Restaurant Masterminds

What an interesting week I have had. The restaurant has been quite busy, and with the hustle and bustle of school starting and the excitement of the Democratic National Convention coming to Colorado, I was quite shocked to find out that I was connected to a political stance….let me fill you in.

A few nights ago I received an email from a guest of mine. Much to my surprise he stated that he was shocked that I supported a recall of one of our cities elected officials. What? I thought to myself, “first of all, who is being recalled, and secondly, how did my image get involved in this?” The guest sent me a link to a YOU TUBE video and asked if I was really supporting this recall and if so, why? What the heck is this guy talking about?

Oh boy, I thought, here we go, which one of my employees took my Ben Martinez Halloween look-alike mask and stood in front of a camera? I clicked on the link and found myself shaking my head in disbelief. One of our guests, who has dined with us for years and I consider him a valuable customer, decided to use my patio and the background of my restaurant as a place to conduct an interview and place his political views on camera for all of the YOU TUBE world to see….(which luckily is quite small right now, my home videos of summer vacation is getting more hits!)…

Many of my guests recognized the patio area, and even one of my employees of 9 years was seen watering plants in the background. That alone, without my face, without my voice, without even saying whether I held a position on this recall….left many guests THINKING I supported this mans issues. As business owners, we know that religion and politics are not topics for discussion, unless cleverly handled. When the media covered my re-naming of my menu items for the Presidential Candidates, it covered ALL of the parties, not just one….anyway, you can just imagine the can of worms that was opened…..both the recall, and the recall-ee are my guests and friends. I had NO IDEA this was happening because I was out of town at the time of the videotaping, and my management team was unaware that he chose to sit outside to record this message.

DAMAGE CONTROL….so now what? Do I put out a YOU TUBE video that says, “the stucco wall seen in the video and the restaurant that it is connected to, does not hold a political stance to this issue”….or do I turn this into a marketing idea? “Mayor’s special….50% off every TO GO menu order…if the line is busy….RECALL”! I immediately called the Mayor and made him aware that I didn’t support the recent video invasion and was unaware of the actions and fortunately, he found some humor in it….so my 15 minutes of fame this time was limited to my restaurant wall, but it is nice to know how easily recognized my building is to so many people! With the upcoming Democratic National Convention coming to Colorado, we’ll be hoping that something marketable happens, and for the week I’ll have to add my “Bar-taco” Obama and “Flan” McCain back on my menu.

Everything is marketable…..look around.

From the Desk of Restaurant Masterminds Marketing Guru
Ben Martinez

I just arrived home from our wonderful meeting we had in Downtown Pittsburgh, PA. What a great city that was!

Today my 23 year old niece came into the restaurant to show off her brand new 2008 Nissan Ultima! She only paid $22,000 with taxes for the car, and boy was she PROUD. I couldn’t help but to think back to my first new car. I purchased, on my own, a Vanilla White Ford GT Escort with black tinted windows…Boy was I proud! I remember grinning from ear to ear for weeks because it was a goal that I set out to do and I achieved it! Like my niece I was extremely proud to show off my first new car to all of my friends and family!

Our first open Mastermind Meeting in Pittsburgh was this past Monday and Tuesday….and today I have those same proud feelings that I had 18 years ago! I am ecstatic and PROUD that Dick, ReNae and I set our goals and achieved them! We spent months and months with preparation and planning for this event, to share with others what we have been doing over the past year. All went smoothly and our event was successful.

We visited four independent restaurants, each of various menus, decor and locations. All of our members clearly enjoyed the 17th St Cafe….and we really found out that “size does matter.” Our guest speakers were fantastic and loaded with tons of information and inspiration…but do you know the one thing that I personally noticed? The energy and passion that we created in our members…Remember that feeling?…The feeling and passion that you had when you first opened your doors…We found that passion and that excitement in our members again. THAT’S what truly made me the proudest!…The power of the Mastermind helped our members refocus, re-energize and most importantly, helped them “Remember that Feeling” of why they opened their restaurant in the first place. They’re all headed back to their restaurants with a new form of energy and passion that will help them conquer their goals and bring back the feeling they had when they first opened their doors.

Do you want to remember that feeling again? You’re in luck! Our next Restaurant Masterminds Group meeting is coming to Phoenix, Arizona, and I’d love to meet you there!

From the desk of The Restaurant Masterminds Marketing Guru,
Ben Martinez

I remember when I first joined the Boy Scouts, one of the first things they taught me was their motto “be prepared”. As a young Boy Scout, I always thought it pertained to camping. As a Restaurateur, I now understand exactly what that statement means.

The weather on the Southern Coast of Maine this summer has been atrocious. We have had rain or thundershowers almost every day for the last month. I can’t believe the thunder and lightening. My poor cat is petrified. Recently my seafood restaurant was struck by lightening and literally scared the daylights out of my customers and staff. The power went out, the computers went on the fritz and the place was packed. These things never happen when the place is empty, or in the off-season. On top of all that, our General Manager was off and our assistant manager was on duty.

For most restaurants this would be a recipe for disaster. Who plans for a power outage? Who is actually “prepared” for this? Our manager on duty calmly took out our power outage emergency kit and followed the directions on the front of the box. I know what you’re thinking, ” who has a power outage emergency kit?’ All three of my restaurants have one. The kit is a cardboard box, with emergency procedures taped to the outside. The first instruction is to go to any terminal on our POS and print all the checks currently in the system. The next instruction is to take out the swingline wall phone and plug it in. Unfortunately, that fancy phone system you have doesn’t work when you don’t have any power. (imagine that) Since this has happened three times this summer, our managers have this procedure down pat. Once your system goes down, you can’t authorize credit cards. With alot of the public using their credit cards for vacation this year, you’d better be calling in and manually getting authorization.

This leads me to what is actually in the box besides a telephone. We have a manual credit card swiper, along with the old fashion carbon slips, we have candles, flashlights, manual checks along with matches and aim and flames to light the candles. Those emergency lights don’t really cover all the dining rooms that well. Don’t forget to have the creditcard authorization numbers by your phone and on your emergency procedure list. In addition, we have the numbers for power, cable and our pos system on the list as well.

You probably think, wow, those guys are prepared. In reality, our next major budget item is a generator. Then we truly could say ” We’re Prepared”

Take a look around your restaurant and ask yourself, “Am I prepared?”.