Restaurant Marketing Strategies With Chip Close

Christin Marvin 0:01

If you are a restaurant owner or operator seeking clarity and a strategic approach to enhance your restaurant's marketing , this episode is for you . In this episode , I engage in a conversation with Chip Klose , a restaurant coach and the podcast host of Restaurant Strategy . Chip has just released his first book , the Restaurant Marketing Mindset , a comprehensive guide to establishing your restaurant's brand from concept to launch and beyond . We discuss the real definition of marketing , how 80% of marketing happens behind your back and why there is a relationship between marketing and operations that must exist for any restaurant to succeed . Welcome to the No Hesitations podcast , the show where restaurant leaders learn tools , tactics and habits from the world's greatest operators . I am your host , Christin Marvin , with Solutions by Christin . I've spent the last two decades in the restaurant industry and now partner with restaurant leaders to help them overcome burnout , increase retention , reignite their passion and drive successful businesses . I also work directly with restaurant leaders through one-on-one coaching and group workshops to help them identify their blind spots , build their confidence and overcome challenges in their business . If you're curious about learning more , visit my website at ChristinMarvin . com to book a 15-minute goal-planning session .

Christin Marvin 1:28

This podcast is sponsored by ScheduleFly . Schedulefly provides a simple , web-based and app-based restaurant employee scheduling software backed by legendary customer service . If you are using pen paper , excel or fancy scheduling software with tons of bells and whistles that you don't use , schedulefly is perfect for your business . When I was a regional manager handling seven locations , schedulefly was our go-to for scheduling . It's hands-down , the easiest platform that I've ever worked with , and their employee scheduling tool is awesome for shooting out mass messages about crucial restaurant updates . Visit ScheduleFlycom and mention the no Hesitations podcast to learn more and get 10% off . I hope you enjoy this episode , chip . Thank you so much for being here today and congratulations on the book . It's so incredible .

Chip Klose 2:27

I appreciate it . It's no small thing . Anybody who's written a book knows what a herculean task it is .

Christin Marvin 2:33

Yeah , I'm in the process of writing mine , but I just am so excited to learn from you . The work begins , I feel like , when you launch . What's the launch been like ? How does it feel to have it launched ?

Chip Klose 2:44

The real work begins when you finally have a first draft . Where are you ? Are you in the first draft phase , right ?

Christin Marvin 2:51

now yes , yes , yep .

Chip Klose 2:54

The biggest piece of advice I can give you , or anyone else who thinks they have something to say and it's worthy of putting in a book , is do it . It's never been easier . But just brain dump , just puke it all out , get it onto a page , get it out of your head , because inevitably you will rework it , reshuffle , reorganize . You will do all of this work after you have the first draft . My book changed , I'll say , dramatically , once I had a first draft . It did the first draft and I walked away from it for a month . It just didn't look at it or think about it . It allows you to come back with a little bit of objectivity . You don't remember how hard it was to write this passage or this chapter or whatever . Yeah , you come in and really look at it and if it stinks , you're like I don't know what I was trying to do there . It stinks because you've got a little distance from it . All the work really happens after the first draft . Launch is actually sort of the easy part , really . Okay , you're talking about it a lot and you're promoting it a lot .

Chip Klose 3:57

Launch is a really beautiful thing . It's sort of like a restaurant . All the work goes into trying to create the thing you want . The difference in a restaurant is , once you open , the people , or I guess the similarities are that once it's out , once the restaurant's open or the book is out , people are going to use it the way they see fit . It doesn't matter . You thought people should wait here while they're waiting for their table , or you thought this , or you thought that People are going to do it . They're going to make it their own , which is a very cool thing .

Chip Klose 4:27

Anybody who's owned , operated , run a restaurant . When people feel a sense of ownership over your place , I find that's a really special thing . It's the same thing with the book . I can talk about it and I can put it out , and I can send emails and promote it , and all that . At the end of the day , people are going to do with it , what they're going to do , and they're going to learn or not learn , or agree with me or disagree with me , and give it to their team or not give it to their team . There's a letting go that I find very freeing . It's a letting go that I didn't feel when I first opened restaurants , when I first opened the industry that I eventually learned and I found the joy in .

Chip Klose 5:05

It's that same thing I've tried to be good about during this process .

Christin Marvin 5:09

I love it . I didn't know when you and I first connected that I don't think I knew that you were writing a book and I was super excited to see that you had launched it . I think I saw it on LinkedIn because we spent a lot of time . I immediately ran out and bought it . I was so excited to just read it and support you and gain more knowledge . I actually ended up and I'll talk a little bit more about this in a little bit but I actually ended up using it a lot for my business . I'm very grateful for that . But again speaks to you just never know how people are going to use it . I've got books that I've been super excited about and read through Within the first month I've had them and then I've let them sit around for six months and then finally picked them up . You just never know about the timing . I would love to know what your motivation was for writing the book .

Chip Klose 5:56

It was a similar motivation . So two parts . There's two answers to your seemingly simple question . The same thing that got me to start my podcast right .

Chip Klose 6:05

So restaurant strategy is now just about five years old and I was running basically consulting with a bunch of restaurant owners back then and I just said I'm saying the same stuff over and over again , like people are misguided in the same areas and they need to be told certain things . And where they're not listening to me about certain things . And I just thought if these people and I was in New York City working at very high end restaurants , I was like if these people , with the resources they have and the access to knowledge that they have , if they don't know it , then I'm going to bet that a lot of other restaurant owners and a lot of other markets also need to know it . So I started the podcast to just sort of like tell people what I think I had learned and what I think would help them . It's the same thing out of the book format . I had to present it differently because people sort of consume a book differently than they consume a podcast and they want different things from them .

Chip Klose 7:07

But the other answer to your question I'll point to Shawn Walchef . So I don't know if you know , Shawn , he is a very skilled podcaster . Restaurant influencers is his show . He's a restaurant owner himself and he's got this media company and sort of in keeping with the same thing he says . You know , he had told me a while back he's like why aren't you on TikTok ? I said because it's just one more thing to learn and one more place to be and all that .

Chip Klose 7:33

He says , yes , it is one more thing to learn , but it's one more place to be . And he said I know you , you want to make an impact and I know what you're trying to do is help people that just don't know these things or haven't heard these things in the way that you're putting them . And he said to me it really resonated with me , and I guess this is the reason why I wrote a book , although I didn't realize it at the time is that you can't dictate how someone learns or where someone gets their information . Some people want to watch TV , some people want to read a book , some people want to listen to a podcast . Some people want to , you know , read magazines or articles or blogs or just follow Twitter . Some people just want to be on TikTok , and that's how they get there .

Chip Klose 8:14

If you can help them , if you can help them learn in a certain way , then you sort of owe it to them to be wherever they are , and it's this old idea of you know meet them where they are .

Chip Klose 8:26

So , rather than me convincing someone to listen to a podcast maybe somebody hates podcasts , which doesn't have time that the only time they have is 1030 at night , 11 o'clock at night , one in the morning , when they're just laying in bed and they're not going to put in , you know , headphones and listen to a podcast , but they will sit there next to their spouse and read a book and he's like so this is for them . Likewise , if someone doesn't have time , they only have a few minutes . While they're waiting for the elevator , while they're waiting for the train , maybe they don't have time for a full podcast , they don't have time to read a book , but they do have time to watch a couple of videos on TikTok or Instagram , and maybe that's going to help inspire them and give them something to think about as they head in to the restaurant for the day . And he's like you can't dictate where people get it from , so be in as many places as you can , which I think is ultimately really good advice .

Christin Marvin 9:11

Yeah , I agree . Are you on TikTok now ? I am , okay , I am , I'm just up to check that out . So , yeah , I agree with you 110% . I've had a lot of people ask me , and just over a year , like why are you doing a podcast ? Why are you writing a book ? Why are you on LinkedIn ? Why are you doing all this content ? Why are you writing a newsletter ? All the things right and same thing . I'm like I don't know how people like to learn , but I know that it's different . Right , I know some people , like you said , like to pick up a book or like to listen to a podcast and I wanna try to help get the information and the development out in any way , shape or form . If somebody is in their car and they need a moment of inspiration before they walk into lineup or they need a moment of just relief before they go home so they don't word bomb it all over their spouse about their day , right , like whatever it is . So I love that you jumped on TikTok .

Chip Klose 9:58

That's great yeah this was a challenge that he had made for me , so it was really funny . So he made that challenge a year and a half ago to me to be on TikTok , which at that point the book was done . I mean , the book was just about finished . It's , I'll say , third round of rewrites . So the book , and it just takes a long time to get it , then copy added it and type set and designed and rented and all of that . But I realized when he was telling me that I was like , oh , that's the same impetus that led me to writing the book . I just didn't think in those terms . He articulated it much more clearly and so now I passed that on in case that helps inspire someone else .

Christin Marvin 10:42

Nice Did you self publish or did you go through a publishing company ?

Chip Klose 10:45

So I went through a hybrid publishing . It's a great question , so do you know which route you're gonna go ?

Christin Marvin 10:51

I'm leaning towards self publishing , yeah , but if you give me feedback , I'm still researching ?

Chip Klose 10:56

Yeah , I would strongly . I mean , traditional publishing is sort of a long , arduous road and ultimately it was like I'm not big enough to get them to notice , and so it very was clearly either self publishing or hybrid . I liked the hybrid model simply because I had the weight of an imprint behind me , so the weight of a publisher who's done this before thousands of times . Yes , I did pay for it in the way that you would pay for self publishing , but I also didn't have to go source my copy editor , my structure editor , my , you know , the typeset or the designer . I didn't have to go do all that .

Chip Klose 11:36

They had all them in house and I , ultimately I felt like I got a really good team to help , to help be able to pass the baton to , and it was a really good relationship . So for me that worked . But it's a hybrid , is a form of self publishing . I just feel like it's got a little bit more weight behind it , a little bit more might than I really had time . I didn't have the , I didn't have the time to go find all of those different players and pieces . So while I could have saved money , it wasn't necessarily enough to make it worth it .

Christin Marvin 12:09

I love it . I want to go back to something you said in the beginning , when you were talking about the book , that you wrote this because there were a lot of misguided ideas out there . Will you speak to some of those ?

Chip Klose 12:19

Yeah , it's really . The book starts this way . So the very first question is you know what is marketing ? And a lot of times when I ask restaurant owners about their marketing , I say , okay , so talk to me about your marketing or tell me how you think about marketing . And usually one of two things happens , right . They say , well , we're just a small company , we can't afford to do marketing right , misguided right . Or they say , oh , yeah , yeah , well , we got , we got this girl and she posts on Facebook and Instagram four times a week and we even do a couple of stories and reels . And we do this and they just tell me about their organic social media presence and almost , almost across the board , that's what I get and that's misguided

Marketing, Social Media, and Systems

Chip Klose 13:00

.

Chip Klose 13:00

Number one if you sell things to other human beings , you got to figure out which human beings are most apt to buy from you , who needs the thing you have , and then you need to figure out how to convince them to buy yours instead of something someone else's . That , in a nutshell , is marketing , right . So if that falls , if you fall into that category , meaning you sell things to human beings , you have to market , because you have to figure out who your market can or should be . And then the other thing right on the other side , this , this idea of social media . Social media is not social media is not marketing is . It is tool that's available to the marketer , but not even a very good tool If you're just using organic posts , and so we go through that in the book and sort of outlines that , and I spent a lot of time talking about it .

Chip Klose 13:49

It's usually one of the last things I talk about , it as it is in this book . It's one of the last things I talk about because I think there are other way more effective tools and channels out there for , in this case , restaurant owners to be able to accomplish what they need to accomplish . So I just that's the best example I can give in the beginning , just a misnomer of what marketing is understanding that that , yes , you have to do it , you're probably already doing it , whether you're doing it well or not , and we can always do it better with greater you know , greater impact .

Christin Marvin 14:23

Yeah , I love that . I love what you said about really having a clear intention around who your audience is and how you're speaking to them and how you're you're bringing them , how you're serving them and how you want to bring them in the doors . I love that . The way that you structured the book , with the assignments at the end of each chapter and then the little pieces of mindset .

Christin Marvin 14:41

I found it incredibly helpful for me because I tend to get distracted easily . I've always wanted to read , but I've never been an avid reader like I've wanted to be until now and I still find myself getting really distracted . So I'll be reading through a page or two and then I'm thinking about something else that I need to do or what have you . And so the assignments really helped me take a pause and immediately start applying that learning . And again I was really surprised to know as I was going through these exercises and trying to think like a restaurant owner . Again , I found a lot of value in in working on my business and a lot of clarity . So thank you for that .

Chip Klose 15:18

It's these principles I wrote a strategy book . Right , it's a mindset book , it's it's a , and the principles can be applied to any business . I shaped it for the restaurant industry because it's where I've spent my career , it's what I'm most passionate about and it's where I think these can be easily applied . But you can apply this stuff anywhere . And for those of you who haven't read the book , you'll see the book is mercifully short . I think it's like 207 pages , and I did that way on purpose , and I split that up into 24 different chapters . So you do the math .

Chip Klose 15:51

Those are very short chapters and with little assignments at the end of each one . So you read chapter one , you do assignment one , the idea being that you look over it and I , and if , over the course of the chapter , I've convinced you , congratulations . I got a pat on the back , but who cares ? If I've convinced you that this is something you should do , then I can certainly go the next step and saying great , so I've convinced you . You now believe what I believe . This is how you apply it to your business and and actually allow it to make an impact , which , for me , for a book like this , I was like I was , I had to do it . I had to help bridge the gap between I read it . I agree with this . Really smart , I'm nodding my head and great . So what do we do about it ? And and so I'm glad the publisher was sort of on board with me doing that . They were like , oh , we love that idea . It's great .

Christin Marvin 16:40

Yeah , it's a . It's a wonderful format . It makes a lot of sense . I love again , just being able to really sit down and immediately start retaining and implementing what you've learned . It's just , it's genius . So thank you for that tool . I loved .

Christin Marvin 16:54

Challenge 24 to assignment 24 , because I was when I read it . I was just getting ready to take my first two week break from my business and and it reminded me of when I was operating restaurants and how I would set the team up for success , right ? So , simon , 24 is you challenge the reader to take a two week break from their vacation and set their team up for success , right ? And that took me back to running restaurants , where I would have meetings with everybody I would have you know , create a do list with them , delegate out my responsibilities or whatever needed to happen , create little cheat sheets for them of passwords and you know , whatever , whatever they needed , right ? And that was so eye opening for me because I had forgotten to think that way in terms of my business . And then it was so eye opening to come back and again see those gaps where I needed to set myself up for the next time I go on vacation 100% it's .

Chip Klose 17:45

I spent a lot of time on the . I spent a lot of time thinking about this and talking about this to the members of my mastermind group , the people that I coach , and I'm sure this will resonate with you . But for me , it all comes down to systems and goals , and not enough of us take the time to actually set a goal . A system without a goal is just stuff to do , just tasks , right . But if we get really clear on what do I want to accomplish ? In this case , I want to go away for two weeks and really switch off , unplug , right . So I'm going to go away for two weeks and everything's going to be fine . Well then , what's the system I need to put into place to make that thing happen ?

Chip Klose 18:23

A system system is a fancy word that we've dressed up over the last , I'll say , 15 years , but a system is just a repeatable set of actions . I talk about that in the book . It's just a repeatable set of actions . I'm going to do this and this and this and this to accomplish the stated goal Right . If it's a repeatable set of actions , right , it can be repeated , it can be replicated . If it can be replicated , it can be scaled , and that's how either we grow a business or even just step away from the business so that we can let other people do it . That's a form of scaling , I firmly believe .

Christin Marvin 19:00

Yeah , and I've always been a huge fan of systems and at certain points in my career I've had people tell me oh , you're too corporate , you like these systems too much and the thing that again misguided right . I believe that systems help your business be more efficient , but more than that , they help your people focus where they want to focus , right with the guests and with each other , and they make your business less dependent on people , which again right now is retention , is such a huge pain point in our industry , and so I work a lot with my clients too . Like let's get some systems in place . Like what questions are your teammates constantly asking you ? There are systems in there , right , that you can create for them .

Chip Klose 19:39

We were just talking about this the other day and I'm sure you know this story but maybe your listeners all don't .

Creating Hospitality Culture in Restaurants

Chip Klose 19:47

Danny Meyer is the founder of Union Square Hospitality Group . Right , it's , it's . He's got dozens of restaurants and eventually they wanted to make Shake Shack and then they spun Shake Shack off into its own company . But Union Square Hospitality Group is one of the nicest groups of people you'll ever find and Danny really wanted to be the hospitality guys . We wanted to be the most hospitable restaurants , certainly in New York City , and his whole thing was okay .

Chip Klose 20:13

So how do I do ? I can say that I can put that in the handbook , I can tell people at the pre shift , but we need somewhere to . You know , we need to put our money where our mouth is and he tells the story . So we literally did . Back in the day they used to give their captains and bartenders basically a comp budget and it was a set budget that says you have I'm making the number up because I forget it you have $25 at your disposal to make someone's night . If you can make someone go Awards , then it's worth it , right ? So maybe that's their .

Chip Klose 20:43

Debating between one appetizer and the other can only really afford one . They pick one , you send the other . And so I know you were debating and you really shouldn't have had to choose between these two because they're both so great . Right , you know the look in their face . They're gonna go whoa . Or they finish the bottle of wine halfway through Rondres and say can I bring you another ? And they said , no , we're not gonna finish another bottle of wine , we're okay , thank you . So you go and bring each of them a half glass of wine and you say I brought you this because it's gonna pair with the dish you're eating in the following ways . And I brought you a half glass of this because they didn't want you to have to finish your entrees without wine , because these are gonna be really great pairings . And they go whoa .

Chip Klose 21:21

And at the end of the shift right , you have to come in when you check out with your manager , right , and it's where's your comps ? Where's your comps ? And tell me the story about what you did . And you say , oh , table 22, . They blah , blah , blah . And so I did this . Great , and it was part of the culture , right , culture is behavior , right .

Chip Klose 21:39

And Seth Godin always talks about this from a marketing perspective . Right , he says marketing is culture right and our job as a marketer is to change behaviors , to change the culture or really establish the culture . And he talks about the most famous , the most important seven words in all of marketing and all of business . And he says it's people like us do things like this right . So people who work here at Danny Meyer's restaurant we always look for opportunities to quote unquote make someone's night . And he's actually given us a budget so I can do it really efficiently , seamlessly , I don't have to bother a manager . I know I have permission , I'm being empowered to be hospitable . And what happens is you're not just looking for opportunities to spend money , but what happens is that it trickles down and you look for all kinds of different opportunities to make someone's night . You just happen to have a budget to be able to go above and beyond to make someone's night .

Christin Marvin 22:33

Yeah , I love so . One of my mentors worked for Danny at Union Square Cafe and I love that . The story that you just told made it from New York to Colorado , because when I worked with Michael at the Broadmoor in my early 20s , we had a similar structure . We weren't , as it wasn't , as systematic as like a comp structure , but we called it as something for nothing . So it's very similar , right . If somebody was deciding between two appetizers having that conversation with the server , which one do we go with , they would say something knowing that they were gonna bring out both . Right . And when you dropped , when you dropped both of those at a table , there's like there's no better feeling in the world when those guests light up and they're just so taken back that you would take it upon yourself to just bring out something . It's such a small little thing , but it goes so far .

Christin Marvin 23:17

Hey , everybody , before we dive back into our episode , let's address a common challenge in the restaurant industry leadership development . If you are a restaurant owner or manager navigating the complexities of leading a restaurant team , you know it's no easy feat . I'd like to offer you a quick 15 minute discovery call to discuss your restaurant's leadership journey , whether you're facing challenges or seeking growth opportunities . This call is a chance for us to explore ways to enhance your leadership skills and develop your team . Head over to my website at christenmarvincom . Slash contact to schedule your call . Let's work together to elevate your leadership game and create a thriving environment in your restaurant . Now let's get back to the show . Thanks for tuning in and I can't wait to connect with you soon .

Chip Klose 24:10

All of the most hospitable things we do . I just ran this marketing summit down in South Carolina for all my mastermind members and it was other people who were not in the group , and so they're being brought into the culture here . The things we end up talking about are so little that , yes , you gave them free food , but actually what you did is you made them feel important . You listened to them , you observed . Anybody can observe a young couple in their early 20s really pinching pennies to be able to afford a nice restaurant , and so you know this restaurant's gonna make 20 , 30 , $40,000 in revenue tonight .

Chip Klose 24:43

Can we send an $18 appetizer ? That's actually about 525 real plate cost . Can we spend 525 to give them something to talk about ? It's easy to look there and say , yeah , we gave them free food , but we're not giving stuff away because they didn't expect it . Right , it's not like we couponed . What we did is we listened to them , we paid attention , we observed and we said I think this is gonna make your night even more special . That's what we did . We made them feel important . All of the best things we do actually cost very , very little , if anything .

Christin Marvin 25:15

Yeah , I love that there's little mindset shift blocks in throughout the book . That I really love too , and two of them really stood out to me . One is that you state that 80% of marketing is happening behind your back . Would you explain that ?

Chip Klose 25:31

Yeah . So I would assume you'd agree , I would assume most of the listeners would agree that word of mouth continues to be our most powerful tool , right , 100% . And the thing that I don't like about word of mouth is that it's very hard to control , right , which is very freeing to say that , like I can't control who talks about their experience , I can't control the words they use to describe their experience that they had in the restaurant . And let's say that if you take care of 100 covers , right , they're all gonna tell a certain amount of people . So let's say we've got a Thursday night , we've got 100 covers , and they go and each tell even just five people right Over the following week , all of the emails I send and the SMS messages I send or the things I post to social media are a fraction or a fraction of what's actually being communicated about my restaurant in that given week .

Chip Klose 26:32

Because I have 100 covers tonight , I have 140 covers the next night , I have 180 covers on Saturday night . I've got on and on and on . The majority of the messaging is not happening , is not our doing , it's happening behind our backs . And in that chapter , in that section , the whole point is it's our responsibility to make sure that we give our guests a shorthand , a vocabulary with which to speak about us . So we want them to say the things that we want them to say right , that it was amazing , that the plating was beautiful , the flavors were incredible , they blew me away , they took care of me .

Chip Klose 27:10

Well then , it's our job to make the flavors dynamic , to make the plating interesting enough to go whoa . I've never seen anything like that . We have to make hospitality service flushes , flourishes that make them go whoa . We were talking about again at this event that I just ran . There are stories that I've been telling for 20 years Because and it was a little thing cost them pennies to do , but I'm still talking about it and it was , for sure , manufactured . They knew they were doing things that were gonna make us go whoa and things that we were gonna talk about . Now , 20 years later , I don't know . Those are probably pretty rare , but you can manufacture the things that will be talked about the next day or the next week or so .

Christin Marvin 27:50

Absolutely . The other mindset shift that I love is that you say there is a relationship between marketing and operations that must exist for any restaurant to exceed . Will you expand on that ?

Chip Klose 28:03

So I love that one . I'm so glad you connected on that one . Oftentimes the role of a marketer certainly at an independent restaurant , although I've even seen this at larger group levels the role of the marketer often is you go down the hall , we'll tell you when we're ready , and then all the operators , right . So the chef , the managers , the owners , they all go into a room and they make a restaurant and they basically come out with a binder , right . They emerge from the room , walk the binder down the hall to the marketing department and say , hey , we figured it out , this is what the restaurant's gonna be . Go sell it .

Christin Marvin 28:40

That sounds ridiculous and I'm laughing because I've been there so many times and now that you're saying it like that , I'm like oh my God .

Chip Klose 28:47

Right . So , really , A concept begins with the marketer Whether it's an actual marketer or whether that's the owner just putting on their marketing hat .

Market Research for Restaurant Success

Chip Klose 28:58

It begins with a marketing action . The marketing action is looking at a given market , a neighborhood , a city , a region and saying who here needs something ? Who here needs something that we are uniquely qualified to provide . What happens ? I say early in the book , two ways to market . You come up with a product and then go find people to buy that product , or you look for people who need something and then go create a product for those people . Most restaurants do it the first way and the best companies in the world do it the latter , which is bizarre because we're in the service industry .

Chip Klose 29:35

We spend our whole day , all our nights , saying , hi , how are you ? What can I get for you ? What do you need ? Can I make this better ? Can I make you more comfortable ? Can I make this be exactly what you want ? Our job is to take care of people for a living . What we often miss is the very first step , which is okay . People need something . Who , though ? Who needs something specific that I can actually provide them with ?

Chip Klose 30:01

The marketing department starts , looks at a market and says I think there's openings here , here and here I think there's room for a new blank restaurant , a new XYZ , whatever it is . Then you go to the operators and you say , hey , I think I know a couple of ways we can succeed here . I've identified groups of people who are a kind of person who really need something . Now that can be something as simple as looking in a neighborhood and saying there's no fine dining restaurant here . Oh , okay , we don't just say , well , you're right , there's no fine dining restaurants here , let's just make one . Then you have to look and say , well , why is that ? Have others opened and failed ? Do people not want New York City ? We're famous for this . There's some neighborhoods that where people just want to live there and they're happy to travel elsewhere for restaurants .

Chip Klose 30:51

I opened a restaurant on the Upper West Side of Manhattan years and years and years ago . They were one of the first , one of the only fine dining restaurants on the Upper West Side . What we discovered , really the hard way over the course of the year , is that there's a reason for that . The people here are it's residential . They don't want those kind of restaurants . In fact , they don't want to just come downstairs and go to a nice restaurant , even if they can afford it , which , by the way , most of them could definitely afford it . They wanted neighborhood , casual , comfortable , bistro kind of places and they were willing to travel because they had a driver . They had to get a taxi or a car to take them to a restaurant in other parts of the city . They didn't mind traveling , but they didn't want it in their backyard . It's very different than , say , the Upper East Side or Tribeca or Gramercy , other defined neighborhoods in Manhattan . But we learned that the hard way and that restaurant no longer exists .

Christin Marvin 31:45

Chip , I've been there too . I worked for a group and I was a managing partner . We opened a restaurant . We took over a space that had been a dive bar for 60 years and put in a high-end comfort food and it failed . We got in there and the guests coming in saying we're saying this is too expensive , I want to compose dish , I can't . This is too expensive for my family . Where's your children's menu ? Then we didn't adapt to that , which I think was our downfall . I was 30 , right , I was learning all the things . How do you know what those neighbors want before you go in ?

Chip Klose 32:23

It's so great , right , it's A couple of hours later I looked at my ugh's roots to gain all this wattage asking questions . Now , that can be literally going up to people and asking questions , or just asking yourself questions , starting by saying what do I think would do really well here ? What do I think people , what could people use here ? Cause they don't know they need it yet . Right , the Steve Jobs genius was that he created an iPhone .

Chip Klose 32:48

Famously , in his early memos he created a pocket computer . He looked in the future and he says I see where we're going . I think there's a time in the very near future where people are going to need to be way more connected than they currently are , meaning they're going to have to have a computer on them at all times . And everyone says no one's going to do it . They already have their wallet , their keys and their phone . And he said well , they've got one pocket left . And he says that goes for all the other stuff . That goes for their hand . That goes , they're not going to put another thing in their pockets . And he said OK , so figure out which one of those we can replace . And he came back like three months later . He says , actually , I want to replace them all . And they said no , you're crazy , we're already going to replace the phone .

Chip Klose 33:28

That's when iPhone was created . He said it's really a pocket computer that actually that also has phone functionality . But the very last ironic laugh that he had is that we have Apple Pay . It is our wallet . We have my doors are all electronics , so my lights it's a smart home . My alarm system is all digital . It's all via an app , so my phone is a computer . It's a phone , it's my wallet and it's my keys Guess what . And if you've got a Tesla , you just use that to start your car . You don't need a key for your car . So he saw what the world needed , but he was asking the question of what do they need ? What do they need that they don't know they need yet ?

Christin Marvin 34:11

Yeah , love that .

Chip Klose 34:12

It begins by asking the question . Sometimes it's simple observation . They always talk about counting cars in the parking lot . Where do people go ? I know maniacal restaurant owners that used to sit and watch people leave the subway right , get home from work , get out of the subway and he would watch where they went . He said how many people are going straight home ? How many people go to a restaurant , a bar , something like that , and which ones do they go to ? Then that's just simple . Tallying it up . The number of restaurants that don't do that are great . That don't even go to that level . Simple observation and surveying , just asking questions . And we didn't even get that much . We spent a chapter on market research in there towards the end of the book , but really it begins with that . Then you can do other things right Studies of your market and understanding you know household income and things like that . Even the post office can give you that kind of information .

Chip Klose 35:09

You can go onto their website and get information about general sort of affluence in the area if you're going to open up a high-end thing Although , in the case of the Upper West Side , that wouldn't have helped us , because people had plenty of money . That just wasn't where they wanted to spend their money on a Wednesday night .

Christin Marvin 35:25

I saw your wheels turning there a second ago when you said market research . Is there another book here in the wing ?

Chip Klose 35:32

No , no , you know what ? It's funny when I was in business school , one of the last classes I took , there were two back-to-back market research classes and the professor I had for both of them is amazing . He's genius . We did a whole episode of this on the Restaurant Strategy podcast and for the life of me I can't remember the number , but it was so good that we did an encore of it . So we did it relatively recently , in the last , I'll say , two months , three months .

Chip Klose 35:56

It's Dr Ernest Baskin . It's my interview with him . If anybody's really interested in learning more about him , that's what he does and he's literally written the book on the subject and he's young and so he gets the way the world is and the way the world is going and I found him and his opinions and his ideas really refreshing . It was worth , I'll say , maybe half of what I spent on my education because I got to know him and learn from him , but it's a really great podcast episode that sort of acts as a masterclass in this area for anybody who's listening and wants to dive deeper .

Christin Marvin 36:32

I love it . I'm going to check it out right after this when I go walk the dogs .

Restaurant Marketing Mindset and Strategy

Christin Marvin 36:36

What's the one thing that you want readers to take away from this book , because I feel like you can jump into any of the 24 chapters and take away a valuable nugget . What's the one thing you want people to walk away with ?

Chip Klose 36:48

Yeah , it's a great question . Number one is that definition for marketing . It's three questions what's the product , who is that product for , and then how do we reach them ? You've got to get clear on the first two , because the rest of your time as a marketer is spent on the third . That's something that's really , really key . You have to understand your people , the people you're looking to serve .

Chip Klose 37:11

So one of the things we learned in the pandemic it was a great example of this we called it the pivot that in the pandemic we served people one way , meaning people came in and they ate in our restaurant and then when the government shut everything down , we couldn't serve them in that way anymore and people were nervous . They wouldn't have come even if it were open . But there was another thing they needed that the best restaurants , the most successful restaurants , were the ones that were sensitive and said we have people who needed something from us . We provided that with them and stopped and said what do they need now ? Ok , they still needed something . They were stuck at home . They didn't want to cook seven days a week , three meals a day , like they were getting bored of their own cooking .

Chip Klose 37:57

Anybody listening to this certainly knows how much that is true . So they needed things that the best thing in business is by looking to your people and saying what do they need ? What do they need that I'm uniquely qualified to provide them with . And if you answer that question and continue to evolve your business and you'll find additional revenue streams , you'll find better ways to serve people than you have been . You'll find better ways to serve them than anyone else is serving them . If you do that , if there's one thing you take away , it begins with your people and you say what do they need , what do they need that I can provide them with . How can I do it in a more compelling way than anyone else out there ? Start there that's your center and then build out from there .

Christin Marvin 38:39

And love it . Chip , thank you so much for being here and sharing all your wisdom with me and with the audience . Would you tell listeners where you can find the restaurant marketing mindset and podcasts and all the goodness ?

Chip Klose 38:53

Yeah for sure . So to find the book , you can go to Amazon and find it , or you can go right , so that's third party , or you can go first party and you can go and get it directly from me , therestaurantmarketingmindset . com . You can get your book there . I get pennies of every copy on the Amazon sales . I get every dollar generated through the website . So if you really want to support your local , whatever you go there . And if it's just easier to go to Amazon , that's fine too . I would say don't buy one book by two books and do that because you're going to give them away . Give them away to the restaurant next door , the restaurant across town , to one of your managers . So therestaurantmarketingmindset . com . And if you want to go find the podcast , go find it . Anywhere you find podcasts . It's called Restaurant Strategy . You can go to restaurantstrategypodcast . com and learn all of the things that I do . Those two will introduce you to my ecosystem .

Christin Marvin 39:44

I love it . I've got a client that I've been thinking about as we've been having this conversation , who needs this book , so I'm going to go buy it from your website Right after we get done .

Chip Klose 39:52

One of the things we're going to do in the next couple of months when the audio book comes out , we're also going to release basically a four book pack . It's like four books , four coats , and the whole point is that I don't want to sell one at a time anymore . I want to sell four at a time , Even if it's at a steep discount , simply because I know that's what moves the needle in the business when everybody is speaking the same language .

Christin Marvin 40:16

I love that . Can I steal that idea from you ?

Chip Klose 40:18

Hey , you could . There are no original ideas . There's nothing precious that I've ever come up with . Everything I do is taken , distilled or stolen from someone else , and what I try to be really good about is just making sure to tell people who I stole it from . I do that . I do it all the time . It's 24 chapters in the book are pretty much . There's no new ideas , just new ways of thinking about the old ideas .

Christin Marvin 40:44

I love it . Well , everybody , please go out and get yourself a copy for sure . Again , thanks , Chip , really appreciate your time today and thank you so much , everybody , for listening . For more free leadership tips , please visit ChristinMarvin . com and be sure to download my free step-by-step guide on how to retain your employees . Thanks everybody , talk to you next week .