Restaurant Owners Uncorked: Twenty Owners Share Their Recipes for Success [Paperback]

Wil Brawley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 28, 2011

Most restaurants fail. Yours can succeed. The owners in this book will tell you how... Restaurant Owners Uncorked is a collection of interviews with a diverse range of twenty owners, such as the legendary and colorful Phil Roberts, founder of Buca di Beppo and The Oceanaire Seafood Room; Scott Leibfried, a renowned, high-energy figure in the culinary industry who is part of the cast of the hit television show, “Hell's Kitchen”; and Chris Sommers, a former Silicon Valley technology executive who makes Chicago-style deep dish pizza (in St. Louis) so well that he was invited to the White House to cook it for President Obama and the first family. This book isn’t useful only for aspiring restaurant owners. It also provides practical advice for anybody who currently owns a restaurant or who simply wants to understand and be entertained by reading the business philosophies of twenty successful entrepreneurs. As you read these interviews, you’ll feel like you are sitting down with the owners over a cup of coffee or a beer, picking their brains and finding out what makes them tick. You’ll learn why restaurants don’t have to be risky at all, what chain restaurants’ collective Achilles heel is, why having a good CPA is as important as the food you put on the plate, and much more.

Editorial Reviews

From the Author

I'm with a company called Schedulefly, and restaurants are our customers. When one of my business partners and I decided that we'd like to open a restaurant one day and began outlining a concept, we realized that as cool as that sounded, we didn't know what it takes to be successful in such a tough industry.  We decided to start interviewing restaurant owners to find out how they do it.  The interviews were so full of great advice and wisdom, we knew we needed to find a way to share them. 

This book is a collection of those interviews - the stories of twenty restaurant owners from all over the U.S., and one from Canada.  They all tell how they got started, what's worked for them, what hasn't worked, and the pearls of wisdom they've learned along the way.  They're all very open, honest and candid about what the restaurant business is like - both the pros and the cons. I hope you'll find Restaurant Owners Uncorked to be easy to read and entertaining, and that you'll learn what it takes to succeed in a fun but tough industry. 

Enjoy your read,
Wil

From the Back Cover

One tip from each owner...
Go Where the Universities Are

Focus On What's Happening Inside Your Four Walls

A Good CPA Is as Important as Good Food

Pay Managers On Profits

Edgy Marketing Gets Free PR

Know Your Community Intimately

Compete For Talent, Not Customers

You Can Dominate In Small Towns

Have a Hook

Serve from the Heart

Give Incredible Benefits

Check Your Ego at the Door

Feed Customers Like They're Friends

Be Transparent with Your Staff

Focus On Volume Over Margins

Keep Your Fundamentals Simple

Never Cut Corners

Evolve or Die

Hire Integrity Over Experience

Hire Sales People for Every Position

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 322 pages
• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (February 28, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1456474820
• ISBN-13: 978-1456474829
• Product Dimensions: 0.7 x 5.9 x 8.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #22,928 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #30 in Books > Business & Investing > Industries & Professions > Hospitality, Travel & Tourism

More About the Author

The other author bios I've seen on Amazon are written in third person, probably because those are famous authors who have people who write their bios for them. I don't, so here's mine in first person...

I'm one of the owners of Schedulefly (www.schedulefly.com). We're a three-person business (Wes Aiken, Tyler Rullman and me) and provide a simple web-based software that helps independent restaurants schedule staff, communicate and get organized online. We all love what we do, and we have a lot of fun. We decided to write this book because we thought it would help people in the industry we serve, help us build brand awareness, help us learn for ourselves what it takes to be a successful restaurant owner, and help us make a little extra dough(not much though - it seems book selling doesn't have great margins...)

I've got a great wife and three awesome kids and I live in Charlotte, NC. I love mountain biking and snow skiing, I exercise daily and I like reading and watching movies. I think The Godfather and The Godfather Part II are the best movies ever made, followed closely by Point Break (yep, you read that correctly). Some favorite recent books are Rework, Made to Stick and DRiVE, and I devour Inc. Magazine, Men's Journal, and Sports Illustrated every week.

This is my first book. And it's not really my book - it belongs to the twenty owners who are profiled. They're the ones who provided the incredible content - I just put it down on paper and packaged it.

Hope you enjoy it!

Wil

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Bible to Starting and Running a Successful Business, Restaurant or Not March 15, 2011

By Entrepreneur

Format:Paperback

Most of the so called "entreprenurial" books are filled with rhetoric from an author describing how he or she started a successful company. Most also contain a lot of what I like to call "fluff" and cliched advice. This Gem "Restaurant Owners Uncorked" contains e)none of the above.

The author of this book is a skilled Software entrepreneur (First Research, ScheduleFly), but admirably and humbly never touts his own experiences or opinions. Instead, through brilliant open-ended and consultative questioning, Wil Brawley guides 20 other successful restaurant entrepreneurs down an exciting path in which they each share tactical advice and nuggets that any business executive will learn from (including myself). Each chapter is it's own journey including do's, dont's, and what it takes to win. If you are thinking of starting any business, this book is a must read. BEWARE - Once you begin it's impossible to put down, except to run and grab a highlighter or jump online and purchase more copies for your colleagues.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Direct answers to real time small business dilemmas March 15, 2011

By J.W. Carne

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I followed the creation of this book through the weekly posting of excerpts that the Schedule-fly website Blog provided. As a small business owner NOT in the food industry I was initially surprised by the common sense approach and situational similarities my business experience shared with these folks being interviewed. I have a couple of friends that have started coffee shop and cupcake stores recently so I was excited to share this read and great insight with them. The pressure of location to hiring the right people to getting new folks through the door and then making sure they come back because they feel you have set yourself apart from the other choices that consumer has are difficult... To see these owners with such different backgrounds and approaches answer the important start-up questions unscripted reassured me in some areas and told me where we need to improve in others. Definitely recommend this book for all small business owners who like to think outside the box..

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Not A Bible, But Excellent Wisdom Within July 11, 2012

By M Johnson

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

If you are considering opening a restaurant, then I would highly recommend this book.

The interviews are often very entertaining, and in each you will find nuggets of wisdom to help you plan your venture. Many themes are repeated by different owners, which helps to hammer the point and highlight the more important ones.

This is not a step-by-step guide to opening a restaurant. It will only give you advice on things to consider and things to avoid.

I had only two complaints with it. The first is the seeming plugging for the restaurant management software that the author is involved in (though I can't fault him for it if he genuinely considers it a helpful resource, it's just my preference not to have advertising thrown in). The second was the bulleting of what the author considered to be the key points of each interview. While I understand why he did that, I am one that by reading those it threw me off and caused me to forget some of the other points I had gathered on my own (thankfully though, there is always rereading).

If you just want to know what a lot of people have had to go through to open a restaurant, you will also find this an enjoyable read.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book, and Not Just For Restaurant Owners March 15, 2011

By M T Livingston

Format:Paperback

I really enjoyed this book, and not because I own a restaurant or aspire to someday. I liked the book because every interview, without exception, contained valuable business advice that can be applied by any small business owner, regardless of industry.

What also makes this book different is that it isn't full of Brawley's theories, rather the content comes "straight from the horse's mouth" (in this case, there are about 20 of them)... all seasoned veterans who share their successes, and in many cases their failures too.

If you aspire to own a restaurant someday, I consider this required reading. If you like sitting down with really smart people over a cup of coffee or a beer, then this is right up your alley, because the book is essentially a collection of conversations with enlightened business people who know what they're talking about.

Caution: Don't read this book on an empty stomach - you'll likely empty your fridge.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely amazing March 16, 2013

By Rick Dobbs

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

As someone who's been in the industry for a bit but just about to open their first spot, this book is absolutely amazing. It's not something written by some consultant who was indispensable to the growth of Applebee's or a professor who's done a study of 300 restaurants but hasn't opened one himself.

This book talks to a wide variety of owners, in a wide variety of market-types, and comes away with so many great things to keep in mind as you delve in to the world of restaurant-opening and operating. You get candid conversations with owners about how they succeeded and what exactly they screwed up (and you can avoid it yourself).

The book is done in interview form so it's not an author's interpretation of what they thought was the owner's most important information. To the contrary, the weakest part of the book is when the author does a few short "key points" at the end of each interview to give you the takeaways. Take those or leave 'em, you'll probably get something different than he did.

If you have a restaurant book library, this needs to be in it. If you only read 3 books before you open a restaurant (please read at least 3), then this needs to be one of those 3.