Restaurant Owner: Your Quality of Life Must Be a Priority

Hey there restaurant pros, it’s Dave Scott Peters and welcome to episode 49 of the Restaurant Prosperity Formula. I’ve been coaching restaurant owners since 2003 and the Restaurant Prosperity Formula is based on what the most successful restaurant owners I’ve worked with do on a daily basis to achieve their success. The basic premise of the formula centers around achieving prosperity, freedom from your restaurant and the financial freedom you deserve. To achieve prosperity you have to follow a very specific formula made-up of leadership, systems, training, accountability, and taking action. Today’s topic centers around the importance of quality of life as a restaurant owner and why you need to make it a priority. Let’s get started. But first, a word from our sponsor. This episode is being brought to you by Repeat Returns.

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A few weeks ago, on my weekly group coaching call with my restaurant transformation intensive members, I posed 3 questions I wanted them to answer regarding quality of life. You see, quality of life is in fact the number one benefit we work towards in our program. It fits perfectly with restaurant prosperity, which is freedom from your restaurant and the financial freedom you deserve. Those 3 questions, what were they? Well, they were these three questions. Number one, why is quality of life so important to you? Right? Think about it.

You’ve got to internally reflect and say, hey, is quality of life something, a pipe dream, something that I really want or something that’s truly a goal and it’s important to me? And it should be. The second question is, what does quality of life look like to you? Now, it looks like something different to everyone. You have to do a little soul searching internally to say, what is it that if I truly started my business to make money and have a life, not be a prisoner to that business, why? not only was it important, but what does that look like? It’s different to many different people, from more time with family to traveling to you name it. You’re the only one who can answer that question.

That’s again why I ask them each of these questions. The 3rd and final question is, what are you doing to get there or maintain it? So what are the steps that you are taking to create quality of life for you? Because it needs to become a priority and we’re going to talk about that. Or if you’re not quite there yet, like many of my members who just start off in the restaurant transformation intensive program, they’re on the journey to get there? some already have it because they might be in week 30. And what are they doing to maintain that? becomes an important question as well. You’ve got to again, make it a priority and a part of a daily habit to make time for yourself, your family.

Quality of life is important. Now some people said things on that call like financial independence for my family and feeling I can focus more on the growth of our business. Others said things like more free time with my family and travel more. But one answer Shauna gave struck a chord with me and everyone on the call. She said, and it was a mic drop, you don’t get second chances. See, you don’t get second chances to see your child graduate. You don’t get second chance to see your family member who might be in their final months or years of life. You don’t get a second chance to attend your best friend’s wedding. You don’t get a second chance to see your kid’s last volleyball game.

You don’t get a chance to go to your significant other’s retirement party. You don’t get a second chance to go to your mother’s 80th birthday party. You get the picture right? You get one chance to do these very special moments in your life. But when you’re a prisoner to your business, when you don’t make time for yourself, when you don’t make quality of life a priority, we miss these things and you don’t get to go backwards in time. Now I saw this play out in front of my very own eyes growing up. See, as many of you know, at one point in time, I worked for the toughest manager I know. That was my mother. We had a restaurant called Friar Tuck’s Tavern in Lynnwood, New Jersey.

And my mother was the general manager and my stepfather was the chef. Now there were partners involved, but the fact of the matter is my family were the operating partners of that business. And I watched them work morning, noon and night, seven days a week. I watched them make sure that whatever needed to happen to that business, they made happen to a point where I didn’t see them very often. Unless I was working in the restaurant, I didn’t see them. I would go to the local sub shop and get food from there. This is before DoorDash and all these things. This is the 1980s, for crying out loud. But the fact of the matter is, my mom would make certain food for me.

And I don’t know if you remember the boil bags where you literally made soups and sauces and these different dishes and you put them in a bag, you sealed them, and then you froze them. And then me as a kid, I’d boil water and throw the boil bag in there and dinner was ready. Why? Because my family wasn’t there. they were wrapped up in the business because they were kind of modeling what was done in the past. And that is the harder you work, the more hours you put in, the more valued you are to your business.

Now I modeled the same behavior growing up in my restaurant career because based on this old way, again, of valuing ourselves by more hours and the harder we worked, that was how valuable you were. This really came out when I was working at Coyote Springs, working my way back into the restaurant industry from bartender to manager to ultimately the operations manager of two units. Now I can tell you this. I was working 80 plus hours a week as I was the operations manager. I was learning books, creating systems, programming in Excel, Visual Basic for Excel. I was working shifts at both locations where people didn’t show or had to be off. I was doing whatever it took to make it work.

Quite honestly, I think I was making 25 grand or 23 grand way back when. So the fact of the matter is while it was a great education for me and an awesome opportunity, I didn’t have much of A life. It was literally in the restaurant. Then when I was at Famous Sam’s my first stint as a director of operations, I was a newlywed and I was working so hard. The guys who bought the company wanted to take it public and I was going to get stock options and I was like, okay, I can work hard from traveling from one place to another, opening restaurants to just working with our current franchisees.

I would say to my wife, again, a newlywed, while I got one day off a week every week, I said, what two days off in a row do you want this month? And that was tough. I mean, I was working my *** off. Heck, when I first started my coaching business back in 2003, coaching independent restaurant owners just like you, I was still two years away from selling Famous Sam’s on my second stint when I was the chief operating officer of that company. So I would not only work my *** off there, trying to turn the company around and sell it, I was starting a business. Not only would I work that full time, I’d come home and my wife would be trying to go to sleep.

It’d be 2:00 in the morning, lights on because our office was in our bedroom. And this is back in the day where I’d duplicate CDs on my computer one at a time, print off labels on an inkjet printer, and I would apply them, put them in boxes and cases and ship off my products because that’s what I had to do. Now I’m going to tell you. I like you needed to shift my mindset and change my priorities because I miss birthdays, games, family functions, and much more because I thought incorrectly that working hard meant working lots of hours. That was my value. And what about you? Are you falling into that same habit? that you’re the only way you can do anything.

If you’re not there, it doesn’t happen. You are the key to your business so much so that you work long hours and really hard and you give up quality of life. Are you still stuck doing the same things over and over again but expecting a different result? What does that sound like? Oh, that’s Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity. Are you crazy or are you ready to make a change? See, you don’t get second chances, restaurant owners. As Shawna shared with us on the group coaching call, which again is a mic drop, the moment she said it, I said, oh my gosh, that’s becoming a podcast. That’s going to become part of my marketing. That resonated with me and everyone on the call.

You don’t get second chances, restaurant owners. For most restaurant owners, quality time with family and things like traveling and vacations are just pipe dreams. Like you opened your business to have freedom, but instead a prisoner. There just isn’t time. Even when they do, they get to leave their restaurant, they’re so exhausted, all they do, they want to do is nothing. Like how many times have you worked your *** off in the business, gone home, and instead of going out with friends and family, you pass on it and you sit there and watch Netflix and drink a beer? The restaurant industry is grueling. I get it. It’s fast-paced. I get it. and you get pulled in a lot of different directions.

It is the toughest business I know. It can be extremely rewarding, however. Restaurant owners wear lots of hats and they meet the demands of lots of different people from the employees, customers, vendors, financial institution, investors, partners, and it all leaves little room for you to have a personal life. While you love your family and want everyone to be happy, You have few hours from your restaurant to do so. It’s hard to find the energy for activities with the family. And when it seems like there’s a crisis in every restaurant day, it’s hard to plan time away, even if it’s just a short vacation that’s close to home. And that’s got to change.

But just because you work in the restaurant industry doesn’t mean you don’t deserve a rich and rewarding personal and family life. Because again, ultimately, did you open your business as an enterprise to keep you a prisoner or to give you freedom from your business and the financial freedom you deserve? See, you deserve time off with your family. You deserve to make enough money to travel and take vacations, enjoy your spoils, if you will. It’s called a restaurant is an enterprise, a business. It’s not meant to be a charity. It’s not meant to be a prisoner. It is meant to be quite the opposite, your future. Not only do you deserve it, you can achieve it.

That’s the incredible news is yes, I’ve painted this picture of struggles, but the truth is there is a path to success of having time and having a great quality of life. How do I know? How can I be so certain? Because I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve been coaching independent restaurant owners since 2003 and I’ve worked with some very successful operators. And not all of them came to me successful. In fact, the vast majority started with struggles, not having systems in place, not having managers, not making the money they deserve, being a prisoner of the business, being the only one who get things done. See, these owners.

that have gone through the program who have changed their lives they get to choose their quality of life they get to choose their quality of life and I say that because some restaurant owners that that ADD entrepreneurial spirit kicks in and while we may give you a little freedom from the actual day-to-day operations they fill their day with other things from working strategically on the business side hustles such as real estate and another business you name it We kind of like to be busy, but you start to work on things you want to work on that can truly make a change for your business versus having to show up every day. Let me give you some examples. Brian, he travels.

He went from managing his business every single day to traveling wherever he wants to go. He knows the restaurant will run. He bowls in tournaments and he works strategically from home most days. In fact, his biggest change is when he walks in the restaurant learning how to communicate what he sees to his management team without upsetting them because he wanted to go, hey, make that change. And he’s learning to say, hey, I happen to notice this, And that’s a new world for him. Avery gets to focus his energy on growth versus day-to-day operations. I couldn’t be more proud of somebody who was in the business on the line making pizzas every Saturday.

And in a short time, in a 30-week program, made the change to where now he is working on moving his location to a much bigger place, changing things up, adding things, having a full management team in place, working on his relationships because he is truly leading his business. Matt works another full-time job as a physical therapist. Now, while he was doing both at the same time, he was still working a full-time job in the restaurant. And now he’s making time for his family. Again, as an entrepreneur, he’s going to fill his day. He likes to work. But instead of being in the restaurant, he’s working strategically and has time for his family.

Brianna and Jonathan, who I’ve known for a long, time. And we’ve work together for now since the pandemic. And I can tell you what’s amazing is from being the ones running their business to having a full management team in place and now working on opening their second location on top of their incredibly growing catering business. And they have time to spend with their small kids, their family. They have learned to work strategically on their business, not have to be in and they travel and go to shows and what have you. And They have the freedom they deserve. Ryan and Neely, they have this incredibly powerful businesses on the seashore. So in the summer, their sales go through the roof.

And normally, they’d be sucked into the business right now. But they’re working strategically on their restaurant, even though they’re in season. and they’ve got kids and they make time to shuttle them around and do their activities and do what’s necessary to be present with them. Now Raul, this man is crushing it with sales. He is crushing it while he concentrates most of that efforts on marketing. The truth is he’s now also focused on being his general contractor and renovating one of his current restaurants. At the same time, everything’s happening and he travels and does the things he wants, has other businesses.

Gina, this is somebody who’s in a family business, 40 years old, was literally the one who had to run the business day-to-day. Well, she’s able to travel now. She’s back to the gym as a bodybuilder and that’s a big commitment. So she’s able to be home to have dinner with her family. This on top of The restaurant’s making money and all these examples, they’re all making money too because they’ve concentrated on quality of life. If you focus on that, creating quality of life, it means you have managers in place and your restaurant is making the money you deserve. That’s the whole part of restaurant prosperity is flipping it from money, money, money to life.

When you get a life, you are set up for success. And oh, by the way, that’s just a short list of my members and their lives. While some of the restaurant owners I work with don’t go far from home, right? They sit there and say, I’m not quite ready to do so. They do take two days off every week and they don’t use time for anything when it comes to the restaurant. Meaning they can take the two days off and decide to do nothing to separate. We talk about it in the group coaching calls. Sometimes that stress gets to us. You have to be able to separate and get recharged.

Now some take those two days off and they use them to work strategically on their business because that’s what they want to do, but they’re not in the business. See, these members are now present with their families and friends. They’re not distracted by the restaurant. They’re not going out to dinner with their friends at another restaurant and getting that text message and going, excuse me, pulling themselves out of the restaurant, calling the restaurant, dealing with a crisis, coming back in. And by the time they get there, the whole table of friends and family have finished their meal while yours is dead in front of your empty chair.

They’re able to leave their business knowing it gets done. Things are getting done their way. Don’t get me wrong, there are crises. It’s the restaurant business. There are times where that will still happen. But the vast majority of time, they know nobody’s going to die. That there may be some hiccups, but they can give up their business to others to run on a day-to-day basis because they’ve been specific and clear on what they want done, trained their people, made it happen, which gives them the freedom to leave and at the same time gives them the ability to lead their business based on the numbers and systems to make the money they deserve.

You know what else improves when these restaurant owners decided their quality of life should be better? Their family relationships. They don’t fight with their spouses as much. They don’t get to experience the joys, or I should go backwards, they get to experience the joys of parenting and grandparenting. They can hang out with their family celebrations and not fight over when they have basically the family business pulling them away from family. How do they do it? They decide that something has to change. then they take action. Do you understand? So you can change this too. You have to make the decision it’s time to change.

It’s time to change what I’m doing on a day-to-day basis to make my life a priority. Not just the bank account, not just everybody else’s life. But I’ve got to make my life a priority and that there is quality to my life. And then decide what actions you need to take and ultimately take those actions. As I told a member on a group coaching call just a couple weeks later, you too can have this kind of success if you simply trust the process. Take action, do the work, and empower your implementer. This is the person who gets **** done.

If you’ve been following me for any length of time, you know as a restaurant owner, I tell you, must have an implementer, somebody who gets **** done, a right-hand person. You need to learn the process, but so doesn’t somebody else, and that person actually implements this system teaches the other managers and helps you hold them accountable. That is critical to you having quality of life. I explain this exactly, basically, that this is exactly what my restaurant transformation intensive program does. It helps you become the leader your restaurant needs. It helps you implement the systems that allow you to impose your will without being there.

It helps you learn what you don’t know and teach your managers too. It helps you hold your management team accountable. See the magic in the sauce, if you will, is if you take action and make quality of life a priority, you will get what you expect. The restaurant of your dreams, which allows you to travel, to spend time with family, to go to each of the events, to have time with your friends, to do the activities that bring you joy more than just running your restaurant.

Quality of life is incredibly important and oh by the way, the symptom if you will, or the, I guess, The secondary thing that happens when you have quality of life, because you have a management team in place that allows you to leave, because you’re running based on systems, allowing you to oppose your will without being there, because you have budgets and you have all the things that go along with it, those managers help you make the money you deserve. And I would tell you, actually make more money by having a full management team in place when you do it properly. So no matter where you are, You’ve got to ask yourself the question, why is quality of life important to you? Right?

What does quality of life look like to you? And then what are you doing to make it a reality or keep it in place? you get to choose your destiny. You get to decide, are you in a fixed mindset? Somebody who says, here are my challenges. This is as good as it gets. There’s nothing I can do. Or do you have a growth mindset saying, I have challenges in front of me, but I can achieve quality of life if I take the time to learn what I need to do, take action on that plan to get me there? It’s up to you. Where are you with your quality of life? What do you want?

com, and figure out how you can jump on a, well, a quick call so that I can learn more about you, your business, your challenges, tell you what we do and see if we’re a possible fit. Not a fit for everybody, but I will tell you for those of you who aren’t ready for that, what I’m going to recommend is that you reach out and you purchase my book. That’s right. It’s a shameless plug. It is my book called Restaurant Prosperity Formula, What Successful Restaurateurs Do. It can be found on Amazon or any of the online booksellers that you like to purchase books from. It will tell you exactly what you need to do. And then you can decide to get on a discovery call with me or someone on my team.

to put you on a path to speed up that process. But you can do it. You just have to take action.

Hey, that was an awesome episode. I want to thank you for taking the time to take action on building a better, more prosperous restaurant. Before you go, I want to give you these three thoughts. One, by combining leadership and taking action with systems and training, being checked by accountability, you are on your way to creating prosperity for you and your restaurant. Two, I have something I need from you. Please leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you happen to listen to podcasts. By leaving us a review, other restaurant pros seeking out this information are able to find it. I read the reviews, and hearing how this information has benefited you does wonders for me.

And 3, if you find any of the discussions helpful, share them. The more restaurant pros who have access to them, the better we become as an industry. com. Be passionate about what you’re doing. Be persistent, but more importantly, become better and help everyone around you become better and your restaurant is going to kick some ***.