[{"_1":2,"_3":-5,"_4":-5},"loaderData",{"_5":6,"_7":8},"actionData","errors","root",{"_138":-5,"_139":-5,"_140":141,"_142":143,"_144":145},"routes/clips.$id.$slug",{"_9":10,"_11":12},"clip",{"_13":14,"_15":16,"_17":-5,"_18":19,"_20":-5,"_21":22,"_23":24,"_25":26,"_27":28,"_29":30,"_31":32,"_33":34,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":40,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_44":45,"_46":-5,"_47":48,"_49":50,"_51":-5},"canonicalUrl","https://howleaderslead.com/clips/3056/centralize-to-reduce-costs-but-not-at-the-expense-of-brand-identity","id",3056,"title","Centralize to reduce costs, but not at the expense of brand identity","subtitle","transcript","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.680\nbasically looking at every single capability that goes into making a restaurant\n\n2\n00:00:03.680 --> 00:00:04.000\ncompany,\n\n3\n00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:07.630\na restaurant company, and said what should be centralized versus what should be\n\n4\n00:00:07.630 --> 00:00:08.880\nbrand specific,\n\n5\n00:00:08.880 --> 00:00:12.400\nthen what do we think we actually will drive outsized competitive advantage and\n\n6\n00:00:12.400 --> 00:00:12.880\nwhat's at\n\n7\n00:00:12.880 --> 00:00:17.290\nleast the investment. And at the end of the day, we start with anything that\n\n8\n00:00:17.290 --> 00:00:18.960\nmakes a brand a brand\n\n9\n00:00:18.960 --> 00:00:23.020\nin the eyes of the customer and the eyes of the franchisee stays brand specific\n\n10\n00:00:23.020 --> 00:00:24.160\n. So in the restaurant\n\n11\n00:00:24.160 --> 00:00:28.300\nindustry, that is the food you serve, the beverage, so culinary, the marketing,\n\n12\n00:00:28.300 --> 00:00:29.840\nthe messaging teams,\n\n13\n00:00:29.840 --> 00:00:34.350\nfranchise operations, brand standards, all that has stays at the brand level\n\n14\n00:00:34.350 --> 00:00:35.280\nand rolls up to the\n\n15\n00:00:35.280 --> 00:00:39.260\nbrand president. Obviously, it's a push pull. If you all you're trying to do is\n\n16\n00:00:39.260 --> 00:00:40.080\ntake cost out,\n\n17\n00:00:40.080 --> 00:00:46.410\nthen you go more centralized. And I saw that in my other experiences at Expedia\n\n18\n00:00:46.410 --> 00:00:46.880\nand Hilton,\n\n19\n00:00:46.880 --> 00:00:51.390\nwhich were also multi brand companies, to where we went back and forth and\n\n20\n00:00:51.390 --> 00:00:52.320\nfinally found that\n\n21\n00:00:52.320 --> 00:00:56.320\nright balance. The challenge is not getting too enamored with the we could take\n\n22\n00:00:56.320 --> 00:00:57.200\nmore cost out\n\n23\n00:00:57.200 --> 00:01:03.320\nif we centralized more and go too far. And so we've really tried to draw the\n\n24\n00:01:03.320 --> 00:01:04.000\nline hard.\n","pretty_transcript","start_time",1551829,"end_time",1615589,"keywords","Centralization, decentralization, brand autonomy, brand identity","slug","centralize-to-reduce-costs-but-not-at-the-expense-of-brand-identity","origin","cms","mux_playback_id","NKFgshJPIh00ubEJsXAKRg4L02k6UsDjiSvl01TedNcZDY","mux_asset_id","XyvTuHMqO8R00TOUGZSdeHbgCNSucobfaV2YKopDyVoY","leader_id",246,"episode_id",398,"updated_at","2025-09-25T17:15:32.000000Z","meta_title","meta_description","og_image_media_id","web_url","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3056/centralize-to-reduce-costs-but-not-at-the-expense-of-brand-identity","og_image_url","leader",{"_13":36,"_102":103,"_104":105,"_106":107,"_25":108,"_109":110,"_61":111,"_58":111,"_112":113,"_68":114,"_39":115,"_116":-5,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_117":118,"_90":119,"_44":120,"_121":122,"_123":124,"_46":-5,"_125":126,"_127":128,"_94":129,"_51":-5},"episode",{"_13":38,"_15":52,"_27":53,"_17":54,"_55":56,"_18":57,"_20":-5,"_58":59,"_60":-5,"_61":59,"_62":-5,"_63":64,"_65":66,"_67":-5,"_68":-5,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":74,"_35":36,"_39":75,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":81,"_82":83,"_84":-5,"_85":-5,"_86":87,"_88":89,"_90":-5,"_46":-5,"_91":92,"_93":-5,"_94":-5,"_51":-5},"og_image_media","Sell what you sell","sell-what-you-sell","Listen to this leadership podcast with Paul Brown, Cofounder and CEO of Inspire Brands, and learn how to get right to the point in your messaging.","summary","

GUEST: Paul Brown, Cofounder and CEO of Inspire Brands, which includes Arby’s, Sonic, Dunkin’, and more.

LISTEN FOR: Insights on clear messaging, leading multiple brands, the changing media landscape, and sharing best practices

","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.600\nWe were going we're in the restaurants looking at the food that we served and\n\n2\n00:00:03.600 --> 00:00:04.320\nwe went into\n\n3\n00:00:04.320 --> 00:00:08.400\nWe went into the freezer and looked at the meat blocks and our ad agency\n\n4\n00:00:08.400 --> 00:00:12.720\nIndividual even said look sell this this is what you have sell what you sell\n\n5\n00:00:12.720 --> 00:00:15.720\nAnd that's where we just came up. It just went straight at it. We have the\n\n6\n00:00:15.720 --> 00:00:15.920\nmeats\n\n7\n00:00:15.920 --> 00:00:21.910\nWhen you think arby's I bet one line instantly comes to mind for you. You know\n\n8\n00:00:21.910 --> 00:00:23.520\nit. You can say it with me\n\n9\n00:00:23.520 --> 00:00:25.600\nWe have the meats\n\n10\n00:00:25.600 --> 00:00:28.560\nBut what you might not know is why it works so well\n\n11\n00:00:29.040 --> 00:00:32.800\nWelcome to how leaders lead. I'm david novak and every week I have\n\n12\n00:00:32.800 --> 00:00:35.280\nconversations with the very best leaders in the world\n\n13\n00:00:35.280 --> 00:00:37.840\nTo help you become the best leader that you can be\n\n14\n00:00:37.840 --> 00:00:42.480\nMy guest today is paul brown the co-founder and co of inspire brands\n\n15\n00:00:42.480 --> 00:00:46.780\nNow that's the parent company behind some of the biggest names in quick service\n\n16\n00:00:46.780 --> 00:00:47.600\nrestaurants\n\n17\n00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:52.480\nWe're talking arby's sonic duncan buffalo wild wings and more\n\n18\n00:00:52.480 --> 00:00:57.950\nBut before he built that portfolio of brands paul was the guy who came in to\n\n19\n00:00:57.950 --> 00:00:58.960\nturn arby's around\n\n20\n00:00:59.120 --> 00:01:05.280\nBack in 2013 and a big part of arby's revival started with that iconic tagline\n\n21\n00:01:05.280 --> 00:01:07.280\nWe have the meats\n\n22\n00:01:07.280 --> 00:01:11.130\nYou're about to hear the whole story and let me tell you there's a powerful\n\n23\n00:01:11.130 --> 00:01:11.840\nlesson in it\n\n24\n00:01:11.840 --> 00:01:16.330\nThat I think every leader needs to understand if you want to break through the\n\n25\n00:01:16.330 --> 00:01:18.400\nnoise and get your message across\n\n26\n00:01:18.400 --> 00:01:23.600\nSo here's my conversation with my good friend and soon to be yours ball brown\n\n27\n00:01:29.440 --> 00:01:30.530\nPaul I got to start out the real personal question. What do you have for\n\n28\n00:01:30.530 --> 00:01:32.560\nbreakfast today?\n\n29\n00:01:32.560 --> 00:01:36.690\nI had a double espresso from duncan have that at least one of those every\n\n30\n00:01:36.690 --> 00:01:38.320\nmorning and how about lunch\n\n31\n00:01:38.320 --> 00:01:42.100\nYou know, what do you have for lunch? I had the spicy east coast Italian to\n\n32\n00:01:42.100 --> 00:01:43.840\nasted sandwich from jimmy johns\n\n33\n00:01:43.840 --> 00:01:47.440\nOh my god, and I know you got to be planning dinner. What do you have coming up\n\n34\n00:01:47.440 --> 00:01:47.680\n?\n\n35\n00:01:47.680 --> 00:01:51.200\nUh, i'm gonna have some steak at stake house. I'll have\n\n36\n00:01:51.200 --> 00:01:53.840\nFortunately, I have a business meeting tonight\n\n37\n00:01:55.280 --> 00:01:59.280\nOh, that's great. You look awful good for a guy's eatin that kind of food all\n\n38\n00:01:59.280 --> 00:01:59.680\nthe time\n\n39\n00:01:59.680 --> 00:02:02.240\nBelieve me. I I did too when I was running young brands\n\n40\n00:02:02.240 --> 00:02:04.240\nSo I loved every every bit of it, you know\n\n41\n00:02:04.240 --> 00:02:10.480\nNow I understand that you were the CEO of arby's and and when you were there\n\n42\n00:02:10.480 --> 00:02:12.880\nyou helped watch the we have the meats campaign\n\n43\n00:02:12.880 --> 00:02:15.280\nYes, that's a fantastic campaign\n\n44\n00:02:15.280 --> 00:02:19.760\nDid you ever consider auditing auditioning for the the voice over acted actor\n\n45\n00:02:19.760 --> 00:02:21.520\nrole in that commercial?\n\n46\n00:02:21.920 --> 00:02:24.770\nI think if I had it wouldn't have been nearly successful as it was over the\n\n47\n00:02:24.770 --> 00:02:25.440\npast 12 years\n\n48\n00:02:25.440 --> 00:02:28.290\nI don't think I have that kind of voice. All right. Well, let's let's give us\n\n49\n00:02:28.290 --> 00:02:30.400\ngive us your best shot on we have the meats\n\n50\n00:02:30.400 --> 00:02:35.450\nWe have the meats. Oh, I think you could I think you could fill in that that is\n\n51\n00:02:35.450 --> 00:02:36.080\nabsolutely great\n\n52\n00:02:36.080 --> 00:02:39.560\nYou know, we're gonna have a lot of fun with this interview and you've got so\n\n53\n00:02:39.560 --> 00:02:41.520\nmuch wisdom because your background is just\n\n54\n00:02:41.520 --> 00:02:46.570\nIncredible at what you've done in your your career, but I before we get into\n\n55\n00:02:46.570 --> 00:02:48.000\njust the whole\n\n56\n00:02:48.720 --> 00:02:52.720\nYou know story of of inspire which which I'll ask you about\n\n57\n00:02:52.720 --> 00:02:58.160\nI'd like to learn a little bit about your journey starting with your childhood\n\n58\n00:02:58.160 --> 00:03:02.700\nCan you can you tell tell me a story from your childhood that really impacted\n\n59\n00:03:02.700 --> 00:03:04.400\nyour your your leadership?\n\n60\n00:03:04.400 --> 00:03:07.920\nWell, I am basically a child of the 80s\n\n61\n00:03:07.920 --> 00:03:12.260\nAnd what that means is that you know the early 80s were very different than the\n\n62\n00:03:12.260 --> 00:03:13.040\nthe late 80s\n\n63\n00:03:13.040 --> 00:03:19.320\nAnd so I grew up when hyperinflation was happening. You know CPI went up 40% in\n\n64\n00:03:19.320 --> 00:03:21.520\nthree years gas prices tripled\n\n65\n00:03:21.520 --> 00:03:27.540\nMortgage rates hint 16% what that meant as I overheard my parents talking about\n\n66\n00:03:27.540 --> 00:03:27.760\nhow\n\n67\n00:03:27.760 --> 00:03:32.560\nDifficult it was to make ends meet even though they were working both jobs\n\n68\n00:03:32.560 --> 00:03:36.160\nAnd that kind of left me with the impression that you know, I don't want that\n\n69\n00:03:36.160 --> 00:03:36.640\nto happen to me\n\n70\n00:03:36.640 --> 00:03:40.880\nIt kind of helped motivate me for wanting to be independent and work really\n\n71\n00:03:40.880 --> 00:03:41.120\nhard\n\n72\n00:03:41.760 --> 00:03:43.920\nAnd I had jobs all throughout\n\n73\n00:03:43.920 --> 00:03:49.320\nMy childhood my first job was at 15 years old working for mcdonald's when you\n\n74\n00:03:49.320 --> 00:03:51.200\ncould actually work behind the grill at 15\n\n75\n00:03:51.200 --> 00:03:56.320\nIn georgia, I had to quit that job because my father I couldn't drive\n\n76\n00:03:56.320 --> 00:03:59.420\nHe got tired of waiting in the parking lot at midnight to pick me up after the\n\n77\n00:03:59.420 --> 00:04:00.000\nheight shift\n\n78\n00:04:00.000 --> 00:04:05.630\nAnd then then moved on to grocery. I had some great jobs there and you know, I\n\n79\n00:04:05.630 --> 00:04:06.800\n'll never forget this story\n\n80\n00:04:06.880 --> 00:04:08.880\nI was a night stalker\n\n81\n00:04:08.880 --> 00:04:11.940\nOne of the things one of the tricks if you're a night stalker is that you don't\n\n82\n00:04:11.940 --> 00:04:13.280\nturn all the labels the right way\n\n83\n00:04:13.280 --> 00:04:15.920\nYou can kind of put the cans on the shelf and cheat a little bit\n\n84\n00:04:15.920 --> 00:04:19.520\nAnd my boss would go through and inspect\n\n85\n00:04:19.520 --> 00:04:23.760\nAll the cans and it really taught me that amount of detail around the fact that\n\n86\n00:04:23.760 --> 00:04:25.040\nyou're if you're going to do a job\n\n87\n00:04:25.040 --> 00:04:26.480\nYou're going to do it right\n\n88\n00:04:26.480 --> 00:04:29.440\nAnd make sure that the customer pulls that can off the shelf\n\n89\n00:04:29.440 --> 00:04:31.920\nActually gets the right one. Yeah, I\n\n90\n00:04:32.480 --> 00:04:36.320\nRemember being at the pep's goal of business and riding with the route salesman\n\n91\n00:04:36.320 --> 00:04:39.820\nAnd you know, they had to get those facings just right and you you know and\n\n92\n00:04:39.820 --> 00:04:41.360\nthat attention to detail really matters\n\n93\n00:04:41.360 --> 00:04:44.820\nThen it drives sales. There's no question about it. Absolutely does and the\n\n94\n00:04:44.820 --> 00:04:46.080\nfact that he cared so much\n\n95\n00:04:46.080 --> 00:04:49.920\nRight as as an overnight manager to actually do that really\n\n96\n00:04:49.920 --> 00:04:54.000\nStuck with me forever quite honestly and and I think it's just so important\n\n97\n00:04:54.000 --> 00:04:58.800\nNow I understand your grandparents also serve customers and uh when you when\n\n98\n00:04:58.800 --> 00:05:00.000\nyou were watching them do that\n\n99\n00:05:00.320 --> 00:05:03.120\nYou have a story that has left sort of a mark on you\n\n100\n00:05:03.120 --> 00:05:07.680\nYeah, so my grandparents bought an old motel in Forsyth, Georgia\n\n101\n00:05:07.680 --> 00:05:11.840\nWhich was about an hour outside of makin and when I say old hotel\n\n102\n00:05:11.840 --> 00:05:14.400\nIt was more like kind of a shitscreek kind of hotel, right?\n\n103\n00:05:14.400 --> 00:05:17.680\nSo and but I would work the front desk with them\n\n104\n00:05:17.680 --> 00:05:23.360\nAnd the the best time ever was when we were able to flip that no vacancy side\n\n105\n00:05:23.360 --> 00:05:27.200\nRight that was just such a great event didn't happen that often unfortunately\n\n106\n00:05:27.600 --> 00:05:30.880\nBut my grandfather would say paul you get to go over there and flip that switch\n\n107\n00:05:30.880 --> 00:05:32.240\nand turn on the no vacancy sign\n\n108\n00:05:32.240 --> 00:05:36.020\nWe can stop selling for the night. And so that was just such a great great\n\n109\n00:05:36.020 --> 00:05:36.720\nexperience\n\n110\n00:05:36.720 --> 00:05:41.770\nSo you saw the power of having the satisfaction of in results at a very young\n\n111\n00:05:41.770 --> 00:05:42.480\nage for sure\n\n112\n00:05:42.480 --> 00:05:46.860\nAbsolutely and I really learned to love to work of I just actually liked the\n\n113\n00:05:46.860 --> 00:05:48.080\nfulfillment they gave me\n\n114\n00:05:48.080 --> 00:05:51.760\nAnd so that's carried through the other thing about being a child of the 80s as\n\n115\n00:05:51.760 --> 00:05:55.680\nAt the end, you know at the 80s. It was actually cool to be a ceo\n\n116\n00:05:56.000 --> 00:05:59.270\nRight if you think of all the secret of my success and now let's be keaton and\n\n117\n00:05:59.270 --> 00:06:00.880\nall those kind of movies that came out\n\n118\n00:06:00.880 --> 00:06:05.190\nIt seems like everybody wanted bs ceo in the future and I think that's one\n\n119\n00:06:05.190 --> 00:06:05.680\nthing just\n\n120\n00:06:05.680 --> 00:06:09.520\nYou know being a child of the front end of the 80s as well as the end\n\n121\n00:06:09.520 --> 00:06:13.710\nA graduated college in 1989, you know, it caught me really the drive to\n\n122\n00:06:13.710 --> 00:06:15.520\nultimately one day bs ceo\n\n123\n00:06:15.520 --> 00:06:19.440\nAnd now you're this restaurant mogul. You have these great brands that we just\n\n124\n00:06:19.440 --> 00:06:20.000\ntalked about\n\n125\n00:06:20.000 --> 00:06:24.640\nTell me the the founding story of how inspired brands came to be\n\n126\n00:06:25.200 --> 00:06:28.800\nWell, it started out as arby's so I joined arby's in 2013\n\n127\n00:06:28.800 --> 00:06:31.040\nas ceo\n\n128\n00:06:31.040 --> 00:06:34.800\nAnd it was a turnaround story of arby's had been through a very difficult\n\n129\n00:06:34.800 --> 00:06:36.720\nperiod coming out of the great recession\n\n130\n00:06:36.720 --> 00:06:39.920\nI've been purchased by private equity for more capital\n\n131\n00:06:39.920 --> 00:06:44.160\nOf about a year and a half earlier and I came on to do the turnaround and that\n\n132\n00:06:44.160 --> 00:06:44.560\n's when we\n\n133\n00:06:44.560 --> 00:06:47.840\nRepositioned the brand came up with the we have the beats campaign and a lot of\n\n134\n00:06:47.840 --> 00:06:49.120\nthings that went with that\n\n135\n00:06:49.760 --> 00:06:53.920\nSo we were sitting there of in 2015 having the business do very well\n\n136\n00:06:53.920 --> 00:06:56.080\nI'm thinking about what do we do with the business?\n\n137\n00:06:56.080 --> 00:07:00.960\nDo we do the typical private equity play and take the take it public or sell it\n\n138\n00:07:00.960 --> 00:07:00.960\n?\n\n139\n00:07:00.960 --> 00:07:04.030\nBut we're also looking around the industry and saw a lot of signs in the\n\n140\n00:07:04.030 --> 00:07:05.840\nrestaurant industry that were similar\n\n141\n00:07:05.840 --> 00:07:08.880\nTo what I had seen in the hotel sector\n\n142\n00:07:08.880 --> 00:07:12.160\nWhere technology was coming in to the business\n\n143\n00:07:12.160 --> 00:07:16.220\nIt was just changing everything about the way that customers interface with the\n\n144\n00:07:16.220 --> 00:07:16.640\nbrands\n\n145\n00:07:17.120 --> 00:07:21.520\nIt also is causing a change in the investment required technology is expensive\n\n146\n00:07:21.520 --> 00:07:25.930\nAnd a lot of the restaurant brands arby's included just weren't at the right\n\n147\n00:07:25.930 --> 00:07:28.320\nlevel of scale to make those kind of investments\n\n148\n00:07:28.320 --> 00:07:31.700\nSo we thought that maybe there's an opportunity to do a play in the restaurant\n\n149\n00:07:31.700 --> 00:07:33.920\nindustry that's similar to what happened in hotels\n\n150\n00:07:33.920 --> 00:07:38.080\nWhere aggregating these great concepts that are individually great concepts\n\n151\n00:07:38.080 --> 00:07:43.520\nBut just subscale by themselves and pull them together in a combined company\n\n152\n00:07:44.080 --> 00:07:47.280\nSharing common platforms capability platforms and technology\n\n153\n00:07:47.280 --> 00:07:51.440\nAnd at the end of the day have a collection of great brands operating under\n\n154\n00:07:51.440 --> 00:07:53.520\nagain a common set of shared services\n\n155\n00:07:53.520 --> 00:07:57.360\nAnd so that's where the idea was born. You know sitting in the same steakhouse\n\n156\n00:07:57.360 --> 00:07:58.880\nquite honestly that i'm going to tonight\n\n157\n00:07:58.880 --> 00:08:03.880\nYou're honest around the round the same table of you know kind of penciling\n\n158\n00:08:03.880 --> 00:08:04.480\nsome of this out\n\n159\n00:08:04.480 --> 00:08:09.530\nAnd did you just get out the napple and the napkin right on it? You know, I did\n\n160\n00:08:09.530 --> 00:08:09.680\nthat\n\n161\n00:08:10.640 --> 00:08:13.640\nAbsolutely did. I have no idea where that napkin is unfortunately. I wish I\n\n162\n00:08:13.640 --> 00:08:15.440\nwould have saved mine too. I really do\n\n163\n00:08:15.440 --> 00:08:19.360\nAnd i'm going to get back to inspire and how you're leading inspire\n\n164\n00:08:19.360 --> 00:08:23.600\nBut you you actually started your career as a as a consultant and you\n\n165\n00:08:23.600 --> 00:08:27.360\nultimately became a partner at at mckenzie in in london\n\n166\n00:08:27.360 --> 00:08:31.920\nWhat did that experience as as a consultant teach you about leadership?\n\n167\n00:08:31.920 --> 00:08:36.160\nWell, I think it's a great way to start a career particularly out of out of\n\n168\n00:08:36.160 --> 00:08:38.640\nschool. I learned how to solve problems\n\n169\n00:08:38.720 --> 00:08:40.720\nI learned how to go into\n\n170\n00:08:40.720 --> 00:08:44.480\nYou know four and a few old situations in industries that I really had no\n\n171\n00:08:44.480 --> 00:08:45.760\nexperience with\n\n172\n00:08:45.760 --> 00:08:51.680\nUh, and and learn the business. I learned how to be a good communicator\n\n173\n00:08:51.680 --> 00:08:55.520\nOne of the things that consultant has to do is do a good job of communicating\n\n174\n00:08:55.520 --> 00:08:59.280\nGot very comfortable around senior management one of the great things\n\n175\n00:08:59.280 --> 00:09:01.200\nparticularly with the top consulting firms\n\n176\n00:09:01.200 --> 00:09:04.400\nIs you do have an opportunity in early tenure in your career\n\n177\n00:09:04.880 --> 00:09:07.990\nActually interface at some of the most senior levels in business and\n\n178\n00:09:07.990 --> 00:09:10.160\ncommunicate and that was something I learned\n\n179\n00:09:10.160 --> 00:09:12.400\nYou know, I got just a lot of great experience\n\n180\n00:09:12.400 --> 00:09:15.320\nAnd I had a great vantage point to see what kind of industries I wanted to be\n\n181\n00:09:15.320 --> 00:09:16.800\nin and hospitality and travel\n\n182\n00:09:16.800 --> 00:09:19.800\nWas what really interested me the most and that's where I focused my time and\n\n183\n00:09:19.800 --> 00:09:20.240\nenergy\n\n184\n00:09:20.240 --> 00:09:24.280\nAnd speaking of travel you you go on to be president of expedient and you\n\n185\n00:09:24.280 --> 00:09:26.160\nworked alongside berry deler\n\n186\n00:09:26.160 --> 00:09:29.920\nAnd uh, I was lucky enough to have lunch with him just a few weeks ago\n\n187\n00:09:30.000 --> 00:09:35.050\nI mean, he is an incredible a leader just such a visionary thinker one of the\n\n188\n00:09:35.050 --> 00:09:36.160\nbest entrepreneurs in the world\n\n189\n00:09:36.160 --> 00:09:41.440\nWas a story about the biggest lesson you you learned by uh being around berry?\n\n190\n00:09:41.440 --> 00:09:45.120\nWell, biggest lesson I learned is I had just taken over as president of the\n\n191\n00:09:45.120 --> 00:09:46.000\nspeeda.com\n\n192\n00:09:46.000 --> 00:09:50.000\nAnd we had to pitch the new marketing campaign to berry\n\n193\n00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:52.960\nUh, so I'd been in the job maybe two months\n\n194\n00:09:52.960 --> 00:09:58.250\nUh and had no experience really of actually running a brand uh and having to do\n\n195\n00:09:58.250 --> 00:09:59.040\nthis sort of thing\n\n196\n00:09:59.120 --> 00:10:05.030\nSo we went in to his office, uh in new york and pitched with my chief marketing\n\n197\n00:10:05.030 --> 00:10:06.160\nofficer and the head of\n\n198\n00:10:06.160 --> 00:10:09.280\nUh, the head of the agency and it didn't go very well\n\n199\n00:10:09.280 --> 00:10:14.570\nThat's probably an understatement. Uh, and in fact quite honestly in my heart\n\n200\n00:10:14.570 --> 00:10:14.960\nof hearts\n\n201\n00:10:14.960 --> 00:10:18.300\nI had a feeling it wasn't that great, but I was new to the job. So I said, let\n\n202\n00:10:18.300 --> 00:10:18.960\n's just go with it\n\n203\n00:10:18.960 --> 00:10:23.200\nSo at the end of the meeting which again berry made it very clear that he was\n\n204\n00:10:23.200 --> 00:10:25.040\nnot happy with the marketing campaign\n\n205\n00:10:25.440 --> 00:10:29.520\nHe asked me to come into his office that was adjacent to the conference room\n\n206\n00:10:29.520 --> 00:10:32.320\nAnd i'm a uh, oh boy. Here we go\n\n207\n00:10:32.320 --> 00:10:36.160\nAnd so he takes me and sits me across the desk and actually says\n\n208\n00:10:36.160 --> 00:10:40.310\nYou know a lot of that was just kind of for show because the point needed to be\n\n209\n00:10:40.310 --> 00:10:43.520\nmaking made that that was not an acceptable approach\n\n210\n00:10:43.520 --> 00:10:48.040\nAnd then here's how you think about brand management. Here's how you think\n\n211\n00:10:48.040 --> 00:10:48.320\nabout\n\n212\n00:10:48.320 --> 00:10:53.370\nUh marketing consumers you go straight at it. You don't go around and tell this\n\n213\n00:10:53.370 --> 00:10:55.360\ncomplicated story in a 30 second ad\n\n214\n00:10:55.680 --> 00:10:57.680\nYou actually sell what you sell\n\n215\n00:10:57.680 --> 00:11:03.040\nRight and you go and it gave me just a 30-minute lesson on kind of marketing\n\n216\n00:11:03.040 --> 00:11:04.400\n101\n\n217\n00:11:04.400 --> 00:11:08.510\nUh, which i've taken those lessons with me from that day forward and i'll never\n\n218\n00:11:08.510 --> 00:11:09.120\nforget it\n\n219\n00:11:09.120 --> 00:11:13.920\nWell, absolutely when you when you that arby's campaign is a great example\n\n220\n00:11:13.920 --> 00:11:17.040\nIt's like you don't beat around the bush you say we have the meat\n\n221\n00:11:17.040 --> 00:11:20.900\nWell, that's exactly how it came up is we were going we're in the restaurants\n\n222\n00:11:20.900 --> 00:11:23.520\nlooking at the food that we served and we went into\n\n223\n00:11:24.160 --> 00:11:26.480\nWe went into the freezer and looked at the meat blocks\n\n224\n00:11:26.480 --> 00:11:30.240\nAnd we were looking at it in our ad agency, uh individual even said look\n\n225\n00:11:30.240 --> 00:11:33.520\nSell this this is what you have sell what you sell\n\n226\n00:11:33.520 --> 00:11:36.920\nAnd that's where we just came up. It just went straight at it. We have the\n\n227\n00:11:36.920 --> 00:11:37.120\nmeats\n\n228\n00:11:37.120 --> 00:11:42.160\nYeah, I love it. I love it. And then you left Expedia and to become president\n\n229\n00:11:42.160 --> 00:11:42.640\nof hilton\n\n230\n00:11:42.640 --> 00:11:46.400\nWhat did that teach you that you carried carried on through the years?\n\n231\n00:11:46.400 --> 00:11:50.890\nWell christmas at a ceo of hilton when i joined and still ceo today is such a\n\n232\n00:11:50.890 --> 00:11:53.680\ngreat culture carrier and and i really learned\n\n233\n00:11:54.240 --> 00:11:59.290\nUh, the the power of culture particularly in a franchise business and a multi-\n\n234\n00:11:59.290 --> 00:12:03.120\nunit franchise business because kind of what really holds\n\n235\n00:12:03.120 --> 00:12:06.240\nEverything together at the end of the day is culture\n\n236\n00:12:06.240 --> 00:12:10.560\nOf the values of the individual brand and is the franchisee and the front line\n\n237\n00:12:10.560 --> 00:12:12.640\nteam member clear on what you know\n\n238\n00:12:12.640 --> 00:12:16.720\nHow in this case to deliver the hampton experience or the hilton experience\n\n239\n00:12:16.720 --> 00:12:20.080\nOf and it can't be done just through operating manuals\n\n240\n00:12:20.560 --> 00:12:25.850\nUh, and to be honest coming from consulting. I probably did not fully\n\n241\n00:12:25.850 --> 00:12:27.680\nappreciate the value of that\n\n242\n00:12:27.680 --> 00:12:30.560\nUntil until that particular experience\n\n243\n00:12:30.560 --> 00:12:35.850\nUh, and I learned from christ and other leaders there, uh, and i've taken that\n\n244\n00:12:35.850 --> 00:12:36.880\nwith me as well\n\n245\n00:12:36.880 --> 00:12:40.550\nUh, you know, that's what we've really worked hard to do is create a great\n\n246\n00:12:40.550 --> 00:12:41.360\nculture of inspire\n\n247\n00:12:41.360 --> 00:12:46.410\nThat is complementary to the individual cultures of the brands that we have\n\n248\n00:12:46.410 --> 00:12:48.880\nacquired and put as part of the portfolio\n\n249\n00:12:49.840 --> 00:12:53.060\nHey, everyone. It's kula from how leaders lead and if you've watched our\n\n250\n00:12:53.060 --> 00:12:54.640\npodcast for any number of episodes\n\n251\n00:12:54.640 --> 00:12:58.240\nYou probably know that a common theme from all of the great leaders we\n\n252\n00:12:58.240 --> 00:13:00.880\ninterview is that they are active learners\n\n253\n00:13:00.880 --> 00:13:05.280\nThey had this commitment to continuing to learn and grow so that they don't say\n\n254\n00:13:05.280 --> 00:13:05.760\nstagnant\n\n255\n00:13:05.760 --> 00:13:10.000\nAnd so that they continue to see success in their leadership and in their life\n\n256\n00:13:10.000 --> 00:13:14.720\nThis theme of active learning is so important and it's what david's latest book\n\n257\n00:13:14.720 --> 00:13:16.640\nhow leaders learn is all about\n\n258\n00:13:17.040 --> 00:13:20.660\nIt's all about helping you develop that skill of active learning so that you\n\n259\n00:13:20.660 --> 00:13:22.320\ntoo can continue to see success\n\n260\n00:13:22.320 --> 00:13:25.920\nIn your leadership and in your life. The book is really entertaining\n\n261\n00:13:25.920 --> 00:13:29.900\nIt pulls stories from some of our greatest podcast guests and pairs those\n\n262\n00:13:29.900 --> 00:13:30.320\nstories\n\n263\n00:13:30.320 --> 00:13:34.160\nWith insights that you can incorporate into your leadership and into your life\n\n264\n00:13:34.160 --> 00:13:39.040\nRight away grab how leaders learn on amazon or wherever books are sold\n\n265\n00:13:39.040 --> 00:13:42.450\nAnd I think you're really going to love it you feel david's personality through\n\n266\n00:13:42.450 --> 00:13:44.080\nthe pages and through history telling\n\n267\n00:13:44.320 --> 00:13:47.280\nAnd it's a really powerful way to level up your leadership\n\n268\n00:13:47.280 --> 00:13:52.330\nYou went from the hospitality business, you know with the expedient and then in\n\n269\n00:13:52.330 --> 00:13:53.920\nhilton to be the rest\n\n270\n00:13:53.920 --> 00:13:58.160\nYour restaurant and CEO of arby's, you know, well, it was a new industry now\n\n271\n00:13:58.160 --> 00:14:01.920\nYou've talked about how you were mckenzie and that taught you how to go into\n\n272\n00:14:01.920 --> 00:14:03.040\nnew industries\n\n273\n00:14:03.040 --> 00:14:07.030\nBut what was the steepest part of your learning curve to get into the\n\n274\n00:14:07.030 --> 00:14:10.240\nrestaurant business and how did you go about getting up to speed?\n\n275\n00:14:10.720 --> 00:14:14.410\nWell, there are a lot of similarities and actually the fact that I wasn't from\n\n276\n00:14:14.410 --> 00:14:17.040\nthe restaurant industry helped me come in and ask\n\n277\n00:14:17.040 --> 00:14:21.500\nYou know, a lot of potentially naive questions early on that I was given the\n\n278\n00:14:21.500 --> 00:14:23.680\nlicense to ask because I was from the outside\n\n279\n00:14:23.680 --> 00:14:26.560\nBut I think the biggest difference is just the pace\n\n280\n00:14:26.560 --> 00:14:31.610\nOf product development every month putting out a new product or two or three a\n\n281\n00:14:31.610 --> 00:14:32.960\nnew marketing campaign\n\n282\n00:14:32.960 --> 00:14:36.890\nOf the calendar and I remember the first time I showed up and said somebody\n\n283\n00:14:36.890 --> 00:14:39.040\nsaid we've got to review the calendar and i'm like\n\n284\n00:14:39.920 --> 00:14:43.600\nReview the calendar watch the calendar and now you you laughing the business\n\n285\n00:14:43.600 --> 00:14:46.820\nWell, the calendar is everything right if you actually do you have the right\n\n286\n00:14:46.820 --> 00:14:49.200\nproducts the right time and the right messaging behind it\n\n287\n00:14:49.200 --> 00:14:53.120\nAnd you have to do it over and over again every single month\n\n288\n00:14:53.120 --> 00:14:58.500\nSo I think this industry versus almost any other industry certainly in consumer\n\n289\n00:14:58.500 --> 00:15:00.160\njust that pace of relentless\n\n290\n00:15:00.160 --> 00:15:04.440\nProduct development and new launch is what makes it so exciting sometimes\n\n291\n00:15:04.440 --> 00:15:05.280\nfrustrating\n\n292\n00:15:05.760 --> 00:15:09.920\nOf and also an industry that you know is others coming from slower industry\n\n293\n00:15:09.920 --> 00:15:13.540\nSometimes have a harder time adapting to the daily intensity of the restaurant\n\n294\n00:15:13.540 --> 00:15:16.080\nbusinesses is hard to really describe\n\n295\n00:15:16.080 --> 00:15:20.320\nNo, I tell people I can we can drop a new product a new marketing campaign\n\n296\n00:15:20.320 --> 00:15:22.400\ntoday and tomorrow I can tell you whether it worked or not\n\n297\n00:15:22.400 --> 00:15:26.560\nYeah, I always said it was the closest thing direct to direct response\n\n298\n00:15:26.560 --> 00:15:30.640\nmarketing you could ever ever come because you can do a new\n\n299\n00:15:30.800 --> 00:15:34.600\nYou know launch that advertising and within three days your mix can be 10% of a\n\n300\n00:15:34.600 --> 00:15:35.120\nproduct\n\n301\n00:15:35.120 --> 00:15:37.840\nYou know, which is crazy, but that's the way out works\n\n302\n00:15:37.840 --> 00:15:41.240\nAnd you know very quickly whether you've hit the mark or not because it can\n\n303\n00:15:41.240 --> 00:15:42.400\nalso not be 10% of\n\n304\n00:15:42.400 --> 00:15:48.800\nHey, believe me. I've been there, you know, but here you have you you started\n\n305\n00:15:48.800 --> 00:15:51.520\nout at arby's and now you built this incredible portfolio\n\n306\n00:15:51.520 --> 00:15:55.120\nAnd it is a great portfolio of leading brands in the respective categories\n\n307\n00:15:56.400 --> 00:16:01.680\nI'd like to start to just by getting sort of a a sense of of what you learn\n\n308\n00:16:01.680 --> 00:16:03.120\nfrom what you've learned\n\n309\n00:16:03.120 --> 00:16:07.210\nHow how to shape in your leadership from each one of these brands and let let's\n\n310\n00:16:07.210 --> 00:16:09.280\njust start start with arby's\n\n311\n00:16:09.280 --> 00:16:12.600\nYou know, what did you learn in arby's that you know, you're going to take with\n\n312\n00:16:12.600 --> 00:16:13.040\nyou forever\n\n313\n00:16:13.040 --> 00:16:17.520\nWell, what I learned in arby's is especially for the turnaround of a brand\n\n314\n00:16:17.520 --> 00:16:22.570\nUh, I think the most important thing to do is go and look back and at the\n\n315\n00:16:22.570 --> 00:16:25.840\nessence of what made it successful when it was doing well\n\n316\n00:16:26.480 --> 00:16:31.360\nAnd then tap into that essence and then find the modern incarnation of that\n\n317\n00:16:31.360 --> 00:16:34.800\nRight, don't just go back and copy what it was doing 40 to 50 years ago\n\n318\n00:16:34.800 --> 00:16:38.720\nBut say why was it winning versus this competitive set and arby's again?\n\n319\n00:16:38.720 --> 00:16:43.120\nIt's a differentiated product. It was not trying to be a burger brand\n\n320\n00:16:43.120 --> 00:16:46.390\nIt was not trying to compete with mcdonald's. It was actually trying to\n\n321\n00:16:46.390 --> 00:16:47.840\ndifferentiate itself from it\n\n322\n00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:53.000\nAnd over the years before of the spin out and it just you know become more and\n\n323\n00:16:53.000 --> 00:16:54.800\nmore like a burger brand\n\n324\n00:16:55.920 --> 00:16:59.600\nAnd the closer it got to being a burger brand the worse it performed\n\n325\n00:16:59.600 --> 00:17:02.560\nSo we just had to step back and again go back to\n\n326\n00:17:02.560 --> 00:17:07.680\nWe have we democratize products that you can't get anywhere in qsr\n\n327\n00:17:07.680 --> 00:17:11.750\nRight and by bringing the brisket or bringing the euro or bringing those kind\n\n328\n00:17:11.750 --> 00:17:13.120\nof products and doing them well\n\n329\n00:17:13.120 --> 00:17:15.600\nIt actually had the right to succeed\n\n330\n00:17:15.600 --> 00:17:19.680\nAnd uh, we've tried to kind of capture that and take that with us as we bought\n\n331\n00:17:19.680 --> 00:17:21.520\nsubsequent brands and turn them around as well\n\n332\n00:17:21.760 --> 00:17:25.100\nYeah, I remember when I first saw the first commercial where we have the the\n\n333\n00:17:25.100 --> 00:17:25.600\nmeats\n\n334\n00:17:25.600 --> 00:17:28.870\nI said they've got it. They're going to go on a run for a long time and you've\n\n335\n00:17:28.870 --> 00:17:29.200\ndone it\n\n336\n00:17:29.200 --> 00:17:33.360\nAnd then you have buffalo wildlings that you know, or what a lot of people call\n\n337\n00:17:33.360 --> 00:17:34.240\nb-dubs\n\n338\n00:17:34.240 --> 00:17:36.400\nYou know, that's I understand it, you know\n\n339\n00:17:36.400 --> 00:17:40.940\nHas such a big loyal fan base. I mean, what's a leadership takeaway you've\n\n340\n00:17:40.940 --> 00:17:41.360\npicked up?\n\n341\n00:17:41.360 --> 00:17:46.320\nThere as you're running that brand keeping a passionate audience engaged\n\n342\n00:17:46.320 --> 00:17:49.600\nThese raving fans you have to have good food\n\n343\n00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:52.080\nAll right, we're ultimately in the restaurant business\n\n344\n00:17:52.080 --> 00:17:57.130\nAnd when we took over the brand I got an earful from the franchisees around the\n\n345\n00:17:57.130 --> 00:17:58.960\nfact that we aren't serving good food\n\n346\n00:17:58.960 --> 00:18:01.680\nThe wings are at the call they need to be the burgers are terrible\n\n347\n00:18:01.680 --> 00:18:05.500\nThey just went down the list and they were actually right and so you can have\n\n348\n00:18:05.500 --> 00:18:06.720\nthe marketing money\n\n349\n00:18:06.720 --> 00:18:10.160\nYou can have the buildings, but ultimately you have to have great food\n\n350\n00:18:10.160 --> 00:18:14.400\nAnd so we went through and we did every single item on the menu\n\n351\n00:18:14.400 --> 00:18:18.300\nAnd everything you see on the menu today and buffalo wildlings is either new or\n\n352\n00:18:18.300 --> 00:18:19.280\nhas been redone\n\n353\n00:18:19.600 --> 00:18:23.280\nIn the past several years of and we learned some of that from arby's because we\n\n354\n00:18:23.280 --> 00:18:24.880\ncame with some pretty good culinary chops\n\n355\n00:18:24.880 --> 00:18:27.360\nComing out of those five years of the arby's turnaround\n\n356\n00:18:27.360 --> 00:18:31.120\nAnd we apply that to buffalo wildlings and then dunkins\n\n357\n00:18:31.120 --> 00:18:35.900\nWhich is obviously a part of your daily life and it's a ritual for for millions\n\n358\n00:18:35.900 --> 00:18:36.560\nof people\n\n359\n00:18:36.560 --> 00:18:39.840\nWhat's a leadership lesson you've learned about being part of someone's\n\n360\n00:18:39.840 --> 00:18:41.040\neveryday life?\n\n361\n00:18:41.040 --> 00:18:45.410\nI mean, how do you how do you get into that that that kind of habitual, you\n\n362\n00:18:45.410 --> 00:18:47.120\nknow, I'm this is my brand\n\n363\n00:18:47.600 --> 00:18:52.000\nYeah, and well one being part of everyone's everyday life means there's a lot\n\n364\n00:18:52.000 --> 00:18:53.520\nof different lives that you're a part of right\n\n365\n00:18:53.520 --> 00:18:56.480\nAnd so, you know, you have to actually do the average\n\n366\n00:18:56.480 --> 00:19:00.120\nThere's just not one recipe and particularly a brand like Duncan where if you\n\n367\n00:19:00.120 --> 00:19:02.080\ngo into parts of the northeast\n\n368\n00:19:02.080 --> 00:19:05.330\nRight, it's it's a very different product that we sell and a very different\n\n369\n00:19:05.330 --> 00:19:05.760\npassion\n\n370\n00:19:05.760 --> 00:19:08.720\nThen if we go into others and in fact Duncan\n\n371\n00:19:08.720 --> 00:19:12.400\nUh has historically been a fairly regional brand\n\n372\n00:19:12.400 --> 00:19:15.680\nRight, it's been a northeast kind of brand\n\n373\n00:19:16.080 --> 00:19:20.660\nAnd I think what has hamstrung it in the past is it tried to do some of the\n\n374\n00:19:20.660 --> 00:19:21.440\nthings that\n\n375\n00:19:21.440 --> 00:19:25.980\nWorked in the northeast but didn't necessarily appeal whether that be different\n\n376\n00:19:25.980 --> 00:19:27.600\nfood products that you need to have\n\n377\n00:19:27.600 --> 00:19:31.840\nOf not just coffee, but iced beverages, which is where almost all of our growth\n\n378\n00:19:31.840 --> 00:19:32.640\nis coming from today\n\n379\n00:19:32.640 --> 00:19:37.360\nSo kind of relaxing the constraints if you will and doing what you need to take\n\n380\n00:19:37.360 --> 00:19:38.240\na brand from being a\n\n381\n00:19:38.240 --> 00:19:41.760\nMostly regional brand to a truly national and international brand\n\n382\n00:19:42.080 --> 00:19:46.240\nThat's that's such a great insight and and then when you look at uh basking rob\n\n383\n00:19:46.240 --> 00:19:46.480\nins\n\n384\n00:19:46.480 --> 00:19:49.760\nAnd it's all about variety and creativity it seems\n\n385\n00:19:49.760 --> 00:19:54.000\nWhat's what's a key insight you've learned from leaving that brand two-thirds\n\n386\n00:19:54.000 --> 00:19:56.080\nof basking robins is outside the united states\n\n387\n00:19:56.080 --> 00:19:58.640\nSo it's actually our most uh global brand\n\n388\n00:19:58.640 --> 00:20:02.430\nUh, and so some of what we've been doing is looking at what was working because\n\n389\n00:20:02.430 --> 00:20:04.240\nit's quite successful outside of the united states\n\n390\n00:20:04.240 --> 00:20:05.200\nIt's been\n\n391\n00:20:05.200 --> 00:20:08.310\nSuccessful inside the united states but not nearly as much as outside and\n\n392\n00:20:08.310 --> 00:20:12.000\ntaking some of those ideas and bringing them to the united states\n\n393\n00:20:12.400 --> 00:20:16.510\nUh, and which includes products that are not just the dipping ice cream\n\n394\n00:20:16.510 --> 00:20:17.200\nproducts\n\n395\n00:20:17.200 --> 00:20:21.930\nUh, and um, and you know also working harder to get it into grocery stores than\n\n396\n00:20:21.930 --> 00:20:23.520\nthey did in the past as well\n\n397\n00:20:23.520 --> 00:20:29.200\nOne brand that I absolutely loved and admired for for many reasons is sonic\n\n398\n00:20:29.200 --> 00:20:31.600\nYou know sonic\n\n399\n00:20:31.600 --> 00:20:34.960\nBut you know one of the things about sonic is they have this ice\n\n400\n00:20:34.960 --> 00:20:38.960\nThis ice is like I don't know what you call crushed ice or whatever it is\n\n401\n00:20:39.280 --> 00:20:42.080\nBut I you know when we listen to customers talk about sonic\n\n402\n00:20:42.080 --> 00:20:47.150\nThey love that ice. What have you learned about the ice at sonic and and what\n\n403\n00:20:47.150 --> 00:20:48.240\ndoes that teach you about?\n\n404\n00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:49.440\nYou know\n\n405\n00:20:49.440 --> 00:20:53.350\nBranding and building a business. Yeah, so people do love that ice is that\n\n406\n00:20:53.350 --> 00:20:54.240\nlittle pellet ice\n\n407\n00:20:54.240 --> 00:20:57.840\nUh if people have had it before and it's uh unique in fact in some of our\n\n408\n00:20:57.840 --> 00:20:58.080\nplaces\n\n409\n00:20:58.080 --> 00:21:00.880\nWe'll just sell bags of that ice in the summer time\n\n410\n00:21:00.880 --> 00:21:05.040\nIt does not surprise me. It's like tortilla chips in some restaurants, you know\n\n411\n00:21:05.040 --> 00:21:06.400\n, you just sell the chips\n\n412\n00:21:06.720 --> 00:21:10.820\nIt's relatively high margin too. So, um, and so there's a passion for that. So\n\n413\n00:21:10.820 --> 00:21:12.640\nwhat we've really learned is how do we\n\n414\n00:21:12.640 --> 00:21:17.180\nUh continue to you know make that more of a core part of how we're messaging\n\n415\n00:21:17.180 --> 00:21:18.480\nour whole drinks platform\n\n416\n00:21:18.480 --> 00:21:23.580\nOf and actually the fact that the ice in fact we're taking into an iced coffee\n\n417\n00:21:23.580 --> 00:21:24.240\nplatform\n\n418\n00:21:24.240 --> 00:21:28.250\nAnd the differentiating thing about our iced coffee platform are the various\n\n419\n00:21:28.250 --> 00:21:28.800\nflavors\n\n420\n00:21:28.800 --> 00:21:32.000\nBut also the fact that it's iced coffee on sonic ice\n\n421\n00:21:32.400 --> 00:21:35.650\nUm, and that makes it that makes it different than any other iced coffee you\n\n422\n00:21:35.650 --> 00:21:35.920\ncan get\n\n423\n00:21:35.920 --> 00:21:39.120\nI have to tell you I now have pellet ice in my homes\n\n424\n00:21:39.120 --> 00:21:43.150\nIn my home. I love it. I can't you know, it's it's something that I absolutely\n\n425\n00:21:43.150 --> 00:21:44.400\nlove and you know\n\n426\n00:21:44.400 --> 00:21:48.540\nJimmy john speaking and I love jimmy john's great sandwiches, you know, it's\n\n427\n00:21:48.540 --> 00:21:52.320\nand it's known for reverent marketing and and a pretty bold voice\n\n428\n00:21:52.320 --> 00:21:53.360\nI'd say\n\n429\n00:21:53.360 --> 00:21:55.280\nWhat have you taken away from?\n\n430\n00:21:55.280 --> 00:21:59.360\nRunning a brand that isn't afraid to be a little edgy and and you guys have a\n\n431\n00:21:59.360 --> 00:22:01.440\nlittle fun with yourself at uh jimmy john's\n\n432\n00:22:01.520 --> 00:22:04.370\nWe do have a lot of fun with ourselves and one of what's driven the growth with\n\n433\n00:22:04.370 --> 00:22:07.440\njimmy john's is we've done things that brand was not doing before\n\n434\n00:22:07.440 --> 00:22:10.240\nWe've added ltos. We added combos. We actually\n\n435\n00:22:10.240 --> 00:22:14.240\nOf are doing a toasted sandwich platform, which the brand has never done\n\n436\n00:22:14.240 --> 00:22:18.300\nWe launched toasted sandwiches this year kind of stretching back to the point\n\n437\n00:22:18.300 --> 00:22:19.200\nof taking risks\n\n438\n00:22:19.200 --> 00:22:23.600\nDoing some things with that brand that you know, the brand was not necessarily\n\n439\n00:22:23.600 --> 00:22:24.160\nallowed to do\n\n440\n00:22:24.160 --> 00:22:29.200\nIn the past and that's you know, it's taking driving some great great growth\n\n441\n00:22:29.200 --> 00:22:29.200\nthere\n\n442\n00:22:29.680 --> 00:22:33.480\nAnd it's fun to have the market. It's just a fun brand. All right, and we we\n\n443\n00:22:33.480 --> 00:22:35.360\njust we we play into that\n\n444\n00:22:35.360 --> 00:22:39.360\nMom, look what I can do. No mom look what I can do\n\n445\n00:22:39.360 --> 00:22:44.410\nTa-da toasted roast beef and cheddar from jimmy john's warm french bread melty\n\n446\n00:22:44.410 --> 00:22:44.800\ncheese\n\n447\n00:22:44.800 --> 00:22:49.850\nSpeaking of toasted hey pal looking crispy toasted sandwiches at jimmy john's.\n\n448\n00:22:49.850 --> 00:22:50.640\nOh, that's good\n\n449\n00:22:50.640 --> 00:22:54.530\nIt's interesting because you've got a real balancing act here is like part of\n\n450\n00:22:54.530 --> 00:22:56.720\nthe success for you is to really understand\n\n451\n00:22:57.280 --> 00:23:02.400\nWhat made a brand work in the past and then you also have to stimulate progress\n\n452\n00:23:02.400 --> 00:23:03.840\nand to and stretch the brand\n\n453\n00:23:03.840 --> 00:23:07.760\nIn in moving into new categories. How do you think about that?\n\n454\n00:23:07.760 --> 00:23:12.600\nWell, it's also particularly hard to do in a portfolio environment where every\n\n455\n00:23:12.600 --> 00:23:13.200\nbrand is different\n\n456\n00:23:13.200 --> 00:23:18.070\nAnd so keeping the integrity in the brand and enough autonomy at the brand\n\n457\n00:23:18.070 --> 00:23:20.560\nlevel to do these types of things because what's right for jimmy\n\n458\n00:23:20.560 --> 00:23:23.520\nJohn's it's not what's right for arby's or not what's right for for duncan\n\n459\n00:23:24.000 --> 00:23:28.000\nUh, but at the same time have them benefit for being part of a common platform\n\n460\n00:23:28.000 --> 00:23:31.600\nAnd so, you know, we've gone through probably one of the biggest lessons i've\n\n461\n00:23:31.600 --> 00:23:33.920\nlearned is what's the right balance?\n\n462\n00:23:33.920 --> 00:23:38.010\nBetween managing at a portfolio level and what should be organized at a\n\n463\n00:23:38.010 --> 00:23:38.960\nportfolio level\n\n464\n00:23:38.960 --> 00:23:43.340\nVersus what needs to retain the integrity of the brand and be organized at a\n\n465\n00:23:43.340 --> 00:23:43.920\nbrand level\n\n466\n00:23:43.920 --> 00:23:49.840\nOf and because you know, I cannot manage each individual brand and come up with\n\n467\n00:23:49.840 --> 00:23:51.200\nthe marketing campaign for each brand\n\n468\n00:23:51.200 --> 00:23:54.530\nRight, the teams have to be empowered to do that and they have to have the\n\n469\n00:23:54.530 --> 00:23:55.440\nclear vision to do that\n\n470\n00:23:55.440 --> 00:23:57.840\nI think that's what makes the portfolio work\n\n471\n00:23:57.840 --> 00:24:01.680\nSo when you think about your role then what would be the three to five things\n\n472\n00:24:01.680 --> 00:24:03.520\nyou focus on to make sure that\n\n473\n00:24:03.520 --> 00:24:06.240\nThis portfolio is moving in the right direction\n\n474\n00:24:06.240 --> 00:24:10.960\nWell, it was the biggest transition in my career actually going from being ceo\n\n475\n00:24:10.960 --> 00:24:13.280\nof an individual brand to being a portfolio ceo\n\n476\n00:24:13.280 --> 00:24:17.440\nUh, and kind of I did have to change what I did every day very different what I\n\n477\n00:24:18.160 --> 00:24:23.300\nPrimarily focused my time on is is people and making sure that the leaders of\n\n478\n00:24:23.300 --> 00:24:24.640\nthe brands actually\n\n479\n00:24:24.640 --> 00:24:28.450\nHave the resources they need they get the direction set clear vision and\n\n480\n00:24:28.450 --> 00:24:31.120\nstrategy at both the portfolio level\n\n481\n00:24:31.120 --> 00:24:36.400\nYou know, I do actually dig in more where there's an underperformance issue\n\n482\n00:24:36.400 --> 00:24:40.000\nSo the brands that are doing well get less of my time and attention and the\n\n483\n00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:41.760\nbrands that may be doing a little less\n\n484\n00:24:41.760 --> 00:24:44.240\nWell, I spent a little bit more time on them\n\n485\n00:24:44.720 --> 00:24:49.770\nAnd so they get the the benefit of that if yeah that what is that saying the\n\n486\n00:24:49.770 --> 00:24:50.880\nautonomy is earned right\n\n487\n00:24:50.880 --> 00:24:56.400\nExactly exactly so that creates an extra incentive to actually do well\n\n488\n00:24:56.400 --> 00:25:00.080\nSo I get out of their business and then I obviously am spending a lot of time\n\n489\n00:25:00.080 --> 00:25:01.760\nmanaging the balance sheet managing\n\n490\n00:25:01.760 --> 00:25:05.480\nYou know the financials and also the shared services platform that we're\n\n491\n00:25:05.480 --> 00:25:07.120\nbuilding because we are\n\n492\n00:25:07.120 --> 00:25:10.780\nAs much a technology company when it comes to the number of people and the\n\n493\n00:25:10.780 --> 00:25:13.760\nsupport center as we are a restaurant company in many ways\n\n494\n00:25:14.160 --> 00:25:16.700\nThat's interesting. I want to talk a little bit about that because you know,\n\n495\n00:25:16.700 --> 00:25:19.760\nyou you said you saw this opportunity to buy more brands\n\n496\n00:25:19.760 --> 00:25:24.220\nBring them into the fold create a common platform leverage the commonalities of\n\n497\n00:25:24.220 --> 00:25:26.560\nthe brands but still provide their independence\n\n498\n00:25:26.560 --> 00:25:30.160\nHow have you managed through the process of saying this is going to be\n\n499\n00:25:30.160 --> 00:25:31.040\ncentralized?\n\n500\n00:25:31.040 --> 00:25:34.560\nThis is where I know we can drive efficiency and effectiveness\n\n501\n00:25:34.560 --> 00:25:39.610\nVersus the decentralized nature of the brands because you know when you're\n\n502\n00:25:39.610 --> 00:25:39.920\nrunning arvies\n\n503\n00:25:40.320 --> 00:25:42.960\nIf somebody came in and said I'm going to run this for that for you\n\n504\n00:25:42.960 --> 00:25:45.760\nI'm sure the hackles kind of went up, you know, I\n\n505\n00:25:45.760 --> 00:25:49.680\nAnd that's pretty true. Yeah. Well, that's part of what was on that napkin\n\n506\n00:25:49.680 --> 00:25:51.760\nAnd so we drew a two by two\n\n507\n00:25:51.760 --> 00:25:55.360\nBasically looking at every single capability that goes into making a restaurant\n\n508\n00:25:55.360 --> 00:25:56.640\ncompany a restaurant company\n\n509\n00:25:56.640 --> 00:26:00.240\nAnd said what should be centralized versus what should be brand specific\n\n510\n00:26:00.240 --> 00:26:03.980\nAnd why do we think we actually will drive outsized competitive advantage and\n\n511\n00:26:03.980 --> 00:26:05.600\nwhat's at least the investment\n\n512\n00:26:06.080 --> 00:26:11.070\nAnd at the end of the day we start with anything that makes a brand a brand in\n\n513\n00:26:11.070 --> 00:26:12.080\nthe eyes of the customer\n\n514\n00:26:12.080 --> 00:26:14.720\nAnd the eyes of the franchisee stays brand specific\n\n515\n00:26:14.720 --> 00:26:18.570\nSo in the restaurant industry that is the food you serve the beverage so\n\n516\n00:26:18.570 --> 00:26:19.280\nculinary\n\n517\n00:26:19.280 --> 00:26:23.920\nThe marketing the messaging teams franchise operations brand standards\n\n518\n00:26:23.920 --> 00:26:27.840\nAll that has stays at the brand level and rolls up to the brand president\n\n519\n00:26:27.840 --> 00:26:31.920\nObviously, it's a push pull if you all you're trying to do is take cost out\n\n520\n00:26:32.560 --> 00:26:37.990\nThen you go more centralized and I saw that in my other experiences at Expedia\n\n521\n00:26:37.990 --> 00:26:38.720\nand Hilton\n\n522\n00:26:38.720 --> 00:26:43.260\nWhich were also multi brand companies to where you we went back and forth and\n\n523\n00:26:43.260 --> 00:26:44.800\nfinally found that right balance\n\n524\n00:26:44.800 --> 00:26:49.040\nThe challenge is not getting too enamored with the we could take more cost out\n\n525\n00:26:49.040 --> 00:26:51.040\nif we simple if we centralized more\n\n526\n00:26:51.040 --> 00:26:52.960\nAnd go too far\n\n527\n00:26:52.960 --> 00:26:55.360\nOf and so we've really tried to draw the line hard\n\n528\n00:26:55.360 --> 00:26:59.140\nWell, how we always looked at it and i'm not saying it was the only way to look\n\n529\n00:26:59.140 --> 00:26:59.360\nat it\n\n530\n00:26:59.440 --> 00:27:03.280\nBut in terms of driving shareholder value or value for all your investors\n\n531\n00:27:03.280 --> 00:27:07.330\nIt was critical you drive same store sales growth that do units and you always\n\n532\n00:27:07.330 --> 00:27:08.960\nhave a high return on invested capital\n\n533\n00:27:08.960 --> 00:27:12.800\nYou do those three things basically your your share price would grow\n\n534\n00:27:12.800 --> 00:27:17.280\nHow do you think about that and how do you communicate that the keys to\n\n535\n00:27:17.280 --> 00:27:20.560\nEverybody's success to the rest of the organization\n\n536\n00:27:20.560 --> 00:27:24.380\nWell, it is very clear in this business that it's all about the top line if the\n\n537\n00:27:24.380 --> 00:27:25.520\ntop line is not moving\n\n538\n00:27:25.600 --> 00:27:28.710\nThere's not enough levers anywhere else in the p&l particularly in a franchise\n\n539\n00:27:28.710 --> 00:27:30.400\nbusiness to actually drive that\n\n540\n00:27:30.400 --> 00:27:33.520\nSo so we really talk a lot about that in fact\n\n541\n00:27:33.520 --> 00:27:37.920\nWe have a weekly stand up on friday mornings of the leaders that are\n\n542\n00:27:37.920 --> 00:27:40.800\nresponsible for driving the top line and i call it the top liners\n\n543\n00:27:40.800 --> 00:27:45.360\nAnd and we actually just share and talk about the top line all the time\n\n544\n00:27:45.360 --> 00:27:49.360\nThat doesn't mean the other levers don't matter but ultimately\n\n545\n00:27:49.360 --> 00:27:53.820\nThat's what our job is as a franchise or right is to drive the top line on\n\n546\n00:27:53.820 --> 00:27:55.360\nbehalf of our franchisees\n\n547\n00:27:55.920 --> 00:27:58.480\nAnd so and that's just part of the conversation\n\n548\n00:27:58.480 --> 00:28:01.040\nall the time\n\n549\n00:28:01.040 --> 00:28:05.000\nAnd conversation even if we're going to add a dollar of cost is that dollar\n\n550\n00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:08.080\ncost going to generate ultimately more on the top line\n\n551\n00:28:08.080 --> 00:28:10.080\non behalf of our franchisees\n\n552\n00:28:10.080 --> 00:28:13.360\nIf not then we have a really hard discussion on whether we're going to add that\n\n553\n00:28:13.360 --> 00:28:14.080\ndollar of cost\n\n554\n00:28:14.080 --> 00:28:15.440\nYeah\n\n555\n00:28:15.440 --> 00:28:18.800\nIn the restaurant business if your sales goes south you get tremendous dele\n\n556\n00:28:18.800 --> 00:28:19.840\nverage as an operator\n\n557\n00:28:19.840 --> 00:28:23.440\nAnd you can't have that as a franchise or and you make your money from the\n\n558\n00:28:23.440 --> 00:28:24.320\nfranchise fees\n\n559\n00:28:24.400 --> 00:28:29.000\nWhich come from the the sales moving forward. So that makes it makes a lot of\n\n560\n00:28:29.000 --> 00:28:30.720\nsense in how do you\n\n561\n00:28:30.720 --> 00:28:36.720\nAs the leader of the overall company, how do you think about target setting and\n\n562\n00:28:36.720 --> 00:28:38.400\nand for each of your businesses?\n\n563\n00:28:38.400 --> 00:28:41.120\nYou know tell us your thought process behind that\n\n564\n00:28:41.120 --> 00:28:46.170\nWe have a bill process where we have you know, we go through and do a lot of\n\n565\n00:28:46.170 --> 00:28:46.960\nanalytics around\n\n566\n00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:51.380\nOf what is going on in the marketplace of how our brands are actually working\n\n567\n00:28:51.380 --> 00:28:52.640\nversus the competitors\n\n568\n00:28:53.280 --> 00:28:55.600\nAnd we start with the top line to work our our way down\n\n569\n00:28:55.600 --> 00:28:59.680\nYou know, I really try to have the businesses own that as much as possible\n\n570\n00:28:59.680 --> 00:29:02.720\nBut as you can imagine the CEO, there's a little bit of a pushing\n\n571\n00:29:02.720 --> 00:29:05.920\nFor just a little bit more in the right areas going forward\n\n572\n00:29:05.920 --> 00:29:09.710\nOf and then obviously holding everybody accountable for that now from an\n\n573\n00:29:09.710 --> 00:29:12.320\nincentive standpoint over the past several years\n\n574\n00:29:12.320 --> 00:29:16.190\nWe've chosen from the senior leadership team to have everybody all their\n\n575\n00:29:16.190 --> 00:29:17.680\nincentives on inspires\n\n576\n00:29:18.160 --> 00:29:22.600\nOverall performance less on the individual brand performance and the reason we\n\n577\n00:29:22.600 --> 00:29:25.200\ndid that is because we're in the process of integrating these businesses\n\n578\n00:29:25.200 --> 00:29:28.480\nAnd we want to encourage everybody to share capabilities and work together\n\n579\n00:29:28.480 --> 00:29:32.240\nUh, we'll probably pivot over the next several years back a little bit more\n\n580\n00:29:32.240 --> 00:29:34.880\ntoward pushing the incentive down at the individual brands\n\n581\n00:29:34.880 --> 00:29:39.360\nBecause my belief is how you incentivize individuals actually as a factor of\n\n582\n00:29:39.360 --> 00:29:39.600\nyou know\n\n583\n00:29:39.600 --> 00:29:43.570\nWhere that business happens to be at that moment in time and you know when you\n\n584\n00:29:43.570 --> 00:29:45.840\n're trying to centralize the number of functions\n\n585\n00:29:46.000 --> 00:29:49.980\nYou know, you're kind of swimming uphill when you're dealing with the\n\n586\n00:29:49.980 --> 00:29:51.200\ndecentralized brands\n\n587\n00:29:51.200 --> 00:29:56.200\nAnd so you got to get I think Jack Welsh told me once he says nobody makes it\n\n588\n00:29:56.200 --> 00:29:57.840\nto sure unless the queen mary does\n\n589\n00:29:57.840 --> 00:30:03.520\nI think that's kind of your approach here that has the approach and culturally\n\n590\n00:30:03.520 --> 00:30:04.960\nit's it's very difficult\n\n591\n00:30:04.960 --> 00:30:06.720\nparticularly when you're buying\n\n592\n00:30:06.720 --> 00:30:10.510\nIndividual businesses that have been standalone and not only they have to think\n\n593\n00:30:10.510 --> 00:30:12.880\nof themselves as part of a brand portfolio\n\n594\n00:30:13.120 --> 00:30:16.440\nBut they have to think about them sharing services with each other that you\n\n595\n00:30:16.440 --> 00:30:16.720\nknow\n\n596\n00:30:16.720 --> 00:30:19.910\nHas taken several years it always takes a few years for kind of that start\n\n597\n00:30:19.910 --> 00:30:21.200\nclicking with individuals\n\n598\n00:30:21.200 --> 00:30:25.920\nAnd you mentioned earlier just the the power of culture and how important it is\n\n599\n00:30:25.920 --> 00:30:28.560\nWhen you think about the inspire culture\n\n600\n00:30:28.560 --> 00:30:33.800\nWhat's would be the single most important behavior you're trying to drive and\n\n601\n00:30:33.800 --> 00:30:34.400\nreinforce\n\n602\n00:30:34.400 --> 00:30:39.920\nUh across all of inspire i'll give you two mavericks and allies, right?\n\n603\n00:30:39.920 --> 00:30:44.960\nSo I think so those are two of our core the top two core behaviors mavericks\n\n604\n00:30:44.960 --> 00:30:48.160\nbecause we really want to push the envelope and do things differently\n\n605\n00:30:48.160 --> 00:30:53.780\nBut if you don't do that in a ally type of environment also in a franchise\n\n606\n00:30:53.780 --> 00:30:54.560\nenvironment\n\n607\n00:30:54.560 --> 00:30:57.760\nYou know, you have to have a culture of being an ally you have to work together\n\n608\n00:30:57.760 --> 00:31:00.240\nBecause if we all we have to win together, right?\n\n609\n00:31:00.240 --> 00:31:04.080\nThere's not a franchise or wins if the franchise he loses or vice versa\n\n610\n00:31:04.480 --> 00:31:09.530\nAnd so you know those two particularly allies is is the real culture the the\n\n611\n00:31:09.530 --> 00:31:10.800\nthe values that we push the most\n\n612\n00:31:10.800 --> 00:31:15.040\nI love your top line meeting on Fridays where you have all your top line meters\n\n613\n00:31:15.040 --> 00:31:16.720\nstand up and talk about what they're doing\n\n614\n00:31:16.720 --> 00:31:20.640\nYou know, it's it's a process to share best practices. I imagine\n\n615\n00:31:20.640 --> 00:31:26.240\nYou know, how do you see leveraging inspires know how across these brands?\n\n616\n00:31:26.240 --> 00:31:30.400\nWell, we always talk about the fact that before these were part of a portfolio\n\n617\n00:31:30.880 --> 00:31:33.760\nUh, each individual brand president would have liked nothing better than to be\n\n618\n00:31:33.760 --> 00:31:36.240\nable to compare notes with the other brand presidents, right?\n\n619\n00:31:36.240 --> 00:31:38.930\nYou just weren't able to do that when they're better. So we're like, let's play\n\n620\n00:31:38.930 --> 00:31:39.280\ninto that\n\n621\n00:31:39.280 --> 00:31:42.880\nSo we're constantly saying what's working over here? What's you know, what\n\n622\n00:31:42.880 --> 00:31:45.200\nworked? What didn't work? What lesson can we learn?\n\n623\n00:31:45.200 --> 00:31:48.720\nWhat are some things that we may have looked at doing at rb's that don't make\n\n624\n00:31:48.720 --> 00:31:51.280\nas much sense for rb's whether it be a culinary or marketing that\n\n625\n00:31:51.280 --> 00:31:53.360\nCan actually do that in another brand?\n\n626\n00:31:53.360 --> 00:31:58.480\nUh, we share media as we think about again demand generation activities\n\n627\n00:31:58.880 --> 00:32:01.440\nBut it's working a lot of us just really sharing best practices\n\n628\n00:32:01.440 --> 00:32:06.430\nOf and doing it in a in a real-time way in fact because we have that stand up\n\n629\n00:32:06.430 --> 00:32:07.920\non friday and everybody knows it's coming\n\n630\n00:32:07.920 --> 00:32:11.240\nWe first started doing it people were sharing a lot of these practices for the\n\n631\n00:32:11.240 --> 00:32:12.480\nfirst time in that meeting\n\n632\n00:32:12.480 --> 00:32:16.740\nIt's funny now that most of those most of that has already been shared at a\n\n633\n00:32:16.740 --> 00:32:17.040\ntime\n\n634\n00:32:17.040 --> 00:32:19.040\nso\n\n635\n00:32:19.040 --> 00:32:22.370\nSo, um, there's there's there's kind of less of that real time surprise\n\n636\n00:32:22.370 --> 00:32:24.240\nhappening in that meeting itself with me in the room\n\n637\n00:32:24.240 --> 00:32:28.160\nWe'll be back with the rest of my conversation with paul brown in just a moment\n\n638\n00:32:28.720 --> 00:32:33.750\nBut as my fellow golf fans know the rider cup is this weekend and one of this\n\n639\n00:32:33.750 --> 00:32:36.000\nyear's captains picks is just in thomas\n\n640\n00:32:36.000 --> 00:32:40.240\nI think leaders can learn a lot from athletes because of their incredible\n\n641\n00:32:40.240 --> 00:32:44.240\nmentality and justin has so much wisdom on that front\n\n642\n00:32:44.240 --> 00:32:47.360\nEspecially this bit about learning from mistakes\n\n643\n00:32:47.360 --> 00:32:52.410\nIt's tough. I mean it's something I think at least me personally. I just go in\n\n644\n00:32:52.410 --> 00:32:52.560\nwaves\n\n645\n00:32:52.560 --> 00:32:56.850\nYou know there's times where it seems easy to when you get done maybe from a\n\n646\n00:32:56.850 --> 00:32:58.160\nbad week. It's it's\n\n647\n00:32:58.800 --> 00:33:01.200\nOkay, well, you know this week. I did a lot of good things\n\n648\n00:33:01.200 --> 00:33:04.850\nbut I maybe just got a little bit ahead of myself there in the end of that fr\n\n649\n00:33:04.850 --> 00:33:05.760\niday round and I\n\n650\n00:33:05.760 --> 00:33:09.600\nI was too aggressive and I started to back nine on saturday and\n\n651\n00:33:09.600 --> 00:33:13.440\nYou know, I took a couple chances that I shouldn't have taken and if I don't do\n\n652\n00:33:13.440 --> 00:33:15.520\nany of those things I have a chance to win\n\n653\n00:33:15.520 --> 00:33:17.280\nVersus there's some weeks\n\n654\n00:33:17.280 --> 00:33:19.280\nYou might do the exact same thing\n\n655\n00:33:19.280 --> 00:33:22.880\nAnd you get done and all you can think about was how dumb those mistakes you\n\n656\n00:33:22.880 --> 00:33:23.600\nmade were and\n\n657\n00:33:24.400 --> 00:33:28.320\nWhy did you do them and and always just looking at the negative side of it but\n\n658\n00:33:28.320 --> 00:33:33.670\nThe sooner that I realized that I have those opportunities to learn from the\n\n659\n00:33:33.670 --> 00:33:35.840\nmistakes that I made definitely the sooner off\n\n660\n00:33:35.840 --> 00:33:40.890\nI started playing better golf and and having a lot better things happen for me.\n\n661\n00:33:40.890 --> 00:33:42.240\nSo it's really just trying to\n\n662\n00:33:42.240 --> 00:33:45.950\nI mean it's the same as everything, you know, it's it doesn't matter whether\n\n663\n00:33:45.950 --> 00:33:46.240\nyou're\n\n664\n00:33:46.240 --> 00:33:50.720\nDavid novak just in thomas or tiger woods worry mac or whatever it is\n\n665\n00:33:50.800 --> 00:33:54.080\nIt's like if you you just wake up some days and you're just not in it, you know\n\n666\n00:33:54.080 --> 00:33:54.720\n, you're you're just\n\n667\n00:33:54.720 --> 00:33:58.640\nWhether you don't gets, you know, good sleep your swing doesn't feel good\n\n668\n00:33:58.640 --> 00:34:03.040\nOr or you maybe don't like the golf course as much as just you're irritable\n\n669\n00:34:03.040 --> 00:34:03.840\nwhatever it is\n\n670\n00:34:03.840 --> 00:34:08.560\nBut those are the days I think that separates the good and the great players is\n\n671\n00:34:08.560 --> 00:34:11.040\nis managing those days and makes the best you can\n\n672\n00:34:11.040 --> 00:34:14.560\nGo back and listen to my entire conversation with jt\n\n673\n00:34:14.560 --> 00:34:18.480\nepisode 135 here on how leaders lead\n\n674\n00:34:19.440 --> 00:34:22.790\nGreat leaders always have truth tellers around them and they want the whole\n\n675\n00:34:22.790 --> 00:34:24.560\ntruth enough but nothing but the truth\n\n676\n00:34:24.560 --> 00:34:29.090\nYou know, what do you do to show that you want to get the real skinny? What's\n\n677\n00:34:29.090 --> 00:34:30.080\nreally happening out there?\n\n678\n00:34:30.080 --> 00:34:34.240\nBut to be honest, I found that that is getting harder and harder the longer i\n\n679\n00:34:34.240 --> 00:34:35.040\n've been ceo\n\n680\n00:34:35.040 --> 00:34:37.760\ni'm going into my 13th year as ceo\n\n681\n00:34:37.760 --> 00:34:43.590\nAnd I found that people assume incorrectly that I have more of the answers than\n\n682\n00:34:43.590 --> 00:34:43.840\nI do\n\n683\n00:34:43.840 --> 00:34:47.280\nAnd so I have really tried to go out of my way to your point of actually\n\n684\n00:34:47.760 --> 00:34:51.360\nHaving people around me encouraging people to kind of tell me the truth\n\n685\n00:34:51.360 --> 00:34:54.960\nOf and I you know, but it's a been a lesson. I've had to learn\n\n686\n00:34:54.960 --> 00:34:58.800\nI've had to change my style a little bit because my style I can come sometimes\n\n687\n00:34:58.800 --> 00:35:00.400\nbe honest come across as\n\n688\n00:35:00.400 --> 00:35:03.760\nYou know, I know the answers or you know, I have the path\n\n689\n00:35:03.760 --> 00:35:05.120\nI have the plan\n\n690\n00:35:05.120 --> 00:35:07.440\nAnd trying to making myself a little bit more vulnerable\n\n691\n00:35:07.440 --> 00:35:12.490\nTo the team and making it very clear that I want to have the contrary an idea\n\n692\n00:35:12.490 --> 00:35:13.440\nis really important\n\n693\n00:35:13.760 --> 00:35:16.640\nI love the fact that you have that self-awareness and and you\n\n694\n00:35:16.640 --> 00:35:20.080\nYou admit that these are things that that you're working on\n\n695\n00:35:20.080 --> 00:35:25.840\nDo you have a personal process you use to assess where you're at as a leader\n\n696\n00:35:25.840 --> 00:35:29.440\nand how you're going to sharpen your axe or has just happened day to day?\n\n697\n00:35:29.440 --> 00:35:33.620\nA lot of it happens day to day, but I'm fortunate to have a lot of really good\n\n698\n00:35:33.620 --> 00:35:34.080\nfriends\n\n699\n00:35:34.080 --> 00:35:36.320\nthat are\n\n700\n00:35:36.320 --> 00:35:37.920\nIn business themselves\n\n701\n00:35:37.920 --> 00:35:41.820\nAnd you know, I spend a lot of time sharing things with them and you know, they\n\n702\n00:35:41.820 --> 00:35:43.280\n're pretty good at calling me out and saying\n\n703\n00:35:43.520 --> 00:35:46.370\nYou could have done that one differently or you could have handled that\n\n704\n00:35:46.370 --> 00:35:48.240\nsituation a little bit differently and\n\n705\n00:35:48.240 --> 00:35:52.270\nYou know in a way that it's hard for your employees or you know, people that\n\n706\n00:35:52.270 --> 00:35:53.600\nwork for you directly to call you out\n\n707\n00:35:53.600 --> 00:35:57.360\nAnd so, you know, I think they have been really instrumental in helping me\n\n708\n00:35:57.360 --> 00:35:59.360\ncontinue to to grow as a leader\n\n709\n00:35:59.360 --> 00:36:03.730\nDo you ever just take a formal look at yourself and say this is what I need to\n\n710\n00:36:03.730 --> 00:36:05.920\ndo or is that iterative as well?\n\n711\n00:36:05.920 --> 00:36:09.520\nPeriodically, I in fact a few years ago. I did an assessment leadership\n\n712\n00:36:09.520 --> 00:36:10.640\nassessment of 360\n\n713\n00:36:10.720 --> 00:36:14.120\nWe did that across the whole leadership team including me and we're going to\n\n714\n00:36:14.120 --> 00:36:15.440\nprobably do that again\n\n715\n00:36:15.440 --> 00:36:17.520\nI think that is a useful exercise to do\n\n716\n00:36:17.520 --> 00:36:20.560\nPeriodically, I think not not every year\n\n717\n00:36:20.560 --> 00:36:25.680\nAnd it was eye opening and I've made some adjustments because of it. Well, good\n\n718\n00:36:25.680 --> 00:36:26.000\ngood\n\n719\n00:36:26.000 --> 00:36:30.090\nYou know, and and you mentioned earlier the importance of having this common\n\n720\n00:36:30.090 --> 00:36:30.880\ntechnological\n\n721\n00:36:30.880 --> 00:36:35.300\nTechnology platform that you can leverage across the brands and in almost every\n\n722\n00:36:35.300 --> 00:36:37.840\nconversation I'm having today with readers\n\n723\n00:36:38.400 --> 00:36:42.800\nAI is is impacting the way they're thinking about their business you\n\n724\n00:36:42.800 --> 00:36:47.860\nHas it changed your your thinking and your strategy? How are you how are you\n\n725\n00:36:47.860 --> 00:36:49.760\nlooking at AI in the restaurant business?\n\n726\n00:36:49.760 --> 00:36:53.650\nWell, I'm looking at a couple of you have several buckets. The first is just\n\n727\n00:36:53.650 --> 00:36:54.560\nproductivity gains\n\n728\n00:36:54.560 --> 00:36:57.680\nSo there are a lot of activities that are very repetitive activities\n\n729\n00:36:57.680 --> 00:37:01.110\nIf you think about in the multi unit business with thousands and hundreds of\n\n730\n00:37:01.110 --> 00:37:02.400\nthousands of team members\n\n731\n00:37:02.880 --> 00:37:06.510\nUh, so automating those tasks anything that was asked of a service desk for\n\n732\n00:37:06.510 --> 00:37:08.720\nexample where people are having to get information\n\n733\n00:37:08.720 --> 00:37:11.120\nThat can be much more efficiently done\n\n734\n00:37:11.120 --> 00:37:15.200\nTask like obviously a technology. So there's a lot of productivity that we're\n\n735\n00:37:15.200 --> 00:37:17.440\ngetting just from using AI in a better way\n\n736\n00:37:17.440 --> 00:37:22.160\nThe second is making better decisions. It's really really fascinating around\n\n737\n00:37:22.160 --> 00:37:26.320\nHow from a product testing from an idea testing\n\n738\n00:37:26.320 --> 00:37:30.240\nUh that you can actually do these through personas in a way that you had to go\n\n739\n00:37:30.240 --> 00:37:30.960\nin the old way\n\n740\n00:37:31.040 --> 00:37:33.980\nYou had to go out and obviously talk to customers and spend all the time and\n\n741\n00:37:33.980 --> 00:37:36.000\nyou can do a lot of that up front\n\n742\n00:37:36.000 --> 00:37:39.440\nDoesn't substitute obviously from actually getting in front of customers\n\n743\n00:37:39.440 --> 00:37:43.680\nBut it kind of helps you kind of at the top of the funnel of idea generation to\n\n744\n00:37:43.680 --> 00:37:44.880\ngo a lot faster\n\n745\n00:37:44.880 --> 00:37:49.340\nAnd then obviously, you know customizing marketing messages and just doing a\n\n746\n00:37:49.340 --> 00:37:50.080\nbetter job\n\n747\n00:37:50.080 --> 00:37:53.560\nTalking to the individual customer the way they want to be talked to and\n\n748\n00:37:53.560 --> 00:37:55.680\nultimately even targeting promotions\n\n749\n00:37:56.160 --> 00:37:59.280\nAnd pricing to a certain extent at an individual level\n\n750\n00:37:59.280 --> 00:38:01.760\nYou know that one's a little further along\n\n751\n00:38:01.760 --> 00:38:04.960\nUh, but it's it's changing very rapidly. What are you doing?\n\n752\n00:38:04.960 --> 00:38:10.950\nWith AI to to help enhance your leadership and how you approach your job every\n\n753\n00:38:10.950 --> 00:38:11.200\nday\n\n754\n00:38:11.200 --> 00:38:14.240\nDo you have any tricks to the trade that you could pass on to us?\n\n755\n00:38:14.240 --> 00:38:17.250\nBecause you know everybody's right everybody's trying to do this everybody's\n\n756\n00:38:17.250 --> 00:38:18.240\ntrying to get up to speed\n\n757\n00:38:18.240 --> 00:38:22.320\nI mean to be honest. I'm still getting comfortable as a tool for myself\n\n758\n00:38:22.480 --> 00:38:27.360\nUh, I am uh, we use co-pilot and we have that and so I have access to that\n\n759\n00:38:27.360 --> 00:38:31.680\nAnd I've been using that as a tool to kind of help me ask a set of questions\n\n760\n00:38:31.680 --> 00:38:31.920\nthat\n\n761\n00:38:31.920 --> 00:38:35.360\nQuite honestly, I might have walked down the hall and asked analyst first\n\n762\n00:38:35.360 --> 00:38:39.610\nBut I can actually get that first round of let's looking into this and it helps\n\n763\n00:38:39.610 --> 00:38:40.960\nme ask better questions\n\n764\n00:38:40.960 --> 00:38:44.660\nRight. So and at the end of the day, I think from a benefit from AI or\n\n765\n00:38:44.660 --> 00:38:45.360\nleadership\n\n766\n00:38:45.360 --> 00:38:49.600\nIt just helps you answer questions faster, which helps you to ask the next next\n\n767\n00:38:49.600 --> 00:38:51.360\none in even a more effective way\n\n768\n00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:55.520\nYou know, this this has been so much fun and I love how you're attacking this\n\n769\n00:38:55.520 --> 00:38:55.840\nbusiness\n\n770\n00:38:55.840 --> 00:38:58.980\nIt's fun to talk to somebody who's actually running the business that I used to\n\n771\n00:38:58.980 --> 00:39:00.720\nhave a little fun with in myself\n\n772\n00:39:00.720 --> 00:39:03.040\nBut I want to ask some more fun with you\n\n773\n00:39:03.040 --> 00:39:06.300\nUh, with my lightning round of questions. So are you ready for this? I'm ready.\n\n774\n00:39:06.300 --> 00:39:07.040\nOkay. Here we go\n\n775\n00:39:07.040 --> 00:39:12.000\nThe three words to best describe you curious strategic and maverick\n\n776\n00:39:12.000 --> 00:39:15.440\nIf you could be one person for a day beside yourself, who would it be?\n\n777\n00:39:15.440 --> 00:39:17.920\nI'd like to be a classical pianist\n\n778\n00:39:18.560 --> 00:39:21.440\nI always wished I hadn't stopped lessons and just to be able to sit down and\n\n779\n00:39:21.440 --> 00:39:23.920\nentertain a room would just be a lot of fun\n\n780\n00:39:23.920 --> 00:39:28.460\nYour biggest pet peeve people making excuses particular leaders not owning the\n\n781\n00:39:28.460 --> 00:39:29.680\nissue but making excuses\n\n782\n00:39:29.680 --> 00:39:33.280\nWho would play you in a movie matt damen speaking of movies?\n\n783\n00:39:33.280 --> 00:39:38.940\nBen affleck was in duncan's uh super bowl ads if the two of you swapped jobs\n\n784\n00:39:38.940 --> 00:39:39.520\nfor a day\n\n785\n00:39:39.520 --> 00:39:42.720\nWhat role would you give him to inspire?\n\n786\n00:39:44.800 --> 00:39:49.860\nOf I would probably put him in the uh in the ideation of the culinary. He's a\n\n787\n00:39:49.860 --> 00:39:50.800\nvery creative person\n\n788\n00:39:50.800 --> 00:39:53.440\nSo he's come up with some pretty interesting product ideas\n\n789\n00:39:53.440 --> 00:39:56.080\nUh, and he still works with us today on the advertising side\n\n790\n00:39:56.080 --> 00:39:59.840\nSo I think he would come up some pretty interesting product ideas for duncan\n\n791\n00:39:59.840 --> 00:40:02.690\nThat's cool. It's you haven't worked with you on the marketing side. That's\n\n792\n00:40:02.690 --> 00:40:05.760\ngreat. What's the best and worst parts about living in atlanta?\n\n793\n00:40:05.760 --> 00:40:10.730\nUh, the best part is the friends that we have and generally the weather most of\n\n794\n00:40:10.730 --> 00:40:10.960\nthe months\n\n795\n00:40:10.960 --> 00:40:14.080\nThe worst part is the weather in the middle of the summer and the traffic\n\n796\n00:40:15.600 --> 00:40:18.450\nYou you get two tickets to anything you want. Where are you going and who are\n\n797\n00:40:18.450 --> 00:40:20.160\nyou going to take with you?\n\n798\n00:40:20.160 --> 00:40:22.800\nuh two tickets I would be to\n\n799\n00:40:22.800 --> 00:40:24.160\num\n\n800\n00:40:24.160 --> 00:40:25.440\nTo the world cup finals\n\n801\n00:40:25.440 --> 00:40:29.040\nUh, i've been several times and I think that is by far the most exciting\n\n802\n00:40:29.040 --> 00:40:30.800\nsporting event and it's just great\n\n803\n00:40:30.800 --> 00:40:35.530\nSo and I would take uh my wife and my two kids. Oh two two. I only get one. So\n\n804\n00:40:35.530 --> 00:40:36.960\ni'll let you take three\n\n805\n00:40:36.960 --> 00:40:39.280\nWe're not going to cut anybody out here\n\n806\n00:40:39.280 --> 00:40:42.240\nWhat's the one thing you do just for you?\n\n807\n00:40:42.800 --> 00:40:46.720\nI like to go on long walks with my dogs and I put in my\n\n808\n00:40:46.720 --> 00:40:51.960\nAirpods and listen to either music or a podcast. It just uh, lets me get away\n\n809\n00:40:51.960 --> 00:40:53.120\nfor just a little while\n\n810\n00:40:53.120 --> 00:40:56.240\nBesides your family, what's your most prized possession?\n\n811\n00:40:56.240 --> 00:41:00.080\nIt is probably my 1982 toyota fj\n\n812\n00:41:00.080 --> 00:41:04.510\nIt's uh, I just love driving it around. It's the one car that I get everybody\n\n813\n00:41:04.510 --> 00:41:05.360\nwaving and smiling\n\n814\n00:41:05.360 --> 00:41:07.680\nI think it makes everybody happy around me as well as myself\n\n815\n00:41:07.680 --> 00:41:10.160\nWhat's something about you that few people would know?\n\n816\n00:41:10.240 --> 00:41:12.710\nThere's a lot of things that people don't know. I've tried to stay a fairly\n\n817\n00:41:12.710 --> 00:41:13.360\nprivate person\n\n818\n00:41:13.360 --> 00:41:16.960\nIn fact, a lot of things I said today. I've never said before so good\n\n819\n00:41:16.960 --> 00:41:18.960\nLet's hear another one\n\n820\n00:41:18.960 --> 00:41:21.440\nOh, um\n\n821\n00:41:21.440 --> 00:41:26.320\nI was a fell piano player and a failed singer, uh and uh in my old age\n\n822\n00:41:26.320 --> 00:41:27.520\nMy younger age\n\n823\n00:41:27.520 --> 00:41:32.010\nWhat's the one of your daily rituals besides drinking duck and donuts coffee or\n\n824\n00:41:32.010 --> 00:41:32.560\nduckin?\n\n825\n00:41:32.560 --> 00:41:33.440\nYeah\n\n826\n00:41:33.440 --> 00:41:35.200\nSomething that you never miss\n\n827\n00:41:35.200 --> 00:41:38.480\nI try to get some form of exercise every day when i'm in town\n\n828\n00:41:38.640 --> 00:41:41.980\nUh, if you'd spend several days a week, I get up very early and work out with\n\n829\n00:41:41.980 --> 00:41:42.480\nthe trainer\n\n830\n00:41:42.480 --> 00:41:45.740\nAnd when i'm out of town, I just try to find in the minimum get outside and\n\n831\n00:41:45.740 --> 00:41:46.240\nwalk around\n\n832\n00:41:46.240 --> 00:41:49.760\nGreat stuff and you're out of the lightning round great job, you know, thank\n\n833\n00:41:49.760 --> 00:41:49.920\nyou\n\n834\n00:41:49.920 --> 00:41:53.840\nI want to come back to bin aff like he he helps you with your advertising and\n\n835\n00:41:53.840 --> 00:41:54.560\nand your marketing\n\n836\n00:41:54.560 --> 00:41:55.600\nHow did that start?\n\n837\n00:41:55.600 --> 00:42:00.370\nWell, he and matt daven created an agency several years ago and we were dunking\n\n838\n00:42:00.370 --> 00:42:01.120\nwas their first client\n\n839\n00:42:01.120 --> 00:42:04.320\nUh, and so they kind of came to us he did come to us and said\n\n840\n00:42:04.880 --> 00:42:08.720\nWe think we have some good ideas, uh for the brand and we'd like to actually\n\n841\n00:42:08.720 --> 00:42:12.400\nSee if you could become a client and that was where the first super bowl\n\n842\n00:42:12.400 --> 00:42:13.920\ncommercial came from for dunkin\n\n843\n00:42:13.920 --> 00:42:19.940\nI don't think you should do this. Let us see if she came to my work. Now. I\n\n844\n00:42:19.940 --> 00:42:21.280\ngotta show her what I can do\n\n845\n00:42:21.280 --> 00:42:24.800\nHe's here. Uh, flack on the track\n\n846\n00:42:24.800 --> 00:42:28.240\nWhat a Bronx for your consideration\n\n847\n00:42:28.400 --> 00:42:30.400\nHey, the car was the Boston massacre\n\n848\n00:42:30.400 --> 00:42:33.360\nThe donkeys\n\n849\n00:42:33.360 --> 00:42:38.510\nTouchdown tongue on the keys play a coach. You got it. I'm hoping in need of no\n\n850\n00:42:38.510 --> 00:42:39.440\nintroduction\n\n851\n00:42:39.440 --> 00:42:42.880\nMy partner. It's really hard to be your friend man. You said you let us put me\n\n852\n00:42:42.880 --> 00:42:55.680\nHow do you like them donuts? I'm so sorry. You had to see it, but I forgive you\n\n853\n00:42:56.240 --> 00:42:58.240\nLay us on the track. Are we gonna be on the album?\n\n854\n00:42:58.240 --> 00:43:01.040\nWe talked about this\n\n855\n00:43:01.040 --> 00:43:03.520\nLet's go\n\n856\n00:43:03.520 --> 00:43:06.560\nYou're blinded by them pin strikes. There goes bae bros\n\n857\n00:43:06.560 --> 00:43:08.000\nTom\n\n858\n00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:09.120\nYou can stay\n\n859\n00:43:09.120 --> 00:43:12.240\nRemember when I told you I'd do anything for you. This is anything chill\n\n860\n00:43:12.240 --> 00:43:14.240\nThey name it a drink after us\n\n861\n00:43:14.240 --> 00:43:17.690\nThey are now still part of our agency lineup and they do a lot of great things\n\n862\n00:43:17.690 --> 00:43:18.000\nfor us\n\n863\n00:43:18.000 --> 00:43:19.680\nSo we're very very happy with them\n\n864\n00:43:19.680 --> 00:43:22.380\nAnd you know, you we talked a little bit earlier you started out as a\n\n865\n00:43:22.380 --> 00:43:23.600\nconsultant mckenzie\n\n866\n00:43:23.760 --> 00:43:27.360\nYou you you you had this meeting with berry diller where he gave you the 30-\n\n867\n00:43:27.360 --> 00:43:29.520\nminute one-on-one in terms of uh\n\n868\n00:43:29.520 --> 00:43:33.440\nMarketing, you know, and what have you learned about?\n\n869\n00:43:33.440 --> 00:43:36.000\ninspiring creative people\n\n870\n00:43:36.000 --> 00:43:41.300\nYou know and because in your business you got to have great ideas and and you\n\n871\n00:43:41.300 --> 00:43:42.960\ngot to have great marketing\n\n872\n00:43:42.960 --> 00:43:46.800\nYou got to keep those sales going that comes from creativity and innovation\n\n873\n00:43:46.800 --> 00:43:51.850\nWhat have you learned about managing that part of the business those kinds of\n\n874\n00:43:51.850 --> 00:43:53.200\npeople that are creative?\n\n875\n00:43:53.760 --> 00:43:57.520\nI think it's setting a view of what could be possible the art of the possible\n\n876\n00:43:57.520 --> 00:43:58.400\nstretching the view\n\n877\n00:43:58.400 --> 00:44:01.840\nChallenges them to tell the story that hadn't been told before\n\n878\n00:44:01.840 --> 00:44:05.470\nAnd and this and breaking through which by the way is harder and harder these\n\n879\n00:44:05.470 --> 00:44:05.840\ndays\n\n880\n00:44:05.840 --> 00:44:08.880\nTo break through in any kind of messaging\n\n881\n00:44:08.880 --> 00:44:11.760\nActually challenging them and giving them tough feedback\n\n882\n00:44:11.760 --> 00:44:15.360\nWhen they need tough effect to kind of try to stretch a little bit more in the\n\n883\n00:44:15.360 --> 00:44:15.680\npast\n\n884\n00:44:15.680 --> 00:44:19.600\nThere was that 30-second tv commercial that would really drive the sales\n\n885\n00:44:19.680 --> 00:44:23.370\nAnd I know it has huge impact even today when people think people aren't\n\n886\n00:44:23.370 --> 00:44:24.080\nwatching tv\n\n887\n00:44:24.080 --> 00:44:28.450\nIt's hard to believe when you see what happens when you put advertising on the\n\n888\n00:44:28.450 --> 00:44:28.720\nair\n\n889\n00:44:28.720 --> 00:44:33.770\nHow are you how are you thinking about media this day in terms of mainstream\n\n890\n00:44:33.770 --> 00:44:36.720\ntelevision versus the tick tox and you know\n\n891\n00:44:36.720 --> 00:44:40.610\nEverything else it's available to you mainstream media effectiveness has been\n\n892\n00:44:40.610 --> 00:44:44.800\ndeclining very very rapidly linear tv outside of live sports\n\n893\n00:44:44.960 --> 00:44:49.450\nLive sports and streaming has been holding but just that we're taking that down\n\n894\n00:44:49.450 --> 00:44:50.240\nless and less\n\n895\n00:44:50.240 --> 00:44:55.280\nWhat was working more and more is just influencers and social it is absolutely\n\n896\n00:44:55.280 --> 00:44:59.760\nFascinating how quickly that can move the needle and we like that because we\n\n897\n00:44:59.760 --> 00:45:01.440\nthink we have great products\n\n898\n00:45:01.440 --> 00:45:06.320\nAnd so if you have good products, then that's that works very very well\n\n899\n00:45:06.320 --> 00:45:10.600\nAnd um, it also works well for some smaller brands, but we continue to dial\n\n900\n00:45:10.600 --> 00:45:11.360\nback linear\n\n901\n00:45:12.000 --> 00:45:15.280\ndial-up social dial-up of influencers\n\n902\n00:45:15.280 --> 00:45:20.330\nuh, and it's working for us really really well and how have you restructured or\n\n903\n00:45:20.330 --> 00:45:21.680\norganized to really go after\n\n904\n00:45:21.680 --> 00:45:25.120\nthe influencers and and and being you know\n\n905\n00:45:25.120 --> 00:45:28.080\nworld-classed social\n\n906\n00:45:28.080 --> 00:45:31.120\nYeah, so we have our demand generation group centralized\n\n907\n00:45:31.120 --> 00:45:36.390\nThe brands have influence in that and so and then we have a group that actually\n\n908\n00:45:36.390 --> 00:45:39.360\nmanages influencers with people within that group\n\n909\n00:45:39.600 --> 00:45:43.240\nDedicated the brand. So what that lets us do particularly now is share learn\n\n910\n00:45:43.240 --> 00:45:43.520\nings\n\n911\n00:45:43.520 --> 00:45:48.070\nAcross and we're using a few different influencer agencies and so right now we\n\n912\n00:45:48.070 --> 00:45:49.520\n're testing which one works best\n\n913\n00:45:49.520 --> 00:45:51.680\nAnd that's part of the top line or meeting on friday\n\n914\n00:45:51.680 --> 00:45:55.610\nA lot of the conversation is we did this last week with these group of influ\n\n915\n00:45:55.610 --> 00:45:57.920\nencers and it worked or vice versa\n\n916\n00:45:57.920 --> 00:46:00.480\nit didn't work and so you should try that and\n\n917\n00:46:00.480 --> 00:46:04.200\nWhat's great about that is you can kind of turn on a dime if you will from an\n\n918\n00:46:04.200 --> 00:46:05.840\ninfluencer standpoint where as you know\n\n919\n00:46:06.320 --> 00:46:09.360\nYou know the big old-fashioned marketing campaigns if it wasn't working\n\n920\n00:46:09.360 --> 00:46:12.400\nYou kind of had to wait a until next month to change it, right?\n\n921\n00:46:12.400 --> 00:46:17.650\nAbsolutely. Yeah, it's the speed is everything now and how much is just speed\n\n922\n00:46:17.650 --> 00:46:19.200\nand sense of urgency\n\n923\n00:46:19.200 --> 00:46:21.840\nSomething that you work hard at driving\n\n924\n00:46:21.840 --> 00:46:25.840\nWe'll talk a lot about that. I've got to be able to pivot very very quickly\n\n925\n00:46:25.840 --> 00:46:27.520\nparticularly over the past several years\n\n926\n00:46:27.520 --> 00:46:30.800\nRight. This has been a very very dynamic business environment\n\n927\n00:46:31.200 --> 00:46:34.800\nParticularly coming out of covet and things that used to work aren't\n\n928\n00:46:34.800 --> 00:46:36.960\nnecessarily working in the same way anymore\n\n929\n00:46:36.960 --> 00:46:41.060\nSo we've got to set ourselves up in a way to pivot not be throwing stuff\n\n930\n00:46:41.060 --> 00:46:43.440\nagainst the wall necessarily to see what six\n\n931\n00:46:43.440 --> 00:46:48.470\nBut it you know be able to pivot very quickly that means sometimes shooting\n\n932\n00:46:48.470 --> 00:46:50.000\nvarious options on marketing campaigns\n\n933\n00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:53.850\nThat means working with franchisees to say we're going to run this for a couple\n\n934\n00:46:53.850 --> 00:46:54.240\nof weeks\n\n935\n00:46:54.240 --> 00:46:56.320\nBut here's the backup plan if that's not working\n\n936\n00:46:56.320 --> 00:46:59.770\nLet's get that pre-approved so we don't have to actually sit and go through the\n\n937\n00:46:59.770 --> 00:47:02.080\nstandard approval processes to pivot\n\n938\n00:47:02.080 --> 00:47:04.160\nYou know midpoint during the window\n\n939\n00:47:04.160 --> 00:47:07.840\nUm, and you know, it's a muscle that we learned pretty well over the past\n\n940\n00:47:07.840 --> 00:47:08.560\nseveral years\n\n941\n00:47:08.560 --> 00:47:10.800\nYou know, well one of the things that\n\n942\n00:47:10.800 --> 00:47:15.010\nYou know when they people talk about leadership, it's one thing when you have\n\n943\n00:47:15.010 --> 00:47:17.760\ncontrol and power of over somebody per se\n\n944\n00:47:17.760 --> 00:47:22.810\nOkay to be able to to lead them. It's another when you don't have all the power\n\n945\n00:47:22.810 --> 00:47:23.200\nyou have to\n\n946\n00:47:23.920 --> 00:47:27.360\nHave indirect influence and you you you deal with these\n\n947\n00:47:27.360 --> 00:47:33.600\nHuge franchise networks where they run their business and they're paying you a\n\n948\n00:47:33.600 --> 00:47:33.920\nfee\n\n949\n00:47:33.920 --> 00:47:40.900\nAnd that fee is expected to drive the top line. You know, how do you how what\n\n950\n00:47:40.900 --> 00:47:41.760\nhave you learned about\n\n951\n00:47:41.760 --> 00:47:44.560\nleading\n\n952\n00:47:44.560 --> 00:47:49.610\nTeams that you don't have the direct influence on it. It's more of an indirect\n\n953\n00:47:49.610 --> 00:47:50.000\ninfluence saying\n\n954\n00:47:50.560 --> 00:47:54.440\nHow do you think about that? I think you have to be a really good listener. I\n\n955\n00:47:54.440 --> 00:47:56.640\nthink you have to start by\n\n956\n00:47:56.640 --> 00:48:01.360\nUnderstanding their perspective listening to them. By the way, they have a lot\n\n957\n00:48:01.360 --> 00:48:02.000\nof great ideas\n\n958\n00:48:02.000 --> 00:48:04.320\nRight and so and if you come in\n\n959\n00:48:04.320 --> 00:48:07.920\nAnd i've seen people fail in this business where you come in just telling\n\n960\n00:48:07.920 --> 00:48:08.640\npeople what it is\n\n961\n00:48:08.640 --> 00:48:11.600\nOr you walk into the room at the franchisee advisory meeting\n\n962\n00:48:11.600 --> 00:48:14.480\nAnd you throw it up and say here's the plan for next month\n\n963\n00:48:14.480 --> 00:48:18.770\nVersus starting out and having a conversation you may end up ultimately still\n\n964\n00:48:18.770 --> 00:48:19.920\ngetting to the same place\n\n965\n00:48:20.480 --> 00:48:24.080\nRight or with a few tweaks, but a lot of it's just the style\n\n966\n00:48:24.080 --> 00:48:29.440\nAnd because these individuals are very successful at their business and they\n\n967\n00:48:29.440 --> 00:48:32.810\nProbably know the front line a lot better. What's happening on the front line\n\n968\n00:48:32.810 --> 00:48:33.840\nbetter than I do certainly\n\n969\n00:48:33.840 --> 00:48:36.800\nRight and so i've got to take that into account\n\n970\n00:48:36.800 --> 00:48:39.360\nYou've got you mentioned earlier\n\n971\n00:48:39.360 --> 00:48:42.080\nIf you add the world cup you take your wife you're two kids, you know\n\n972\n00:48:42.080 --> 00:48:45.940\nWhat's something that you've picked up at work that you you've taken into your\n\n973\n00:48:45.940 --> 00:48:47.200\npersonal life and you know\n\n974\n00:48:47.840 --> 00:48:49.840\nThat's helped you become\n\n975\n00:48:49.840 --> 00:48:53.250\nAn even more effective leader at home. Well, one thing i've learned is that i\n\n976\n00:48:53.250 --> 00:48:55.280\nam definitely not the ceo of my home\n\n977\n00:48:55.280 --> 00:49:00.020\nAnd so if i so if i go home acting like the ceo of a home, that's not going to\n\n978\n00:49:00.020 --> 00:49:00.560\ngo up very well\n\n979\n00:49:00.560 --> 00:49:05.760\nQuite honestly i've learned as you have to end business around\n\n980\n00:49:05.760 --> 00:49:09.940\nWhat can you influence and spend the time and energy on things that you can\n\n981\n00:49:09.940 --> 00:49:12.480\ninfluence then what are others better at doing than you\n\n982\n00:49:12.480 --> 00:49:15.680\nAnd let them actually manage it so that to kind of division\n\n983\n00:49:16.560 --> 00:49:17.440\nI\n\n984\n00:49:17.440 --> 00:49:21.490\nTend to like to control things like a lot of people so i've had to learn not to\n\n985\n00:49:21.490 --> 00:49:23.040\nnecessarily approach it that way\n\n986\n00:49:23.040 --> 00:49:28.470\nAnd i'm sure i'm sure your wife is a very good truth teller every now and then\n\n987\n00:49:28.470 --> 00:49:28.640\nright\n\n988\n00:49:28.640 --> 00:49:31.760\nAnd the kids are even better absolutely\n\n989\n00:49:31.760 --> 00:49:35.840\nWell, you're lucky to have such a great family, you know\n\n990\n00:49:35.840 --> 00:49:38.880\nWhat do you see is your your unfinished business?\n\n991\n00:49:38.880 --> 00:49:43.930\nI think there's still opportunity for inspire to grow certainly organically but\n\n992\n00:49:43.930 --> 00:49:44.080\neven\n\n993\n00:49:44.160 --> 00:49:47.600\nInorganically over time, I think we are building something very special here\n\n994\n00:49:47.600 --> 00:49:52.560\nAnd I think there's a lot of opportunity in this industry for continued change\n\n995\n00:49:52.560 --> 00:49:56.720\nAnd we want to be at the forefront of it the timing of that is obviously very\n\n996\n00:49:56.720 --> 00:49:57.200\nvariable\n\n997\n00:49:57.200 --> 00:50:00.390\nBut we think that I feel really good about the fact that we've built something\n\n998\n00:50:00.390 --> 00:50:03.990\nthat is very sustainable and very differentiated and will add lots of value\n\n999\n00:50:03.990 --> 00:50:04.720\nover time\n\n1000\n00:50:04.720 --> 00:50:10.960\nAnd that will obviously turn into increased shareholder value as well. So, you\n\n1001\n00:50:10.960 --> 00:50:12.560\nknow, i've been at this for a while\n\n1002\n00:50:12.560 --> 00:50:14.800\nBut I still feel like we're very early in the journey\n\n1003\n00:50:14.800 --> 00:50:19.360\nA lot of exciting things ahead of us and I have one last question for you here\n\n1004\n00:50:19.360 --> 00:50:23.850\nIt's what's one piece of advice you'd give to anyone who wants to be a better\n\n1005\n00:50:23.850 --> 00:50:24.400\nleader\n\n1006\n00:50:24.400 --> 00:50:26.800\nIt's all about the people it's all about\n\n1007\n00:50:26.800 --> 00:50:30.410\nAttracting the right people it's about retaining the right people and it's\n\n1008\n00:50:30.410 --> 00:50:31.600\nhelping set them up for\n\n1009\n00:50:31.600 --> 00:50:33.600\nSuccess\n\n1010\n00:50:33.600 --> 00:50:38.130\nAnd sometimes hopefully not frequently you know making the hard decisions about\n\n1011\n00:50:38.130 --> 00:50:39.600\npeople that are not part of the team\n\n1012\n00:50:39.600 --> 00:50:42.680\nAnd it's not just about the individuals, but it's about getting those\n\n1013\n00:50:42.680 --> 00:50:46.240\nindividuals to work together as a team in a collaborative way\n\n1014\n00:50:46.240 --> 00:50:51.680\nAnd that second part I think oftentimes is harder than the first part, right?\n\n1015\n00:50:51.680 --> 00:50:55.280\nFinding great people is hard but getting those great individuals to work\n\n1016\n00:50:55.280 --> 00:50:57.440\ntogether and be better together than they are individually\n\n1017\n00:50:57.440 --> 00:51:01.200\nI think actually is harder. Yeah, that's that's some tough flooding and\n\n1018\n00:51:01.200 --> 00:51:04.950\nParticularly when you've got a business like yours where you've got these\n\n1019\n00:51:04.950 --> 00:51:05.760\nindependent brands\n\n1020\n00:51:06.080 --> 00:51:10.160\nIndependent franchisees and and you're trying to find that balance between the\n\n1021\n00:51:10.160 --> 00:51:12.400\ncentralization and decentralization\n\n1022\n00:51:12.400 --> 00:51:16.170\nBut I have to tell you you're obviously doing it very well because you're you\n\n1023\n00:51:16.170 --> 00:51:17.920\n're winning in the marketplace and\n\n1024\n00:51:17.920 --> 00:51:23.920\nYou've got a great approach that I admire and respect and I want to thank you\n\n1025\n00:51:23.920 --> 00:51:28.400\nfor sharing your insights on this show and and wish you continued success\n\n1026\n00:51:28.400 --> 00:51:32.240\nThank you again. It means so much coming from you David. Appreciate it\n\n1027\n00:51:36.960 --> 00:51:37.760\nI\n\n1028\n00:51:37.760 --> 00:51:41.360\nLike Paul learned early in his career. It's easy to over complicate your\n\n1029\n00:51:41.360 --> 00:51:41.920\nmarketing\n\n1030\n00:51:41.920 --> 00:51:46.970\nBut the best message is get right to the point just like we have the meets does\n\n1031\n00:51:46.970 --> 00:51:47.680\nfor Arby's\n\n1032\n00:51:47.680 --> 00:51:52.160\nPaul said it himself. It's getting harder and harder to break through the noise\n\n1033\n00:51:52.160 --> 00:51:57.030\nThat's why leaders have to know how to sell what they sell clearly directly and\n\n1034\n00:51:57.030 --> 00:51:57.920\nwith confidence\n\n1035\n00:51:57.920 --> 00:52:01.680\nThis week take a fresh look at a recent piece of marketing\n\n1036\n00:52:01.680 --> 00:52:05.760\nTogether with your team ask if it clearly sells what you sell\n\n1037\n00:52:06.560 --> 00:52:10.540\nAnd if not, how could you sharpen it to be even more direct about what makes\n\n1038\n00:52:10.540 --> 00:52:11.920\nyour brand special\n\n1039\n00:52:11.920 --> 00:52:16.060\nSo do you want to know how leaders lead? Well, we learned today is the great\n\n1040\n00:52:16.060 --> 00:52:18.240\nleaders know how to sell what they sell\n\n1041\n00:52:18.240 --> 00:52:22.000\nComing up next on how leaders lead is Sarah Gibson Tuttle\n\n1042\n00:52:22.000 --> 00:52:27.120\nFounder and CEO of the popular nail polish brand all of in june\n\n1043\n00:52:27.120 --> 00:52:31.690\nSo be sure to subscribe on youtube or wherever you get your podcast so you don\n\n1044\n00:52:31.690 --> 00:52:32.400\n't miss it\n\n1045\n00:52:33.120 --> 00:52:36.720\nThanks again for tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead where every\n\n1046\n00:52:36.720 --> 00:52:37.280\nThursday\n\n1047\n00:52:37.280 --> 00:52:41.000\nYou get to listen in while I interview some of the very best leaders in the\n\n1048\n00:52:41.000 --> 00:52:41.360\nworld\n\n1049\n00:52:41.360 --> 00:52:45.430\nI make it a point to give you something simple on each episode that you can\n\n1050\n00:52:45.430 --> 00:52:46.640\napply to your business\n\n1051\n00:52:46.640 --> 00:52:49.360\nSo that you will become the best leader you can be\n","is_pinned",false,"pinned_at","is_featured","featured_at","mix_url","https://chtbl.com/track/DCB44F/traffic.megaphone.fm/DVL5910555230.mp3","dx_media_id",2488,"video_media_id","thumbnail_image_media_id","published_date","2025-09-25","itunes_episode_id",258,"youtube_id","8apAteeq_6c","2025-09-25T15:48:40.000000Z","dx_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/iRczyQrOfyqw8OZpqraIsnsCZD0QeJiK8VOfM4Fr.mp3","dx_filename","iRczyQrOfyqw8OZpqraIsnsCZD0QeJiK8VOfM4Fr.mp3","dx_mux_playback_id","nNA9y7w01d9O9pTnzitvBEuugGiAHdV0216GxWyqAGzac","dx_waveform_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/waveforms/2488.json","video_url","video_mux_playback_id","duration",3169950,"thumbnail_url","https://img.youtube.com/vi/8apAteeq_6c/maxresdefault.jpg","thumbnail_image_url","dx_media",{"_13":66,"_95":79,"_96":77,"_97":-5,"_31":81,"_33":98,"_99":-5,"_100":83,"_86":87,"_101":-5},"video_media","thumbnail_image_media","filename","url","status","qU5b67Acjiu00937nwesFBd02OVsGWZrEOhLMPYI01rWaU","mux_upload_id","waveform_url","preview_media_id","first_name","Paul","last_name","Brown","job_title","Inspire Brands, Cofounder and CEO","Paul Brown, CEO, Inspire Brands, QSR, restaurant, Arby’s, portfolio company","external_links","https://www.linkedin.com/in/brownpaulj",0,"image_media_id",2481,2482,"2026-07-20T20:43:17.000000Z","send_push_notification_at","image_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/b2fhdgBXeRjKyWUBHMUBcizED8IlN4PXwDeWurxa.jpg","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/8DkWXlT9D3iVuBFRtdNWMbpqitiSuhHUs71dzBbS.jpg","https://www.howleaderslead.com/leaders/246/paul-brown","industry_id",8,"industry",{"_13":122,"_133":134,"_135":137},"industries",[132],"image_media",{"_13":113,"_95":131,"_96":118,"_97":-5,"_31":-5,"_33":-5,"_99":-5,"_100":-5,"_86":-5,"_101":-5},{"_13":114,"_95":130,"_96":119,"_97":-5,"_31":-5,"_33":-5,"_99":-5,"_100":-5,"_86":-5,"_101":-5},"8DkWXlT9D3iVuBFRtdNWMbpqitiSuhHUs71dzBbS.jpg","b2fhdgBXeRjKyWUBHMUBcizED8IlN4PXwDeWurxa.jpg",{"_13":122,"_133":134,"_135":136},"name","Food and Bev","pivot",{"_35":36,"_121":122},{"_35":36,"_121":122},"user","token","favorites",[],"collections",[],"env",{"_146":147,"_148":149,"_150":151,"_152":153,"_154":155},"GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID","644017954836-qpllhu38r0tsrtfq85ukntcvsb0akbht.apps.googleusercontent.com","APPLE_CLIENT_ID","com.howleaderslead.webapp","APPLE_REDIRECT_URI","https://www.howleaderslead.com/auth/apple-callback","APP_URL","https://howleaderslead.com","GTM_ID",""]