About David
I think differently about why restaurants struggle.
Most coaches sell information. I sell clarity under pressure — the one diagnosis, the one decision, the one system that actually moves the needle. Here’s how I got here and why I see the work this way.
01 · What I believe
Restaurant pros are not overwhelmed because they lack systems.
They are overwhelmed because they lack clarity — and because the systems they do have were never really installed. Every owner I’ve worked with since 2003 has hit the same wall: not a knowledge gap, not a market problem, not a team problem. It’s a decision they’ve been avoiding — and the work has become the place they hide from it.
My job is to slow your thinking down, help you name the one decision that would change everything, and then build the standard around it and install it — so your team holds it, not just you. Clarity first. Then the systems that make it stick.
02 · How I got here
Thirty years of restaurants. Twenty-plus of coaching. One stubborn idea.
I grew up in restaurants. I worked the family business before I worked anywhere else. From there I ran kitchens and dining rooms at Coyote Springs Brewing Company & Cafe, opened and operated locations of Famous Sam’s Restaurant & Sports Bar, and spent years teaching the next generation of restaurateurs at Scottsdale Culinary Institute. Every stop, the same pattern: smart, passionate owners stuck inside their own businesses, working harder and harder on the wrong things.
In 2003 I founded my first restaurant coaching company, built a restaurant-management software platform from the ground up, and eventually sold it. Along the way I wrote The Restaurant Prosperity Formula, started the podcast by the same name, and built the coaching practice I run today — group coaching, the 3-day Vegas workshop, and the on-demand training library behind it all.
Across all of it, the lesson never changed: more systems are not the answer. The right system at the right time is. And you cannot pick the right system until you know which decision you’re actually trying to make.
03 · The receipts
Credentials, but second.
30+ years in restaurants
Family restaurants, Coyote Springs Brewing Company & Cafe, Famous Sam’s Restaurant & Sports Bar, and Scottsdale Culinary Institute — dishwasher through operator through educator.
Coaching since 2003
Became the original restaurant coach. Coached independent restaurant owners across the U.S., Canada, and abroad through every market cycle since.
Built and sold restaurant software
Founded, built, and sold a restaurant-management software platform — the same controls and reporting I now teach members to wire into their own operations.
Book, podcast, workshop
Author of The Restaurant Prosperity Formula. Host of the podcast by the same name. Anchor of the 3-day Restaurant Workshop in Las Vegas.
If this sounds like how you already wish someone would think about your restaurant —
Book a Profit Finder Call. Thirty minutes with Ryan James on my team. He’s a former member who turned his own restaurant around using this work. He’ll diagnose whether we’re the right fit — and tell you the truth either way.