From Parking-Lot Pop-Up to Global Phenomenon: A Conversation with Dave’s Hot Chicken CEO

[MUSIC PLAYING] Welcome to Delivered, the Journey of Packaging, brought to you by SupplyCatty, the leading global packaging supplier servicing the food service and hospitality industries. Each episode we sit down with leaders and visionaries to unbox how supply chain and brand strategy are shaping the food service industry. This is where real conversations happen, and where the journey of packaging begins. You can follow the journey on Spotify, YouTube, Amazon Music, and Apple podcasts. Let's get into it. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another exciting episode of Delivered, the Journey of Packaging. I'm Bradley Sabbath. I'm joined by my business partner and co-host Zachary Stein. We are SupplyCatty. And today, on the podcast, very exciting to introduce Jim Bittix, president and COO of Dave's Hot Chicken. Welcome, Jim. Wow. That was the most energetic podcast intro I've ever been a part of. That was very nicely done. We like to keep it hot and spicy here, just like you. [LAUGHTER] So the task here is a quick question just to get started. Always. Bradley and Zachary, as opposed to you, Brad and Zach. It depends how warm you want to get. Usually when I'm in trouble, my wife's called me Zachary. That's about-- My life calls me other. I feel like Zach, I've been introduced to Zach as Zach. I know Zach as Zach, and I feel like Bradley is always Bradley. Like, you know what I mean? Like, your emails, I think you sign Bradley. You don't ever sign Brad. I don't think. So I was Brad until I turned 18, and then I felt like Bradley was a little more mature and could help me grow up quicker. It didn't work. I was Jimmy up until I was about 12. And then somewhere along the line, someone said, I should be Jim. And I think that was a bad call. [LAUGHTER] I am in no way happy with the idea that I became Jim. So at any time-- Are you saying we need to bring back Jimmy? Yeah. I was on another podcast with the branded guys. Jimi? It's like-- Did Jimmy first learn-- Did you get a word in? And Shats. Did you get a word in? Yeah, no, I did. Actually, I think they were shocked by how much I talked. Shout out to the brand new guys. They're good friends. They're amazing. We love you, guys. They are good, guys. And we agreed. Jimmy and I agreed that in any event-- because he's a little older. And I'm not questioning his health. But if you called me and said, hey, Jimmy's in the hospital, I'd be like, yeah, I can see that. He's running some machine, though. He is in machine. No, he is. He's great. I'm just kidding. I'm completely-- everything I see is just the same. But if he were-- we agreed that if he were ever incapacitated for any reason that I could step in, and it could still be Shatsy and Jimmy. We agreed that I'm the new Jimmy. So-- You could be the finance guy. They call him the finance guy. You could be the finance guy. And I'm not the finance guy. I would be the brand. I would call it something that I stuff the brand guy. I'm a brand guy now. I like it. But they agreed that I was the next Jimmy, just so you know. Number one. You heard it here. But also, what happened when I was a kid was the only Jimmy's that were out there when I was a kid were Jimmy Carter, who didn't have a great reputation. And Jimmy and he crick it from Jepetto's workshop or Pinocchio. There weren't any cool Jimmy's. Now, today you got Jimmy Kimmel and you got Jimmy Fallon. And then Superman made a whole resurgence. He got like Jimmy Olson. Got Jimmy Butler. There are. Yeah, Jimmy Butler. You got all these good Jimmy's now. Yeah, a lot of good Jimmy's, yeah. Yeah. And then somewhere along the way, I think when I was in high school, the term Jimmy hat took a bit of a hold, which didn't have anything to do with me. But it was also cool. You know what I mean? Hey, you got your Jimmy hat? So there's precedence now for why I would want to be Jimmy. And I don't know what email I signed in. I was signed in with Jim Bittix. I have a Gmail where I put my name as Jimmy. I think Jimmy Bittix has a nice Jimmy B. Jimmy Bittix. Let's bring it back. What do you think I'm funny? Like I'm fun, right? I'm fun and funny. Jimmy B is a fun, funny guy, yeah, totally. So I feel like I could be a Jimmy now. The real question is, what does your wife think about Jim versus Jimmy? I don't think I think I'm stupid all the way around. She thinks that I just say stuff so that I get a laugh. And she's not wrong. So I don't think I can ever get her to call me Jimmy. Be honest with you. Well, we have 2026 goals. There we go. All right. So you guys help me get it started. So you put this podcast list me as Jimmy Bittix from Dave's hot chick. Done, done. Speaking actually, let's do the whole intro again. By the way, you guys prompt me. You just constantly need to be shirtless during this and you're both. We're only six minutes in. We got a long ways to go. OK. Turn up. So with that, Jim, I had it by token. And I pay you guys along. There we go. Jimmy Bittix, let's set the tone here. I think everyone has seen the crazy story in news around Dave's hot chicken, $900 start parking lot, kaboom, meteoric rise. Let's talk about Jimmy Bittix for a second. Let's set the tone with Jimmy. What led you into the food service space? What was like that ultimate driver that got you into hospitality and then ultimately led you to want to join up with the Dave's hot chicken squad? I am the product of a single mom who when I was six years old, she was like a secretary. She's like a legal secretary. And she decided that she should have gone to college. And so never too late, she was 31 years old. She started going to night school at the local community college in Mesa, Arizona. And she picked me up from daycare and then she would take me to nightcare at the community college and she started going to school. And somewhere along the way she decided that she had to commit fully to college in order to ever finish. And so that was in 1981. And in 1989, how was six years old? How was six years old in 1981? And in 1989, she finished all of her schooling with her PhD in experimental psychology. So she did her bachelor's, her master's, and her PhD in about seven years. She funded it through her academic prowess, through grants and scholarships and school loans. And she was a waitress half the time and she also worked at the university part of the time. And so we didn't, we always had somewhere to live. We always had like, I always had clothes. We always had toilet paper. We weren't doing any weird things to survive. I had a couple of friends one specifically who whose mom got kicked out of her apartment many times. And she and her sisters often lived in a car for a couple of months until they got enough money to get back into an apartment. That was never us. But there was also never any extra stuff. Like, you know, I think Nintendo came out in 1988 or 1989. I didn't have that. We didn't have anything extra. We just had what we had to have, what we needed, what we, what led us to survive. So on my way home from 9th grade one day, I walked by the Jack in the box restaurant and they have a now hiring sign. And so I was like, let me go try to get hired and they said you have to be 16. And so when I filled out the application, I changed my birth year. And I just, I put it that I was a year younger and I got hired. My best friend and I both got a job there within a couple of months of each other. And with my very first check, it was $181 and I bought a bike so that I could get myself to and from work. And then pretty much every time they called and said, hey, you want to come in and work? Or, you know, whatever the schedule was, whatever it was, I put myself in a position to go do the job. My mom never asked for any money. She didn't need help with the rent or I mean, she did her thing that she was a very responsible parent who took care of all the bills. We were never homeless. We always had everything we needed. But when I wanted to buy, you know, a fresh pair of shoes or or something, we didn't have that. And so she's like, you do with your money, what you want. And so first thing was a bike. Second thing was a super Nintendo. And then I don't know what other trash I bought on every other check. But it was always, you know, stuff that I that we never had that we didn't that we didn't maybe a VCR at some point or something. Like, I mean, it was just stuff. And I was allowed she didn't care what I what I bought, but let me buy whatever I wanted. So I got into it because the money was mine. at the time, you guys are significantly younger than I am, but minimum wage was $3.35 an hour. And I was happy to have it. Like I said, that first check was $181. And I remember it, I remember it too this day, like $181. Like, our rent, when I was a kid, my mom paid $283 a month for rent. So I got one check and I paid, I had more than half the rent. - Crazy. - I was like, ready to, I could move out. (laughing) But, and then along the way, it was easy work. Restaurants are the type of a job where you don't need anything, but a willingness to work and an ability to show up. And most restaurants are open, what, 18 hours a day, like the work hours are like 18 hours a day. So even if you can't work the night shift, you can pick up hours in the morning, or if you can't work the day shift, you can pick up hours at night or wherever. And so restaurants often become the catch all for the employees that either can't, because the industry doesn't want them, let's say it's people that don't speak English fully. So like, you know, maybe you don't speak English fully, so you're not gonna probably be working at the local Wells Fargo bank, or if you are, they only need one person that speaks Spanish. You know what I'm saying? Like, the jobs aren't plentiful. And so you end up taking the job that'll have you and that'll fit around your schedule. You might be going to school and they'll work around your school schedule, whether you're in high school or you're in college, or you might only have access to transportation in the morning, or at night, or whatever, and they'll take you, and they'll work you at a fast food place, like a jack in the box. They also have a grade internship. There you have employees working 24 hours a day. So you end up in a job like that. And then for me, every time they offered me a promotion or some way to make more money, I was like, you know, I was like, sure, I'll do that. I'll be a shift leader, you know, or I remember one time, and I was during my first two weeks working, I had worked the full eight or nine hour shift. I think I had gone into overtime. I left, it was like seven or eight o'clock at night, and then the guy that was supposed to show up at 10 to do the graveyard shift didn't show up, and they called me, and they said, "Any chance you can come back and work again?" As two hours later, and I was like, I was said, "Yeah, I'll come back. "How late do you need me to work?" And they go, "We need you to work till six." So I worked till six a.m., you know, and I had worked, whatever, 10 a.m., so I don't even remember. Eight o'clock at night or something like that, and then the guy that was supposed to come at six didn't show up, and I worked till seven or eight that morning, and my mom was like, it was a weekend, it wasn't that big a deal, but my mom's like, "I don't want you getting too wrapped up in all this," and I was like, "I probably need $300 today." (laughing) What are you talking about? (laughing) I said, "You got to every time." I said, "Yes, every time." My boss right now, my CEO at Dave's, he goes, "You have FOMO." And I was like, "How do you even know what FOMO means?" He's, I think he turned a hundred. (laughing) And it's a surprise. - I'm surprised Bill knows what FOMO is. - Yeah, he's 70. And he goes, "You have FOMO." 'Cause every time he invites me to go somewhere, do something, or whatever, I always go, "Sure, I'll go." I'll do it. And it's not whether it's work-related or fun-related, I always go, "Sure, I'll go." And he goes, "You're afraid of missing out." And I go, "I don't know that I'm afraid of missing out." I was like, "I didn't have all these experiences as a kid." So the first time he was like, "You want to fly to Miami on a private jet?" (laughing) "Sure, I'll go, like, "Oh, go to Miami on a private jet." Let's do it. I'm not gonna pay for it, do I? (laughing) No, you can't pay for it. But anyway, so I landed in the restaurant industry because the restaurant industry would have me. They didn't check my ID, or what they did, and they didn't care that I lied about my age or whatever. And they gave me lots of hours, and I'm sure that I broke probably lots of like, child labor laws or youth labor laws. In California, like, you can, kids, high school kids can only work four hours a day, and they have to be out of the workplace by like 10 p.m. like they gotta go home. And so in Arizona though, I was like doing full closing shifts or opening shifts or double shifts or whatever, and I was hooked. When my mom got her PhD, we moved to a Missouri, Columbia, Missouri for a couple years, and I got a job as a bus boy at a steakhouse there that, they only, I heard the other day, there were only 27 of them left in the world. And it was a company at the time called Bananza steakhouse, named after the old TV show, Bananza TV show, which wasn't on at the time. I'm way too young, but it was named after that. And it eventually got bought by Ponderosa Company, and that Ponderosa, there's 27 Ponderosa's left in the world, supposedly. But I did that bus boy dishwasher cook, line cook thing. And again, they let me work whatever I wanted to work, double shifts, et cetera. I did a good job. I got promoted. I was lead broiler cook, like when I was like 17 or whatever. And then just along the way, I've taken every job promotion I ever was offered. I did a lot of, when I was 18 and a little older, I did a lot of, well, internal company training. And then I also did a lot of community college stuff. And then I tried finishing college by going to ASU. They didn't want me. And so then I did a bunch of ASU being Arizona State. And then I did a lot of adult reentry, like Ottawa or University of Phoenix, where you just buy your degree. You actually do learn quite a bit. But again, by then I had two kids. And I don't know, I was making $150,000 a year. And I mean, I think I just got stuck in it. And I was maybe one of the taller pigmies of the people available in the fast food, QSR industry at the time. So it worked out for me. And so going back to Dave's, I mean, that story is incredible. The restaurant industry has done so much for you. Your mom was sort of a big pillar of sort of you getting into that and seeing what she gave up to get what you want. We haven't really spoke about some of the places you were, Blaze Kitchen, Carl's Jr, etc. Obviously landing at Dave's, for all the things that you've gone through in this industry and the hospitality world and all the different positions that you've had, you've seen training, you've seen operations, you've seen sales. What was it about the founders or the brand of Dave's that made you say, man, this is something special. Like the first time I saw it, what is it? - Okay, so to be totally honest, I was at Blaze Pizza. I was at Carl's Jr. for about 17 years. They did a private equity deal. And a year later, as often happens with private equity deals, there were a lot of changes. A lot of leadership changes, brand, e-close changes, whatever you want to call it. And I ended up wanting to make a change based on a lot of the changes that occurred. I learned a lot in those last two years and good things and bad things, by the way. I don't say it in any way with negativity because it turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me up to that point. And I landed at Blaze Pizza when they had two locations. And I took that job and five years later, they did a private equity deal. And just like at Carl's, a year later, our CEO had decided it was time to depart and our whole team, everybody decided that it was time to move on or make some changes. - Maybe private equity's falling, you Jim. Jimy. - I don't know if you did it. And both times I made a lot of money. I had shares and it was a good thing. But Bill Phelps, who was one of the founding investors of Blaze Pizza, had just gone over and started Dave's hot chicken. And I heard that he was struggling with his ops people. He had gone through a couple of them. And so I got a call from my work mom, her name's Carolyn Kennedy. She's our chief development officer at Dave's. She was our chief development officer and president of international at Blaze Pizza. She was my district manager, VP of ops and mentor at Carl's Junior in rallies. - She's a rock star. - I'm a good actor. - Yeah, I've known her since I was 19 years old. And I'm gonna be 52 in about two months. So I've known her my whole life. And she literally is my work mom. And she calls me and says, you need to come to work for Blaze Pizza. I say how many she says to locations. I say, Carolyn, I have three kids. There's no way. Long story short, I ended up there because of the change at Carl's. Five years goes by, we sell private equity. Things start changing. Everybody's leaving. Carolyn has become a franchisee of Dave's hot chicken. She's been to their fourth opening and she said that, it was a cluster that there was a lot that they needed a lot of help. And it was mid-COVID, I'm not criticizing anybody. It was just there was a lot going on. She goes, "Jim, you need to come to Dave's." And I said, I go, "Carol and like I would love to go to Dave's." But bills on the board, like they're not going to let me go, you know, whatever. And Bill tells me I'm not allowed to tell the story, but I tell it anyway. I called my mom psychic. Her name is Joyce. And I asked Joyce about the opportunity at Dave's hot chicken. And long story short, she said, "This is amazing for you. This is lucrative." And this is over the phone, by the way. Like she's reading my tarot cards over the phone. And she says, "They're telling me this is your forever job." I'm like, "Who's Dave?" It's her spirit guide to her spirit. It's her spirit guides, her spirit guides, whomever. And I got off that call, convinced that I probably should go to Dave's hot chicken. So I texted Bill and it was this Sunday morning, I go, "Hey, I want to come work for you at Dave's hot chicken. How do we make that happen?" And he said, "Call me on Monday." And so I called him on Monday and he was insistent on having to go ask permission. Like I had this whole plan of like, "I'm going to tell him I'm quitting." And then at the last minute, you offered me a job, or whatever, because I thought they would say no. And they didn't say no. To my sugar in, they were just like, "No, go ahead. You're good." No, I actually, the CEO at the time, her name was Mandy Shaw. I think she didn't make it very long, but she was very generous to me by allowing me to go. And while I think she probably wanted to hire her own team and bring her own people in, and there were reasons why she was willing to allow me to jump over with Bill, I will be grateful for my entire lifetime that she said yes to that. Because she could have said no. She could have said, "Hey, I just got promoted. You guys come back and get him in a year, or give me a few minutes to get my grounding." You know what I'm saying? But she generously gave me up. And I started with Bill a month later, and it's been the ride of a lifetime for me. It was the best, moving to Blaze was the best thing I ever did when I moved to Blaze. Moving to Dave's was the best thing I ever did at the time when I moved to Dave's. I got a chance to be a franchisee of the brand, which was driven by Bill Thelps, and funded by Bill Thelps, by the way. Generous, human, good leader, I mean, not even good leader, but just a good person, I guess is what I really mean. Loan me the money to get started. I'm now a partner in five Dave's franchise locations. >> Congratulations. >> We're going to open our six locations six months or something. Like that. And you know, I made a lot of money with the work deal, and I don't say that to Flex or like sound all bad or anything. I'm just telling you, it has been an amazing, an amazing experience to land at Dave's. And I'm grateful to everybody that's had a hand in it. From Bill to Mandy to Rick and Elise and Letzel at Blaze to Jim Meises to Rick Fortman and Eric Williams, the guy that I think he didn't care for me very much at Carl's. But I learned a lot from him and everybody along the way, I can name everybody and say, these people helped me get there, including the underlings, the people that did all the work. My right hand guy, Juan Lopez, has been my right hand guy for 12 years, 13 years. My other right hand guy, Edgar Bia, and I have been working together since 2001. He and I have been other longer than he and his last four wives. So, so how do you get in it? I think you just get in it and then it works out well enough. And the opportunities come if you work hard. I think I worked fairly hard. I worked really hard and did what I was supposed to do at each of the jobs in New York. You're also now doing one of the things that I dream about being able to do one day, which is having my two sons work with me at supply caddy. So, three and a half and six months. I got a ways to go. You know, this is, you guys are grooming them now. He comes to you off. He's at the office the other day. If you ask him what his dad had to do, he tells you he sells packaging. He's in the know. Yeah. But talk to us about what that experience has been like to have your two boys. You know, Dylan's been there a minute. And by the way, it's just an unbelievable job with the training program. So you should be very proud. But tell us about that experience. So I have four kids. I have my, my older daughter. Yeah. And, and she's 25. And she's a teacher. She has her masters. And she wanted to be a teacher. So that she could be a mom and have kids and be home with them on the weekends and whatever. And as much as I try to get her to come work with us at plays and at Dave's, she's like. No, thanks. I'm good. She's, she's perfectly happy where she's at. I started working in, in Allie is my daughter. Allie started working at Blaze when she was 15 also over the summer. And I bribed her by letting her hire her friends. She, she bring a friend and Edgar, who I just mentioned a minute ago, he was the, the DM at the time. And he just made sure they worked the same shifts and, and it was great. It's good experience for her. She learned a lot. And then she learned that she definitely didn't want to be in the restaurant. That was, that was the number one lesson. I think she got out of that. And then Dylan, he's like a year and a half behind her two years behind her. He's 19 months younger. And he started going to work with me back when he was like eight. And we were living in Texas. And I used to have to go to Houston. We lived in Austin. And they, a lot of times it was over the weekends and it was it, it was a tough deal. Texas is a tough market. Carls was a new thing there trying to take down, what a burger. In and out had just joined the fray. They were doing a great job and Carls, uh, Carls had made it was its second attempt to go into, um, into Texas. I struggled those first couple of years and then they, um, I was in San Diego at the time. And they offered me a job that couldn't refuse. I gave me huge rays, they gave me money to move. And they said we need someone to go fix Texas, which is how I ended up moving to Austin. And, um, I was there for two weeks and my then supervisor retired. And the new guy came in and the new guy was super smart, new so much about operations and, and, and was a very tough leader. And, and I, and I say that and sounds like I'm being a jerk and I'm not, I learned a lot. I, I, I, I, I swear to God I did. And I'm not going to do the thing or I learned what not to do. Like we learn, we learn what to do and what not to do from everybody just so you know. He, he was, uh, his name was Eric, Eric Williams, his operational knowledge and intelligence, uh, that he had in his pinky finger was more than I had in was probably like 22 years of a career at that time. Like he was just very smart. And he knew he knew operations like the back of his hand like in and out. And he knew how to talk to people and how to get people to do things and, and, and he knew how to be tough. I mean, there was a lot I learned, I learned a ton from him to be honest. Um, uh, but Dylan was eight at the time and he loved holiday and express cinnamon rolls. And then at the time I said, Hey, I got to go to Houston. He's like, can I go? And I was like, sure, I told, I told my wife and my, and my daughter and I have another son named Nicholas who's also in the business. And I have, I have a fourth or a child, a third son, his name's Connor. He wasn't born yet. But anytime I asked any one of them, you guys want to go with me to Houston or you want to go with me to whatever the answer was always a hell no. Dylan would be like, can we stay at holiday and express? Can we get cinnamon rolls? Can we rent movies red box? Oh, it was a big deal at the time. We had the little, little mobile DVD player. And he's a planner. He's a planner. My wife calls him a cruise director. And he'd be like, well, let's get this movie, this movie, this movie, let's get these snacks. Like he had it all set up. And he'd be like, because I'd be gone for several days a week sometimes. And he'd call me on Thursdays. Like, hey, are you home tomorrow? And I'd be like, yeah. And he'd say, can we camp in the backyard? And I'd be like, sure, we can camp in the backyard. And I'd get home. And he'd have the tent set up and the sleeping bags and all the snacks, like with a cooler. Like Dylan chose me. Like he wanted to do stuff with me. Dylan was my best friend when I was 34 years old. And because he, because. For whatever reason he liked me enough that he was like I want to spend as much time with him as I can and so he used to come with me to Houston We used to Stay in these holiday and expresses I'd go in the restaurant He'd sit on the top of my company car which I think at the time was like a Chevy Impala nice or I Traver as a Chevy trailblazer The ones that look like like a bean kind of that that version and he'd sit on the car playing whatever Play station or whatever was popular at the time while I went in the restaurant sometimes he go in the restaurant too and And sometimes he'd sit in the restaurant sometimes he go back in the back of the kitchen with me and he loved it if he got a chance to make the food He's like can I make something and I'd be like sure you ever want and so I think he got addicted to or hooked on it based on those trips more than anything and then So that's what you got to do proudly you got to you got to get what's your what's your oldest son's name? Si Yeah, get Si to go with you on these things and then and then what you do is you give him food and Ice cream and rewards along the way so he wants to keep doing it for the rest of the day Bringing our boys on every trip moving forward Yeah, it's the name of the game And eventually though it's from like 11 I have this picture of Dylan in our backyard when he's 11 and we had just got a new puppy And it's Dylan the puppy and like seven girls 7-11 and 12 year old girls and that was probably the last time I talked to Dylan in my whole life I remember one Christmas one Christmas I bought Celtics tickets he was he was found the Celtics and I think Kyrie Irving was on the Celtics that year And I was like we can either go to the Celtics Hey, what's up? We can either go to the Celtics game in LA or And this is the one I wanted we could fly to Boston and we can see the Celtics in Boston just you and me I Go and he goes Can I just stay in LA and take my friend I was like sure you can and inside I died just you know inside that that one That may May have almost killed me. I remember wanting to cry. It was a Christmas morning And I remember wanting to cry because I want what I wanted so bad Was I wanted him to pick me to go see like you know like the old days, you know what I mean? Not interested. I'm taking my sunda la in February to see the Warriors Lakers games and he chose me He's like that. Listen man LeBron's retiring this year. I have to go see him You're getting to all we have to go together. I'm like we're going I'll see six and a half And what's his name Bennett Okay, so Bennett and and that's gonna have to change to ban or Benny we call him BB Okay, BB But yeah, those trips guys those are the ones when there's up until about 11 or 12 and they start they start getting interested in You know friends and and girls or whatever Uh, though you have you have a you have a finite window just so you know noted and uh good show Dillon's 24 will be 24 in February Wednesday's brother started coming back to the house. He started coming back to the house now He he moved out uh you bought a house two years ago February what and Uh ninth on the 22nd I'm the 22nd. No way Yeah, there we go really watch the George Washington. Yeah Right Everyone always think it's February 19th. It's not the right 19. No, it's you know But uh, but yeah, so um Dylan got real interested real early When I got to blaze blaze was a way cooler Brandon Carl's So he was very interested in that and he wanted to work there when he was 15 and he put a lot he was a hard worker And uh my right-hand guy uh Juan Lopez whose my BP my senior vice president of operations And will one day be my chief operating officer or whatever, you know, I I believe you always dance with the one that brought you and And that's true of my whole team. Hey man. That's why Andrew still here. That's why Carol and still here with me That's why once here with me. That's why you know whoever lifers and I I they're lifers and I can name a list of them and by the way And I will be rolling bill felps into restaurants in his wheelchair for 20 years now And he will 120 You like to say night when he's 120 and he likes to give people $100 bills for work and he goes thank you Thank you, you know and right now he's ambulatory and he's still he's super tall But I'm I'm picturing in that wheelchair and he's gonna be And I'm gonna be the guy pushing him Just so you know like that's still part of that's part of my play. I love that I love it And uh so anyway Juan was at Blaze with us And I really wanted Dylan to go on a new restaurant opening Uh, but he was only 50 he was only 15. I think he was 15 or you might have maybe he was 60 He was not allowed to go he was an 18 yet to be 18 And uh Juan one said I'll take him and so uh My wife wasn't happy about it, but he went and he opened the restaurant Philadelphia And he was hooked I think he was hooked on the whole new restaurant opening training Like all of that and it became he he I think he's opened Probably 300 restaurants now he's gonna be 24 Wow, it's close to that number. He's art. He's our uh director of training At Blaze our sorry at Dave's and sometimes people I know sometimes people go like oh that's just because Jim's your dad It's not true. I honestly what I did is I sort of divorced myself from it because I didn't want people to say that I don't want them to say that about me And I didn't want them to take away anything from him and so um I've let Juan and and and uh the Juan's right hand guy is named Jose Ayala I've let them lead Dylan's career. I haven't let Dylan's we've seen Dylan four years ago running around at at the vendor conference Like a chicken with his head cut off and and running that that was long before he was director of training And yeah, he worked his way up by the way same same Dave's con we saw One sing his ass off True The singer and uh and so I it's not that I haven't Encouraged either one any of them to be like well what about Dylan for this or that you know there's there've been those moments but uh Dylan has earned his way up completely and I know people will be out there going like yeah right Sure he did no we can vouch for that because we have seen it first And and and and Juan has been his like mentor teacher trainer leader Love it probably significantly more than I have I mean I've said it probably a like been a role model example person But even in this in the grand scheme of things my wife's to stay at home mom and she spent 90% of her time with him So she gets the credit Honestly for for him and professionally I give the credit to to Juan and his team and Dylan of course is the key to Dylan's heart still a Holiday in express Seminole I think his his uh his taste have gotten a lot We did this private equity deal because people got bonus of Dylan. Dylan's one of the bonus skaters And I think he now owns like two Rolexes and he paid off his uh his raptor truck which is you know like a hundred K I mean he He definitely has more expensive taste than uh cinnamon rolls Nick when Nick turned 16 he started working for us at one of our franchise restaurants and he liked it too And now he and Dylan work together in the training uh Nick reports into Dylan which is sort of weird but Um It's it's one of those really cool things to watch because I've seen Dylan Take Nick under his wing you know and and um Help develop him and train him the way that I saw Juan who I consider my oldest son even though I'm way too young and he's way too old For that to be a real thing Um, I think I'm like 10 years older than Juan, but but I do look at Juan is like sort of my my prodigy protege Uh first born if you will in the in the industry and um I see Dylan um taking Nick and helping him learn and the way that he does with the rest of his team I mean Dylan's got a great team. It's not just him and Nick. I mean he's got a guy named Julian on his team Kim um Jasmine how well I mean I he's got all these great people that he's taken and he's he's taught Developed them and and done his job as their leader but to see both kids that that was the original question involved and such a big part of everything um and and owning it and doing it in a way that is uh, you know, it makes me proud I'm proud of it. I mean, Jim do you think they they got them from seeing you throughout your career And maybe the stories that you've told it seems like you got intoxicated with this industry very early on and sometimes those stories can be translated to your kids. Do you think it was partly because of you or partly because of timing with a brand like Dave's you think they could have had that same experience with any other brand now's author I think they both they both to do anything with any other brand that's out there. I think the basis is like hard work, but honestly, I think they're both super entrepreneurial and like Dylan early on always wanted to earn his own money. Sort of like the story I said when I got to earn my own money. And I think that for Dylan, for sure, he just wanted money. 'Cause he had those seven girls he had to impress. And he had all his friends that he was hanging out with all the time and he loved shoes. Like he's got like, - Like two. - 100's of Nike's and you know, these plastic, hermetically sealed boxes at his house. We have this video of him when my wife gave him, I don't even remember what shoe they wore. It was like, he was a junior, I think, in high school. And he gets out of the car and he's like, trying to walk on the edges of the shoes 'cause he didn't want to scuff him or get him dirty or whatever, you know? And I think when Nick started making money, he did the same thing. He just like, he really was motivated by the money. And Dylan was going to Cal Poly, which is close to our house. And he's like, that you know I'm gonna make $200,000 this year. And I was like, great. And he's like, you really think I need to finish school? And I was like, yeah, you got to finish school dude. Like, I mean, you know, and he goes, you don't think I can make it without a degree? I go, no, that's not true. I think you can make it without a degree. I think you should get the degree as backup. You never know what's gonna happen. - Sure. - You know what I'm saying? - I'm not sure I'm gonna do a degree. (laughing) - And then even Nick, Nick was a super AP student. He only had like two years left of school after he graduated high school. He had two years. And he did a year at UC Santa Cruz. He's like, I think I wanna come home and just go to work. And I'm like, no, bro, go. What are you doing? What are you guys doing? But they look at this as like prime earning years. And I think they think, you know what, we can always finish school later. And then I always point to Ali and I say, I go, guys, Ali has her master. What are you doing? And then they both go, and we're making twice as much as she's making. - Part of the entrepreneurial game. - Yeah, wrong. - Jim, let me ask you a question. I mean, Dave's has achieved this growth that's rarely seen in food service. Hyperscaling units, elite AUVs, all the recognized fastest growing restaurant, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But I wanna ask you a question. What part of the Dave's story do you think the industry still underestimates? 'Cause you see all this news surrounding it. But what is something that maybe the industry looks at that's underestimated from the Dave's story? - That's a really cool question, really interesting question. I think that what people don't know or don't understand fully about the Dave's story is that Armand and Dave envisioned all of this before they opened the parking lot to Hoppe. They wanted to start a restaurant and they had no money. So they thought they'd do a food truck, but it was the same problem, no money. So they landed on a parking lot, Popup, a tent thing, you know? Easy up with a fryer, they bought it Home Depot and plastic tables. And when you hear them tell the story, they decided to do all the foods and all of the recipes with basic supplies. So that they could franchise it someday. And the first time Armand told me that story, I was like, oh, that's come on dude, that's close. You did not think that. And he goes, no, we really did think it. We said if we could make food taste this good with stuff that you can just get at the grocery store or whatever, that there's no way you couldn't turn this into a franchise. And I think very few people understand that they specifically Armand, but Dave too, but and Tommy, I mean, they did this together. It was a group thing, but they envisioned it becoming a big business. We were writing sites in Las Vegas, probably in 2021. And we were looking at a closing, as Carl's Jr., that was going to close down. And we started talking about, what do you think Dave's going to sell for someday? And they asked me and I go, I think it would be amazing if you guys could get 500 million because Blaze had sold for valuation 260 million. And they said a billion. Dave goes billion. And I remember going, you guys are smoking crack. Like you're going to take $900, turning to 500 million, you're going to tell them no. You're going to say, now I'm going to wait until for the billion dollar offer. And they did that. And I think that people don't realize how much intentionality there was behind creating the brand. And even the launch story, there were a lot of pop-up things going on in 2017. And Armand's big plan, his big picture thing was that they were going to get food blogger to come out and launch the brand, like say great things and get the brand notoriety and kick off. And on the eighth day, I think the eighth day we were open, Farley Elliott from Eater LA came out, love the food, post an article that said, late night hot chicken stand might blow your mind. And the next day they had a line around the block and they never stopped. And that was part of the strategy. And people don't understand that they pictured it this way. They literally, it's like the law of attraction or the secret or what's the other one, when you visualize visualization and the storyboarding. Yeah, they believed so deeply in their potential success that they created it for themselves. So do you think that the simplicity became the competitive advantage for them as they continued to scale? Yeah, I think they thought of it that way too. They said, you know what? Because in and out is one of their muses or one of their emulator brands. And Howlin Rays was one of their emulator brands. I don't know if you guys know Howlin Rays, but it's a more traditional Nashville hot chicken with bone and chicken thigh, leg, tender sandwiches, sandows as they call them. And they loved it. And they paid total respect to Howlin Rays. And they said, if we did something like Howlin Rays meets in and out, just the chicken tender, not all the other stuff. And it's either on a piece of plain white bread, which is traditional Nashville hot chicken style so that it soaks up the juices and spices. Or it's on a bun with pickles and slaw and sauce. So it's a sandwich or it's a tender that they would be able to focus on how good the food was, the quality of it. And that would help catapult them into success. - Eight years later, one bill. - And here we are. Eight years later, and I'm not supposed to talk about their money, but they have enough money for probably five lifetimes. Each, each, each, each. - Truly unbelievable. - Yeah. - Did you guys, I don't want to get them robbed. They just, they made a lot of money. - There are meaning. - I mean, our monolith last year, also. - No one would know that he has money. - They'll take whoever's butt comes after them, but they are, and they are, they are so generous also, by the way. Our mon has been one of those people that transformed my life just by telling me to read the power of now, which is hilarious because when he told me that, I thought he was like, he didn't read that book. He'll read, doesn't read, bro, read. And he goes, he goes, it's the book that made me start Dave. So I read it and I believe that it helped change my life too. And so they have a very, there's some things about them that people don't realize. You know, everyone's, oh, you guys caught lightning in a bottle, you guys got so lucky. All that's true, but I bet you, and they're working on like a coffee brand they want to do, I bet you they could do it again, because of the way they, the way they think, the way they operate, the way they are. So that's, I would say that's one of the things. One of the little known secrets, if you will, about Dave's, is that this was all done intentionally, and it was all created by them in their minds before it actually happened. - Did you always know it was Rourke, or was that out of the, out of the sky? - No, Rourke was the first one in, and the last one out, they did their due diligence. They worked really, really hard on the steel from when we had like 13 or 14 restaurants open. They met us for the first time. They had their eye on us from the very beginning. The way that like high school talent scouts are out looking at eight grade players, you know what I mean? - Totally. - Saying, "Oh, that kid's gonna be good." And they check in on them every year, like that. They were, their talent scouts, our managing director's name is Jeff Hill. I think he, I've known him now a few years. I've gotten to know him well in the last year. I think he's a rock star. Our other one is Mike Sharky, also a rock star. And then the other guy on our team, Mark Lawrence. I don't say he's a rock star, but he's a very mild mannered rock star. So it feels wrong to call him a rock star, but he's a rock star too. And then one of the original guys that he was looking at at the very beginning, his name is Paul. And I always, I don't know how to say his last name is like Anguiano. I don't know what whatever. Paul, Paul. Paul. Paulie. Paulie there you go. Paulie. Yeah. He had his eye on us at the very beginning also. These guys, the rock guys, they do their homework, their, their diligent, their hard working. And they earn, they earn what they get. They earn, they earn the business to be honest with you. Bill always says they stole it. You know, you got it for a billion. You guys should, it's twice that. But, but, but, but, but, but they, they, they did their, they did their work. And Jim, what is the, what is the work partnership unlock from an execution standpoint from founder vision to keep going and from now corporate team to continue international growth and everything else you guys are doing. As I was getting to know the work guys during the, the, the process or in sales process. And a little bit after I found various podcasts, I read articles, whatever. And I found a podcast from like 2008 or 2009. And it was Jeff Hill, who is our managing director guy. And they were asking him questions about what work does, how they do it, whatever. And all of his answers were the exact same answers that he gave or, or would give during the diligence process. And the reason I bring that up is that I was very impressed with the stability and the vision and, and how they do their thing. It wasn't BS. It wasn't lip service. It wasn't say what's expedient in the moment. I found that to be impressive about about him. Specifically. And so. And I think what they unlock is a lot of knowledge about how to add value to, to a brand, how to grow the value, how to grow the equity of the company. I think they are masters at the international game, which is what we're doing now. We're very focused on the international side. I think they're masters at figuring out how to improve the cost models. And they're in like 88,000 restaurants. And, and then they're in all sorts of other brands and other, you know, industries. We have a little bit of data to go off of. Yeah, so, so they, they know their stuff and they, they've got, and I think they've got a really great culture from what I've seen. I've been to their office a few times. Their CEO came out, Neil Ernstson came out and met with us during the process. Took us out to dinner as they worked the deal. I think they're pros. Let's talk about culture for a second, because Dave obviously has a very unique culture. And if you've ever attended a, you know, vendor conference of, of Dave's, you know, you live and breathe that for, for three days. And it's intoxicating to say the least. How are you guys maintaining. Yeah, I mean, it's Dave's con. How are you keeping that culture that you've worked so hard to build when a PE, you know, group comes in and we've all seen that movie before. They like to change things as we've, we spoke about earlier. They like to, you know, make things maybe more cost effective and change recipes and yada yada yada. How are we, how are we not doing that here? They've been through their work. I asked those questions myself at the beginning. Like what, you know, because of the experiences I had at the carl saw on the carl side and on the blade side. Where, where the brand ethos changed on day two. Of the sale at, at blaze and in a. I, you know, like, hey, they pay $250 million. Like I get it. Like you, they want, they want to start making their money back. They say that without any disrespect or, or I understand, but they, we went from, we're building a great brand mode to we need to build a great P and L mode within. I don't know, 10 days of the sale. It completely changed at blaze. And I asked those questions as part of the work deal. And I said, I said, I'm pretty direct with them. And in a way that I hope it doesn't come across as disrespectful, but I figure we might as well get it all out on the table. Direct is good. And direct. You're just wasting time. And yeah, and Jeff specifically said, we're investing in you and your team. We're investing in the brand. But without you guys, who's going to make, you know, like we can go higher a whole new team. That's going to put us back a year. Like, yeah, there, there's a, there's a whole thing about the management team is essential to the deal. Which is why we've been so focused on keeping the management team together. Everyone's like, oh, you know, when are you guys leaving? And I'm like, Joyce told me this is my forever job guys. According to Joyce, I'm not going anywhere. That was in the contract with work. Joyce said, you can't, you can't ever let me go. And like I told you earlier, I plan on wheeling bill into every restaurant we open together. The further along he gets on his journey to, to Yoda hood before he becomes the Yoda of restaurants. I plan on, on being here as long as they'll have me love that to be honest with you. And so they haven't changed anything yet. They they've come in and they've had their opinions and they've pushed us on this or that. But at the end of the day, they've allowed us to make the decisions they haven't taken over. It isn't one of those things. One of the things that happened at Blaze was we started in meetings asking the question, well, what is, what is Brent would think? And that was like question number one or question number two when we're trying to make a decision. And that was, that was an error on our part. That was, that was learning that we gained as a team together in a shared experience that in the, in the Dave's experience. I personally have banned that question. It's, they're not, no one's allowed to ask that question the first five questions about an idea of a plan, something we're working on. It's important. I mean, they're the majority owner like I'm not sitting here saying, well, I don't care what work says. But I believe Jeff and Mike when they tell us, guys, we're investing in you guys making these decisions. We don't want to make these decisions. That's true. Then why would I change the decision making process that I've used that Bill and I have used for the last five years, just because we have new partners, new investment partners. The process is obviously working. So don't, don't change the thing. Yes, that's right. So our plan is to keep running it the way we've run, we've run it so far. We've got some moves around and some of our people are CMO retired. Really shout out. It was very nice. What you guys did at Dave's not with that was incredible. Brad Haley, Brad Haley is the man. I knew him at Carl. I got him. I convinced him to come work with us here, beg them basically. And he's been amazing. He's been amazingly helpful. He helped us find our new CMO, his name is Brandon Rodin. And he is kicking butt already. I think he's going to be amazing for us as well. We had our VP, our senior vice president of franchise development, her name is Shannon Swenson. And we sold out the whole country. I mean, like we don't, there's, there's Hawaii is left, by the way. If you guys want to franchise, you can franchise in Hawaii. All right. And she jumped over. I think she jumped over to Swig. Yeah. Yeah. Swig is that's a great. Swig is in the supply caddy family. Perfect. And she is a great franchise sales and franchise development person. She did an amazing job for us. And I'm sure she'll do an amazing job. I told their co-founder Dylan that they got a real winner in. Yeah, they did. They got a great one. And we didn't, it was an amicable like she, what is she going to sell? What happens in a brand like this is you start doing resale or we start having private equity groups, but she made so much money in the first five years on her incentive package for the sales. So that woman is an entrepreneur and a, and a, and a, a burner like she, like she kicks butt. She did a fantastic job at days and I, I think she'll do a fantastic job at Swig. That's exactly right. And you know, our chief development officer that mentioned Carolyn Candid, she's been with us for the last five years. She's a franchise. And she does a fantastic job. And, and I anticipate Carolyn will be here for another couple of years, but she's, you know, I don't want to say she's an old woman now, but you know, she is the sweetest lady. We love her. Yeah, we love her too. And so, you know, there's going to be a day when she says Jim got to go, you know what I mean? And so our job or our role is to continue to keep it going, keep the culture alive. Even though we know there's going to be shifts in and changes. What we're not doing is we're not coming in and saying it's time to upgrade the whole team, which did happen at Blase Pizza. And it's probably the reason Blase Pizza's never, it's never been able to keep going the way it had been going because they did, they did a lot of that initial thinking. It's sort of like, it's sort of like you buy the Lakers or you buy the 1990s Chicago Bulls. And you say, you know what? See, I'm just like, let's get rid of Jordan. Let's get rid of Pippin. I don't even know this Rodman guy. Like, you know, let's get rid of that guy. And let's just start, let's just start all over. And that's, that's sort of what Blase did. And I think Blase, I think the Blase team, the Blase, the Brentwood group, I think they, if they had to do, again, they wouldn't do that because the exact same team that was at Blase Pizza and got us to that $250 valuation is literally the exact same team that got Dave's hot chicken to the billion dollar valuation. Like literally, we've had 90% of the team. 90% of the team was like Blase Pizza people and the other 10% were Wetzel's pretzels pizza or some version of that. And, and we didn't need to upgrade the team at Blase. Every one of those people came to Dave's and they survived. And there's several of them that didn't end up at Dave's are, are former director of marketing or VP of marketing. She's now the CMO at Raising Cains. Never heard of him. Kim. Yeah, Kim. She's great. It's like this whole group of people at Blase went on after they graduated from Blase and they're, they're building the industry, that makes sense. They're, they're doing stuff that we learned at, you know, under Rick and Elise and Jim at Blase. And we for sure benefited from the experience at Blase at Dave's because that same team is the same team that got you a billion dollar. It's amazing. It's amazing to see. We'll let you go grab your flight before we get yelled at. Zach has one question he always likes to ask all of our guests before you take flight. I mean, listen, it might be challenging for you. I don't know how you're going to top this story with your son having cinnamon, you know, cinnamon rolls a holiday in. But we always like to ask, like if all the experiences that you've been in throughout the hospitality food service space, what is one memory that stands out that is just like man that's something I'll never forget and molded who I am. And that's why I continue to go on this industry. Yeah, it's going to be tough. You've got a war chest of. I will tell you that and this is in an old memory. This is a new memory, but this is, this is instructive for me for the rest of my career. The at the end of the deal with work and with the existing Dave's board of directors. They had this billion dollar offer and Bill said, okay, we're ready to sign the deal, but we're not going to sign the deal unless you guys set aside an astronomical number. I don't even I won't say the number, but it's close to $100 million worth of money to bonus the entire team. And our board eventually went along with it, our existing board eventually went along with it. But only because of his leadership, his and our mom's leadership pushed that through and everybody at the end of the deal with blaze, sorry, with days, everybody at the end of the deal with days got essentially a year or two worth of salary, if not more. And 19 people got millions of dollars out of the deal. Bill, Bill created and Dave's created and the board. And I don't want to take credit away from the board. I just it was Bill's leadership in doing it. They all they all had to vote for it. They all voted yes on every one of the board members voted yes on it. But it was Bill pushing it and ensuring that his team that took a $900 business and made a billion dollar business. His team was rewarded for it. And it's one of those things that you don't see happened. You don't see it happening along the way very often. Incredible. Well, blaze was generous to you know, they made they made room for people to get bonuses and stuff. But the amount of value that Bill and team and our team created allowed for bonuses that have allowed people to buy homes, put money into investment, create retirement accounts like open days. Yeah, open their own days, get involved in other stuff. That is a like premier lesson in leadership and generosity that I got I got a chance to learn at age 51. That will color how I do stuff going forward forever. Amen. The event that I have the opportunity to do those things. The idea that we did that and and and and changed people's lives. Bill's personal mission statement is he wants to transform people's life, transform the people's lives with the people that work with him. He did it. He did it for me. He did it for Dylan. He did it for Juan. He did it for Scott. He did it for James. Like there are entire team has been treated in a way. I've never been so well treated at any job I've ever had in my entire life as I've been treated here. And it's not just the treatment of me personally. It's the treatment of the team that came with me. And that to me is like one of those lessons that you go that's how you do it. That makes the whole capitalism thing and the you know, shigantic billion dollar number, something that you can be proud of and not sort of like a little bit embarrassed up. A little bit of like, oh my god, it's like gluttonous. Like you guys, that's ridiculous. How do you get a million dollars for a chicken place? You know, and at the end of the day when when everyone was sort of voting and I'm not a voting board member at Dave's. But when everyone's voting should we do the deal or not do the deal? We all voted yes because of the the money and the benefit and the reward that each one of these people were going to be able to get off of it. That was that was sort of like the yeah, of course, let's do it because it's life changing. It's life changing. So honestly, it's probably life changing for every one of them. You know, like if you were 20 and you got a hundred thousand dollar check, like what do you do that hundred thousand dollar check when you're 20? If you're 35 and you get a four million dollar check, what do you do with that when you're when you're when you're 35, you know, or vice versa. The point being that that whole thing is one of those life affirming long memories that will impact how I look at stuff as we go forward and how we do things together as a team. So that was incredible. I hope that's going to answer. Jimmy Bittix, president and CEO of Dave's hot chicken. Thanks so much for joining us. We love you. We love the brand. We love working with the whole team and we'll see you soon. [Music]