thank you for having me. I'm very honored, very humbled. Thank you. Very humbled.

00:01:44:16 - 00:02:08:03
Shane
So a little background. That's a I think good to know about the relationship between Seth, Brian, Cornelia and myself. And now Stephanie by adoption is us. Seth was on our high school volleyball team and Seth at Seth was another. We call it the the Yin and the Yang Center. So Brian was the yin or whatever is the better center.

00:02:08:05 - 00:02:19:17
Shane
And then Seth was not as good setter on the one team. A little sad on that team. Let's you brought it up. We were in Hawaii recently. Talked me through it, buddy.

00:02:19:17 - 00:02:40:16
Seth
So I so Shane came to Hawaii to visit me and I and we were going down memory lane. And as the high school setter, the only reason why I played, I wouldn't be second string. I think I'd be more like seventh string. And the only reason why I played was because all of us being in the same year, Brian was the varsity setter, but he rolled his ankle.

00:02:40:18 - 00:03:01:00
Seth
So the only other option was the JV center. So they bumped me up. And so that's what started my varsity setting career at Newbury Park High School. And then after that, he went junior and he went off to play in Hawaii over here, where I'm at now for one of the local what high school they get, Brian.

00:03:01:02 - 00:03:02:06
Brian
Saint Louis.

00:03:02:08 - 00:03:26:05
Seth
Saint Louis. That's right. Which is an epic for us. And Saint Louis, they're like a killer. Saint Louis, like their football team is good. Their their volleyball team is good. So anyways, again, was it NCAA? Whatever the rules are for high school volleyball, he can't play two seasons in a single high school year. So that once again, I had to roll up into the varsity setting situation.

00:03:26:05 - 00:03:27:23
Seth
And our coach.

00:03:28:01 - 00:03:31:02
Brian
You're not giving you're not going to have enough credit, man. You. How about.

00:03:31:08 - 00:03:53:21
Seth
You're good. Well scrappy but like but Ed Ed ball this is what I thought it said Ed Bonner our coach. Right. He's like in the middle of a game. And he would tell me yeah, you're the only setter I've ever met that sets it so perfectly, so consistently for the other team. Put it on this side of the net.

00:03:53:23 - 00:04:17:19
Seth
So they always try to. This guy is like by, my high school volleyball setting career, but loved it very much. Shane was a Shane was a total killer hitting it on the outside. Brian was a total killer. Went off to play D1, BYU setting and playing volleyball over there. And yeah, I probably should have been watching from the sidelines, but we love the game.

00:04:17:19 - 00:04:24:17
Seth
I was honored enough to play with these two guys. And Shane, didn't you go on? You played too, right? Didn't you go on to play and College.

00:04:24:19 - 00:04:38:23
Shane
Three is quote unquote playing volleyball at that point. Yeah. When you when you're shaped like a trapezoid, you can only jump, you know, when you didn't just instead of 38in you, you're only going D3. I mean it's it's adorable to think otherwise, but no.

00:04:38:23 - 00:04:54:17
Seth
But total legends like so you have Brian that came out of that high school. You have his older brother Rob, who played D1. BYU came out of Casey Patterson. That was an Olympian that came out of that high school. So there was a lot of killers and I think argue that my brother Sterling and Spencer Sterling, especially he my older brother could have gone something with it.

00:04:54:17 - 00:05:14:07
Seth
But, yeah, you know, he made a left turn in life, got married, and, you know, that's how that goes. But yeah, we were so. So those guys graduated. Brian rolled his ankle and then went off to a better high school. So they were stuck with me. Great times though. Had a great time. Love the game and it was epic.

00:05:14:09 - 00:05:18:19
Shane
It was just a fun little background to kind of bring into what this really is supposed to be about today.

00:05:19:00 - 00:05:19:12
Seth
Yeah.

00:05:19:12 - 00:05:31:12
Steph
So I know I high performing. We talked about this all the time. Right. There's something to be said about high performing athletes. Go on. Continue to be high performers. So hey guess.

00:05:31:14 - 00:06:03:19
Shane
High performer baby to the point where now he is in the master class and it's he's a part of running a company that I honestly think is is the type of food you eat at Sunday dinner. And so today with with him, we really want to dig into what happened, like what caused their business to start the way that it did, how it survived with the number of family members involved and is continuing to crescendo into, you know, the beautiful brand that is seven brothers today as it starts to take over the United States.

00:06:03:19 - 00:06:08:22
Shane
I think you're farthest west. You guys are in Utah, right now, and you're also down in Arizona, and Utah.

00:06:08:22 - 00:06:09:12
Seth
And Arizona.

00:06:09:18 - 00:06:15:03
Shane
Dominate the the United States one state at a time. So except for California at the moment.

00:06:15:05 - 00:06:34:01
Seth
Right at the moment, at the moment, yeah, we're going to we're going to avoid that for the time being. But no it's been it it well it's been an amazing journey so far. I mean, as far as the origin story goes, 2009, you know, so you fast forward, we're all living in Hawaii and going to there's a BYU Hawaii here.

00:06:34:01 - 00:07:00:06
Seth
It's a small sister branch of the Provo, Utah, BYU or BYU, college campus, the small school, the small town little village on the North Shore of Oahu. And, my dad bought a small hole in the wall restaurant behind the gas station in 2009, when four of us older brothers were married already going to college, and the three younger brothers were still coming up through like, high school.

00:07:00:06 - 00:07:17:15
Seth
And I think eighth grade was the youngest brother at the time or ninth grade. And my dad was came home one day and said, hey, what do you guys think about running a restaurant and backstory to like, in a nutshell, dad's a full on entrepreneur. He's a guy that threw caution to the wind when it came to business decisions.

00:07:17:15 - 00:07:34:22
Seth
It was all about like the goal, the idea of working together as a family so that that's something that to be said, even as a kid, I remember when I was 8 or 7, my dad drove us to this place that was a pizza pizza place that was for sale. And we walked it and we were he was like, hey, what do you guys think if we opened up a pizza shop?

00:07:34:22 - 00:08:01:18
Seth
So that was the first concept I remember as a little kid of my dad, just like this guy's an entrepreneur. He's like this, you know, he he left his before I was even born. He left his big corner office in downtown LA job to open up his own shoeshine stand in the 80s. I think maybe I was born like one, but talk about a guy that takes risks.

00:08:01:18 - 00:08:37:19
Seth
So he went from security to which crashed and failed by the way. And to shout out to my dad, I love the story. Actually, if I can detour a little bit further down the rabbit hole. So he was working for this, like corporate America, flying all around. He was 28, 29 years old at the time, and just an ambitious guy climbed his way up in two years with this company corner office, and he was a consultant for, like, I can't remember the name of the company, but he made it basically by all the measures of it, you know, made it quits that job, leave it to open a shoeshine stand, because shoe shining in

00:08:37:19 - 00:09:04:04
Seth
the 80s was a thing at the airport. So he put your boot up on this thing and this lady and people, they shine your shoes. And he started talking to this guy. I thought that was so cool. And this guy kind of sold them the sign on this idea, like, oh, I shine this many people shoes. I charge him this, look at my desk, sort the numbers, and it's like, and if I had one in San Diego, one in LA and at the all the airports, you know, JFK and I could probably, you know, make it's like he quits his job to do that without even testing at first just goes all in.

00:09:04:06 - 00:09:26:08
Seth
It crashed, burned and failed. He had there's a picture of my mom dressed up in, like this, this vest, like, it's almost. It's like almost like a tuxedo, minus the suit. But at this vest, it's like a three piece outfit. Anyways, it crashed and burned, and my dad's executive board, people that he used to work with saw him at LAX one day, and they said, Art, is that you want.

00:09:26:08 - 00:09:42:18
Seth
My dad's shining a shoe, right corner office, the shoe shining, and they're like, what happened or what? What's going on? Like, oh, man. Like, yeah, you disappeared one day. We don't know what happened to you. And my dad's like, no, I left the company to do this. And he's like, you okay? He's like, no, no, look, this is my own business, my own thing.

00:09:42:18 - 00:10:03:05
Seth
This was always my dream. I want to do something on my own. The guy shook my dad's and was like, they're good for you. These guys are in their suits and ties, by the way. Off to do stuff that he used to do and shout out to my dad. And the credit, of course, throwing caution to the wind, going after what your dream and your passion is to to be an entrepreneur and do your own business and to grow something to call your own.

00:10:03:07 - 00:10:24:15
Seth
Fast forward, that was in the 80s. Fast forward to 2009. Buys this hole in the wall restaurant with it was a two. It was a two person operation. Husband and wife Korean. And they sold my dad this restaurant on a whim. Like my dad just rolled up and said, hey, I get to buy it comes in like on a Friday night and says, hey guys, what do you think about running a restaurant?

00:10:24:15 - 00:10:40:04
Seth
Kind of like when we were eight years old, back in that pizza real place. I raise my hand and say, dad, this is crazy. We're going to college right now. Like, we all have little kids we're trying to raise. Our focus is like trying to get our degrees. No, don't do this. Don't do this. Like, well, too bad I already bought it.

00:10:40:06 - 00:10:58:22
Seth
And you guys are all working on Monday. By the way, I need your help. With what? And it was totally, again, the knee jerk reaction. This other thing that he did, he saw it as a vision of just something cool to work together as a family. And maybe we can take a few bucks from the register to buy a book at college that we needed, or whatever.

00:10:58:22 - 00:11:17:17
Seth
Buy some milk. He never saw the vision of what it was today. None of us did, really, and I just I have so much of, respect for dad, obviously. And then also mom to supporting him and all of these things, like, you know, the saying, like, behind every man is a great woman, right? That's like supporting and leading and guiding the way.

00:11:17:17 - 00:11:34:21
Seth
And, you know, big shout out to my mother, Peggy Hanneman, who my dad and all of his ideas and things that she supported him and always just trusted in him, that he knew what he was doing. But anyways, that's how we bought the restaurant. It was called Kahuku Grill at the time. That was in 2009. And then it just started.

00:11:35:00 - 00:11:54:05
Seth
It just started happening where the next town over, like, yeah, there was an opening that came up in a little strip mall right there next to an Ace Hardware. And my dad's like, hey, what do you guys think? Three miles apart from each other, mind you. So if Kahuku do you have like. Yeah, three miles apart. Population in Kahuku 7000.

00:11:54:05 - 00:12:16:13
Seth
Population in like year 5003 miles apart. And you're competing with McDonald's. The number one burger brand in the planet. So typically you think why from a business perspective it doesn't make sense. Yeah. We're like dad I don't know. And it's like no, we're doing it. We're doing it. Boom. Two and a half years later, 2009 to 2000, end of 12, beginning of 13.

00:12:16:13 - 00:12:38:09
Seth
Boom. Another restaurant right there kind of pops up. And then we had these two locations that were just firing off. And then and then it just kind of kept going from there and something that became like, you know, well, too bad I bought it. Let's just start working it. Whatever became this family project. And I remember when we bought the first location, my brother Sterling was kind of like helping.

00:12:38:13 - 00:12:55:05
Seth
So Sterling, the second oldest myself, my brother Shem, number four, and my brother Sikh number five, we were all kind of working it like a little bit, but Sterling was the one that took the bull by the reins and really saw this as like, this is a cool opportunity. He's the one that was working it and kind of managing it.

00:12:55:07 - 00:13:06:21
Seth
We were like, it hadn't even been like maybe two months that we've had this thing. It was the Lakers. It was the it was the finals and the Lakers were playing against, I think.

00:13:06:23 - 00:13:08:09
Brian
South Texas.

00:13:08:11 - 00:13:30:21
Seth
Maybe the Celtics. And it was like game 4 or 5. And I was supposed to show up for work on my first day on like at 6:00. But the game ended like at whatever, seven, 730 or something like that. I showed up like an hour or two late for work. My brother Sterling gave me the dirtiest scoldings and he's like, you're supposed to be here.

00:13:31:00 - 00:13:44:10
Seth
Like, I think, I suppose we don't get paid for. So like a at four o'clock hours ago and I'm like, why? Dude, who cares? This is like you guys are play with Play-Doh a little better than that. This is nothing. This is this is just, you know, did you even have a customer while I was gone? Come on.

00:13:44:11 - 00:14:05:01
Seth
The skeptic. And he squares up to me and he says this. It'll never forget it. Sterling's the one that put. Kind of like the reality was like, this is the new family business. You either are here or you're not. You either show up or you don't. But don't be dilly dallying around and not show up, because this is a real business and it's the new family business.

00:14:05:03 - 00:14:29:00
Seth
And and my first response was the Lakers were I think I'm on that, you know? But the reality kicked in and I was glad because under other circumstances, if we were younger, he would have beat the crap out of me, right then and there. But, that didn't happen. I got the message right then and there, and from there on I was like, oh, this is like a real thing.

00:14:29:00 - 00:14:47:07
Seth
Like, Dad and Mom have actually invested money into this. This is our family business. There are real customers coming to the window, and we need to make sure that there's the transaction happen. They give us money, we give them food, pasta, make sure it tastes good, and then, you know, oh, yeah, the tables need to be wiped to like, make sure they sit down on a clean area.

00:14:47:07 - 00:15:07:05
Seth
Oh, let's chase the chickens out of the dining room now. Probably because I did chickens in Hawaii over here. So it's like that would be, you know, which is still an issue. But yeah, I think the reality started just kicking in like, okay, this is a real business. So long, long answer to the question, Shane. So that's the origin story of how it started.

00:15:07:06 - 00:15:11:09
Seth
And everybody jumped on board. And then it was it was go time.

00:15:11:11 - 00:15:18:18
Shane
Well and so today you have are literally all seven brothers involved in the day to day operations. At some point.

00:15:18:20 - 00:15:20:15
Seth
We are all seven brothers and.

00:15:20:17 - 00:15:36:12
Shane
He's doing something. So you got a lot of a lot of different and, you know, a lot of brothers who are all, you know, pining for the moment in the spotlight. But how do you function as a, as a group of seven and then also your father, I mean, your father definitely is a visionary man. We've known him.

00:15:36:12 - 00:15:55:04
Shane
He's he's like engaged, goes after it, attacks. And we know Peggy personally, but like, how do you make that work with seven guys? I mean, granted, and I think maybe ten locations ago when there wasn't this many location for operate, you know, so like what what was put in place to actually make that functional.

00:15:55:06 - 00:16:15:17
Seth
So we got to give credit where credit's due, like God is the short answer. And a lot of praying and a lot of fasting. And when you have a dynamic work. So my mom was we sit here and she's holy, she's white, my dad is Samoan. So the someone culture you never really like disrespect or talk back to your elders or parents, which is pretty typical and, you know, every culture.

00:16:15:17 - 00:16:46:11
Seth
But ultimately, dad, it was the most difficult thing for the dynamic of the family was now that we were raised, we were told his children that we're adults, where four of the seven us were married with little kids trying to navigate the waters of, okay, this is dad, but he's also our boss. But we have ideas, too. It was difficult for him, I think, to see us as not children and to see us as like peers and as like business partners.

00:16:46:13 - 00:17:14:23
Seth
And then equally, it was difficult for us to separate the line between, like dad and like business partner as well. Two where. Yeah. How do you balance the dynamic of that and honestly trial, error, fasting, prayer, all of that and coming to it where we still respected our father and lot of disagree like there was, let's be honest, like so many fights, so many argues, so many, you know, cooks in the kitchen, literally, figuratively.

00:17:14:23 - 00:17:31:22
Seth
All that jazz and I think what one of our blessings was that there was seven of us. So when you have seven people and all at different ages, and then the younger ones are coming up and they started going on missions for the church and coming back home and like, hey, let's go to college. Hey, I need a career now.

00:17:31:22 - 00:17:54:15
Seth
Graduating college, we're all looking at career paths. There was this like, I mean, this love for this little hole in the wall concept, like raising a child almost. And each of us had a piece of it. But I think one of our greatest successes was that there was so many of us. Even my mom worked at two. So technically there are seven or so.

00:17:54:15 - 00:18:09:10
Seth
Really, there was nine of us because there was mom and dad and our wives all worked at two. So I mean, there was like 11, 12, 13 that the four of us made it. So we all were working it. And then there were times when we got burnout, which happened all of the time. We would step away, take away.

00:18:09:10 - 00:18:27:11
Seth
I stepped away for a couple of years. I got into medical sales. My brother Sterling, he was here in college working it, and then he stepped away. We've all stepped away for years at a time, but it's so funny that we've all come back. Every one of us to are all seven of us now in the position that we're in, where it's the most successful we've ever been?

00:18:27:11 - 00:18:42:11
Seth
And now there's this, like real growth and rolling, but going back again, like, how did we do it? I look, I just got to keep coming back to where we leaned heavily on dad for the vision of it. And if dad was on this call, too, he did. Our burger that put us on the map is the Pawnee Yellow Burger.

00:18:42:11 - 00:19:06:03
Seth
And he would tell you, like, God made that burger, and there's still a fight to this day who actually thought of it. But when we started whacking things off the menu that we felt weren't doing that well, and every brother would have a piece that they would bring to the table where whether it was dialing in the menu better and then getting it, then the dad, in an act of God would be like, okay, let's try that.

00:19:06:03 - 00:19:27:20
Seth
Right? Because he was holding onto the reins really tight. And then slowly, like with enough arguing and battling and fighting like, okay, well, let's try it. For example, my brother Shem, he's kind of like he's a big foodie and he why dad and him kind of got into it one day and we did the math and we were losing so much money on just our, our, our burgers.

00:19:27:20 - 00:19:44:01
Seth
We were like, it was like we were paying people because the prices were so low. Dad wanted to make it affordable and I was like, dude, we're we're literally paying people to eat our food for the for our number one item, the burger. That's like, no one's going to buy an $8 burger. You know, this is, 20 1011.

00:19:44:03 - 00:20:06:11
Seth
No one's going to pay for a burger on burgers now. Not exactly, but that's at the burger and the back. Then it was 375 money. So $3.75 for a good like, proper hamburger that we were hand making the patty, chopping up the potatoes like, like real like cooking raw ingredients here. Nothing ever frozen. Nothing coming out of a package.

00:20:06:11 - 00:20:26:16
Seth
Like even the salad. Everything chopped up, hand delicious. So dad's like, no one's going to buy an $8 burger or a $7 burger. She was like, dad, I'm going to take the challenge. I'm gonna create a burger. He came up with the burger and he looked at all the ingredients that we had and we had avocados. He made a homemade guacamole, which is amazing.

00:20:26:18 - 00:20:41:06
Seth
And he added the guacamole on it, sold it for eight bucks and it worked. So like, oh my gosh, like, this is mind blowing. So as long as you put the love and the time and attention into it, and if it's a homemade piece like you can get guacamole, you can buy it out of a, out of a, out of a bag.

00:20:41:06 - 00:21:02:19
Seth
Actually, it's already made it. It's not bad. It's gotten better over the years. But there's something different when you when you make it. So the whole making the whole making the the food as much as you can. And then dad loosening up on the reins a little bit, it's like, okay, that works. And then cutting things. So Shem was the chef was the food, the menu guy.

00:21:02:21 - 00:21:20:00
Seth
I'm like the guy that came in like customer service was like the big thing for me. I, I got into sales early on and so like the sales piece of it and the customer service piece with that was huge for me, my brother Sterling and Max. Like operationally they just I don't know, they just get it like, hey, let's move the grill here.

00:21:20:00 - 00:21:39:02
Seth
Let's move that here. Let's eliminate the steps. This person's walking too much. So over the years, what what any person probably could come and do like that's pro at this. They could have done. It took us a long time like I wouldn't say were the model at all for how to do this quick or fast. Like you have seven voices, seven people coming together.

00:21:39:02 - 00:21:42:11
Seth
So it was definitely a slow roll.

00:21:42:12 - 00:22:03:06
Shane
Well, I got a question for, for Steph. There's a couple industries that we tend to master in where I see if similarly a similar family orienting, one of them is your specialty, right. You have the, the funeral home industry. You ever encounter anything similar to this, with, with families that you've, that you've worked with?

00:22:03:07 - 00:22:07:19
Shane
In our industry where it's almost generational, like the way that it gets built.

00:22:07:21 - 00:22:26:03
Steph
Yeah. The whole time I'm listening to you thinking, the dynamic is so interesting to me because I try to envision, okay, how how could I fit in if I was a part of that family, you know, like I can only imagine who's on first is always my question, you know, like every day. Like, who's in charge of what?

00:22:26:03 - 00:22:49:11
Steph
Like you said, how do you how does everyone stay in their lane? And so when I, I've done a lot of funeral home loans over my career, and it's very much a family business, it's usually multi-generational. They inherited it from great grandparents and they continue to do it the way the that it's always been done. Right. So that's that's a dynamic in of itself.

00:22:49:13 - 00:23:14:01
Steph
But the thing in the funeral business, and this is one of my questions for you in the funeral business, everyone has their their family unique brand. And it's not necessarily the culture, you know, because everyone throws that around. And it's not like the marketing piece, it's the family brand. Like, what does this family stand for in this business?

00:23:14:03 - 00:23:47:05
Steph
So that anyone walking through the door feels that and experiences it. And so I was on your Instagram earlier and I was like, man, I could like feel the essence of the brand there. And the brand is family consistency and dedication and which runs deep in the funeral business. So yeah, that was my question for you, is like, if you had to bottle your brand, not the culture, not the marketing slogan, like fresh ingredients and all that stuff, right?

00:23:47:07 - 00:24:01:14
Steph
But what you do, your secret sauce is all the stuff you're talking about right now, which is like the family dynamic, like people are interested in that. They want to come experience it because they want to feel part of that experience.

00:24:01:16 - 00:24:03:05
Seth
So that's so cool.

00:24:03:07 - 00:24:25:11
Steph
Yeah. My question for you is like, do you feel that was it like, is it just something that you guys have translated into the restaurant experience because that's the special sauce and is the like, that's why people are going to eat at a big Italian restaurants because they feel like, oh, I'm part of the family and they experience the history.

00:24:25:11 - 00:24:44:16
Steph
They like to read the history on the menu, and they like to feel part of that experience. You know, it's like special, like Dollywood. I'm obsessed with Dolly Parton because she does that, too. In Dollywood, she has her mom has a recipe for banana bread, too, and you can buy it there. And everyone wants to be a part of her family experience.

00:24:44:18 - 00:24:45:07
Steph
So for.

00:24:45:07 - 00:24:45:18
Seth
Me.

00:24:45:20 - 00:24:54:09
Steph
I yeah, are you doing it intentionally? Because it's coming through and that's really cool.

00:24:54:11 - 00:25:12:10
Seth
I love that you say that stuff because that's the goal. And me, I'm I so I do a lot of the marketing and the customer service piece of it. So the fact that you're picking up on that is like music to my ears. I love that. And so thank you for seeing that. And so if I was the bottle of the bottle it up, it would come on these three things.

00:25:12:10 - 00:25:33:07
Seth
And these are our three pillars that we stand on. And again dad came up with this, but we live, eat, breathe and die by these three things. So number one is this Christ centered. The business has to be centered as we were raised, as our family was raised, Christ centered at the very middle of that. Number two is family focused.

00:25:33:09 - 00:25:50:04
Seth
And then the third thing is the food. We're we're passionate about making and serving food. And dad's always been on don't forget the service part of the service is huge, making and serving food that will blow people away. So that, in a nutshell, is the answer to your question. And how did we come to that? I think.

00:25:50:06 - 00:25:55:12
Speaker 5
Charles, that's great. And you gotta you gotta.

00:25:55:14 - 00:26:00:05
Steph
Please tell me that's on the wall in every restaurant, like the darkest.

00:26:00:05 - 00:26:02:22
Seth
Night. That's a good point, though. Yeah.

00:26:03:00 - 00:26:03:18
Speaker 5
Yeah.

00:26:03:20 - 00:26:22:10
Seth
But yeah, I mean, everything we do, we try to make those three things come out. You know, that's a that's a good point. Like putting on a wall but without having it on the wall and without it, like bread in our foreheads. We're hoping that that's the message and that's the image that's being portrayed. And it's not so much as like, hey, look at this.

00:26:22:12 - 00:26:39:15
Seth
Look at us over here. We're, you know, such whatever people, right? But rather just how we live, how we act, how we treat people, how we make our food, how we treat our people that work with us. Is it, does it represent those three things? Right. And I think that's kind of our North Star and all three.

00:26:39:15 - 00:26:53:06
Seth
It's making sure that when we wake up, that's what we're trying to do, this we're trying to accomplish. And I love that you asked that question. And I totally love you, Steph, for picking up on that, because that's really cool. Because that's what we're trying to like promote.

00:26:53:08 - 00:26:54:07
Steph
So yeah.

00:26:54:08 - 00:26:55:04
Seth
Yeah, yeah.

00:26:55:06 - 00:26:56:12
Steph
I love it.

00:26:56:13 - 00:27:16:17
Brian
I want to share something real fast because I, I remember going to a Coucou grill when it was just the Coucou grill. That's all you guys that was or the only one you guys had. I remember going in and actually we were there on my honeymoon with my wife and, and we went out there and we both walked away going, wow, that was so tasty.

00:27:16:19 - 00:27:37:19
Brian
It was so good. That was so amazing. I'm so impressed. That's awesome. And then like, the next time we went to Hawaii, we were there and you guys had the Seven Brothers Burgers at that point. And you guys, they kind of changed the branding. You know, to the Seven Brothers branding. And everything was a little bit more along those lines.

00:27:37:19 - 00:28:08:23
Brian
And I just remember kind of like what Steph was saying, walking in and seeing that same picture, you know, all the brothers with the surfboards because I'll tell a quick story. This was like a famous thing for us in high school. Like everyone, everyone that knew the Hammonds knew Saturday morning we're doing a service project. And then arts got the arts, got the boards, the surfboards on the roof rack of the van, and we're going to serve after after the service project with donut.

00:28:09:01 - 00:28:21:20
Brian
That was always the same for us guys in high school. So we would always do that and remember that. But like you've literally translated that yeah, same vibe that everyone growing up wanted to participate in.

00:28:21:22 - 00:28:22:17
Steph
Yeah.

00:28:22:19 - 00:28:31:10
Brian
You translated that to the brand that you guys are built the, the restaurants. So I, I think that that's really cool and I would.

00:28:31:12 - 00:28:59:04
Steph
Yeah. Well and you know, I'm, I'm an only child which is interesting. So when I'm like mesmerized when I see big family dynamics, like I looked you up before this column, man. And he has five kids, seven brothers, five kids. You all seven have five kids. I'm like, could you imagine Christmas? It must be amazing because now the restaurant concept is a way for you to share a big family with everyone else you know, which is really cool.

00:28:59:06 - 00:29:10:04
Steph
Like, a lot of people don't get to experience that amazing like experience of of a big, loving family that's all involved.

00:29:10:06 - 00:29:30:07
Shane
Well, so I have so fun. So knowing that we're talking about this idea of legacy. So we we live in a world where entrepreneurs are buying restaurants, they're expanding restaurants. And the story that often gets told to us is they want some big, delicious exit, right? They want private equity. Come buy them out. Like that's the that's the pitch.

00:29:30:07 - 00:29:37:14
Shane
Let me open up 17 crumble restaurants, crumble locations and swig your favorite, the soda shops. Right. That you do.

00:29:37:16 - 00:29:37:21
Speaker 5
In a.

00:29:37:21 - 00:29:40:13
Shane
Conversation about these like I don't get it's soda.

00:29:40:15 - 00:29:41:01
Seth
But the.

00:29:41:07 - 00:29:58:05
Shane
The, the whole idea is open up as many of these as possible so that I can bundle them up and sell them off for 30, $40 million. But I see a brand like this one that is personalized, that has some elements that I would say that aren't agnostic when it comes to, you know, by Christ being the center of it.

00:29:58:06 - 00:30:18:15
Shane
And things that aren't don't tend to get popularized, especially in like, social media and everything else. Right, like right away from ever wants to neutralize it. Yet you're finding success in, in polarizing your view, not even polarizing. What's the word I'm looking for in pulling your view into the center of how you operate? And it sits apart from the way other people tend to run their business.

00:30:18:15 - 00:30:31:02
Shane
So what what is the discussed long term strategy for Seven brothers from where it's at? How are you looking? Have you talked about like where do we go with this.

00:30:31:04 - 00:30:51:03
Seth
Always talking about it. And from so starting it from like a branding perspective where it's morphed. I still feel today like what is our brand and the answer seems to keep coming back where all seven of us are very different and so similar there. Our vision and dream of where we're going has kind of been the origin story of also how the brand has emerged to what it is today.

00:30:51:05 - 00:31:17:10
Seth
So we want to be all over the planet. We want to be, you know, international. We want Scotland where got where? Oh, Scotland. Yeah. Ireland. Like the idea is that and I think we're learning now to that location is very key and very important. Where are you going. Like we so are we a McDonald's or a five guys that's on every street corner or burger King, or are we more of like a destination location?

00:31:17:10 - 00:31:44:05
Seth
I'm thinking and we're thinking we're more of a destiny destination location where, we have places like, you know, your Las Vegas strip, your Waikiki and these types of places, you know, New York and South. But, from a vision standpoint, that's where we want to go. But having, being, being a little bit more particular about our locations and not just, oh, there's a this is a cool turnkey operation.

00:31:44:06 - 00:32:14:14
Seth
This was an old whatever. And we can just roll right up in there. And it's not too expensive. We I think making the investment and approaching it methodically, that those things pay off long term where it might be a bigger investment in the front end, but then might be better long term. And then and then just staying super true to those key principles and to those values and what's really cool and pays off, too, I think, of dividends is not just us doing that, but teaching the next generation.

00:32:14:14 - 00:32:29:20
Seth
And a lot of the kids that we work with, I say kids, there's a lot of teenagers that we work with, but then the teams of people that we work with, it's so cool. We we like to follow a lot of companies that seem to be like minded work. Christ seems to be a big part of their companies as well.

00:32:29:20 - 00:32:50:15
Seth
To chick fil A in and out has the John 316 under the cup. It's subtle, but it's there. There's these there's these like hints of Christianity and of some, you know, of God and I there was a customer we had and I won't name that particular location, but they came in, read our story like, oh, they're Christians. And they were disgusted and walked out.

00:32:50:17 - 00:33:11:17
Seth
And for me, I wasn't offended by that. I thought two things. One was, is it? It's so cool that we live in a country that you can do that, and someone can say that and think that, and that's super cool that they're not going to get, you know, shot or something like that, whatever. Secondly, I can't think of a better way to lose a customer in the name of, you know, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

00:33:11:17 - 00:33:30:02
Seth
And if that's the case, but it's I think there are way more people that are attracted and appeal to it as opposed to those that do not. And everyone's entitled to their opinion for X, Y, and z reasons. And that's awesome. High five to them. Totally cool. And we that's not going to shy us away to embrace everything that.

00:33:30:04 - 00:33:55:06
Seth
Brian I appreciate you sharing that story. Like my dad has always been unapologetically who he is and it does offend a lot of people. I respect that I'm biased towards that position because obviously he's my dad. That's how we were raised. And in areas of positions where I felt maybe shy about my religion or my beliefs in certain settings, I, I just kind of revert back and think to my dad and that it's, you know, it.

00:33:55:08 - 00:34:13:18
Seth
We should never be ashamed who we are, what we are, what we believe or whatever. Right? We should we should wear proud. And if people think less of us as a result of that, you know, totally fine, totally good for them. And I think when we put ourselves in these little tests of how people will respond or act to certain things, and it's not even to be controversial at all.

00:34:13:18 - 00:34:30:12
Seth
It's just to be, you know, this is who I am, and it's okay if you don't like it. It's totally fine. Like, still love you. And I think we have more in common than things that we don't. And finding those common grounds and as a vision for us, as long as we hold true, it's we are here today because of holding on to those three pillars.

00:34:30:12 - 00:34:46:11
Seth
My dad reminds us constantly. And now dad and mom are like a little bit more retired. He still is like the chief of board, and he's the guy that still pops in and checks in, making sure that those three pillars are never changing. There are other things that are subsets of that, but those are the three things that he's constantly reminding us back.

00:34:46:11 - 00:35:05:04
Seth
And as a as an entrepreneur, my dad and as a as a consultant his entire life, he's always just like popping his head in the office that we are making sure that we brothers haven't lost our way. As the seven of us wake up every day and we're still trying to morph this family brand and dynamic and making sure we're making sure we don't lose our way.

00:35:05:04 - 00:35:23:10
Seth
And I mean, Steph, you're talking about Instagram videos and things that we're making. And Chris and my brother, my brother, Sikh brother number five is our CEO. Crazy laser focus vision on what the brand is, what it is and making sure we don't lose our way. He's like, I'm so impressed by him, my little brother. Right. My boss.

00:35:23:12 - 00:35:45:00
Seth
And it's interesting that he's just so focused on making sure we're not losing our way and all that. And I think that as all seven of us never question those three pillars and those three values, it says a lot, regardless of like maybe there's one song that might be all for brand for one of my Instagram videos, or I edit a video that was a little weird or something like that, and those are just like little one offs.

00:35:45:00 - 00:36:09:10
Seth
But at the end of the day, I think we're still learning. And our style of restaurant. Brian, you talked about was Kahuku Grill in the beginning. And as the years went on, it more than we called it Seven Brothers. And then that was the branding logo that we went behind. And then we settled on that, and it was just now you fast forward to 2025, where me personally and some of the brothers, we agree, the inside of our diners.

00:36:09:10 - 00:36:31:12
Seth
I think we just now figured out after 14 locations of what they should look like, because if you go to each store, they're a little different. And, you know, McDonald's and Burger King, it's like cookie cutter. So we wanted a little bit of some, you know, for it to be malleable a little bit for each location, have its own personality and you can let each brother kind of put their own little love and aloha into it.

00:36:31:14 - 00:36:43:02
Seth
But now we're kind of figuring, okay, this is each building may not be exactly the same, but we want this type of a look and feeling. And it's like walking into our living room, you know, it's like, yeah, kind of give it that homey feeling.

00:36:43:04 - 00:37:12:12
Brian
I mean, to what extent is that just. It seems like I should say it's a lot based on now you guys are growing, you're getting 14 locations. It's not just, you know, two, three, 4 or 5 locations. So to what extent is that applying different pressures on you guys to, you know, create like you're saying, a method, a system, a protocol for every step of the business.

00:37:12:14 - 00:37:25:10
Seth
Is such a good question, bro. It I swear it changes. I just got a new role. Like, within the last 48 hours.

00:37:25:12 - 00:37:53:05
Seth
So I think for us, having the humility of the older brother of the fifth brother, he's not even the first. Second mean fifth is pretty far down the line of seven. Right. So you're little little for me. It's my little, little brother being the boss and steering this. And then the so I would say humility, being humble enough to where it's like I think there's really there's not any one of us that is like, dude, I need the power.

00:37:53:05 - 00:38:12:23
Seth
I need the privilege. I need to be the spotlight. I need to be, you know, arguably, I'm the guy that loves the spotlight the most. Like, you know, if there's, like a dance floor or a microphone graduate on the Instagram, like, I don't buy that stuff. And my brothers kind of shy away from that. But to where one of us has a strength, the other has weaknesses and vice versa.

00:38:12:23 - 00:38:52:04
Seth
And so humility, I think, is a big part of it. And we're still learning that, practicing that, trying to do that all the time. But being cool with this brother, being the boss and being cool with this brother, doing this and then being cool like, hey, this is a growing and emerging brand. And we've got we got pretty decently okay with running a restaurant and now we're doing this entirely different business where we're in franchising, and now we're looking at more of doing, primarily just opening more corporate stores and then bringing on partners for financial help and then bringing on people and both in the company and out of the company to become like regional

00:38:52:04 - 00:39:10:22
Seth
managers, things that we've never really done before. So to answer your question, Brian, I think it's it's rolling with the punches and being cool with, hey, Seth, you're doing a great job in the marketing Instagram piece, but now we want you to be over these four stores overseeing like kind of the regional responsibility because of X, Y, and Z reasons.

00:39:10:22 - 00:39:29:15
Seth
We think they we think your front of house skillset might be best suited for these four stores that need a little more loving. Aloha will say on the front of house, and what am I going to say? So it's presented to me in a way like, hey, you have to not like you have to do this, but rather think about it, talk to your wife, mommy, about it.

00:39:29:17 - 00:39:51:01
Seth
This is what we're kind of thinking. And me and Max. Max, brother number six, my little, little, little brother. We're talking and we're making this decision. What do you think? So I think just as a family dynamic, you have to be somewhat cool with it, right? And you have to be able to roll with it. And, working with that.

00:39:51:01 - 00:40:02:00
Seth
And dude, we are not perfect at all. Like. And I don't want this to sound like, oh, Seth is like, we have fought. I can tell you stories where we literally were in the kitchen fighting, like, literally fighting like.

00:40:02:06 - 00:40:02:17
Shane
Promotion and.

00:40:02:17 - 00:40:28:23
Seth
Slaughter. House put on throw, so on slaughterhouse, like Max and Sterling, like literally fighting, like, so good. And then my dad coming in like, we've had full on blowout fights, but I guess one of our super strengths is that in the end, no matter how big the fight was, we've always been able to, like, lower the Jets, lower the jets, lower the lower the flame, whatever it is.

00:40:29:00 - 00:40:32:01
Seth
And.

00:40:32:03 - 00:40:47:22
Seth
Say, sorry if we were in the wrong, I guess, and be humble enough to be like, dude, you you totally suck, bro. That sucked that you did that. Like and then saying sorry and apologizing, hugging it out because we beat the tar out of each other as brothers, drawing our 100%. And then we've grown up to work. Okay.

00:40:48:00 - 00:41:04:14
Seth
It's like a lot of arguing, but then when we were adults, we still had a little love. So in high school, they were still kids. So yeah, we still beat them up a little bit. But now that we're all adults, the fighting has lessened. But I think we've been able to we've I don't know if we forgive each other pretty quick and we, we really cool that afterwards.

00:41:04:14 - 00:41:23:15
Seth
Like we're brothers. Right. And we're all each other's best friends. At the end of the day. So it's cool or I think in the. So that's the plus in the -0 filter, I'm going to fight you. Typically that doesn't happen in, you know, corporate setting, but it's super honest and you know exactly what the other person's thinking and where they're at.

00:41:23:17 - 00:41:41:01
Seth
So I think that would be one of the positives. And then because we're brothers, we're not suing each other for, you know, beating the tired of each other. I know that happens, but I, I can honestly say like I would and that you're right, Shane, that does happen. So like, dude, none of us has a soul bone in their body.

00:41:41:02 - 00:41:58:10
Seth
Let's see what happens is this thing girls will see. But I think we're all just like we're each other's best friends. We're, like, super tight. And regardless of what happens, like, none of us are in this for the cash either. Like zero. If we were in this for the cash, we would have quit officially. Not just quit like for a year or two and been done and gone.

00:41:58:14 - 00:42:17:09
Seth
And people have told me, I got to make a big point about this, Seth, how do you guys do it? Like I I'm thinking about doing, a food truck or whatever I like. I would never wish it upon my greatest enemy to go into food and beverage. Why? It is the hardest way to make a dollar on the planet argue, than maybe farming.

00:42:17:11 - 00:42:38:12
Seth
There are so many ways to make cash these days. You can make a ton of cash for sitting in the air conditioning of your house, and Bali food and beverage is like old school grind. Out in the trenches. You have people. Everybody eats. Everybody's a critic. You know you're a software engineer designed to like, everybody eats, everyone's got a palate.

00:42:38:12 - 00:42:52:06
Seth
Everyone is their A is their own god of food criticism, critiquing food. Yeah. And so to accommodate angry people that are hungry and families and I say anyway, sorry, I'm going down rabbit holes all points.

00:42:52:06 - 00:42:54:04
Brian
But ultimately oh you give if.

00:42:54:06 - 00:43:14:14
Seth
It's so hard. We are not in this for the money. Never do we want to make money. Yes. Do you have to make money? You got to. And working together as a family, our blessing is simply been like forgiving each other really quickly and being humble enough to do what a younger brother may tell you what they think is best for the company at that time.

00:43:14:16 - 00:43:36:16
Seth
And we've learned how to speak to each other as adults, as and as business partners, as opposed to you're an idiot. You're my younger, younger brother. I'm not listening to you. You do what I tell you to do. Nobody wants to make any more money than anybody else either. And everyone I don't know. Mom and dad have just raised us to be, like, pretty level headed when it comes to that stuff.

00:43:36:16 - 00:43:56:04
Steph
So I'd like to just really pull the thread on the dream. And how do I actually make a living? By doing what you love to do, right? So everyone has a dream of owning a restaurant, I do right? I've always wanted to own a restaurant and just do it on my own. Build an amazing brand. And yeah, I'll build this great experience.

00:43:56:06 - 00:44:22:09
Steph
But then I need to know. And this is what every entrepreneur needs to know. What are the levers that I need to really hone in on and master so that I could make a living owning a restaurant? Is it inventory control? Is it cost of labor? Is it fresh ingredients like what are the there are tricks. And I think every brand has their tricks, right?

00:44:22:09 - 00:44:45:12
Steph
Chick-Fil-A has their tricks and Hobby Lobby is another one. They have tricks. They know their levers and they've all figured it out. Right? So what are the levers that you discovered? And it was like a epiphany, like, oh man, these levers guys are going to make us more profitable. Like, we need to focus on these areas and really master these areas so we can make a living.

00:44:45:12 - 00:44:47:17
Steph
Now, doing this.

00:44:47:18 - 00:45:20:03
Seth
And such a good question. Stuff. Well, to start a restaurant, I would say one thing that helps a lot is have seven boys and have them work for free for the first three years. That helps a lot. That's really good science, right? You know? Yeah. And then, I but you take every everything and everything you talked about to stuff and you can hear it like somebody that knows from the business points, like, okay, the answer to that question is like there's a hundred different things.

00:45:20:03 - 00:45:37:21
Seth
And then there's like three major core things that you can like look at. And then individually there's like individual silos, even subset of beneath all of that. But I know when I was reaching out and there were times where the accounts are negative, payroll is about to go out and there's not enough money to cover it. Holy cow.

00:45:37:23 - 00:45:56:20
Seth
Small business owners and entrepreneurs all alike, we we've been there. We kind of know that feeling. It sucks. And trying to get the vendor that you know, hey, can you can you push us to net 15 or net 30 for this month because we just don't got it. So you wake up as like my wife back in the day.

00:45:56:20 - 00:46:09:06
Seth
So I'm in college. She would tell me I'd wake up, I'd be sitting up and I'd because I just we all cook that work, then work the grill right. I'd be sitting up in bed like this and she's like, honey, what are you doing? What are you doing? I'm like, I don't know. I got to get the person.

00:46:09:08 - 00:46:26:12
Seth
You're sleeping. You're sleeping. I'd be cooking, right? So you're working all day, you're going to school, you go to work, and then I'm still working at night time when I was also sleeping. Right. And I think we've all kind of been there in these places like that. But what's the secret? How do you make it work from a restaurant standpoint?

00:46:26:14 - 00:46:47:00
Seth
There's no way if if the service is amazing and the food is terrible, you're not going back. And I think even when you guys go out with your with your spouses or whatever date night, whatever friends, one of the first questions when you go to a new place, the question afterwards like how was it? Are we going back like, oh, we loved it, or it was great, the food was great, right?

00:46:47:00 - 00:47:10:02
Seth
So we we are all the biggest food critics because we have our own palates and we're the ones paying for it if the food isn't, isn't good. And so, dad, recognize this from day one, regardless of what your values or principles are, if your food is terrible, people are not going to come back. It has to be a good product if your product is terrible.

00:47:10:04 - 00:47:30:14
Seth
Right. So that was like so top of the pyramid list is the product has to be awesome. Has to be amazing. So who does what we do in the burger industry that we love. And like we love it or know we've always thought In-N-Out was the best burger to this day. Whether you like them or hate them, you can't beat it up.

00:47:30:14 - 00:47:45:16
Seth
It's still a $3 burger. It's three bucks to 75 to 2, 53, 53, 75. The price. You can't beat it. You can get nowhere else on the planet. Get a burger like that. Okay? We love in and out. They use fresh ingredients. You go to the drive thru, you see them chopping the potatoes right there. Well, let's do the same thing.

00:47:45:16 - 00:48:08:08
Seth
We cut the potatoes so you find the people who are doing it the best. And you copy and paste to the best of your ability. Now when it comes down, okay. Dad would put a number up on the board and say, okay, we want to be a business that makes $150,000 in gross sales. And that was a place where we thought, you know, you do your you do your homework, everything.

00:48:08:08 - 00:48:21:01
Seth
And that's relatively low to sell these low places. But for us, coming from the North Shore town of 5000 people, that was an incredible thing. Mind you, the the Korean couple before us, they were doing $300 a day.

00:48:21:03 - 00:48:22:12
Speaker 5
Wow.

00:48:22:14 - 00:48:45:14
Seth
$500 in a day was good. Yeah. So that's first goal was to do it. Let's see if we can do $1,000 in one day. And I remember if we can drive for one second the story I'm cooking on the grill. We have this line. I've been I've been I've been at school all day. And I came out, I went to work at 4:00 and it was like 730 in the middle of a rush.

00:48:45:16 - 00:49:03:05
Seth
And it's chaos in the kitchen. Chaos. I'm on the grill and my dad comes in and there's this long line. People are waiting 30 minutes for their food, 35 minutes, 40 minutes for their food. We all know that's super long, right? And we've had times when people waited even longer than that.

00:49:03:07 - 00:49:24:07
Seth
Chaos. That was a chaos. My dad comes in and he's so angry. He's like, what's going on over here? People are getting their food. It's a mess. And he stops everything, pulls me out of the kitchen to have a conversation with like, what the heck is going on? And I have anxiety, like dial to 11 because I try to take this food out.

00:49:24:12 - 00:49:39:11
Seth
My dad pulls it out of the kitchen, we go around to the back. It's crazy. There was a line of people like, it takes me all the way to the back. I have no idea what the employees were doing at the time. Okay, like the Kobe Bryant just got pulled off the court like, hey guys, keep playing, right?

00:49:39:11 - 00:49:57:02
Seth
I'm gonna I'm gonna go have a private meeting in a locker room with this guy. Right now. No idea to this day what the employees were doing. So he was came in super hot and angry, and then he pulls out his pocket and he had gone to the register and he's like, said, look at this. I was like, dad, why are you so mad?

00:49:57:02 - 00:50:21:19
Seth
It's crazy. I was like, I don't know, I'm not mad anymore. You guys did $800 tonight. It's incredible. Great job. What? I thought he was gonna, like, kill me. You know, he's taking me to the back of the building, but he kept it, so the dynamic was so I. It was the first time we ever did $800 up until, like, 7:00 in that day, right where we were almost at that, like 1000 threshold mark.

00:50:21:21 - 00:50:42:18
Seth
And I mean, it's kind of as I shared out, it's kind of emotional to like there were so many ebbs and flows. So how to run a successful business is where my dad comes in hot. But then seeing like we did this thing, we got 800 bucks and it's like we do $800. Like, I mean, that's a that's like we did that in like, you know, in an hour.

00:50:42:20 - 00:51:00:00
Seth
But it was it just so cool that dynamic. So having that for me, seeing my dad at that point and the place where he was my boss is my everything, he was proud of me. Right. And then we were both I was seated and he was seated, but we both were able to come meet each other so that that happened.

00:51:00:00 - 00:51:27:02
Seth
But it so the goal $150,000. If that's what your gross sales goal is, he created like this program where you check in every single shift. There's two shifts in a day for us. We open at 11, close at nine. Each shift has a goal and a dollar. Uncle the and he would always say like, if you don't know what the scoreboard is in a game, why are you playing the game?

00:51:27:02 - 00:51:52:04
Seth
Every game it's a scoreboard. We're in the game of life. So if a 150 broken down, we're closed on Sundays. Chick-Fil-A model, right? We're all in church on Sunday. So you have 26 working days in a month. You break that into two shifts each. You get a dollar amount that each shift is responsible for. And every player employee is tied to that amount from a service perspective, from your sales.

00:51:52:04 - 00:52:09:18
Seth
Okay. Would you like a drink with that small kind of selling and so on and so forth. So that's measured. That's really good for the for hitting that goal on the backside. And this was the part that was tough for me. Whenever there was an issue or struggling, I'm like, hey, there's still not enough money to like hey, we're making money.

00:52:09:18 - 00:52:41:02
Seth
But there's there's there's bleeding going on. There is a leak in the boat and it's still sinking. Like, what the heck? We're meeting our numbers, what's going on? And it's these few things, theft from employees putting bacon on their burger when they're not supposed to. The inventory, the inventory where if somebody drops off inventory, you have a $5,000 grocery inventory slapped right in the back of your kitchen.

00:52:41:04 - 00:52:57:03
Seth
We didn't do it for years. It's the tedious thing to go through it, but it's standard. You can ChatGPT it. You can Google it. It's like Standard operating 101. If you want a restaurant, you have to go through it because it could be human error, where the truck driver is supposed to drop off 15 bags of potatoes, 15 bags of potatoes to look at it.

00:52:57:05 - 00:53:17:09
Seth
If you look at 12 bags, potatoes guarantee you wouldn't pick up the difference between 12 and 15 bags. You're missing three bags of potatoes because it's a huge frickin stack of potatoes. So that is a huge key element. And whether the driver accidentally missed it or some cases, the driver, you know, takes on three sacks of potatoes and sells them somewhere else or whatever.

00:53:17:11 - 00:53:35:05
Seth
That's the that's a thing that's like that happens. You got to make sure inventory more cases than not. It's human error though. So employee theft inventory check off and then portion control. Those three things are so vital. And I've had so many people tell me that. And I'm like, no, no, no, that's not it. It is it that is super.

00:53:35:05 - 00:53:55:00
Seth
It that's like totally. Did you have a 16 year old kid that's giving a small fry with the portion of a large fry? Yeah. You can't pound that over two shifts every single day. You have 14 to 15 employees working majority, more teenagers over 26 days. Those dollars and pennies add up to like ten. Like sometimes thousands of dollars.

00:53:55:01 - 00:54:14:18
Seth
And, you know, employees taking sort of their you have to be, you know, I don't know how politically correct to say Nazi about it, but you have to be really gnarly about it and really on top of it with employee food, you have to be, super, super on it with that stuff. I can't stress that enough. Everybody knows what I'm talking about.

00:54:14:18 - 00:54:38:07
Seth
But I always hated those responses when I reached out to other people because I thought that they were too. Those problems were too small or too little, you know, it's like, that's not it. It's not. It's not these things like. No. And then cash too, like, we didn't have a cash system for the longest time. And it was the greatest lesson to me learned when all of my employees, I touted are the best, that none of them would steal a penny from me.

00:54:38:07 - 00:54:58:12
Seth
They're so good. These kids are good. I've trained them myself. I'm handling this stuff. My system that I had, I thought was good, but it was totally like antiquated. Come to find out, one of my top people that we loved dearly and adult, a responsible adult was stealing.

00:54:58:14 - 00:54:59:05
Steph
Young man.

00:54:59:10 - 00:55:09:07
Seth
Thousands of dollars, thousands of dollars, thousands, hundreds at a time on the daily from not one restaurant, from two.

00:55:09:09 - 00:55:09:18
Speaker 5


00:55:09:20 - 00:55:30:03
Seth
It's like, take that in consideration, which we've never recovered. But the problem is, like, operationally, if your systems in your cash and like, there's hundreds of things. Right. But in my opinion, if someone now is reaching out to me like, dude, Seth, I've been in the trenches three years now, the restaurant just isn't really working. My first question is, do let me taste your food.

00:55:30:03 - 00:55:47:20
Seth
How's the food taste? Not to be good. The customer service piece I think is a huge element. But food will trump customer service all day. Our opinion. And then you go into the back end like, hey, your sales are doing good, what are you doing on? You know, if you're out of a food truck, you should be making like this much money.

00:55:47:20 - 00:56:05:17
Seth
A month. You know you can beat that all day long. You should be making this a day and you keep everything within percentages. You can't. Your labor has to be at 27% or less your food. For us, we do it at 33%, which is arguably a little high for some people, but our ingredients are a little bit more expensive.

00:56:05:17 - 00:56:28:15
Seth
So we but you want to keep it around 30%, and then you have to track your inventory and your portion control, and then you have to train your employees on all that stuff, like hiring the right people and firing really quickly, which I'm not very good at. I feel like it's we've learned that over the years, like hire slow and fire fast is the thing, right?

00:56:28:17 - 00:56:49:14
Seth
And sometimes you let somebody let a fox in the henhouse for a little bit too long. It's like, okay, that was an offense. That was an offense. But like, you know, just you just got to go, right. Because you start to love these kids too. But at the end of the day, you can't keep on, you know, an 18 year old person, even a 30 year old person, if they're just not doing the thing that they need to be doing, you know?

00:56:49:14 - 00:56:54:18
Seth
So anyways, super long answer to that stuff. But like, yeah, there's.

00:56:54:20 - 00:56:57:16
Shane
Every answer is a long answer. And that's all.

00:56:57:18 - 00:56:58:16
Brian
I want to.

00:56:58:18 - 00:57:04:04
Shane
Build the framework, built the book just a second ago of a freaking restaurant. Like every element of it.

00:57:04:05 - 00:57:07:11
Steph
That's product that was so beautiful.

00:57:07:13 - 00:57:08:09
Shane
How do you break it down?

00:57:08:11 - 00:57:13:13
Steph
That breakdown is transferable to every business. So you ask because yeah.

00:57:13:15 - 00:57:14:17
Seth
I think so.

00:57:14:18 - 00:57:24:05
Steph
And I'm listening to you. And I mean, it's like talking to one of my funeral directors explaining their business. Me exact same model, except it's dead people and not burgers.

00:57:24:06 - 00:57:25:15
Seth
Dead people. Yeah.

00:57:25:17 - 00:57:31:01
Steph
That's all right. That's the only difference. But, you know, it's not you.

00:57:31:03 - 00:57:32:09
Brian
You don't need the palate.

00:57:32:11 - 00:57:52:15
Steph
You know, all the things that you just ascribe to are the characteristics of a high performer. Right? High performers think like that. And so anyone you you hire or anyone that works in our in our groups and we deal with this all the time, that is a characteristic of a high performer integrity, hard work, paying attention to the detail.

00:57:52:15 - 00:58:01:03
Steph
Everything's about detail. And, my, my, one of my famous lines is this. Because I worked in a restaurant growing up for years, my whole family, everyone in my family.

00:58:01:04 - 00:58:05:06
Seth
Okay, I thought saw stuff. I thought I saw that in you right there, I see you.

00:58:05:07 - 00:58:22:02
Steph
Yeah. Okay. You need me on the grill. I'm there, all right? I have no problems at all. But, you know, and it's like we're in banking and. And my interview when I interview candidates. My question is, have you ever worked in a restaurant, like to be a banker?

00:58:22:02 - 00:58:22:22
Seth
Yes.

00:58:23:02 - 00:58:24:09
Steph
To be a banker.

00:58:24:11 - 00:58:26:16
Seth
Because if I love that restaurant.

00:58:26:18 - 00:58:47:11
Steph
Guess what? When you're walking, you never walked back empty handed. Ever. No one walks empty handed. Ever. And guess what? If you ask who dropped the plate, you've not worked in a restaurant. You don't care. You stop, you pick up the plate and you keep going like nobody has to point fingers. It's about the client experience and everyone having the pride.

00:58:47:11 - 00:59:01:06
Steph
Like, this is your own place, right? And so everything you just describe is exactly transferable to every business owner that we talked to. So those are some golden nuggets in there guys. We got to get some some Seth.

00:59:01:08 - 00:59:11:23
Brian
Scariest moment in the time that you've been in the business in Seven Brothers, what was the scariest moment and what did you guys do?

00:59:12:01 - 00:59:46:16
Seth
I feel like the scariest moment always is the financial struggle. I think the scariest moment is always I hit on a short leg. There's no there's no money in the account. There's payrolls coming up, the vendor, the vendor bills coming due. I would say that, is always super scary. What do you do? I pray really hard. Know, it's like, oh, you know, this is, you know, I don't know how popular this house would be, but I feel like one of.

00:59:46:18 - 01:00:02:05
Seth
Okay, I've two parts of this I want to talk about this. And then the other scariest part was when we partnered with people. And so I'll hit that with the two full questions. So what were the first one when there's nobody on the council? All those things that we talked about doing those things and seemingly like you're doing everything perfect, right.

01:00:02:05 - 01:00:30:00
Seth
And it just seems like there's a like you plug one leak and another one springs up, and then there's another one. You're on this boat and it's just like constantly sinking. It just seems like all the time it's like, dude, how do I just get this to a float? One of one of the miracles I think of the business of it working out is paying tithing to my church, and I feel like that has been like such a saving grace for me.

01:00:30:00 - 01:00:46:17
Seth
So without going like, totally into Sunday school here, guys, there's that. But from the financial piece of it, it just seems that if you're doing right by people and as far as what we did about it, Brian, like I, I wish I could tell you like, oh, we did this financially, we did this and we did this and we did this.

01:00:46:17 - 01:01:03:22
Seth
Like, you know, we took out a line of credit that gave us some leeway at one point. And then we just got smarter with our books and our operations. Or I say smarter, like we got a better system. We weren't using a shoe box for our cash register anymore, you know what I mean? Like, so they said it was just money.

01:01:03:22 - 01:01:22:09
Seth
Money. There was so much money taken over the years. I told you one story, but there's like. And that's a lot on us. This guy told me, hey, something. You have money coming out of your business from your employees that's on you. You got to get your stuff together and you got to get better operations and systems like get a register, get a good place, like make proper investments into your business.

01:01:22:09 - 01:01:43:03
Seth
I mean, that's a whole nother podcast in itself is reinvesting back into your business so that don't make it so that the employees have access to that type of cash, where that's you have to have a better system. Humans are humans, and when somebody needs an extra 20 bucks, they're going to, you know, whatever. But I think having so what we did about it.

01:01:43:03 - 01:02:17:05
Seth
Yeah. So we upgraded the POS, upgraded the register, created better systems. We were a pen and paper, old school for a real long time. And I think just having a better interviewing process as well to filtering people through areas like that. And then a lot of the cash like that, just cash goes away. So if you're running into financial problems, I'd say if there is zero theft within your operation system, then you have to look at your numbers in terms of your food and labor, food and labor, two biggest costs.

01:02:17:05 - 01:02:34:01
Seth
So one of them's off. That's all there is to it. If you're if because that's your profits, right. So if your food or labor is even up off by 2% points, that 3% points, that's the that's thousands of dollars. If you're a food truck and operating on your own, you have 2 or 3 employees. Still, that could be like two grand.

01:02:34:06 - 01:02:55:02
Seth
If you're a food truck, $2,000 in your pocket, that's a huge difference. Heck, even for me, I got five kids, $2,000. That's that. That's a Costco. That's one of my Tesco trips, you know. Yeah, yeah, that that's cash. That's money. Right. 500 bucks to $2,000. That stuff is sacred. Right. So as business owners, we appreciate recognize that the money can't be this like fluffy thing.

01:02:55:02 - 01:03:17:03
Seth
That's real. It has to be really tight. Anyways, that was the scary, the scariest parts for me. Almost like I get emotional tears. Like on Friday. This is. And this has happened so many times. You guys like you hear these stories in like church I guess I pay tithing Friday, payroll goes out, account goes negative. You got of like 40 employees.

01:03:17:03 - 01:03:32:08
Seth
You have 3 or 4 of them that didn't quite make the cut. He said, I got this insufficient funds. Check bounced back to me thing. What's going on? I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. Can you wait till one day let me. And then sure enough, because it's two or it's over the weekend, it's a day or two.

01:03:32:10 - 01:03:49:02
Seth
There's a delay, right? When the money hits the account from the POS. So then when Monday and Tuesday hits, we would have this, like mammoth weekend, like kill a weekend and the accounts would jump right back up from negative to like an awesome positive. And that would flow float us again through the week like like total miracle kind stuff.

01:03:49:02 - 01:04:17:03
Seth
Just. And you ask people like, hey, how did you hear about us? That's one of my favorite questions when asking people. And again, what did we do about it? One of my things that I do when I'm super stressed, like I go and I work the tables and I do front of house for than back of the house now, because I like talking to the people and engaging and serving people and wiping their table again, kind of a cheesy answer, but the stress of the financial burden you just if you just go and like, just deliver food to people and then, hey, how'd you hear about us?

01:04:17:03 - 01:04:34:05
Seth
Like, and then you hear the feedback, oh my gosh, we heard about you, from our uncle that was visiting here in Hawaii. They said they came here five times in the one week they were in Hawaii. And they loved this was their favorite burger place. And like, oh, really? Where are you guys from? We're from we're from, Southern California.

01:04:34:06 - 01:04:48:06
Seth
I'm always the in and out, Robbie. Oh, you guys are getting our fans right? Like, we love it and out, but we love you guys better. I'm like, no, no, no, no, hold the phone. We're not better than in and Out. In and out is the gold standard here. Like no, no, no, we love this place. It's like it just it's emotional right?

01:04:48:07 - 01:05:07:21
Seth
Yeah. It's like okay, all this is it for not what do I do about it? When I'm financially struggling I go and play the game. I go into the restaurant. I serve people and it seems to take the edge off. And then I pay my tithing. Monday hits. Tuesday hits. Monday. You get the deposit from Thursday, Friday, Tuesday you get it from Saturday.

01:05:07:21 - 01:05:30:08
Seth
And it's just like the accounts go up and we're like, thank you, great, great blessings. And it's like, it's a miracle. But, I don't know as far as like, you know, what we do about it. But the second piece of it, the, the scariest part was partnering, partnering with people, because for so long we were it was just as a fit as a family.

01:05:30:10 - 01:05:52:04
Seth
And we met with so many people over the course of the years, like, why did we decide to go into the franchising world? Because that's what traditionally people do to take it to the next level. If we don't have the capital right, and we want to organically grow, but scale it at a reasonably really cool pace, you go and find someone you franchise is the answer.

01:05:52:04 - 01:06:10:19
Seth
And that's what took us into the franchising world. And for so long, dad was scared to franchise. We did a licensing thing for a minute and we kind of backed from that. A little bit. And you basically are entrusting somebody else with your baby. So every business owner knows that you have to cross this bridge. Like, hey, if you're going to scale the way you want to scale, not everybody can do it.

01:06:10:19 - 01:06:33:00
Seth
Like in and out, just organically raw all the way. Like this. So long story short, dad finally got on board, saw the vision of where this could go using other people's capital as a franchise model for them to build it out, and we train and teach them. And that was really scary to to to partner with people like that.

01:06:33:00 - 01:06:57:11
Seth
Like, and then to bring on a financial partner as well to also very scary because you're now sharing ownership. And the scariest part was, is that we have just heard so many horror stories where people had hostile takeovers, where they brought somebody in, and it was just like somebody that was like more cunning, more wealthy. They had the back and they figured out how to, like, push out the founder.

01:06:57:11 - 01:07:30:18
Seth
Right. McDonald's. Right. And Ray Kroc, these guys. Right. So that was that's always in the back of his head, just super afraid what we did about it. Again, lots and lots of Frank met with tons of people as a family, like thousands and thousands of hours of meeting time as a family where we got mom, everybody, even during the all the, all of our wives into like we're all married and just like literally hashing this thing out, thinking of every scenario, talking to people who were like us, had businesses brought on, partners, hearing their horror stories, how crazy hard it was.

01:07:30:18 - 01:07:51:01
Seth
They sold 50% of their company. And before it was just them, you know, and now they have this other guy from like New York chiming in, telling them what to do because he owns 50% of the company. Yeah, they got so, so much fear around that, so much anxiety around that. But at the same time, what what did we do about it?

01:07:51:01 - 01:07:54:12
Seth
Brian, as far as that goes? Like.

01:07:54:14 - 01:08:14:09
Seth
One of the pinnacle things that somebody had told us and said, you guys, I was in your same shoes I sold my company for like $56 million. Guy totally killed it. And and so we having we brought on mentors actually kind of mentors like just like interviewing and talking to people, like finding out, collecting information as much as we could.

01:08:14:11 - 01:08:41:02
Seth
And this guy said this, he's like, look, you seven brothers aren't. And Peggy, my mom and dad is like, you guys could own 100% of a company that's worth a million bucks, let's say. Or you could own 50% or 60%, or 30% of $1 billion company.

01:08:41:04 - 01:08:46:14
Shane
But numbers didn't lie. They got so the vision.

01:08:46:14 - 01:08:55:22
Seth
That was the vision. That was it. That was it. That was it right there. So it's like, oh, okay. And it's cool that a guy. What's that shit?

01:08:56:00 - 01:08:59:09
Shane
I said, you thought of the scale of what it could become.

01:08:59:11 - 01:09:15:23
Seth
The scale of what it become, and we could organically go up. I mean, it took us forever to open up like a couple people. There are brands way younger than us that are Dave's hot chicken. They're on fire right now. Dave's for chicken is like, they're huge and there's there's dozens of others. We've been around for 15 years.

01:09:15:23 - 01:09:36:23
Seth
These brands have been around for seven years, eight years, six years that are way bigger than us. And it's because organically and I think that was good for us. We had to figure out who we were. And as we were like figuring out how to, like, work together as a family and not fight in the kitchen anymore, and this brother would leave and then I would leave and then this, really this brother comes back, this sort of comes back like, what are your role?

01:09:36:23 - 01:09:52:17
Seth
What's your role then? Now it's like the synergy and the vision. It's all coming together. That was a massively huge milestone for us to come together as a family. Kate, we're gonna start franchising. That was huge. Okay. We're going to bring on some some capital partners. Hey, we're going to do this. That was amazing for us to be able to do.

01:09:52:17 - 01:10:05:17
Seth
It was amazing for dad to get on board with that, because that was huge. Because if dad wasn't on board, we fired the entire time, went to work. So when Mom and Dad got on board with that, to all of us, brothers kind of came together with Kate. This is this is the path of this we're going to do.

01:10:05:18 - 01:10:24:18
Seth
And, so we. Yeah. So. Right. So the short answer, right, is this that we we brought it I would say we brought a mentors. We brought them more mentors. Lot of praying, a lot of fasting, making sure that we were in the right mindset and kind of letting the Almighty kind of steer the ship a little bit there.

01:10:24:18 - 01:10:43:22
Seth
And then people started coming into our pathway. And then what's really interesting is that the people that we we love our franchisees, they're great people. But the people that we ended up, you know, partnering with, dude, it was like it was like falling in love almost for like without being cheesy. It was like this, like really cool, moment.

01:10:43:22 - 01:11:03:21
Seth
Like, hey, of all the people that we've spoken to, like, this is the guy. Yeah. And he's an amazing he's an amazing human being. His family is amazing. His partners are amazing, his people, his circle. They're all epic people. And there's a ton of people that have tash, tons of people that have business experience every day. And it's so many people are so successful and so smart.

01:11:03:23 - 01:11:20:00
Seth
But it had to be the right fit, right? It had to be the right person. It wasn't about, you know, who's the richest guy who has the most this or whatever, or even who has the deepest resume. And we are a lot of people who goes into business with a family of nine people, seven brothers and their mom and their dad.

01:11:20:00 - 01:11:38:13
Seth
Who does that? That's crazy, right? Usually it's a business partner is like two people. Maybe it's three, maybe four, like board member nine. It's a joke. Having to like everybody has like their own opinion on things. It's crazy. So for these guys also that was another big setting for them to like not wash this over like a tidal wave.

01:11:38:13 - 01:11:58:06
Seth
Like, hey, you guys are a bunch of surf bums that know what the heck you're doing. Can't even set the ball right in high school. Come on bro, You know, but so that it works. So I think that these people are coming to our pathway. It's like fallen in love. I feel like, kind of like we all, as a family to come together.

01:11:58:06 - 01:12:15:15
Seth
For all of us to be like, this is the guy was like, is kind of a big deal for us because it's, it's we're not always on the same page. Yeah. So that was that's what we thought. That was scary. Giving that up and making sure we give it up with the right people, bringing on a partner. So really, what are they going to do?

01:12:15:15 - 01:12:31:21
Seth
How they're life? Are they going to make us work like 1000 hours a week, you know, are these guys workaholics that they have zero family life balance? Like, I got five kids, right? Are they going to make us move to Utah where all the growth is right now? Where I'm on the North shore of Hawaii. We don't want to move, but we're happy to do what we got to do.

01:12:31:21 - 01:12:43:05
Seth
Like, how is this going to work, right? You give away piece of your company, these guys, you have to answer to these guys, you know. So that was super scary. And it turns out yeah, they're super cool. And the visions are aligned.

01:12:43:05 - 01:12:44:15
Steph
So that's awesome.

01:12:44:15 - 01:12:46:05
Brian
Yeah that's asset.

01:12:46:06 - 01:13:21:09
Shane
No. And that's honestly said I appreciate you coming on and and like spending the time with us the storytelling the campfire is a fireside right now. Yeah I love it I remember that time. It's like the weird like scary stories. You're but delivering some truth. I think that every entrepreneur, especially those within the restaurant world, but even now get can see how how a business operate and the how you can take something that you're passionate about and create a formula and a system and a science around it, it it becomes successful and not still like lose the passion.

01:13:21:11 - 01:13:50:00
Shane
Yeah. That's the thing that I think is the kind of the most unique element about it is that you're able to maintain, you've crafted a brand of this passion brand and a passion product, and you've fortified it with the infrastructure to actually help it grow. And I think that's honestly what what tends to be missing out of a lot of people if they just build the infrastructure but they don't have the passion, it will crumble, it will scale, it'll plateau right to the point where it just isn't going to grow because it doesn't have the energy, it doesn't have the person.

01:13:50:00 - 01:14:08:17
Shane
Not that at the helm of it. That's thinking, I'm so stressed I can't make payroll, I'm going to go out and wipe some tables down because I love it that much. Like nobody freaking does. Like, you know what I mean? Like, that's not what the triggers in the person's brain, but in an entrepreneur's brain and a business owner who loves what they do and loves what loves to serve and loves what they sell.

01:14:08:19 - 01:14:28:21
Shane
Like that's the difference between the scalability concept of that brand, or one that's just going to man, maybe make a couple hundred thousand dollars fizzle out and you sell off the equipment when you can't run it anymore. All right. So I think, I think that, you've defined what, a way that somebody can be successful with it and a way to do it when you have six crazy brothers that.

01:14:29:00 - 01:14:35:09
Shane
Yeah, like, stomp on each other's faces in the kitchen and have the boxing matches in their living room every Saturday.

01:14:35:09 - 01:14:53:05
Seth
Stories. Yeah. No, that's kind strange. We appreciate it. It's, Yeah, it's been a total blessing. And it's honestly, I'm grateful you guys would take the time to even talk to us. We're we're an emerging brand, and we're small. But I'm super stoked. It's fun, it's fun. It's fun to talk about and to make connections like this and stuff going to mazing and to answer the questions.

01:14:53:05 - 01:15:07:21
Seth
And honestly, it's it's really cool to to go back to see where it's and it's really exciting to see where it will go. And I'm super excited to see where your guys's podcast is going to go to, you know, scaling and growing powerful, powerful people right here.

01:15:07:22 - 01:15:09:16
Brian
Are we needed you on there, bro?

01:15:09:18 - 01:15:11:17
Speaker 5
You know, preach the way.

01:15:11:18 - 01:15:16:17
Seth
You're going to lose followers because of this. Probably like this. Because this guy can't set the ball right.

01:15:16:19 - 01:15:29:16
Shane
All right. So we're grateful that, Seth was able to shine with us today. If you're, just listening. You got this far into this long podcast, please be sure to follow and look us up on on Lords of lending.com. We'll catch you next time.