Panera Founder Ron Shaich

0:00 I've done this now. Over half a century. I was part of building bakery cafes in America between Old Bon Pen Panera. These were of the dominant brands. How do you develop the long term thinking that you've brought to all these different concepts. I have an expression. I'm long term greedy, not short term stupid. Now it seems so obvious, but how did you hit on this insight at the time? I think that the most powerful skill.

0:24 that I have as a business person and what I would Challenge entrepreneurs. to acquire. Is the skill of talk to me about the difficulties of running a business, the family costs, the social costs.

0:38 Doing anything. That's takes powerful commitment. That commitment owns you. You don't own it. There's a Very real personal price.

0:47 I've been married twice. It's not something I'm proud of. Everything I believe in. About business.

0:55 Starts with Three words. What are you obsessed with lately? My health.

1:07 Actually what does that mean for you to be obsessed with that? Well Um Seventy one. And I look at my kids, I look at

1:15 My relationships and There's so much to live for and so much to see and I really wanna do everything I can. Every opportunity to

1:27 Live And see. How the world unfolds. And how has that changed your behaviors? I got more serious about it.

1:35 Because I would say And my Earlier years, thirties, forties, and fifties. I was probably more focused on work and

1:44 Relationships. Family. And as I began Gain perspective on it. If I'm ever gonna do it, now's the time. So I'm

1:53 Trying to Every day. In some serious way and Really

2:00 E well take the right medication supplements, anything I can to to help myself. Uh but to me that's about an attitude towards life. And that attitude essentially starts with a view Um

2:14 That's It's our responsibility. to figure out what it is that we're gonna respect. In the future. I tell it by way of a story. My

2:23 I watch my mom and dad pass away. Yeah. Thirty odd years ago. One of them died very much at peace, the other Not so much at peace.

2:32 And they really were second guessing some of the decisions they've made in their lives. And I began to realize there's a judgment day. I can't tell you, Shane, it's up there. That's a personal spiritual decision. But I can tell you if you if you have a chronic illness and you have the opportunity You have a judgment day, a self judgment as you go through the uh the end of life. And watching them die thirty years ago, I concluded

2:57 For me. I wanted that opportunity To have that judgment day, not in the ninth inning with two outs. Button up. Seventh inning, the fifth inning, the third inning when I could really do something about it.

3:08 And ever since I began on an annual basis sitting down and saying What is it in five years, and ten years? I'm gonna respect. in the context of my relationships with my work

3:21 My relationships with my Family and friends. My relationships with my body. and my own relationships with my my own spirituality. And so that process of defining what I'll respect is where I began and

3:36 And I would then on a Basically Um codify those.

3:45 I'd codify them. Into projects. And then Literally sit down with myself once a quarter and say, How am I doing? Am I actually

3:54 full of baloney or or not? Am I actually getting done what I signed up to do? And so increasingly Over time, bring it back, I have Found myself. Realizing that I

4:07 have to do a better job of caring for my body and that The power of exercise, the power of physical engagement really matters and I think I feel better About that relationship. today than probably at any other point in my life.

4:21 Take me through one of those quarterly reviews. What does that look like to you? Do you like pull up your calendar and look at how you're spending your time? Do you Yes, we look at time, but it's not so much about time. Time is that. is a means, it's not the the end.

4:36 Uh I'm really looking what did I get done? Did I get done? the things that I said I needed to do. To create That conditions.

4:46 that I'm trying to attain in three, five, and ten years. So I give you a very specific example and we're staying in the health domain. I think it was probably

4:56 Fifteen years ago. I When to my doctor and I realized I was On the edge of becoming pre diabetic.

5:04 Uh I was also doing work at Panera. And uh I had a medical advisor helping me w deal with How our food manifested itself and we wanted to really serve people.

5:16 We had done a clean food initiative. And He put me on a continuous glucose monitor. And he wanted me to see how I was affected by Panera food. And and that whole experience between my doctor

5:30 And this work I was doing Panera. made me realize I needed to manage my own relationship with carbohydrates, my own relationship with my diet. And that led me to To say hey. If you're ever gonna do this, I was at that time.

5:44 Yeah. Mid fifties. I said if I'm ever gonna do that I gotta get to work on doing it. And I then

5:52 Uh in my case to to move to a a more vegan diet. Another piece of that was to hire a trainer. And I hired a

6:04 Ukrainian uh former Olympic trainer. Track and field coach. who uh would come to my house at five thirty in the morning. And did so for for twelve years. And so What I'm really saying is

6:16 I'm trying to no nobody knows where we're gonna end up, but I'm trying to create a state. And then the question is, what are the projects the things I can do to do that. And then to sit down and say, every quarter, how am I doing against that? So now we're fifteen years later. I still wear that continuous glucose monitor. My blood sugar is

6:36 You know, lone normal. Um but it's a way in which I I I keep the data and I've I've I've become educated. It's a it's an ongoing project. Um same thing now with exercise. I have a Different trainer. Um I've evolved, but I I'm really trying hard now.

6:53 to push up my VO two max as opposed to Simply my By strength and um But but again, all these are project

7:05 Against an end of trying to keep to r recognize it's my responsibility to care for myself. And nobody knows how this is all gonna play out and whether I will remain healthy or not, or any of us will. But I can do what I can do. and on a regular basis.

7:21 I'm sitting there. I and I'm I'm literally writing it down. I'm really saying this is where I'm trying to get to. And then I am literally writing it down. It's controversial when I talk to people about exercising every day. People are like, You're crazy. You need rest and I'm like, It's easier to exercise every day than it is five days a week for me anyway. Yeah, I'm committed to it every day.

7:42 And in fact what I did Again, part of that project is I m I set an appointment for eight A. M. every day. And I do it. With a trainer or myself.

7:53 But I'm there. Eight AM. And I get it done before the day begins, basically. Yeah. And and you know, I've I've started to be a little more um kind to myself I'm not doing it five thirty AM anymore. But I still I wanna get it done before the day starts because if it's really important

8:09 It's one of the key things I'm trying to drive and it's one of the projects I'm focused on. Then I have to make sure I make time. But the wisdom that you have now looking back and and building Au Bon Pan and Panera, which I want to get into in in detail. Do you wish you would have Placed more of an emphasis on your Health. Back then.

8:29 Yes. But I have to put that in context as well. Okay. I'm seventy one. I couldn't feel more blessed.

8:36 I've had uh an amazing life. I've had great health. I'm still in the prime of my life. Uh I have uh extraordinary family I I I've had.

8:47 um the chance to do really interesting work and impact. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of of people. I've been able to engage my mind I've

8:59 to live a blessed life. I look backwards and There are certainly lessons I've learned and things I might do differently. But taken as a whole.

9:10 I couldn't be more at peace and more pleased. Does it change how you think about sort of food and the experience that you're creating for people in the restaurant. Like I think of something like True Food Kitchen, which is a very health conscious sort of restaurant. H how does it change how you think about serving millions of Americans every day? I've always

9:33 Come from a place. of wanting to make a difference in people's lives. My way of approaching the world was Essentially initially in a political context. And I

9:44 discovered through some experiences and University. And we can talk about these but but I discovered that Business?

9:52 It's probably one of the most creative things you can ever do. And for a a kid who couldn't dance and couldn't sing, I was I was By the power of business. Both the creativity of it.

10:04 And it is a lever to change. I think I've been involved in more change as a business person. More positive change for the world than I ever could have been If I had done politics or gone into government or been a lawyer. I mean you take

10:19 Panera. Panera was one of the two frigate. first brands to introduce the antibiotic free chicken in America, it led to changing the marketplaces to challenge a brand in doing so. We actually opened up the market, lowered the prices, and in came all Yeah, everybody from McDonald's to Chick-fil-A. We were the

10:39 Among the first people to remove trans fats. um from our menu, um in the in the early What eight. Yeah. the US government wanted to post caloric information.

10:51 Um the industry was fighting it. In intensely. Publicly said, Look at You know, wha what what's the problem with this industry? If people are afraid of of posting caloric information what's in their food

11:03 Maybe the answer isn't trying to hide it. Maybe the answer is to actually change what you got in your food if you think people aren't gonna be too pleased with that. We were in the lead. uh and and had the opportunity to be one of the first Large organizations. To remove all artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners.

11:21 Preservatives. really to to push for what is now called clean food. Uh removing the ultra. Processing. And I I I know.

11:31 That we've made a difference. Um I also think we've made a difference in in in in the food culture. When I grew up the only choices were Fast food and fine dining. In the early nineties is I think

11:43 You and maybe some of your listeners now. We really developed the ideology that became what is called today fast casual. Wasn't very complicated. we we we began to

11:56 to look around and could see. It's been ninety two, ninety three. That One out of three consumers, one out of four consumers. held their noses when they went into fast food.

12:07 Yeah. And you said, What is it that they're looking for? Yeah, I know we spent a year or Two on the road listening to people. And what you heard.

12:15 was that so many of these consumers What they really thought. Environments that engage them, served by people that that cared. And they actually wanted an experience that

12:27 Elevated their sense of self. Not depleted it, which is what they experienced in fast food. And we began to say, if we could create that kind of environment Um we we could create something that that actually Elevated people.

12:43 And that this was a powerful opportunity. Now I was trying to figure it out for my own company But that ideology, that view of the world which it In the early nineties nobody thought would ever work. that became the ideology that fuel what's called fast casual today, which is a three hundred and fifty billion dollar

13:02 Um Panair became the poster child for it. Uh Howard Schultz and Starbucks played a similar kind of Um Paradigm, Stevelles and Chipotle. And I think together you saw the the evolution of food culture. I'm I'm so pleased. One of the things that we did

13:19 Was just say. Fo was about so much more than what you put in your stomach and how cheap it was. Food industry is the second oldest profession. And it's about hospitality at its core. You know, the idea that we could create environments that people actually wanted to sit in.

13:35 And invite'em to to come in and enjoy it. And find it as a place where you where you really did want to Have an interview, gather the soccer moms, have a Bible study group. Write the great American novel. I mean all of these were experiences that played out.

13:51 in environments that we created. And to me, it That was uh a a beautiful contribution to people's lives. If you're a founder, you know naming your startup takes forever. You finally land on the perfect name only to find out that Peter from Delaware got to the dot com first. So you're stuck with two bad options, pay up and fund Peter's retirement, or tack on random words until your domain looks like a wifi password.

14:16 But after all the time and money spent on naming, you don't want that. And thanks to dot tech domains, you don't have to. With that tech, you get the name you actually want. It's clean, sharp, no compromises. It instantly tells investors and customers that you're building technology. CES dot tech, the world's biggest consumer tech event, uses dot tech domain. So does 1X dot tech. An open AI backed startup along with hundreds of thousands of tech companies worldwide. So don't waste another minute negotiating.

14:47 go to GoDaddy, Namecheap, Cloudflare, or wherever you buy your domains and get your dot tech domain today. The holidays are here. If you're searching for a truly meaningful gift for someone you care about or maybe for yourself, I might just have the perfect idea. Meet Remarkable, the paper tablet. We're all glued to screens that demand our constant attention, but remarkable is a different kind of screen.

15:12 It's an elegantly designed distraction free paper tablet built to help you think better and focus deeper. It has the simplicity and feel of writing on paper, but with the power of technology like organizing all your notes and ideas into one place, and even converting your handwriting into type text. With Remarkable, there are no ops, no social media, and no notifications, just pure uninterrupted focus. Choose the device that fits your needs. The original black and white remarkable too. the advanced color display of Remarkable Paper Pro, or the new portable Remarkable Paper Pro move.

15:48 This holiday season give the gift of being present. Give the gift of focus. Find the perfect distraction free paper tablet at remarkable. dot com.

15:58 It's remarkable. I mean looking back now it seems so obvious, but how did you hit on this insight at the time? I think that the most powerful skill that I have As a business person and what I would Challenge entrepreneurs. to acquire is the skill of empathy.

16:15 Empathy is about the ability to Climb into somebody else's brain. to feel what they're feeling and to see what they're feeling. And not sell them. But understand and appreciate them.

16:27 And I think that Historically we've had Those kinds of skills. I mean, I think it's a good thing You know, when you talk about My career you talk about

16:36 Often the financial results you have Kava. Which has been the most successful food service. IPO the last. Five years, arguably. Now uh

16:46 Come worth Seven billion dollars. Was it worth as much as Fifteen billion, but it's up. Three, fourfold from its IPO. Year and a half ago.

16:56 Um you talk about Panera. Panera was the best performing restaurant stock. Over two decades. its last two decades, um, produced twenty five percent IRR. Uh

17:08 fact somebody told me we we actually beat uh Mormon Buffett in Berkshire half the way. You know, people talk about the financial Performance but that's not the part that gets me excited. That's not the part that I actually feel. That's a byproduct or manifestation of what really was exciting, which is

17:25 Learning And transforming. And so Over the course of Our history.

17:31 And I can I can take you through this, but there were three or four, maybe five Key learnings that broke maybe every five years. That led to massive transformation. And it was Actually getting that.

17:44 And figuring it out. And seeing it and tasting it? That I loved. Um that to me was where the real work was, the to understand that with empathy, what the opportunity was, and And then to have the the the discipline to go in

18:00 Not just to understand it, but actually Build that into an organization and put that in place. And we can go all the way back. Two. The initiation of my career. I started it

18:11 With a single cookie store in downtown Boston? That Cookie store. A lead to um

18:19 An opportunity. To become involved in another company? Colo Bom Pen. Essentially there were fifty thousand people a day walking by that store. The cookie store. The cookie store. Nobody bought cookies before twelve noon.

18:32 So we made a decision. Um to put in French bake goods. We became a licensee of this company called Au Bonpin. I didn't know at that time, but Au Bon Pin was really a French bread manufacturer. Um they had opened Thirteen stories enclosed ten of them.

18:47 had about three million in debt were Functionally bankrupt. And uh I became their licensee in this one square block area in downtown Boston. And I I can tell you As an operator. I know which of my vendors are any good and which aren't.

19:01 They were so out of control. Sometimes they billed me, sometimes they didn't, sometimes they delivered, sometimes they didn't. I'm sure to this day I still owe money. But the point of the story is simply to say they had a lot of issues. I saw the opportunity to apply what I'd learned in the cookie business and to the French bakery business and it led to a merger. Ah, we took sixty percent of the company.

19:22 And they kept Forty percent and then split it up. That company, Obompin Coinc, which we formed, was my cookie store, and their three French bakeries, was the company we ended up literally selling for seven point eight billion dollars in twenty seventeen. But the point of the story is that

19:40 First thing that we actually really figured out. Was the possibility the opportunity the of what O'Bompen represented.

19:49 And I wouldn't be working on the counter. And customers would walk in and say, I want that baguette. And I say sure, and they say, Slice it. I start to slice it. You know how you slice bread, you slice it like this. And they say, No, slice it from top to bottom.

20:04 I do so. And I hand him the the baguette machine. And they Pull out a little bag from a Supermarket.

20:12 Put some Bourzon and roast beef on or smoked turkey. And again you didn't have to be a marketing whiz. To say wait a second. What they really care about the job they want is a sandwich, a They want something.

20:26 It's not the cosana bread they want itself. It's how that forms a platform for something else. And we began to say maybe the opportunity, the job we wanted to the that the customer wanted to hire us for was actually to make'em The sandwich. Make him the salad, use the croissant bread. As a platform.

20:45 And straight up. Um again doesn't seem like a Revelation now. But we began to rebuild this concept around that idea. And

20:55 Very quickly this burning. broken bankrupt company old Bon Penn started taking off. And when we were selling sandwiches and and in croissant, it was an elevated food experience. People loved it. And this broken down little company in the course of six, eight years took off.

21:12 Uh it became a uh Category. in balls across North America. We had everybody from Pepsi and Sara Lee to Um attempt to

21:23 Take us on or Buy us out or take it. Take us out. By nineteen ninety one. The manifestation of that was we went public

21:31 As opposed to just a French bakery. That was one learning. That that observation That empathetic observation was

21:43 Of the power which Of Not as an end in and of itself, but as a platform that led to uh Powerfully successful concept.

21:52 The same thing happened again by ninety three, the Oh Bon Penn. was beginning to run out of Organic growth. And the one thing if you're in a public company and I've been

22:03 involved in any number of public companies. most of its valuation is generated by its possibility of growth. And you have to actually deliver that. I know it was very clear to me in the n early nineties that O Bon Pem was limited in his growth. It was great in Boston, New York.

22:21 D C, Chicago, but it didn't work in the malls in LA. It didn't work in the malls in in Missouri. And we ended up backward integrating. And We Ended up.

22:33 building a big international business. We said if we're the best United States at high density urban feeding, there's or more opportunities abroad than just the United States. We also began building a manufacturing business with Uh I'd always had manufacturing skills and built what was the At that time the largest Frozen dough plant ever built in the the Midwest.

22:56 And then I I ended up buying a A little nineteen star chain in Saint Louis called the Saint Louis Bread Company. And I saw that again at that time as a a gateway to the suburban marketplace. So Bump would be urban. uh the Sainless Brake Company could be suburban And and and it was interesting. And it was that point, this would've been ninety three, ninety four, ninety five, I I ran it through an ear now.

23:21 I I began traveling the country with Guy named Scott Davis, another There were uh people that work with me, colleagues who I thought

23:33 You know. I learn from And we began Sh These consumers.

23:39 Who wanted something more. And it was very clear that there was this very distinct consumer niche out there that wanted something better. And we begin to to try to make sense of it. And again, you asked me how we did it. It was

23:54 Traveling into the West Coast, the East Coast, up to Vancouver and Canada, My Glasgow and Terbreads Amazing bread he was doing up there. And we're trying to find out who are the best people. Um

24:07 that were meeting customer needs and why were people smiling when they came out of there? And it was from that that we essentially began to get it. And I can I can I can remember. Um sitting in a in a bar. With

24:21 These two guys, Scott Davis and Dwight Jusin, and Dwight was my researcher, and Dwight said, You know? You really want to understand today's consumer. Look at their beer bottle. That label on it. is a mirror for who people perceive themselves to be.

24:36 And our opportunity is for our food. Yeah. To give people a sense of who they were. And what they are. To make sense of it.

24:46 And again, for me The the the The powerful theme here, Shane. is trying to search for what is the The signal versus the noise.

24:56 Um w you know, what really matters because there's all this stuff coming at you. But what are the deeper trends? And what had become clear to me that As I was Traveling the country and watching people.

25:09 and their angst around fast food. their need for speed, but their need for quality, their need for a a an experience that elevated them as I was doing that. I began to understand a deeper theme, but Post World War two all food was local. But you fast forward that then

25:26 nineteen ninety. Almost every major consumer category. had been commodified. It had been turned into an oligopoly. You can take beer It had all once been local beer. It was the Anheiser Bush and Miller.

25:39 You can take coffee. It was also again once local coffee roasters. That had morphed into um Folgers and and and and Maxwell House You can take um soft drinks. Uh once had been local soft drink.

25:55 Manufacturers that had become Coke and Pepsi. And every action draws reaction. And that's the deeper trend. And we began to see In different consumer categories, people waking up. And saying, You know, I don't wanna be part of a mass market. I wanna feel special

26:12 In a world in which I don't. And you started to see the development of craft breweries in beer. Good friend of mine in Boston, Jim Uh cook. Um did Samuel. Uh you know, it was an answer to what?

26:26 Um and have been to the marketplace. We saw the same thing with coffee with the growth of specialty coffee. I mean back then if you came to my house for dinner on Friday night, I'd serve you. Soldier. Today if I don't use a you know, an expensive espresso machine, I'm or an espresso, I'm somehow insulting you.

26:45 That was the deeper Trent. People wanted to feel special. You saw the same thing with beverages. Cochum Pepsi morphed into Snapple, into a Waldo. And now you walk into a convenience store, you're gonna see a couple hundred different beverage brands. The point of it is we saw the same thing, the same opportunity happening in food.

27:05 At one time all food had been local and had been commoditized into fast food and And the powerful opportunity of was for specialty food. For food that was done the way it had been done, for food that people respected with ingredients. And we began to see the power of that and saw the same thing happening with bakery.

27:25 One time bakery had all been local in the consolidation, the commodification, that had become three loaves for ninety nine cents. And by the early nineties, some consumers will wake up and saying, I want it done the way my grandparents did it. No chemicals, no preservatives. Stone deck ovens. There's a powerful opportunity in, shall we say, specialty food. And there's no more powerful platform to compete with that than a specialty bakery. And putting those two together

27:54 It became our manifestation. Of what? We could do us now called fast casual concept. And so again, same thing. I saw it. I could see it.

28:05 I could taste it. And it was the opportunity to go put that in place. We should come back to what the objective of all this is in a second. But that led to That second transformation was And the second transformation.

28:18 ultimately was the Apply those principles and Of a specialty food. Yeah. And I began to apply it to this one concept we held called Saint Louis Brake Company.

28:30 And we literally completely rebuilt it. We took that unit that was doing about a million dollars a a year. It was basically a a a s sandwich place in which the bread was the differentiator. And we added A breakfast business rooted in sourdough bagels. And the business popped from a million to a million two fifty. And then we came in and created a whole different environment.

28:53 For the store. A place that you wanted us at Uh wonderful, wonderful. Designer named Terry Heckler. Who actually did our logo and did the original Starbucks logo out of out of Seattle.

29:05 who's since passed away, but but he was instrumental in that. And we created a kind of environment. that welcomed you and invited you. I used to call it visual candy, wherever you sat. And we we we we softened the environment, we made it comfortable, we made it a place.

29:22 You want it to be. And we put that into place in our stores. Very quickly our volumes pop from a million two fifty up to a million seven fifty, and we began to understand that we were actually playing in another business that A gathering place business, offering an opportunity for a place people could go to. To touch base, to see each other, to connect soccer mobs, Bible groups, all

29:46 Pharma reps, folks doing interviews, people doing their taxes, and we created these environments, and again. This is the manifestation of this understanding that people wanted to feel special. In a world in which they didn't. And Panair became the poster child for that, and we built that out.

30:05 And that led to third learning and transformation. By ninety eight, ninety nine. I was feeling some real frustration. I was running a big public company. We had four divisions at that time, Au Bom Pen, O Bon Pen Manufacturing, O Bon Pen International, and this fourth division. St. Louis Bread Company that we had renamed Panera. That's a whole nother story why we did it. But it was renamera bread.

30:31 And um On a beach down in the Caribbean. With a friend. And I'm lamenting his friend. Yeah, everybody's fighting.

30:38 Everybody's angry at me. The guys at Old Bomb Penn are angry at me. Why am I trying to take their capital and Shift it to the This growth thing, Panera.

30:47 The guys in International didn't want to call home and the guys in manufacturer were trying to figure out why they were in a retail company. Any rate. We had professional managers in every one.

30:58 And and I was I said this strange, you know, the real The real shame here. This thing, Panera. Even though it's the third biggest of our companies, not the largest. It's not the name on the door. The name of the door was O Bon Pam.

31:09 That was the public company. I said this thing has the potential to be a nationally dominant company. For every thousand people say it, one ever makes it. And it was pretty clear that w we we had that opportunity. And I said and you know what, we're gonna screw it up.

31:23 We're not gonna give it the capital. We're not gonna give it the human resources. To get it where it needs to go. And my friend looked at me and said, Ron, what would you do? Yeah. The name of the company was Panera.

31:34 Panera owned. Everything else. How would that change the way you thought? I looked at my friend and I said, Wow. I never thought of it that way. If I had any guts, if I had if it was really Panera.

31:45 I would monetize every other asset. Take the financial capital. And I'd also take the human capital, the best people. And I'd go down there and I'd make this happen. Because the greatest Gem in this company was that division.

31:59 And the greatest risk to to its Possibility, it's potential. was that we didn't give it what it needed to actually grow and become what it could be. And I thought about it. I'm this kind of guy. If I say I'm gonna do it, I often go do it. I wanna live with myself. And I went off and

32:17 and and came back two months later and went to my board with a proposal to sell every other business and bet the whole thing on this banero bread division. You know, I didn't control the company at that point, and that was uh definitely a very tough situation. But ultimately Um they gave me the room to do it. I did it, it led to the worst year and a half of my life. I sold every other division. Uh these aren't just businesses, these were

32:41 Yeah, the old bone pen was my first child. My kids know that. You know, I mean it was a part of me. These were people I had sweated with and bled with and I loved The good news is most of them ultimately came back to work for us.

32:55 When their non competes were over. But we sold the the you know, O Bon Pen and Au Bon Pen International. We sold the manufacturing business. And by ninety nine. I ended up With

33:07 Panera bread. And a whole bunch of cash and and a business that had extraordinary potential. And then I went to work to help Make that happen. And we took it from what, a couple of hundred stores up to

33:19 Two thousand restaurants. Very close to it. By the end of that decade. And that led Again to the

33:26 The the next transformation. 'Cause they they come in waves. And by two thousand. A two thousand nine.

33:34 I personally was Feeling Yeah. I wanted transformation. I wanted to Understand

33:42 If you have a These powerful lessons I learned about long term thinking. and actually apply'em in a a broader civic society. I had been involved with

33:52 The Obama campaign. And there had been some discussion of of joining the administration And I was Unable to give him my commitment to Panera. And I decided I

34:04 I wanted to go do this in some way. And I also had a a desire to test out an idea I had been working on, which was something called Panera Cares. Cafes of shared responsibility where There would be no set prices. It was a test of humanity. People come in. And

34:22 But I wanted to test out these these cafes of shared responsibility. And so in two thousand eight, two thousand nine. I step down to see you. I tried to take that opportunity as jumping off a high dive board. to actually learn what it felt to go in the water. And I spent

34:39 About a year, a year and a half. Um creating Panera Care is doing a bunch of political things that was one of the eight or nine people that co founded a group called No Labels here in the United States. Which is

34:51 meant to reduce the hyperpartisanship in DC, the polarization and focus us on long term thinking. Again, you it's about seeing opportunity. I had the chance to To return. Um from the West Coast.

35:06 I was still the executive chairman of Panarin the largest shareholder. And I did a lot of the M and A work and some of the consumer work. And I came back From a trip after a weekend.

35:18 And I essentially Just said it I wanted to write a um a manifesto. I would compete with Panera if I weren't part of Panera. I would say how I would screw with Panera. But but how would you take it on? How would you best it?

35:32 And I essentially at that time called for for Complete digital access. Which didn't exist in the restaurant industry. We can talk more about that. I called for something called loyalty.

35:44 Which again didn't exist, it's become prevalent in the industry. Uh it had actually been developed in the UK with a company called Tesco and came through Kroger. in the United States where your best customers were treated different differently. I called for clean food, a different approach to eating and how you might eat. And I essentially call for on the channel.

36:05 And I I I handed in this Vision. um for a radical transformation of Panera to Bill Morten who'd become the CEO. And Bill was my very dear friend, twenty year colleague. And looked at me and said, Wow.

36:19 He said, I don't have anybody to work on this. Would you go work on it? I said, Yeah, I'll have some fun with him. And twenty five million dollars later in another year The the the executive chairman is working eighty hours a week on this vision. for how to have integrated technology change the guest experience. Change the the the whole deal.

36:39 I was loving it. I had none of the ceremonial duties of being a CEO. I didn't have to tell people what I just did. I don't have to tell them what I was gonna do. I just was dealing with the product. And um He personally had a problem.

36:52 He couldn't travel, something had happened in his family. And He said, Maybe we should make you CEO again and I should step down. And we Debated it'cause it wasn't what I wanted necessarily.

37:04 But it seemed to be necessary at a certain point. And maybe nine months or a year later we we executed that. We just swapped positions. He became executive vice chairman, and I became As CEO again. And I put this in place. And again.

37:20 It it all sounds lovely, but it led to the worst three years I can ever imagine. I had activist investors attack me. I spent a hundred and fifty million dollars on technology. I used to refer to technology as social security of Benera. It was only a matter of time till it was a hundred percent of our revenue.

37:38 I m that was we were really investing in it. And you didn't know where it would end. And we tr ended up having to transform everything. We transform not just Technology But we transformed how we how we dealt with the guest, what our our our concept essence was. Um we transformed

37:57 much of the senior management team this company had had had grown and its needs and its requirements. Ultimately this became one of the mo largest transformations in the industry and it took on a life of its own. And again, straight up I could see the opportunity for a better Panera. That was not competing the way it competed for the prior twenty years. But was competing against what the possibility was of what the consumer wanted. And then came the hard work of actually putting that into existence. And by

38:27 Two thousand seventeen. It was working our our Ebad was uh thirty five percent our Comstore sales were were pushing double digits. And we had a European money manager. Uh J B, who came along and fell in love with Panera.

38:44 And they wanted to buy it. And though I was never selling it, It wasn't my intention. Uh, you know, when somebody falls in love, who is it for me to deny them what they wanted if they were willing to pay for it.

38:56 And they They paid for it and what? At that time was the the largest or second largest US restaurant deal ever done. Seven point eight.

39:06 And among the highest multiples. And you know, again it seemed like An opportunity Two Harvest.

39:14 Everything that we had worked on. for a lot of people that had believed in us and we we took that opportunity. You know people talk a lot about product market fit sales tactics or pricing strategy. The truth is success in selling often comes down to something much simpler. The system behind the sale.

39:31 That's why I use and love ShopPay because nobody does selling better than Shopify. They've built the number one checkout on the planet, and with ShopPay, businesses see up to 50% higher conversions. That's not a rounding error, that's a game changer. Attention is scarce. Shopify helps you capture it and convert it. If you're building a serious business, your commerce platform needs to meet your customers wherever they are.

39:57 An your site in store. In their feed. Right inside their inbox. The less they think, the more they buy. Businesses that sell more sell on Shopify. If you're serious about selling,

40:08 The tech behind the scenes matters as much as the product. Upgrade your business and get the same checkout that I use. Sign up for your one dollar per month trial period at Shopify.com slash knowledge project. All lowercase. go to shopify dot com slash knowledge project upgrade your selling today

40:26 Shopify dot com slash knowledge project. And then one of the major clicks to get us to Kavanaugh. You know, it's so I I I love Panera. I had always had interest in a number of other

40:40 Little businesses. And I was doing after I left I was doing a lot of speaking on the pervasive short termism in the US capital markets. And how

40:51 not just our polo our body politic, but our capital markets and how that was essentially making us less competitive. It was it was not helping our GDP growth. If we're not thinking long term we're not gonna have innovation. If all we want is is to pop the stock, it's short term Cost cutting that drives it.

41:11 one of my my associates, a guy named Keith Pasco. Oh I. And work with me, Panera said. Why don't you take your own money and put your money where your mouth is? And I ultimately took Roughly two hundred million dollars of my own money.

41:24 No L Ps, no external folks, just my own money and a bit of money from some of my Partners. Um some of the people that chose to join us and took some of the people I had worked with and decided to go do it. And

41:38 Essentially I created a Investment vehicle. 'Cause it's not a firm. It's called Act Three. You can figure out where that comes from, Old Bom Pan Panera and now Act Three, Holdings.

41:50 And within eight weeks of of leaving Panera. Yeah. gotten involved in our first really real deal. Which was Kava. I had been an investor in Kava.

42:01 Uh when it was two restaurants, just a little something. And after I left Panera, they asked me if I joined their board. Another company called Zoe's had asked me if I joined their board. uh they were a public company, you know, and it was very clear to me Again, I could see and taste that opportunity. Mediterranean had power. It was the number one diet in America. It was bold flavors. It was different but accessible.

42:27 And you could tell this was a a a powerful Channel with lots of winds at its back, the channel. And I began to say who has the potential to dominate is it's always Urkava and Again, these folks' Zoe's were were five times the size of Kava, but Kava was doing higher volumes and was a better concept. I started to think to myself, you know what, what I should do is buy the Zoe's It was a three or four hundred million dollar public company at that point.

42:54 From a billion. Instead of figuring out for them buy it. And then merge it in with Kava. And the one problem is I had to tell that to Kava who wanted me to join their board. And I I both didn't use the Brett Shulman who was the

43:07 This wonderful CEO Donna Kava. And Brett said, Wow, okay, that's an interesting idea. And he said, Before you join the board, maybe you want to tell him about this and I I went Basically pitch their board. On this idea. In in their wisdom, I must be

43:23 Be straight. of building a a dominant Brand in the Mediterranean category. And um it helped that I agreed to essentially finance um a large part of the acquisition. And uh to help lead it. But what it

43:41 What instead of me buying Zoe's we decided to have Kava. By Zoe. And then we would help them make that transformation. Here was the bet. that by buying a company five times larger we could apply our discipline.

43:57 Our skills, our culinary skills. Um to end up with the dominant player in this category. And the the thesis um Step back.

44:09 is we bet on categories that have tailwinds. And then we endeavor to build the dominant player in that category. Uh my industry is an industry of winner take all. Think McDonald's and Burger King, think Panera. Corner Bakery, Tropoli, Quadoba. All of the

44:27 The value creation tends to Um happen for those that are building something of large scale and and and if you have that that dominant position and you're a better competitive alternative, you win. And so we saw that opportunity. Yeah.

44:43 And that's what led us to to make that acquisition. And at that point Gava went almost overnight, so it took us Six months to do the deal. But from fifty restaurants to three hundred. And it led to a very, very tough two thousand nineteen.

44:58 Because the company wasn't prepared or ready for it. And one of the things about Act Three Holdings we're we're able I have um seven or eight partners. Not one of them is a financial guy. There's only one financial guy in the mix. Who was actually the activist who attacked me. I couldn't tell anybody at the time that I actually thought he was smart and liked him.

45:18 But at any rate I did. And um he joined us as our CFO and You know, I have one partner that was the has been with me for twenty odd years, who does all our deepest research and strategic thinking. He was the guy who was really helped me develop

45:35 Fast casual in that ideology. I used to say from from his brain to my lips, I'd speak it, but he was the guy who really pushed me hard on on thinking he's with us and I've another partners open five thousand retail locations and I have another partner who came up through Darden with president of Dairy Queen, the president of um Brugger's Bagels.

45:59 Uh was my CO. Mm. Guy who really understands discipline scaling and how you build these companies. We took out the A number of people from Panera's technology function.

46:11 The number three guy who built all that technology joined us and he brought a team with him. We have the capability of really doing technology. I haven't Another partner who's a a serial entrepreneur great at food. Created design.

46:25 Gry with ideas, We get into a smaller business I mean he's superb in helping bring it all together. So the model For us. in Act three was one to to bet on on a category.

46:39 And then have the ability to go in. And help them build the dominant player in that category. And so at Kava, the We were able that first year to really provide a lot of technology, skills that were needed. Help out.

46:53 in in many ways. as there wasn't a an effective CFO. until we brought that in, and to actually help in multiple different ways to help that business grow. And it was a very tough year, I can remember Bread.

47:07 R COP. We used to go to breakfast every other week, walking back from breakfast in downtown D C And he looked at me wistfully and said, Run. I just wish we still had just our fifty stories, not these three hundred that we bought. And I looked in and I go, Brett

47:23 You know We don't have that choice anymore. What we need to build is load bearing people and organization around you. that can take on this opportunity. But if we can pull this off Katie bar the door. We're gonna build an amazing company in a powerful category.

47:39 Ultimately Kava has been Probably the the single best IPO in the last half decade in the restaurant industry. How many restaurants are you up to now? About four hundred. But but more importantly. I mean it's perceived as a um

47:53 A brand Who's Filling out a category Mediterranean and dominating in that. And you know, given its market Cat.

48:01 market valuation which has gyrated between seven billion and fifteen billion up and down. Um You know, the market perceives this as something very real. Eh, with the potential to fulfill its destiny is the next Chipoli. And that's what they're paying for that. Potential.

48:21 Let's go back to the O Bom Pow IPO just for a second because I remember you talking about how it changed everything for you. And you didn't anticipate having all these new constituents or people breathing down your neck and the the shorttermism that sort of comes with some partners, I guess, some capital partners. I'd say it differently. I did a book called Know What Matters and I Did a chapter on. The IPO. A morning shine, I've

48:49 Council. Dozens of people. And I typically start by telling people Ninety percent of the entrepreneurs that go public?

49:00 Live to regret it. Because it's a very different Enterprise. Now for me it was phenomenal. I've done it multiple times. And you know, it's created great blessings in my life in many ways. But they're also difficulties that go with it. And I can remember the day we went public.

49:18 My partner at that time, Lou King, was It was on cloud nine. And um I am The car we were in?

49:27 Uh the limousine. And I got out and I walked through Central Park d here in New York. And I started thinking to myself Just the sense of responsibility I felt. To all of these folks that were investing.

49:39 Tens, hundreds of millions of dollars in this company. And the reality is When you're running an enterprise, You have a responsibility, the people that believe in you and you want to deliver. I want to deliver it over the people who are buying the stock, not the ones that are shorting the stock. Yeah.

49:55 There were any number of those investors. They all came from very different places. Some were with us in building something for the long term. Others were we're trading the stock for the short term. And you had all of these pressures and it all played out in a very public way. You had very limited ability to protect and whatever was going on in your company and develop it and you needed to be ready for prime time.

50:18 And so I I'll I've I'll tell you a a story. When when we decided to take Kafka public I think people would consider it a very successful IPO. Today. Three and a half times from the IPO price.

50:30 But considered very successful. What do we do? We helped. Bread. And the team get ready for an IPO.

50:37 For a year and a half before we went public? We did quarterly earnings calls. in the company simulated with our investors. You know, they had to do press releases, they had to take questions. We we we worked with great diligence in getting their narrative down so that when they went out They knew what they were selling and they were selling

50:59 the possibility of participating in the growth of the what would be the the dominant player in Mediterranean. I think we really prepared this company. Uh when we actually went to market, we didn't let the investment bankers control the distribution we did. We brought in cornerstone investors like T Row who I had a longstanding relationship with and make and helped make We brought in um Capri, the Capital Group, which again I had been part of helping make billions of dollars for them. We brought them in as early investors. We limited the distribution.

51:34 None of us were selling stock on the IPO. This wasn't an opportunity for any of the existing investors or the or the largest ones like me to get money out. It was an opportunity to f support and fuel the company. And essentially we only allowed the investment banker Nine percent of the sharing distribution. Which essentially went to their clients and the hedge funds. We protected ninety one percent of it. Of that distribution, so that's It ended up in the right hands, but

52:03 And I think that we serve that company very well. Um in taking a the long term view of the IPO the N was to me an IPO. is a little like a wedding celebration. It's the beginning of the marriage.

52:18 It's not the end. And you know, having been married, I I would say to you You want to really contemplate that on your on your wedding day. What what is it you're gonna have to do to have a successful wedding? Um that celebration will will will will fall by the wayside. Um if you don't.

52:36 Do you think about control differently now with all your experiences? I'd answer it differently. You asked me if I think about control. Look at One of the lessons I've learned. Is To believe in yourself. When I was growing up and coming of age professionally.

52:49 If you're smart, you're always gonna say, That guy's leaning on me about this or that. What am I not getting? What should I do? And one of the lessons I learned as I look back Is to trust myself. That I actually know what I'm doing.

53:02 And I have to believe in it and I have to have the faith to get through the long march. I have to have the faith to go through the pain of transformation. One of the really Interesting.

53:16 Is to actually trust myself. And That has led to a to a a decision. That's

53:24 generally when we we we like to be in a control situation in a company. By that I mean that We're willing to bet our own money, we're willing to bet on ourselves. Myself and the Act Three partners. But we don't want to be at the effect of somebody else who has a different idea.

53:42 And and straight up. When you have Investment partners. the best way I can I can express it to you, it's a little like having a baby with someone. You take their money?

53:52 You know, they have they they have legitimate rights. And if you're the kind of person I am, you want to listen and you wanna be responsive. And so I like generally being in a controlled position. is it allows us to take a long term approach. to do the things that that don't drive profitability in the short term. But actually build a far better company.

54:14 You know, there's there's one principle here that we haven't talked about. And then I want to talk about Act Three with you. Everything I believe in. About business.

54:24 Starts with Three words. Better competitive alternative. The the world doesn't need another business. It certainly doesn't need another restaurant. The whole objective of everything we do

54:36 Is the built something? That for some target customer. This is the best alternative they can find. And what I mean by that Sounds like fancy MBA talk. It isn't.

54:47 All it means is That your target consumer. is gonna Walk past all of your competitors, all the people doing something similar to you, and choose to come to you because you do it better than anybody else. If you're able to do that, you can win.

55:02 And so I I I tell it by way of a story. I was in um Vegas speaking, I don't know, a couple of years ago. And I walk the casino at eleven thirty and I see

55:13 Folks dumping chips into these slam machines. And I think to myself Right. The only way I'd ever be in a casino at eleven PM. Is if I owned the casino and had the house vague.

55:25 It's the same exact thing, For me when I think about business, if I don't have a better competitive alternative I don't have the house vague. This is a ugly business and I don't want to be in it. What I've come to know.

55:38 And what I'm trying to to make sure your listeners here loud and clear. Is it what matter more than anything else? is genuinely having a concept a vehicle. A business. That in whatever your mini market is, the physical one mile or

55:53 The nation of its real estate, whatever it might be, that you're the best alternative. When you have that, Then you have the possibility of growing and building something. Is that what you were trying to do with the concept essence document is like hash that out? Totally. Concept essence was where we started every business and every business we're in today. And we should talk about the the multiple businesses we're in today. Every business that we're in.

56:21 with a consubescence document. What is a consubescence document? It's essentially a script. for regional theater. Think of it this way, if you're in a multi unit business.

56:32 I'm running thousands of of of regional theater shows. that are performing eighteen hours a day. And so what is that script? What is the Aesthetic.

56:43 of the environment. What is the food and the food attitude? Um what is the humanity? What are the people like? How do you experience it? From a consumer's perspective, when you walk in and we try to really go deep And use words that mean something.

56:59 in writing that script. Or that vision for how we're gonna compete. And that becomes an organizing tool. I mean just imagine uh Panera, we had A hundred and twenty five thousand people. How do you get them all in line with what we're trying to create if you can't put it into words? But you obsessed over this. You spent nine months working on this document before you started and you were obsessed about all the details and walk me through that a little bit because lot of other people there's there's sort of wisdom which is like go fast and fail fast and

57:30 This is sort of the opposite of that. You took your time, you were methodical, you were in the weeds, you were Watching people But you know, go fast and and fail. Make sense in technology. Where it's very much

57:43 Um there there's no fixed cost. And you can repair completely. Um, I'm in a business I call it fashion with fixed assets. It you know, you build a restaurant and you're gonna spend a million, a million, yeah, two million dollars, maybe more.

57:58 You don't want to mess it up. Because fixing it is really difficult. So you want to get very clear What you're doing. What do you do first, second, third? And make sure you get it in the right order.

58:10 So I am much more concerned About getting it right. In a really serious way in understanding it and then Taking the right steps. from that than I am.

58:22 about getting out there and getting market share first. Because the cost of failure is so high. Because the cost of failure is extraordinary. And w oftentimes once you you bounce, you can't come back. And remember, we're talking about fixed assets. We're talking about

58:38 Yeah. Building restaurants. If I don't understand what I'm doing, I'm gonna build it wrong. I'm gonna fail. How often do restaurants turn around Once they start losing sales.

58:48 Rarely. It's really hard. Because organizations by their nature Don't like to change. In fact, I'll I'll share with you something I've I've I've written about.

58:59 I call it The life cycle of a business. It starts with discovery. And ends With delivery.

59:07 And think of it this way, when a business starts out It's so hard to get off the ground and win. So hard. Probabilities are very low. I mean you have no capital.

59:17 No scale. Um no competitive advantage. You have the highest cluster ever gonna have. And and it requires something that really is powerful to break through with the

59:28 Consumer. Deal with all those forces working against you. But some people do. And people discover a better way to approach the customer

59:37 That touch the customer, a better experience and And they get off the ground, and they start to scale, and it works. And it's doing well. And it's getting bigger. Along comes outside capital. And outside capital says, you know, we can help you grow even further.

59:53 And pretty soon you have a board meeting of people saying, You know, this business is doing great, but but but you know what? It could do even better if we bring in some of these I'll call them delivery people. Mm-hmm. delivery people or you know, financial planning and purchasing and A range of different disciplines. And the truth of the matter is

1:00:12 You bring in the delivery people? It makes the place better. The margins get better, and The business gets more disciplined, it gets tightened. But here's what begins to happen, and not over six months, but over years and and half a decade. The delivery people and the discovery people find they're talking different languages. The language of discovery

1:00:33 is the language of poetry. It's the language of imagine if. If only we could do this. The language of of of Discovery of delivery. is the language of prove it to me.

1:00:44 Show me the numbers. Let me see the spread sheet. I don't believe you. And quite frankly, these these forces But the language of uh but but delivery because it ha does add value.

1:00:57 starts to push out deliver discovery because discovery Doesn't have oxygen. If if if you got delivery pushing down on it. And over time what happens in so many food companies is is that that discovery is pushed out by delivery.

1:01:14 delivery gets stronger and stronger and stronger and it becomes the dominant force in the company. And then these companies wake up After fifteen or twenty years, They're billion dollar companies. And they're really powerful.

1:01:27 About delivering What was wanted and needed by the consumer Five years ago, ten years ago, and twenty. And really terrible. about discovering what's gonna need be needed and wanted for tomorrow. And so one of the things that I've always focused on is

1:01:43 is actually protecting discovery. And in fact, as the CEO, viewing my role as discoverer in chief, innovator in chief, because that will by the very nature of of centrifugal force. Um size and scale. You will end up

1:02:00 Yeah. Decapitating discovery. in these companies. One of the things that I see and anecdotally, of course, I'm not uh in this space at all, is There's that.

1:02:10 almost a trend when you have a concept that's sort of working and then you add on to it and you keep adding and adding. And I always think, well, the the backend operations get a lot more complicated. The purchasing gets complicated, the inventory management gets more complicated. And and then you look at something like In and Out, which has basically a a very simple menu. Privately held. Privately held. Incredibly successful. How do you think through that? What's your reaction to that? Oh, my reaction to it is I I know the the the polls. I've been there. It the world look it, the world pays the marketplace pays.

1:02:44 Or Something that's getting bigger. Larger. Better. So how do you do that? You you add things, you improve things, you make it better.

1:02:54 Uh we all want that. I mean we're susceptible susceptible to that. By human nature. And The unfortunate truth is oftentimes, many times, it doesn't make it better. It actually just makes it worse, more complicated.

1:03:11 And so my view Is we don't want to do We don't want to be everything for everybody. We want to be Something special for somebody.

1:03:20 And that's the essence of what we mean when we see we say being a better competitive alternative. to actually standing for something and being something better. How important is marketing now in terms of getting traffic in? There's this concept of viral marketing for restaurants and people trying to break through. I can see the eye roll. Yeah.

1:03:38 Marketing is the wrong phrase in my book. I think the right phrase. is amplification. By amplification I mean if I've got something that actually touches people. Then I've got to let them know.

1:03:52 It's available. But the idea that I'm gonna somehow come up with something cute or better tactic or better technique That may work in the in the very short term, but it doesn't sustain a business. And When you're building fixed assets as we are.

1:04:09 You want something that sustains a last for For Years and and decades. You want something that that Built a competitive moat. Uh and is a better competitive alternative.

1:04:21 So to me Marketing is is Never the end. To be cuter or better is never the end.

1:04:29 The end is to actually sustain is to build a better business but That's sustaining and powerful in its own right, and then figure out how to make sure its target customers are Actually know about it. And it's on their short list. Do you look at other restaurants and

1:04:45 uh think that oh I would do this differently and they have a good concept but they haven't quite nailed it and Maybe you can give me an example and walk through one like True Food Kitchen or something. Well first I I have a rule. I d will not talk about competitors because that always gets me in trouble. But uh I would say this to you. Doing this as long as I've done it.

1:05:06 You know, I've done this now. Uh over half a century. And and I've been in this industry. Um and the collective Leadership of Factory Holdings my my group.

1:05:19 We probably got two or three hundred years of history. We there isn't a day that goes by that we don't have on our uh private chat. Some Um interesting commentary. On um what

1:05:33 folks are doing. You can see these patterns over and over and over again. What are the key metrics you look at without mentioning any any sort of particular competitor? If it's a public company What would be the two or three variables in the financial statements you look at? And if it's a private company, how do you first the financial statements are are A byproduct. They're not the end. So I'm often not looking at the financial statements um as a leading indicator. I'm looking at the financial statements as the trailing indicator.

1:06:05 What we always start with. In act three. Yeah. Does that category? Does it have tailwinds? Does it have power?

1:06:16 Is this a category that's getting struck? Okay, Mediterranean. It's the number one diet in America. Every time you go to the doctor, you read an article. They're giving you a commercial.

1:06:26 for our diet. Um it's both flavors, it's ambitious flavors, and yet it feels safe. Um, you know, it's food that you can eat. Lamb and and chicken. Um it's it's it's it's cravable wellness. It's healthy.

1:06:41 Um and yet it it's it's also tasty. That's a category that's got power. Uh Where we have another business then plan forward. uh we call it positive eating. three percent of American is vegetarian, but forty percent are eating

1:06:57 Um um more plant forward. They want they want that in their diets. Somebody's gonna win in that category. We intend to be those people. You can think about Bakery Cafes. I was part of building bakery cafes in America between Old Bomb Penn

1:07:11 An era These were of the dominant brands. Well, I can tell you the future Is in Upscale baker cafes where you have real chefs. Um where you have um food that's worth going out of your way for.'Cause it's part of the experience.

1:07:27 And how important is that experience? It's everything. You don't just come for Food. You come for the totality of that experience, the people that serve you, the environments that you're in, how you feel when you're there. Um but but at any rate, so I I just want to continue with this.

1:07:43 We're in immersive entertainment. Power category. Um, where in in Healthy eating in Europe. Another powerful category. So first at Act Three we bet on the category. And and I'm trying to take a f a forward look and say what's gonna

1:07:59 in five or ten years. I don't want to be fighting a against headwinds. I want to be sailing with tailwinds. That's number one. Number two, I only want to invest. And I only want to

1:08:13 play in that The Nexus. of building the dominant player in that category. Because the rewards fall to those that are the dominant players in these categories. Our goal is to build it. And the truth is we have a playbook.

1:08:27 We knew how to do it. Uh between me and my partners we have built. Dozens of companies. Any number of successful ones, and we know what works. And you know the the mantra here at

1:08:38 Act three. You know, it's tougher to build a nationally dominant company than it is to climb Everest. Nobody goes up Mount Everest without a guide because the the risk of falling off the side is huge. Death.

1:08:54 I our challenge is why go up and try to build a nationally dominant company Without somebody who's been there before, has done that route three, four, five times. And we basically Practice what we call Sherpa Management. When we're in the boardroom.

1:09:09 We don't have financial people. We're not. ever worrying about the liquidity event. We're in the business of building companies, not selling them. And we're not looking at the balance sheet, we're not looking at the numbers so much as As really trying to help that management team.

1:09:26 Know what's gonna hit'em. And how to protect them. I I would say for example, we at Act Three. believe that financing which is preval which is at the core of so many companies.

1:09:37 should not be seen as a life cycle or event. A raising money in an annual or or more frequent basis is if You know, it it should be done every birthday.

1:09:48 Our view is Running a company. is hard enough work without having to continually be out there selling. And so when we invest in a company We're gonna put an investment in it. Um and then we're going to agree uh take a right of first refusal.

1:10:04 And all follow on rounds of capital at a pre agreed to multiple, so we're all in alignment. Um, it's an easy thing. And the truth is we have yet to ever turn down the um a follow on round of capital. Other up to an IPO.

1:10:18 And for our for our companies, they've never ever worried about capital they call pick up the phone and and and we get there because we're of them and we're with them and we recognize that capital raising is not something they should be doing. But rather they should be worrying about building a better competitive alternative. Similar kind of thing with the many skills that my my partners bring to it, whether there whether it be strategy. Whether it be real estate.

1:10:44 Whether it be Technology. Our guys are available to the companies we invest in. Again, we don't push it, but on a cost plus basis. And we want to protect our management team to focus on building a better company and not have to worry

1:10:58 About Scaling up. so many of these different functions. Well let's talk about building a company. One of the phrases that you use over and over again is means and byproduct. How does that factor into building the company? Well, I think it starts with life. So so much of what I've learned about building companies starts with life shame.

1:11:17 I think in much of our Society much oralize we've confused. Buy products. With ends. And means.

1:11:26 Uh I have a friend who's a type one diabetic. His goal in life is to stay alive as long as you and me. But that is not something he can control. It's a byproduct. What is it a byproduct of? of of a simple end. keeping his blood sugar between eighty and one hundred eighty. When he does that, the byproduct is life.

1:11:45 What's this means diet, exercise, and insul. It's literally the same thing in business, but Do I want value creation? You better bet on it. But the way I get value creation is by creating and A better competitive alternative.

1:11:59 A place that people want to come visit you in. That they're willing to walk past your competitors to come to you. What's the means? It's everything I do every day in a business. It's how I spend my time. It's focusing on the the aesthetics, the operations, the structures, the processes.

1:12:17 Um the way in which we engage with our team members, the way in which we engage With our customers. That's the doing of the doing that drives the the the end a better alternative that actually creates the the the wherewithal To have the byproduct.

1:12:33 Only I can tell you is Those companies. Those CEOs, those leaders? That focus on the on the on on the byproduct, the outcome. Never get there.

1:12:42 It's rare. because they they actually miss the mark on what creates it. You know, it's like saying I want to be happy. You can't create happiness. You can create the conditions in your life that leads to a feeling of happiness, and And if I were talking to my kids I'd be telling them, Do the things that lead to your own self respect.

1:13:00 Do the things that you will respect and And if you in fact do that as your end, Your byproduct will be that happiness. Go deep or or spend a couple of clicks maybe on sort of how businesses go backwards when they try to get the outcome instead of the inputs, if you will.

1:13:17 It's the means versus the byproduct. So When you focus On Driving

1:13:25 The bottom line. You missed Understand that the most important thing is Is to drive um the customer experience and the the reason they want to come in.

1:13:35 Um, I I give you an example. I was involved with a company that were made nameless. They had a little E. coli scare. Their immediate reaction was to cut labor. I looked at him, I said, You're gr you you're nuts. If you do that, you're gonna destroy what?

1:13:49 you've been working on for for years, which is telling your people that what matters most is running great stores. In fact, when you run into Any enterprise. What you do is much more important than what you say. And so when you focus on very short term metrics, Even though it seems like a desirable thing, it actually costs you far more in the long term.

1:14:10 How do you develop the long term thinking that you've brought to all these different concepts from O Bom Pan to Panera to Cava. Just makes sense to me. I mean it just seems logical. Right. Like if I I wanna start out and figure out where I'm trying to be in five years and ten years, and what's it gonna take me to get there?

1:14:29 And that's what we mean by future back thinking. Um and it what seems stupid to me is to do what's short term expedient and long term stupid. I have an expression. I'm I'm I'm long term greedy, not short term stupid. And I I really want to build something of value, but the way you do that

1:14:47 Whether you're talking about a business. Or a relationship? Or your own life. is the focus on those things that have meaning and self respect and those things that when you get down get to the other side of it will have touched other people and most importantly touch yourself. Spend a few clicks on that. Is there an example that comes to mind in the short termism versus longtermism? And I love the idea of being long term greedy.

1:15:12 I've publicly spoken to this, but You can look at the difference between the way Kava went public and sweet green went public. These were two companies. That emerged out of the the DC market?

1:15:25 About the same time? One was out there with a Um That was sweet green.

1:15:35 Kava. Was slower, more disciplined, Um You know, I think sweet green Ah went in one direction with its real estate Kava state.

1:15:46 Um much more Disciplined as it went forward. Uh ultimately they both went public. Um I think that in the sweet green IPO We see a case where

1:15:58 A number of the investors sold fairly quickly. It was a different headset. Uh let's get this thing up. Off the ground? Um you saw Um

1:16:10 Of very instant. um gratification for some of the folks involved in the IPO. I think you see in Kava a very different approach. We took a whole um A slower approach to that IPO, a much more disciplined approach to it. And I think

1:16:26 we were much more disciplined in The the consistency of the brand and the brand integrity? Um concebessance as we call it. Um I think that You see the byproduct of it.

1:16:40 Um today I I I would Gather that Kava is gonna market cap five times what sweet greens is worth, something in that order. Four or five times. Depends on on you know, but it's stayed in that range. And I think that

1:16:56 That value creation is a byproduction of of the very real decisions we made in Kava. About staying disciplined, staying focused on consecence. Building something that really delivered for our team members first. For our our guest second.

1:17:13 And by doing that that our investors would would end up doing well. And always taking the long term approach. One thing that I don't think it's enough attention and this is something I think you're open to talking about is Um

1:17:26 The difficulties of Running a business, the costs of running a business, the family costs, the social costs, the Talk to me about that with O Bon Pan in particular and Panera and When you're

1:17:39 Doing anything. That's Takes powerful commitment. That commitment owns you, you don't own it. I I I've never owned a business. The business is on me.

1:17:50 It's with me in the shower. Is with me on vacation? Um It's it's it's it's there with me. In fact some of my best work is done when I'm um I'm I'm on vacation. I'm not actually Thinking about it in a conscious sense.

1:18:04 And I have the ability to extract and and understand. But but Listen, doing anything in the world? Whether it's working out every morning. Whether it's

1:18:13 Being in a relationship. Requires commitment. And it requires the commitment to the long term and it requires responsibility. I would simply say I've been committed to these businesses. I've been committed to the people that have believed in me.

1:18:28 I've been committed to my team members, to my investors, and I want it Give them something worthy. I wanna I wanna build something of quality and there's a Very real personal price. I've been married twice.

1:18:40 Um it's not something I'm proud of. I feel like uh It it it it's A failure. Is that a failure because I was committed to my business? I don't know. But I but I sometimes I think about that. The biggest fallacy of life is that you can have everything.

1:18:57 And then all there are are choices. And that You you want to make your choices with a clear head and c and your open eyes, and As to what you value, what you respect. And then you want to build your life.

1:19:11 around that. Just as I try to build a business Around what it is we try to w a concecence and what we expect. I try to build my life around what is it I'm gonna respect, and that's why I really try to think through on a regular basis what is it I need to do to Um for my own self respect in the context of a relationship with my my body.

1:19:33 My relationship with my family and and and My my My spouse Um my friends Um my relationship

1:19:42 With my work and And what does it mean to do that well? And ultimately a relationship with my own spirituality. And my own Um personal integrity.

1:19:52 You take all of that. And you try to put that together and you try to build a life Understanding. There is no Balance. You can't have it all.

1:20:02 You've got to you make choices. And they're trade offs, and you try to do that as well as you can. I just encourage your listeners to be clear what it is that they want. And what it is that they're gonna respect. What you don't want to do is wake up one day and say, I wish I had.

1:20:17 And miss it. How important do you think that focus was in your success? I'm pretty focused. And you know, I work hard, I always have. I love it.

1:20:28 I enjoy it. I love when we figure things out. I I like to think That I protected the people around me. Mm. And uh um

1:20:38 But I I like to think I'm willing to pay the price. And by that I mean I'm willing to do what it takes to do the hard work. Most people aren't willing to pay that price and they don't understand you're not gonna get the byproduct if you don't if you don't Build something. Better alternative. And that's hard work. And I I I would share with you this too.

1:20:57 Uh I'll share with you two things. I often say too Two entrepreneurs. I said it yesterday, uh was it uh Tony Robbins. Event.

1:21:07 And I said to the folks, I said, listen. If you don't enjoy The people in your business, the people in your life. If you're you know, you're y if you don't enjoy the doing of the doing. You're never gonna get there. If you're doing this to make money

1:21:21 You're never gonna make money. If you're doing this um for the for the glory of it all. You're never gonna get it. You're gonna fail.

1:21:33 And for me it was never about the end. It was about the doing. I love the figuring it out. I love the people that I work with to this day. I I'm not doing act three because it's gonna change my life. Or my kids' lives in any way. I'm doing it because I actually love the process of having challenges and figuring it out.

1:21:56 So I w I would say the uh I say to people all the time. Don't do it. for the for the outcomes to it because you you actually love it. Um, we should talk about another concept.

1:22:06 About entrepreneurship. I think it's often misunderstood. What? Entrepreneurs do this is what my business life's been about. Entrepreneurs see a better opportunity.

1:22:17 And and they're not risk takers, but They're actually risk avoiders. They see that opportunity, an opportunity to serve somebody, to make a difference, to do a job better for somebody, and And in the context of that They're risk avoidant. They don't want to take risks that get in the way of their getting there. And for me

1:22:36 When I can see a better way to do something, when I can see a way to make a difference in somebody's life. Um, be it a guest or even a Team member? I wanna do that with all the energy I can and I wanna protect it. And that to me is what an entrepreneur is. It's somebody who sees

1:22:54 opportunity and then seizes that opportunity. I share with you something else that I think is important. You have to be both strategic. and detailed. So I I I can operate it up.

1:23:05 Oh. What are we trying to accomplish in five years level? Again, I can then get down into a discussion. And is that Floor material.

1:23:15 Um working in a way that it's it's bouncing sound around and the sound is the wrong thing for the experience we imagine. It's the totality of both sides of it in these complex businesses that's essential. Some people want to just be strategic, others can't get out of the detail and It's the ability for both you get a strategy from the detail. And

1:23:37 Frankly, no strategy is worth anything if it can't be executed. I find that fascinating. In in particular the detail, there's such an aversion uh from a lot of people to get in the weeds of things, to understand things deeply. And so they're often reading Information that's filtered or synthesized, but wrong.

1:23:56 Well and it could be completely wrong and they'd have no idea. Somebody told me This and I I don't know if it's true or not, and it it's somewhere provocative, but you they said you can't rely on Uh somebody who doesn't know to filter information for somebody who does know. And they used more provocative terms than that. But I think there's some truth to that. I think there yeah. So the ability to go between these levels. from high, you know, thirty thousand feet to the one inch level. And anything in between is the sign of of somebody who's really involved in the in the details, getting first hand information, but I think that's what creates the pattern recognition

1:24:33 that you can see when you spot these transformations that we've talked about from O Bon Pan to Panera to, you know, Panera Act Two. And I I think like if you're not in the weeds on that stuff and you're not in the details, you'll never be able to spot that. Totally true. I think that You can't have an effective strategy because

1:24:52 If it's not informed by an understanding of what actually is gonna touch your customer and And how it's going to get executed. On the other hand, the most powerful strategy in the world means nothing if it can't be Executed. And so the ability to understand how you're doing on both levels

1:25:09 Simultaneously it's been an essential characteristic that served me and particularly well in my career. Some people would call it obsessive. How would you respond to that? It's thoughtful. Yeah.

1:25:22 Being obsessive isn't enough. Uh unless you're right. Ha you know, being right isn't enough unless you can get it done. And I guess What?

1:25:32 I'm trying to argue for Is Is Not micromanaging, not getting into the detail because that's the only place you know how to operate. But being able to

1:25:44 Use the detail to extract and learn. Like I'll tell you a story, Shame. I I go to visit restaurants we own all the time. I'm not going to check out the people who work there. They all think I am. But I'm not going to catch somebody doing something wrong. I'm actually going to check out myself and our senior management. And how are we doing in

1:26:05 Projecting a vision of how we compete, and then Delivering that down through an organization and a group of people to actually get it done. That's a great way to look at it. I I wanna come to act three for a second here and W what's spend a few clicks on what you're doing, what you're trying to do, and why you're doing it.

1:26:23 What we're trying to do is build the next generation of great companies. And we're Doing that. Based on a understanding that building better

1:26:33 Competitive alternatives is everything. And we want to enable the best competitive alternative in categories That have extraordinary power.

1:26:43 We have a couple of principles. Number one We believe in found a friendly capital. So when we go in we hope it's the last Uh investment capital that gets taken before an IPO. Uh generally we will um come in as common stock.

1:26:57 Not preferred, same place as the as the management team. And we will uh typically take a right of first refusal and all follow on rounds of capital, have never turned it down. and essentially have enabled our founding teams to to feel confident that they have unlimited capital behind. Secondly, we practice what we call Sharp um management, not venture capital. When we're in the boardroom,

1:27:25 When we're in the boardroom we're actually in there helping solve real problems. Typically And most often we're saying you need to put more overhead here. Not there, what comes first, second, and third.

1:27:39 And each of my partners are Our serious Um C Swede. operations folks that have experience Uh in our twenty five people we have only one that's really financially

1:27:52 Driven. Um or thinks financially. That was the activist investment. What's his name? Noah L. Bogan. Yeah, I had three hundred people chanting, uh Yeah, if you know a And uh later.

1:28:05 I I ended up um Respecting the guy, but I couldn't tell anybody. I liked him. I made a investment in a hedge fund he had and Ultimately asked them to join me in this endeavor.

1:28:16 But but we he says he's now a reformed activist. We don't practice activism. We we help people. And then obviously third, we only at Act Three invest where we have competitive advantage. Um what does that mean? We invest where we know something and we know how to build Dominant players in in in very specific categories. Um we're now Act three, as you know, is the largest independent

1:28:45 Um we're also in a company called Tate. Which is in Boston and D C and now the New York market. It's fifty restaurants doing About five million dollars a year.

1:28:56 Two hundred fifty million. Say. Powerful. Cafe, it's got a bakery there. It's got Artists in third wave coffee, and it also has authority with real chefs, it's a fascinating. Because it brings the attitude and voice of the Levant.

1:29:13 The Middle East the founder Woman of Zor Israeli. And in Yeah.

1:29:23 really third wave and they're differentiated. They're worth Actually eating. Why New York? Isn't that like I I don't know. I don't know the restaurant space, but isn't that the most competitive market in the single most competitive market. We're not yet in we'll be in New York next year. We're in Ridgewood, New Jersey. We're in we're going to Scarsdale, Garden City, Summit. Um, Millburn. 'Cause we started in Boston.

1:29:46 They built out substantially in Boston. We went to D C did great in D C New York is in the middle of it. You're absolutely right. New York City is about as competitive a market As as ever. That's good enough to really compete. Is New York a good barometer then? Like if it works. It's it's the funniest thing. People come from Europe all the time. They all go to New York.

1:30:08 It's the worst market. Because it's not the rest of the country, it's not representative. I I've tell you a quick story. And we'll go back to the act three thing. Uh one of the first discussions I remember having with Brett Shulman, our CO Dana Kava. I I said to him, Bret.

1:30:23 Right. You you know, you and the sweet green guys, you all went out, you know, you started in D C and then you went out to LA as your second market. I said. Here's the deal. I said what really matters? It's not how you do in LA.

1:30:36 in Malibu in West Hollywood. What matters? This is how you do in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Mm. You you make it in Fredericksburg, Virginia, you do two to three million a unit. I'll show you a thousand locations in America. That's the case.

1:30:49 And and I will tell you that if you're building a spark Business of mass scale. It isn't New York City that matters. Um it is in LA that matters. It's everything in between.

1:31:00 And can you offer people something of quality and substance. Uh it's it's a different environment to compete in. Um New York City costs are three to four times higher. It's money it's if you're an in you know, if you're really good you can make it, but it's very difficult. Why did O Bom Penn not work? You mentioned that earlier when you went west, it didn't work out there. Didn't work in the malls. It didn't work in suburbia. So it worked like downtown LA.

1:31:27 If there was a downtown LA. Yeah. I mean back then. There is today. It would it worked. In a major office building in downtown.'Cause it was about high density urban, quick where people pay a premium for quality and quickness. Yeah. It worked in Eton Center in You know.

1:31:45 In Toronto kind of thing. Right, okay. So come back to the act three. So act three. So y you know, we we start with with Tata. You know, it's got authority in bakery, it's got authority in third wave coffee. It's got chefs in every store. It's got real food. We're doing breakfast. We're doing lunch. We're doing gathering place. It's rooted in this powerful aesthetic.

1:32:05 Uh it's it's it's it's they're beautiful. They're a mix of antiques. That's twice you've mentioned the experience of having a chef in the the actual unit as a differentiator. Talk to me a little bit more about that as a concept or how it creates the experience. And then we gotta get back to act three. But yes. Every one of these businesses. Their structure structure matters but

1:32:29 For example I can't tell you how many conversations over the years I had with Howard Schultz. about Starbucks and their desire to do better food. But they could never Why couldn't they? Because they have a frozen food system.

1:32:43 They manufacture in one place, they freeze it. They ship it into the fr the store and they defrost it. They spent a hundred million dollars on an acquisition blinger. Grape little bakery? Could they bring it to Starbucks? No. Because the system defines what they're capable of doing.

1:33:01 Similarly at Panera. We were an assembly business. We started as a sandwich place. We put together sandwiches We didn't have real culinary skills in the stores. Our ability was was simply to assemble. So we were limited. We took on Tate and I originally bought Tate for Penera.

1:33:19 I saw it as a a better version of Panera in in certain neighborhoods. I then converted one of our stores to In Harvard Square, actually. We pop the the sales volume by more than two fold. Yeah, exactly. And um pr you know, maturely change the Ebada.

1:33:37 It left me in a place where I said, Wow, this is powerful, and when I sold Panera I negotiated the right to take Panera's interest. In Tata. dozen stores or whatever, to take that interest with me as part of my um my package. And I ultimately did take Tate with me. That's how it became part of Act three. Similarly another business, life alive.

1:34:00 Um again, plan forward, positive eating. Um, I l I love this business. We've been in it eight years. I can tell you that plan forward is a is a tailwind that is powerful. Somebody is gonna win in it.

1:34:12 We've now produced stores in Boston and D C producing very high volumes. uh surprisingly high volumes for Positive eating for this kind of food. Uh and and a and a really powerful team and concept and we have a a ton of it.

1:34:31 We have another company called Level ninety nine, but Uh, this is a guy who I was introduced to Yeah. He'd come out of um MIT and And had been involved in the um entertainment business for many, many years.

1:34:47 um uh engineer. And he had a vision for taking a space forty thousand square feet, uh all kinds of different things. We said to him, Let's drop a a farm to table restaurant in the middle of it. A brewery. We opened the first one in in in Natick, Massachusetts, at the Natick Mall. I have never been involved in a business as powerful as this.

1:35:07 blew me away. We've since opened in Providence, Rhode Island. opening in Tyson's corner in D C in four weeks. We're opening in Disney World down in um in Orlando in the coming year. Uh it's going to be at a location uh close to you any time soon. But uh sometime soon. But th this is another one of these powerful businesses. Uh last year we made an investment in a business in Barcelona, Spain.

1:35:33 Call on his greens. Again, very high volumes, Um it's Basically chefs in every restaurant. Real gr vegetables, greens.

1:35:44 Uh salmon. Check in put together in a way that lots of Of the young Spaniards have found exciting the Uh that business is now thirty odd restaurants in Spain and Portugal.

1:35:59 on its way to the UK and and and France next year. Again, we think that there's a powerful opportunity to bring some of these disciplines to Europe. But to do it right. Uh we also have another business that we're involved in with Act Three.

1:36:14 began in Covet, but We have lots of connections with institutional um capital. And the capital has asked us to get involved in companies, but And typically we can't With public companies we can't

1:36:28 Uh take a carry. We know get paid. So we we do a deal with the company with the support of their investors to take a Percentage of the company warrants. So we have an interest with a company called BJ's out on the West Coast, where we Provides some strategic guidance.

1:36:45 We have another involvement with a company called Uh which is trying to really be the source for um for unified commerce in restaurants.

1:36:57 Yeah, these are all strong public companies where we've been able to help them. And in the case of BJs, this stock is More than doubled since we got involved in the case of Parr. It's held very strongly. And so Again, what we really are in the business of doing is

1:37:14 Yeah Doing what we love to do, help figuring out. Where the future is going to be, making sure we arrive at that future before the rest of the world gets there. figuring out what those categories are, and then helping wonderful management teams build the dominant

1:37:30 And you know, it started as a two hundred million dollar investment is now a Nearly. Yeah, I w it's a two billion dollar portfolio.

1:37:42 And um It's delivered fifty five percent returns and and mostly we're just having fun. I mean we are not yeah we work hard, but But it isn't like running a company. The the the guys that are running the companies are doing the heavy lifting and we're there trying to make people think. I love it. Shame we talked about something before I just want to mention. I sit on any number of boards I lead

1:38:05 The boards of most of these companies. I was on the board at Hopefully when we sold it to Amazon. To me. One of the things that people misunderstand about boards The job of board is not to run a company.

1:38:17 Our job in Act three is not to run it. It's actually to ask. Good questions that make the people that are running it think. And that's where the power comes. It's in the quality of the question.

1:38:28 and the quality of how it helps impact other people's brains. That actually matters. The discipline is not in micromanagement. The details is not in micromanagement. The detail is an actually helping drive. powerful and profound understanding that allows you to do a better job. I think that is an incredibly profound misunderstanding about boards and the value that people bring, especially when you're on the board

1:38:54 With a founder. Who's the CEO instead of professional. Yeah, and we can take Kava. I think you know if Brett Shulman, who is the CO we're here. He would say Our relationship has evolved and grown over the six, seven years we've known each other, and

1:39:09 I think there were times along the way You know, that were really hard. I think he's come to know we're really on his side, we're really with him. And I think he would say The most powerful thing we

1:39:22 Yeah. Um and our relationship changed. For the better. When basically my role has been to challenge his thinking and let him deal with the implications of it.

1:39:35 As opposed to Be directive. Yeah. And you know, he's grown immensely. He started as my student and uh you know, I learn from him all the time watching him do it. But we share the same value system. We share a a a common thought possible about what's gonna work.

1:39:52 And so the way you get there, the is through taking the time to think about things in a deep way that And again. Goes to my book Know What Matters, Knowing What Matters. I think that the board in Kava Which I chair.

1:40:05 would say we understand Uh our role. Which is certainly to ensure financial integrity, to ensure um uh risk assessment and and and and and to fill that. But most importantly, we don't Help that company.

1:40:24 flying in on some basis and telling them what to do, we help them by bringing to to bear our experiences and helping make them think in such a way that they have a better sense of what's going to hit'em in the future, and they're prepared to handle that today. This has been an incredible conversation. We always end with the same question, which is what is success for you? Self respect. Ironically, the To me success is

1:40:48 Looking at myself And Knowing. I have built. Uh

1:40:54 Best life that I know how to build. Whether it be my role as a father, my relationship with my kids, My role is um a spouse and and in in relationships.

1:41:06 whether it be the kind of boss I've been and the difference I've made in the lives of people. Um very important to me, the lives I I've I've touched all over this country in Many parts of this world have

1:41:19 Yes, who Thank you for you know. I for what you did, why I love being in your places, but You know, and and and and knowing I

1:41:29 was the best version of myself I could be. You know, I'll I'll say something to your to your windows. People always say to me What's your legacy? Somebody said to me yesterday at this Tony Robbins eventually. You know, what do you want your legacy to be? And I I think about it and I realize

1:41:45 There is no legacy. You know, w you know, things go on, they change. I don't think fifty years from now people will be talking about me. I I I think what My legacy? Is Frankly, what matters most is my kids.

1:41:59 And the things I show them I They'll live on in their lives. And in their hearts and in their their souls. And in their kids. And those are the kinds of things that matter, and as I look back at this

1:42:14 My seventy one years on this earth. Uh I just feel so blessed. must have had the chance to do.

1:42:24 Um, to touch people. And I hope in some small way I've done this in a way that Yes. Worthy of All those blessings.

1:42:32 I love that answer. Thank you so much for the time today. Good. This was fun.

What you see above is a preview of the first minutes. One unlock costs 10 credits and covers this episode forever: full segment and word-level timestamps on this page, plus .txt, .srt, .vtt and word-level JSON downloads, as many times as you like.