From Dream to Reality: The Journey of Starting Kairos Kafe

Ever dreamt of starting your own restaurant? Been captivated by the idea of turning an old building into a buzzing food hub, but haven’t the faintest clue where to begin? Well, pull up a chair, we've quite a story to share! On this episode, we rewind to the beginning of our Kairos Kafe journey, the transformation of an old barbecue building in Birmingham to a community gathering spot. 

We delve into the trials and tribulations of the process, the nail-biting talks with conservative church elders, and the grueling renovation to meet food service standards. Learn how we turned potential investors into believers of our vision, and yes, there will be stories about maxing out credit cards and tapping into home equity. We assure you, it’s not all tears and sweat. We also share our joy in decorating the restaurant and paying homage to our supporters.

The climax, of course, is the grand opening. Drama, tension, unexpected guests, it had it all! But amidst the chaos, Kairos Kafe was born - a testament to our dream. Lastly, we'd love for you to join us on our Patreon page and social platforms for exclusive "For Real Reel" content. We can’t wait for you to join us on this exhilarating journey of starting a restaurant, because let’s face it, the journey is as important as the destination.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 5:02

Well, hey guys, thanks for tuning in to the Straight Out of Prison podcast. My name is James K Jones and this is my story.

Speaker 2: 5:09

And this is Hailey Jones, and this is his story that has now become a part of my story.

Speaker 1: 5:14

So this episode we're going to be talking about Cairo's Cafe and getting that up and going and the process and, you know, just realizing my dreams.

Speaker 2: 5:24

Right, it was a process, but also just to remind everybody from last week that what we talked about last week the hot and steamy episode- with his ex Hot and steamy. Well, it wasn't hot and steamy, but that everything that we talked about last episode was happening at the exact same time of the things we're going to be talking about today.

Speaker 1: 5:46

This episode. So we just separated them out so that it would be hard to tell the Cairo story without telling you know the mess that happened with the Charlotte story.

Speaker 2: 5:55

Right.

Speaker 1: 5:56

Because they happened at exactly the same time.

Speaker 2: 5:58

And it is interesting because, I mean, I think everyone can relate to this, knowing what was going on, what we talked about last week, and that this, what we're talking about now, was going on at the same time. That's a lot of transition and change.

Speaker 1: 6:14

It was a very difficult time.

Speaker 2: 6:16

And I have to say I'm going to kind of zoom out and jump forward for three seconds and you said it was a very hard time and whatever, but the beginning of Cairo's I'm just going to mention was actually how we ended up meeting. Yeah, I mean way later, not during this time at all, but it's just kind of neat to think of because I know what a trial this was. We're going to talk about it, but at the end of the day, we met Cairo's yeah, they got me, they got me.

Speaker 1: 6:42

Tim Busby said it perfectly. He said so what if you lost a million dollars? You found your wife, so it's worth it, yeah.

Speaker 2: 6:50

No problem, a million dollars, flush it down. Here we go Okay, so zooming back in.

Speaker 1: 6:56

I think we're starting to start at the beginning. I worked for Mr Feraletta that time I was about five and a half years in. We transformed the restaurant, we transformed everything about it when it was just I just love having a next thing to do, like something to work on, something to make it better. And we got to a place where we had a catering business, we had a delivery business, we had a banquet business and there was nowhere else to go at.

Speaker 1: 7:26

Leonardo's, and I think I coasted for maybe a year. I was still making plenty of money, which that always is helpful, money is helpful. But I was getting to a place where I want to do my thing. I want my own place.

Speaker 2: 7:44

And we talked about that. That is kind of how you're made.

Speaker 1: 7:47

Yeah, I'm always ready. You know I'm not ready if it's not done, but once this thing is done I'm ready for next, right, so next for me was starting my own business. But I started looking into it and it just. It was a daunting task. Starting a restaurant is hard anyways, but Steve bought the old Ollie's barbecue building in downtown Birmingham right off of the UAB campus. They transformed the whole building into like a church.

Speaker 1: 8:16

So, what used to be their barbecue pit was now where the kids you know, the kids had a Sunday school and what had been like the walk-in coolers, because this was a huge restaurant. It was like 10,000 square feet it was. It was a big place, but they left one little corner of the building as like a dining room and they took what had been Ollie's barbecue dish room and left that as like a little kitchen and it had been there for five or six years. But every time I walked through there I thought you could have a restaurant here and I just got to thinking, okay, I'm either going to tell him what I want to do and see, let them tell me no, this is going to continue to be a fantasy in my mind Because I would, you know, I would sit and dream and think and, oh, this could work, this could work, this could work, but didn't really make sense to put a business inside of a church either, and I knew, and plus, they were very conservative. But I got to a place where I just decided I'm just going to put this out there and see what happens. And then, when they tell me no, I fully expected them to tell me no. Then, when they tell me no, then I can just move on. Does that make sense? So I you know we were having lunch and I pulled up on him. I said I got to get this off my chest. And he was like delighted, like his eyes lit up and he got all excited. You know, I had a small plan of what I wanted to do. I want to do like a lunch cafe and then I want to do catering. You know, I knew like I couldn't do like dinner or anything there because of the location. But he was just like giddy with excitement when I put the idea out there to him. But then he explained to me like how that church like worked. It was not a. He couldn't just say this is what we're doing and you did it, cause the way that that type of churches ran is ran through the elders. So Steve was like the leader of the elders, like board, so it'd be like a, he'd be like a CEO. And then you have all these other people, you know, cio and CFO, that would have to sign on to it. So he he said, you know, I'd have to put it to them. And you know some of them are very, you know very conservative. And so I was like, well, let's, let's see what happens. And he had a mean.

Speaker 1: 11:54

I think it was that Tuesday night I was at work at Leonardo's and I went out to check my phone. Because in those days, what was my rule at Leonardo's? Don't bring yourself phones up in here, cause you're not going to be talking on the phone when we're supposed to be working. So in order for that to work, I had to not bring my phone in either. So I always left my phone in my car and I went out after, when the uh, dinner shift was like winding down, and I checked my phone and I had a message from him. He said call me as soon as you can. And I called him and he was just like over the moon. He was like they all said yes, they're so excited. They all said every was a hundred percent unanimous. Everybody said yes. And I was like, wow, but that did. But then I was like, okay, you know okay, what's next?

Speaker 1: 12:38

Where do we go from here? So he uh Asked me to sit down and write out a vision, you know, for what I wanted to do, like practical stuff, how it would work. You know how we would split up the building.

Speaker 1: 12:52

You know, you know how I pay rent a business plan, basically, yeah, yeah, and the fun, the fun part for me was writing out the, you know, writing out the menu because I knew what kind of food I wanted to do. I didn't, I didn't want to do a tagging because I didn't want to compete with mr Fuleta, because I you know that was, I wasn't gonna do that. But I wanted to do like Southern food, like my granny and my me, mo, and then maybe with like a Greek or Italian, like spin, like a twist, and so that's that's what we call, ended up calling it Southern food with the Greek twist. But I got the menu out and then, you know, I wrote the vision for the cafe in the catering business and in the beginning I did not name it Cairo's cafe, like, because I I wanted something real simple, like a simple catering company, like a simple little cafe, and Originally I named it simplicity catering. That was what it was gonna be called.

Speaker 1: 13:48

Put that forward to the elders board, had them vote on it again. They were unanimous, you know I mean there, let me know I would have to do everything. Right, it would be on me to do everything, but that they would. You know, basically they gave me that space.

Speaker 2: 14:01

So real quick. Were you gonna have to get every idea you like approved by this board? Like every time you came up with something, do I have to have a vote?

Speaker 1: 14:11

I was getting myself into a situation that I didn't see coming Later on. Yeah, it would be like that.

Speaker 2: 14:17

Okay, I was curious it was always something.

Speaker 1: 14:20

But in the beginning I did not think that. But then, after they said yes and we started moving the ball forward, I sat down and had a meeting with Steve at his house and that was my first like red flag because his Did you know it was a red flag at the time. I did, but I didn't.

Speaker 1: 14:37

I thought maybe I was just being scared, or you know, trying to find a reason not to move forward right, yeah but the red flag was just the way that he talked to me, like he was very like forceful with me, like just not in any way He'd ever talked to me before.

Speaker 2: 14:52

I like, okay, so like forceful, like when he was talking about what like about like how we're gonna structure the business and how are Everything's gonna have things.

Speaker 1: 14:59

We're gonna go, and it was just very just matter of fact and almost like Letting me know that he had all the leverage.

Speaker 2: 15:08

Okay. So me hearing this for the first time, I can think To me oh, it just sounds like it that was a business conversation, yeah you know, sometimes in business conversations.

Speaker 1: 15:17

You have to have a hard conversation.

Speaker 2: 15:19

Right, so it. What are you saying that? It wasn't really like that, or?

Speaker 1: 15:22

it was, but it was like a initial, like red flag. Okay, that would prove true later on, right, but it was like I'm getting myself Into something that I'm not gonna be able to get out of and I'm Allowing myself to be controlled In a way that I didn't want to be right, that makes sense.

Speaker 1: 15:43

Yeah, it does, but but you didn't know that at the time, so let's no but it was just like a red fire, thought there's something, something to shift in here with our relationship, the way he's talking to me. So he had the idea because he you know, he's a pastor. He'd been in ministry Pretty much most of his life. He did work some he worked at UV test, some like part-time. But he wanted us to raise the money through like fundraising.

Speaker 1: 16:08

You know, I don't like I don't like asking people for money, like that's not my right. I hate stuff like that. I'd rather like I'll come work for you and then you pay me for it, but I don't like asking people for money. So he like took me on this Journey of like mentoring me into like you're not asking for money, asking people to invest in you, invest in your vision. So we spent probably a Month or two like working on you know, like Contacts and coming up with people, and he thought the best way to do it would be to have a dinner party in what would later be the Cairo's cafe and then do a presentation and ask people to invest. So initially I didn't know what I didn't know. So I thought I went through and you know, price stuff out and I thought I needed like between 30 and 50 thousand dollars. That's what I thought I needed to To you know get started, yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:07

I mean there was a lot I Need. There was a lot that need to be done like upgraded and fixed, but that was going in. I thought I needed between 30 and 50 thousand dollars. That was my plan. So we had the meeting. You know, I fed everybody. They got to eat all the food. Then we had a, went back in the church.

Speaker 2: 17:25

We had a presentation, presentation just curious who paid for like all the food supplies and stuff. Did you pay it for it personally?

Speaker 1: 17:33

Yeah okay.

Speaker 2: 17:34

So you bought all the food and cooked like just yeah, as an attempt to try to raise money for the restaurant.

Speaker 1: 17:40

Well, I think we might have like 50 or 60 people there.

Speaker 2: 17:43

Okay, I mean, that's a lot of people to cook for.

Speaker 1: 17:45

I mean, but I invited everybody. Invited people from the Leonardo's world. I invited people from you know church people. I knew people from you know volunteers that I'd known in prison.

Speaker 1: 17:54

I invited everybody that I knew yeah because he said, instead of trying to like get a partner and go for, like somebody with big Money, you know, if you need thirty thousand dollars, you just need thirty people to give a thousand dollars yeah, invest. So he came up with we came up with like these contracts where there would be like interest and repayment and all stuff. And he started it off, him Lenore, he invested a thousand dollars. He was like put me on first, so that's how we, that's how we kicked it off. But after the, the party that we had, I raised my thirty thousand dollars that first night, wow, and I remember miss Fuleta was there and she she just was like, had tears in her eyes and she came up to me and she was like my kids would never get up there and ask For something like that. They tell me to do it. And I was like, well, I mean, I'm, I don't like it, but I'm doing what.

Speaker 2: 18:45

I'm like we don't want Norma Jean up there asking for money.

Speaker 1: 18:49

But it was good. So I had my start. This was like January 2005 and we were ready to move forward. Now, if you go back to the last season, this was right when Sean came home. So it started off just us, and then Things.

Speaker 2: 19:08

So okay, so first night. That's incredible. So you said you had about 50 or 60 people there.

Speaker 1: 19:12

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 19:12

And after you. I mean, what was your pitch like? What did you say when you asked for money?

Speaker 1: 19:17

Because that is a hard thing to do that I, just I want to start this restaurant in this building.

Speaker 2: 19:23

Some money to do it.

Speaker 1: 19:25

Well, no, it wasn't just like a fantasy dream. I had, I had a business plan, or at least what I thought. I had the menu I had.

Speaker 1: 19:34

I had statistics from area you know that was in a very busy area. There was, like you know, 50,000 people that rode by there on their way into work in Birmingham every day and then rode out. So I had all this, all these ideas, and I had been to, I did my homework, I went to every restaurant and ate lunch in that area just to see, and they were always packed and busy. And there's so many people in downtown Birmingham right, working in the corporate buildings and stuff.

Speaker 1: 20:00

Yeah, and then the school was there and it's just so much Going on. But another interesting fact is the night before we did the Investors thing because I had to write out contracts with people like they would give me a check, I'd write a contract, would sign and get a witness, then they'd keep a copy. I kept a copy.

Speaker 2: 20:20

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1: 20:21

I changed the name. I just it was. It's a weird.

Speaker 2: 20:26

Okay, so the night before this dinner you change the name.

Speaker 1: 20:28

I changed the name from simplicity catering. It's gonna be simplicity catering, and then we're gonna have the simplicity cafe.

Speaker 2: 20:34

Okay, so what prompted the change?

Speaker 1: 20:36

I think it was Jesus. I felt I did feel like it was. So this is Most people don't know this and when I try to explain to people, especially like Cairo's people, they get like, they act like they Don't hear what I said. I did not name that Cairo's cafe and it's weird Because Cairo's was the prison ministry when I was in prison and it's Cairo's is a Greek word that means God's special time.

Speaker 1: 20:58

Mm-hmm and that was what we were looking to do, like do special, special lunch, special catering, all things. But there was a group of Students that came down I think it was the first year that we were in that building and they were doing like college ministry and they asked if they could use that portion of the dining room of the church where the dining room was to start like a coffee, like deal for kids to come and hang out on like Friday, saturday night, and they named it Cairo's cafe and that was. I don't have anything to do with that.

Speaker 2: 21:31

So how long before this restaurant was that? Did that happen?

Speaker 1: 21:35

for about three years.

Speaker 2: 21:36

Okay, it had been there before.

Speaker 1: 21:37

Yeah, well, no, I mean like they had a. You know Nelson Grice. He was an elder and it was worst leader, but he's also artist. He taught art at Hoover high school. He would come in and do murals. So he did this huge mural with a coffee cup and it said Cairo's cafe and they called that Cairo's, the area, cairo's. They wouldn't say go in there and to diamond me, say it's in Cairo's. So I thought I think it. I thought they probably don't want me to say that. But I called Steve the night before. I said I really, you know, I know y'all have this Cairo's cafe thing going on. This really fits me a little bit better. So I'm thinking about changing the name of my business to Cairo's catering. And he was like I love that idea. So it's just, it's kind of weird, like yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:22

I didn't name it, I didn't, it was already there. It was already Kairos cafe when I got there.

Speaker 2: 22:25

So yeah, so Kairos cafe, I mean, yeah, I just want to ask real quick, because you said you were gonna name a simplicity, simplicity catering and then Kairos catering. But was there some reason you weren't putting the like cafe in there, or did you want the main part, what your business to be the catering part?

Speaker 1: 22:44

I don't understand what you're saying.

Speaker 2: 22:45

Well, when you, when you first said I was, I decided to name it simplicity catering.

Speaker 1: 22:50

That was my initial plan.

Speaker 2: 22:51

Yeah, okay, so, but I guess maybe you just say that instead of simplicity, cafe or simplicity.

Speaker 1: 22:57

Well no, I knew the the cafe part was gonna be like an afterthought.

Speaker 2: 23:02

Okay. So yeah, I didn't realize that.

Speaker 1: 23:03

Well, no, I wanted to make my money and catering because I knew from Leonardo's like that's where the money was like. Okay, you want to make a lot of money. Do catering.

Speaker 2: 23:11

Okay, I don't think that was clear, because I didn't understand that this probably not clear other people, so that's a good question. Right yeah.

Speaker 1: 23:16

I didn't want them. I really didn't want to start with a restaurant business. Okay and then my vision that I had it said that I was gonna start a catering business and then start a restaurant. Okay so I thought this would like be a good starting point, Because I could keep my staff small and I could make money right, so that was my full-on plan. But I also knew that you don't just wake up one day and decide to start a catering business right. Because if people don't know what you're doing, exactly they don't know your brand, they don't know your style.

Speaker 1: 23:40

It's not gonna work. And I love the idea of just having to do lunch five days a week. You know that's almost refreshing, right. You know, 10, 30 to 30,. You know, come in eat lunch, get to know the, the food, get to know the. You know how we do things and then People want you to do that.

Speaker 2: 23:56

Okay it's funny. I mean I do have a short-term memory, but all the years that we've been married now and talked exhaustively about Cairo's, I did not realize that that was the intent from the beginning, to start with just the catering and then the cafe was after thought yeah, that was my strategy. Okay, all right, so so the name changed name, change the cows catering.

Speaker 1: 24:16

We got to work. I had a great time playing the kitchen it was. It was very difficult because it was such a small narrow space. It had actually been the always barbecue Dishroom. There was nothing in there. I could use it. Set up a sink, the back part of the, the kitchen, like where the door went in and out. There was still a furnace there. Well, they were like they had a full-service Barbecue restaurant where they, you know they served thousands of people a day, so they would. I think they burned the trash in that this was before the EPA and all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 24:50

Yeah, what's EPA Like. Yeah, what's it be environment protection.

Speaker 1: 24:54

They just like they probably couldn't get away with that now, but there was a. There was just a lot of stuff before we started. There was a lot of stuff that had to come out.

Speaker 1: 25:01

Yeah so they had put like some old home refrigerators and some old home ovens in there, so in some old Dusty cabinets. And so I told Steve, if we're gonna like, I gotta like before we get started I gotta get all this crap out of here. So we went on like a had a lot of people helping me from the church. We just Basically pulled everything out of there. And I remember looking at the, the furnace thing, because it was like big as a room and it was like cast iron, like how are we gonna get that out of here? So Initially I got very overwhelmed with Like how can I dollars? You know it's working full-time how long do this? So In the last episode we talked about Tony and Jeremy, the Steve's Second daughter, and her husband.

Speaker 1: 25:54

Like we were like good friends at that time. They were my best friends. At that time we hung out two or three times a week. Well, he was working for a city wholesale like delivering, like driving a truck delivering Groceries or so I can't remember. But I just kind of floated the idea with him Like what would he think about working with me? And I just like dropped it and left and the next day Tonya Carmen was like can you please call Jeremy? He was up all night with excitement like he really wants to work with you. So Call him back. You know we sat down I think it was me, him and Tonya. We had a conversation and he basically came on board, but I thought I can't pay you till we get open right till we get started.

Speaker 2: 26:36

But did he quit his job?

Speaker 1: 26:38

Not till we hope not to get not to the end. But no, I was clear about that, like I'm, I can't give you, like you know, if you want to help, help, but it's gonna be like a, an investment, you know, you know a ministry, whatever. But he came on board with me and then we started working together and that kind of helped the ball start moving forward. But then I didn't know the things that I didn't know. I didn't know about codes and you know I've set up an appointment with the health department, one with them, mr Ollie, the guy that had originally owned, always barbecue.

Speaker 1: 27:13

Well, he was actually a son. He knew one of the health department guys and somehow Steve got that name for me and I made the appointment with this guy and he came out and basically told me Everything you got that you've written down all these plans. You can't have them. I was like what are you talking about? He was like you have to have plans, like from architect. So I was like why? Like the building's already here? And he was like this building is not ready for a food service establishment, so Fast forward. I had to go hire an architect and you know he ended up charging me three, four grand, just to drop these plans.

Speaker 1: 27:51

I said yeah and he basically came in and told us everything you have here is not gonna work. So it was very daunting Firecodes were bad, the plumbing was bad, the electric was bad, like everything. We had to do. A total like renovation of that side of the building is actually about a quarter of the building. So I had to totally renovate the dining room, the dish room, there was an office and then a bathroom and then a bathroom totally had to renovate that and then the firecodes were bad. So we're gonna have to put in a sprinkler system which was like $50,000. I can't remember it was.

Speaker 1: 28:32

So that $30,000 is yeah, it just not looking so went up when I went up in a puff of smoke.

Speaker 1: 28:39

Yeah so we went back and forth with him and then Steve was involved with that with but you know, the elders had to vote on every single thing. So basically what they came up with was a plan where we wouldn't have to put in Sprinkler systems but we would have to put in firewalls, which meant we had to go through the whole building and redo all the walls and they had to be like for dick had a fire doors. It was rough, it was a lot, but people that were part of the church at that time were so excited that we just had a work day and everybody volunteered and came and we I think it took three or four days for us to put up the new walls and do all that stuff. And you remember Mickey Graber.

Speaker 2: 29:23

Yes.

Speaker 1: 29:24

Her husband Dan. He was like my main, he was an elder at that time but he just was like, let's just do it, let's get it done. You know I got a week off. Let's take a week and just do it.

Speaker 2: 29:35

I love that.

Speaker 1: 29:36

It's really neat how they rallied around oh yeah, everybody was excited, but then you had to repaint everything and to redo everything. It was just such a long drawn out process. But then we got through the coach for the health department. But then when the county came in, then it was another set of things and I think the biggest one that just made me want to quit and say nevermind, was they had just instituted a grease department. A grease department, what is that?

Speaker 2: 30:06

Like, release the grease.

Speaker 1: 30:07

No, like the food service, can let a lot of like grease and oil out into the environment. And so they came up with this new department of grease in Jefferson County and basically they came and made sure you had a grease strap, which we did, but he said it wasn't big enough. And then let me just long story short. I had to spend $30,000 on just a dumpster pad that was behind the building, that had plumbing ran to it with hot water, had to have hot water. These are the codes. These are the codes. It had to be a covered dumpster pad. It had to have fences and locks.

Speaker 2: 30:49

You gotta really want to start that restaurant now, or catering business whatever. And then the grease trap thing.

Speaker 1: 30:54

They had to put in like a 300 gallon grease trap so they had to dig up the parking lot and find the plumber to do that. It was just, and then, knowing that it was nonsense, that I was never gonna use hot water in a dumpster pad, I mean, just what can happen. And we didn't have a contractor because we couldn't really afford it and we were like working on a tight, tight budget and you would get people in that would start to do stuff and then you know, wasn't good, Like I had so many. I got ripped off so many times by especially like church people that did business.

Speaker 2: 31:32

Okay, but pause here, because you just said that dumpster pad was cost $30,000. Okay, so at some point in all those things that you've just said in the last 60 seconds, you must have realized okay, I need more money.

Speaker 1: 31:46

Oh yeah, we're not gonna make it.

Speaker 2: 31:48

So what were you thinking?

Speaker 1: 31:50

I didn't know. I didn't know what to do. But then Steve like he wanted to like raise money, let's just go back and do another round. And I hate stuff like that. I don't like asking people for money, I just don't like it.

Speaker 2: 32:04

Yeah, it's something about that kind of robs me wrong. Not that I think it's bad, but it just feels like.

Speaker 1: 32:09

But he would always be like you're just, you don't think the right way. It's not. You're asking for money, they're investing in you and I'm like I'm still asking them for to write a check. So I mean I don't like stuff like that. So what ended up happening during that process was he and Jeremy started like working their networks and they Jeremy didn't but Steve pulled in some investors. I take that back Jeremy's parents did invest. I think they gave us like $2,000. But Jeremy went on a campaign like he was always.

Speaker 2: 32:40

Okay, so I can imagine that you must have like as.

Speaker 1: 32:44

I hated this part of it.

Speaker 2: 32:45

Well, hold on that, they're using their network. And then Jeremy's parents gave $2,000. I'm just thinking how I would feel, and how you must have felt, just kind of this, as people are just giving money. You feel this added pressure like I have to make this work. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's how.

Speaker 1: 33:02

I would feel, okay, time out. They were not giving money, they were investing into Kairos and I had to write them a contract with a repayment schedule, like I asked for a year. Like, give me a year to make money.

Speaker 2: 33:13

Okay, but even still that's another like. So I feel like avenue that brings stress, because then you know. I'm gonna have to get this up and I have to like pay back.

Speaker 1: 33:21

But then it ended up being like people, I know, like my aunt Sue, put some money in and then there was a girl that I worked with. Her grandmother died and left her a bunch of money and she put in, like I think she put in like $8,000. Like she believed in the Kairos, but it was just, it was a lot and it was a lot of pressure. And then we were doing all this and it wasn't bearing any fruit Because we got you know, by this time we were about like six, seven months in and it just the news just kept getting worse, everything kept getting worse.

Speaker 2: 33:52

It's like every time you did something, it revealed something else that could be done, that cost money.

Speaker 1: 33:58

And the problem with it. You had the health department. You had to pass the health department, you had to pass the county, you had to pass the city, you had to pass the fire department, and then you had to pass this new Greece department, the environmental, which is a racket. I mean, I don't even know if it still exists, but anyways, pushing through all that, in the middle of all this, I had an idea. I don't know if it was an idea or what it was, if it was Jesus, but I thought it almost every day for like two weeks. This was when Bush was president.

Speaker 2: 34:32

Big Bush, little Bush.

Speaker 1: 34:33

W Bush, George W Bush.

Speaker 1: 34:34

Oh, yeah, yeah of course, and he would always. He was a big talk about business and he was always talking about you know, you need to own your own home, you need a business. And I was listening to him and so I thought, well, listening to him go on and on was why I stopped renting an apartment and bought a house, cause he kept that was during the time. That's stuff that he was pushing like as president. So I just felt like I needed to write. I needed to write a letter to the president and tell him a story. So I thought it was crazy and silly, but I sat down. I think it was late after I got off work one night. It was another one of those things like I feel like I need to do this. I just need to do it. I'll probably never hear anything back from this.

Speaker 2: 35:16

So you don't have to, so you could stop thinking about it Really. So did you long hand a letter?

Speaker 1: 35:21

No, I typed it.

Speaker 2: 35:22

I have a copy of it somewhere it was just like.

Speaker 1: 35:24

Dear president Bush, my name is James K Jones. I told him like a brief, like caps, with my story and you know that I was trying to start a business and I was stuck and didn't fully think I would get it. I don't think I told anybody that I did that, so it's kind of silly. No, I did tell Steve. I told Steve and he kind of chuckled at me when I told him. About two, three weeks later I got a call from the White House and it was a voicemail.

Speaker 2: 35:54

Yeah, never known, do you?

Speaker 1: 35:57

Crazy. It was a voicemail on my cell phone when I was at work, that is insane. It freaked me out and it was like this is so and so, calling from the White House. We got your president Bush, got your letter, blah, blah, blah. And so I called back. We had a little chat and it wasn't like the Oval Office, it was like somebody you know he probably still he probably never read the letter, but they, you know, is that you know the White House has got hundreds of people that work there.

Speaker 1: 36:25

But whatever it was, it tugged on the heartstrings and they got back with me and she told me that I needed to go through the Small Business Administration and I didn't know what that was and but lucky for me that there was. The chapter for North Alabama was in Birmingham, so she sat me up a meeting with the Small Business Administration it's in it's actually in Homewood, right outside of Birmingham and got me an appointment.

Speaker 2: 36:50

Okay, the irony of this, hold on it's silly. That note that you wrote had to write a letter to the president of the United States, send it to Washington DC for them to read it and call you and set up a meeting with an office that was in Birmingham the whole time.

Speaker 1: 37:09

Well, you needed a connection.

Speaker 2: 37:10

Oh, so you couldn't just like get an appointment?

Speaker 1: 37:12

I mean, I'm sure you could have, but I didn't even know it was there.

Speaker 2: 37:15

I know when that you found out. It was there because of that letter, which is awesome.

Speaker 1: 37:18

But they actually wrote me a letter back. I used to have it hanging in my office. I need to.

Speaker 2: 37:22

You need to find them. I'll put it on our Patreon thing. Oh yeah, Patreon, that's good.

Speaker 1: 37:27

Anyways, long story short, I got up, got dressed up, put on a suit and tie you know, made my stuff look sharp.

Speaker 2: 37:33

This is amazing, truly.

Speaker 1: 37:35

I had all my shiny shoes that Mr Fuleta bought me for Mr Bruno's son's wedding and strode up into the Small Business Administration. I'm James K Jones having an appointment and you know it was one. It's a federal building. So they like took your license and you know, first year and gave you a name tag and all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 37:51

Okay, but pause. So what did Steve say when you told him that the White House called you? Oh, they were over the moon.

Speaker 1: 37:58

They were over the moon because I called them. It was actually him, eleanor. I called him and just played the voicemail over my home phone to them.

Speaker 1: 38:07

It was crazy, that was crazy, it was crazy. So anyways, I went in there. He explained to me how it worked. The Small Business Administration would love to help me, but they don't actually give money. They don't do money. They do guarantees for loans. So they will guarantee like 80% of a business loan. If you go through their process and then you have to go to a bank and get the money, does that make sense?

Speaker 2: 38:29

Yeah. So it's like so they're basically signing for you.

Speaker 1: 38:32

Yeah, like co-signers. But I mean it's the federal government, so I mean it's not too risky to do that Right. So we got rolling with that he gave me. It was quite a process of things that I had to go through. One of the things I had to do was he gave me an outline to rewrite my business plan. That was like what they wanted, but I had to have someone sign off on it. Like and it couldn't be him Like they have these kind of like coaches.

Speaker 1: 39:02

I guess but they're like business owners that wanna help other small business owners get started. And he connected me with a guy in Decatur, alabama, who had I think he had like four or five coffee shops and bookstores in Decatur. Do you remember his name, jay something? The name of his things were Java Jays.

Speaker 2: 39:23

Okay.

Speaker 1: 39:24

But anyways they sent me to him. I was gonna have to spend the day with him, so that's about an hour and a half drive north of Birmingham. So I set up the meeting, went up there, had my business plan. He had started some really neat businesses there, like little coffee shops and chicken salad nothing like what I wanted to do, but like more simple type of stuff. But then he would get four or five people that worked for him and he would grow the business and then he would sell it to one of them, like he would let the workers eventually, like they knew they could work towards that If I'd work hard and we keep doing this, then they. At that time there were three of them that were owned by former employees, which was neat.

Speaker 2: 40:06

It was kind of like a franchise situation.

Speaker 1: 40:09

Maybe, but not really Like. He was more like he was passionate about investing in people and he had a business mind and he took me to all of them. I was kind of getting annoyed, like by the time I went to the fourth one I'm like they're all the same so. But we went to his main one, we sat down, he went through my business plan. You know how they do. They go through the red thing and tell you what does this mean and let's do this.

Speaker 1: 40:34

And he signed off on it and on my way out the door that day I was leaving, he said I noticed you had a dishwasher, like you need a dishwasher, like on your equipment, cause they wanted to know everything, like even like civilware, and you know they needed to know everything. He said I actually have a dishwasher back here. You know, when I bought this, there was a dishwasher in here and you know we don't use dishwashers cause we, you know, we use paper stuff. You can have it if you want it. And I was like I looked at it and it was like it wasn't brand new, but it was almost brand new and it was like a Hobart. It was like Hobart baby.

Speaker 1: 41:10

No, but it was like a $5,000 dish machine One of the ones you know you lift up and down and I couldn't believe it. So we put it on the back of my truck and strapped it down and I drove back to Birmingham. But if you go back to the last episode, that was one on the way back. I was so excited. That was when Steve called me and told me that I was sending in to stay away from Shawna.

Speaker 1: 41:28

Okay, so the whole thing got twisted and awkward and but anyways, at this time there was that going on and I didn't really like it. But I was trying to be. What was I trying to be obedient?

Speaker 2: 41:42

Yeah, honoring maybe.

Speaker 1: 41:44

Yeah, and you know, doing what they asked me to do. I was staying away from Shawna but I got real busy with doing the carousel. Plus I was still working full-time at Leonardo's but I was feeling guilty at work because I hadn't told Tony yet.

Speaker 2: 41:56

You hadn't told Tony that what?

Speaker 1: 41:58

That I was in the process of starting a restaurant.

Speaker 2: 42:00

Oh, you hadn't at this point.

Speaker 1: 42:01

No.

Speaker 2: 42:01

Even after all this rigmarole. No, it was uh Even after a call from the White House.

Speaker 1: 42:08

No. I think you didn't tell him I couldn't tell him, I couldn't pull the trigger. No, no, I think I had told him because he came to my initial meeting.

Speaker 1: 42:17

Okay, yeah, you said that he came to my initial meeting but somewhere during this process we were already putting up walls and doing stuff. I couldn't tell him Like I couldn't come. I couldn't bring my heart to tell him what I was doing. So I told him a little, tony, I said I need y'all to go for a ride with me, I need to show you something. And I just took him in there and they were like what is this? Is this where you go to church? I was like, yeah, what's going on here? And I said, well, I'm planning to open a restaurant. And that's how I told him.

Speaker 2: 42:42

Oh, how did that go? What did they say?

Speaker 1: 42:45

He didn't want to see me go, but he loved me and wanted me to do. You know, he wanted me to follow my heart.

Speaker 1: 42:50

Yeah, he wanted me to. But I think initially he, you know he had some advice for me. You know food cost stuff like that but he was excited about the Cairo's aspect because he was a Cairo's man. But uh, after I told him it got easy like right and I think he had, like this fantasy that my mom adopted later on was that I was going to go try that and fail and then I would never really leave Leonardo's, like I would still be a part of Leonardo's.

Speaker 1: 43:15

Yeah and I well, I mean, I stayed connected to Leonardo's even after I started Cairo's, but uh, this was where it got weird. Once we got past the planning stages, you know, everything started falling into place.

Speaker 2: 43:29

Okay, assuming, because we didn't really finish this you did end up getting the loan.

Speaker 1: 43:33

Well, no, this was where it got weird.

Speaker 2: 43:35

Okay, this is where it got weird.

Speaker 1: 43:36

We went in um, these are like federally backed loans and we found out that because I was on parole I was still on parole at that time I couldn't get a loan. Because I was on parole, like it was not, I was still a high risk individual, at least for that kind of bank and stuff like that.

Speaker 2: 43:56

And how long had you been out by this point? Six years, five years six years, six years Okay but it's still when you're on parole, like and technically you're still on parole. I was still on parole.

Speaker 1: 44:08

Wow, but I mean sometimes. The first time I tried to get life insurance, I couldn't get life insurance because I was on parole.

Speaker 2: 44:13

Okay, really quick. How long were you on parole? Total, just to give me 13 years. Wow, okay.

Speaker 1: 44:19

I mean I told you you get in trouble. 13 years.

Speaker 2: 44:23

Easy to get in, okay, I'm hard to get out, so you couldn't get a loan. So then what happened?

Speaker 1: 44:27

So we were like stuck and this was my idea. It came to me.

Speaker 2: 44:33

Did you write another letter to President Bush?

Speaker 1: 44:35

No, I mean, I got the help that I needed. We had, everything was there, the money was there, it just couldn't be me, oh wow. So I didn't know what to do. So I thought, well, I'll just put everything in my mama's name. You know, because I think that song was out during the time, I put everything in my mama name, and that's okay, because I'm gonna ride. But she didn't want anything to do with it. She said no, I'm not getting involved in that. Like she started off, she was gonna be one of my, she was gonna go work with me, but then all the stuff with Sean started happening. There was a rift between her and Steven the North and she started getting aggravated them and she got to this place. When I talked to her about that, she said no, I don't know, count me out, I'm out.

Speaker 2: 45:19

Oh, so it was really becoming a real.

Speaker 1: 45:21

I mean, it was just my.

Speaker 2: 45:23

French a real like shit show kind of yeah but I thought who do I trust?

Speaker 1: 45:26

I trust my mama completely, like my mama would never rip me off. And I thought who's the other person I try? Is there anybody else that I trust fully, like, fully trust, to like sign over things too? And it was Steve. He was the only one. And so the idea came to me.

Speaker 1: 45:43

It was that night, while I was brushing my teeth, and I called him and he was discouraged. Everybody was discouraged. Like what are we gonna do? So I said what do you think about being my business partner? I'm going into the restaurant business with me. So I initially I asked him he was like what are you talking about? And I said you ain't gotta do nothing, just let me put everything in your name and you do the loans and we'll go from there. And he said well, let me think about it. I need to talk to my wife. And it came back with they did some. It took three or four days, but they did some studying, like even if it went bad, like because it was a business only couldn't come after them personally right that she told him he could.

Speaker 1: 46:22

So we went back to the lawyer that incorporated my business and told him. I told him I wanted to put all my stock over into Steve's name and I'd already put 10%. I gave Jeremy 10% of stock and Lenora 10% of the stock because they were both coming to work for me and they were helping me build it, so they were part of the team. So I'd already did like. I had 80% of stock in my name, 10% for Lenora, 10% for Jeremy and when I went back to the lawyer to get put my 80% into Steve's name, he told me don't do this like don't. What are you doing? Why?

Speaker 2: 47:02

did he tell you not to do it?

Speaker 1: 47:04

well, I explained to him. I said I can't get the loan stuck, I can't get the loans. He said but if you do this, then you don't own your business anymore. It's not your business. And I said well, he's not gonna like rip. And this was in front of. Steve was sitting there with me. I see he's not gonna rip me off or anything like that. And he's like look, I'm your lawyer, I get paid to advise you. Don't do this. This is a bad idea, this is a bad deal and it's not gonna end well. I've seen too many people come to my office and sit here and have all these like rainbow and butterfly dreams and they net it's. This never works out. Don't do it, figure out another way, but don't do this. And then Steve, steve kind of got his fence hurt and he was like well, look, my only thing I'm doing here is trying to help James succeed and you know, see his dream, you know, do all things. And the lawyer was like mm-hmm what was the lawyer's name?

Speaker 2: 47:57

do you remember?

Speaker 1: 47:58

I can't remember he had a lot of like Christian paraphernalia in his office like fishes and you know. But you know they do that and you know this is a bible belt and you know, if you want extra business, you put a fish by your name in the yellow pages. But uh, he, uh, yellow pages. That was when you still had the yellow pages. Okay, um, and you know he advertised on christian radio, all that stuff, yeah, but I think that's how I found him.

Speaker 2: 48:22

I don't know well, he obviously was giving you sound advice he was.

Speaker 1: 48:25

But I said well, this is what I'm doing, so I just need you to draw it up, fix it up so you basically were like do it anyway.

Speaker 2: 48:32

Yeah, this is what I'm doing.

Speaker 1: 48:34

I didn't see another way yeah like this is the only way to move forward. So we move forward in that way, but it uh, something. Something changed after that with the whole process, because this was where stuff was heating up. At the same time, stuff was heating up with shawna. Oh yeah, me and linoa were having friction and me and jeremy were having friction. I actually got why couldn't stand jeremy? I couldn't stand looking at him. I didn't want to talk to him, I didn't, but it was because shawna was living in their house and it was just this. He was always telling on us and I'm like we're grown men, you know, you're a man. Why aren't you telling like a little girl? I don't understand.

Speaker 1: 49:11

I don't get all this but no, he, he's made that way. He's very rural oriented and he would uh, he thought he was trying to protect me, but it was just weird, like if we were in church and Sean and I were trying to get close to having a conversation, he comes stand in between us. I was like look bro, no, don't, whatever you're doing, you need to stop doing it with me. So that caused us a lot of friction and then I was so overwhelmed with the contracting stuff. Um, jeremy kind of took that over, but then he got real hostile about it.

Speaker 2: 49:48

Well, I know, we we said I feel like I said this last episode, but I'll say it again it's just there's so many Dynamics going on and there's so many it was crazy time. Just I mean, I can just see how so many things could creep in, not just emotion wise, but just like resentment wise, with the girlfriend stuff and him. I guess trying to act like he was your parent and protect you when you don't need protecting.

Speaker 1: 50:14

No, he was the. I didn't. I don't think I mentioned is he was the youth pastor there. So he was like trying to be youth pastor to me. I was like well, the problem with that is I'm not a youth, I'm more than you like, I've got a lot more life experience than you got. So If you could like find a way to miss me with all that, that'd be great. But we ended up getting I think it was three pretty substantial loans like there was like a 50,000, 30,000 and 20,000. They came from three different banks, so, but they didn't all come at once. We got like one, then we had to go back and get another.

Speaker 1: 50:45

I'm gonna go because everything, every like step in this process was oh no, you got to do now, you got to do this. And then it was hard for me because it was like I'm gonna vape in this whole freaking building and they could kick me out and I'm on the hook for all this money. And by the time it was over with it and it was close to three hundred thousand dollars. That whoa.

Speaker 1: 51:08

I had Out there. I know, I know that was Carlos cafe Garndale. Excuse me, it was close to a hundred and 78,000 dollars that I was on the hook for so, but technically, legally, steve was on the hook for yeah well.

Speaker 2: 51:25

I mean, you know, I'm just that's how it is. I mean, I know you were on the hook and, but this is where the whole thing is complicated, you know, and messy, because, yes, you were on the hook, but which probably made you feel even more pressure, it being in Steve's name.

Speaker 1: 51:39

It was. Yeah, it was. Because I don't want to mess, I'm up, yeah, you know, or you know his wife, you know they had they were doing doing good for themselves. I didn't want, like anything, I didn't want to be the person that caused those kind of problems. So it was a lot of pressure. And then, yeah, add to that the stuff with Shawna and then Me, knowing that I'm gonna have to work with an orange and me every day and then try to deal with the stuff that was going on. It was just so. It was a rough time. But you know, during that process Jeremy kind of took over the contracting part of it and then Contracting.

Speaker 2: 52:15

Oh, you mean, like the building we didn't have a we didn't we couldn't afford a contract.

Speaker 1: 52:19

So we were having to, like, find a plumber or find electrician, or At the end I had to come back in because, nope, he wasn't getting anybody to finish or do anything, and I just called everyone like we got to get done, like I don't care, I won't hear anymore about anything.

Speaker 2: 52:31

You got to say come and do this work and again, or I'm not gonna pay you it's funny because I can see how that situation gets more and more pressure packed because you're wanting to get it open to be able to make money. Yeah all these loans now you have okay, so in retrospect really quick, though in retrospect Do you feel like it was kind of where it all Really started going wrong? Or maybe the big decision that like was the fork in the road is when you Said, like went against the lawyers advice.

Speaker 2: 53:03

Yeah, and and put all the loans in Steve's name.

Speaker 1: 53:06

Yeah, it wasn't good.

Speaker 2: 53:07

So I mean I'm asking you, do you think that was the big thing, that kind of like the whole thing?

Speaker 1: 53:11

the whole thing was bad. Yeah the whole thing was bad. Then you had the stuff with shawna going on. Steve's attitude kind of changed towards me because we had a team, four of us would meet once a week and and playing what we were doing that week, you know, to keep the ball moving forward. And At the time that all the stuff started happening with shawna and then, if you remember from the last episode, I canceled them.

Speaker 2: 53:33

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 53:34

I also put the brakes on this. I was like I'm not doing this, this is crap. I'm not getting sucked into this, I'm not getting stuck in this, I'm gonna figure out. I got to figure out a way to get out of, so I put the brakes on.

Speaker 2: 53:44

But the reality is you all, you already really felt stuck.

Speaker 1: 53:47

I was stuck Lord have mercy. But I put the brakes on it for like two or three months, like I, I didn't even try to meet, like I don't want to meet right now. You know I'm gonna talk about so. During that process Steve kind of took the reins for me for that. So now I had Jeremy like doing a hostile takeover of the process of the contract and then Steve doing like a gentle you know, I'm just going easy in here and take over because James can't handle this kind of deal. So that just bothered me even more, because now I feel like you know, like, like they're, they're controlling me and I didn't like that.

Speaker 1: 54:24

I hated every part of it. And then, but we just kept, you know, I kept pushing through. And then, you know, there was this thought, like if this is what you want, is these are really your dreams, like what you just keep going. So we got to the end and we ran out of money again and we didn't have any. You know we were stuck, but we were right on the. You know, we were like on the 20-yard line.

Speaker 1: 54:45

We're in the red zone right Right so I did some very foolish things during that time like what. I bought my house in 2003. This was 2006. There's a huge housing bubble during that time. So, like my townhouse when I bought it for like 130, that was valued at like 180 at this time. So I took out like a $40,000 home equity line.

Speaker 1: 55:09

Mm-hmm sunk it all in Kairos, and then my last, like two or three week push of trying to get open. I Went and maxed out all my credit cards at the bank, like I had like 10 or 12 credit cards, but I didn't even know you could do this. You can go to the bank and tell them I want to put $5,000 in my account with this credit card, just, and they would swipe it. And so it was. Basically it was. It was a disaster.

Speaker 2: 55:35

Yeah, the whole thing was a disaster it almost feels like it was like a panic move, like everything was kind of yeah.

Speaker 1: 55:40

We gotta do, we gotta go, we gotta do, we gotta do, we gotta finish. And we barely, barely, barely, like, eased in there. And it was the end of the year, the Christmas season was starting and I wanted to wait till the first of the year and I was in a meeting with them when Jeremy was trying to figure out when to quit his job or when to put in his notice, and Steve told him when to put in his Notice and I said I'm not ready, I'm not ready, like we need to wait till the first of the year. And he was like no, we're moving forward, jeremy, put in your notice to your job. So I was like Good luck on Jeremy getting paid. I mean, you pay him then, whatever you need to do.

Speaker 1: 56:19

But uh, it was like pressure from every side. There was pressure from them, there's pressure from Shauna, there's pressure from my mom, there's pressure from, I think mr Fuleta saw what a painful process I was in and he was, you know. He would tell me like are you sure? Like you, are you sure? And then boo, that worked in the office there, she couldn't stand, steve, like she was, like there's something right about him or something he's trying to control and I just kept kept pushing through like, you know, gotta do, gotta do.

Speaker 1: 56:51

And you know we got our final inspection. The health department came in and I chose the wrong kind of paint for the kitchen. So we had to repaint the whole kitchen at the last. It was just crazy. And then when he came back again a week later, the paint wouldn't dry. What are we gonna do? And then there was a problem with the in the bathroom there, the employee bathroom. The hot water didn't work, so Found out the line one hooked up for hot. It was just something every day and that building was had been built in the 60s and it was so old and it still had the original AC and everything. And you know we had to rewire, put up all new lights, all new plumbing, had to put in a Ventilation system in the kitchen and you know that cost me 15 grand. It was just like what am I getting myself into?

Speaker 2: 57:40

it's crazy what started out. So just kind of simple hopeful and exciting. I mean, yeah, the irony simplicity, catering.

Speaker 1: 57:50

Yeah, it turned into just how quickly it turned into.

Speaker 2: 57:53

Just Just stress and just like a. What do you call it like? As something that's just about to Implode or explode at any moment? Yeah like it's a pressure cooker, that's it was crazy, but there was some.

Speaker 1: 58:08

There were fun parts to it. Like I got to read, read my other dining room and you know I put up like old Birmingham pictures and you know, when I was doing the menu I took a cue from Tony and I named something on after People that were my investors or my family. Yeah, like granny's rolls and stuff. Like there was a lot of neat stuff that happened in that I Originally you know, for people that are cow's fans I really wanted to do garlic bread, kind of like focaccia bread, like what Tony did. Yeah, and my grandmother had this roll recipe that I didn't. She kept telling me about it and I kept saying that don't sound, I don't, that don't sound good.

Speaker 1: 58:45

The Month or two before we opened Was over at my aunt Glen's is and she had some bread on the table. I said where'd you buy this? And she was like I made it. And I see you don't, you don't know how to make bread and she was like no, that's mom's recipe. And I was like these are good. It was the granny's rolls that we had at Kairos and I was doing a Leonardo's catering event at Hunter Street Baptist Church in Hoover, mm-hmm, and the lady it was like my fourth or fifth one I'd done for them the lady that ran their food service. They had a huge food service. She found out I was opening the restaurant. She was like you come back on Monday and you bring a truck or a van and I'll give you everything I got that I need to get rid of. So she gave me. Granny's rolls originally were little bitty, like mini, like a mini cupcake size.

Speaker 1: 59:31

Yeah but she gave me 15 Month in pens you from Hunter Street and they were arrested and me and Jeremy took them and cleaned them up and that's how the roles got to be that size, because that's all I had to work with, like I was, we were running on fumes, but we got up to the end. We had a Somebody was doing some kind of conference there the week before we opened and they asked me if they could, if we could like, cook for it, and it was like a hundred people there and I mean it was wasn't free, they paid for it, right, but so it was. I called it like our Dress rehearsal yeah, I rose.

Speaker 1: 1:00:08

So I had me and Jeremy, and then I had Lenora, and then Wanda was the lady that went to church with us. She wanted to come work with us. I sent her to Leonardo's for like six months to be the bus boy during lunch, to learn how to do.

Speaker 2: 1:00:23

Wanda to be the best boy.

Speaker 1: 1:00:25

Yeah, well, that was what she wanted to. You mean, best girl, best girl, best person, yeah, politically correct. So she had went to work at Leonardo's to learn how to do that part of it. Lenora got a job in Mountain work at Alexa's learning how to weigh tables, because there was nobody had any experience. And then I hired Jeremy at Leonardo's as a food runner on Monday nights just to get a feel for the restaurant business. So I was walking this. I'm not only any real experience, they all three had like a combined like six months experience in the food service business. So it was a it was a weird time.

Speaker 1: 1:00:56

But the day that we did the that little thing getting ready to open the next week, it was going great. You know, people were loving the food. It was like man, it's gonna be so much fun. And my mom came and she was trying to help and she went back in the kitchen and she said what can I do to help? You know, my mom is, she's all. What can I do to help? And she said that Jeremy, like had a glove on, was back there doing something. He snapped his glove at her and looked at her and said you don't work here.

Speaker 1: 1:01:27

And she lost her mind like she gave him a what for, and you know how mom is when Phoenix City, come to Birmingham, to the Kairos cafe a great some truth church, it was a, it was, but I wasn't in there, I was somewhere else. And I came and I was like where's my mom? And oh she, she left and I was like, just like that, she just let the shit I'll sound. So I called her and she was crying and she was like he talked to me, like that I saw this big deal and I was like what did they say? And so I went in there and I was like what happened with my mom? And he said well, she came back here Trying to help and I told her you don't work here. And she got all Been out of shape and by this time, because the stuff was shown or they had started making her like the bad guy too.

Speaker 2: 1:02:16

Yeah, I mean, I think that is important to know that there was a lot of extra.

Speaker 1: 1:02:20

There's a lot of friction going on there, right. But then, um, I'm like you know what, I don't play about my mama. Like you do not know. You know, I don't care how you need to figure out whatever you need. I would never talk to your mom like that and this ain't gonna work, like you're not gonna be able to work with me like you're, you're not going. Nobody's gonna talk to my mama like that, you know. I mean, it was an unnecessary.

Speaker 1: 1:02:46

Yeah almost like a dig at her. Right, you decided not to be a part of this. So, yeah, it was like a cut and but he started crying and he cried the rest of the day and I'm like, well, you gotta stop. I said call her and you tell her you're sorry, do something. And so he like called her and told her you're sorry, and she Was like I don't know you, thank you, are you? Thank you, jj, but you ain't, you ain't him. Okay, so it was just, and it was so hard cuz. Then, like Shawna got involved in and she was like he didn't even really say nothing. I was like you know, he's a smart ass when he wants to be.

Speaker 1: 1:03:28

I can, even I can actually it was like total conflict. But then Tonya got in the Steven Lenore and everybody talking about it now.

Speaker 2: 1:03:35

I can almost feel the tense.

Speaker 1: 1:03:37

It was bad. It was a bad situation and it would only really only get worse from there. But, uh, we got our, we're ready to go. We got approved operate, everything was ready to go. Steve was trying to get me to open the next day and I'm like, no, I'm gonna have some margin, you know, and Plan the day. It was a Monday in December, it was like the second week of December, which I thought was stupid. Like why don't you open it right before Christmas? Like why not wait till after Christmas and start fresh on the new year? But by this time he had a lot more leverage and was like pushing me and pushing me.

Speaker 2: 1:04:10

Really which part of me I can understand the pressure I mean I've we've talked about the pressure you felt, but that he felt. Yeah now knowing, having all these loans in his name, that it does affect you differently.

Speaker 1: 1:04:22

Yeah, and it wasn't just that like he had a lot of the people that invested. I mean, I have people that invested because they believed in me, but a lot of them invested because Steve told him to, so he had his. You had his influence on the line. There was all these loans. It was just a mess.

Speaker 2: 1:04:37

Right, it was a mess.

Speaker 1: 1:04:38

And then the thing was, sean, I had blew up and we were trying to. We were trying to repair that. You know she was. You know Her divorce was final by the time everything. It was still not a good situation. It was a bad situation, so Worked all week getting it ready. You know, my mom went to pottery barn and a party barn pure one and bought me a bunch of dishes and brought them in and I was like I by this time I just didn't want to hurt her feelings. I was like you know I don't bring expensive dishes like that at a restaurant because they're gonna break. But I, you know I didn't want to tell her that. And then Got down to the wire. Let me tell you. Sunday Evening it was me and Brandon. Brandon came with me. It was me and Brandon. We went and got all my supplies to open on Monday morning and that was a opening day, december 2006. It was uh, people talk about being excited about starting stuff like this the whole day. I just want to throw up.

Speaker 2: 1:05:36

I was scared.

Speaker 1: 1:05:37

Yeah, I was scared to death and I knew it was just so much work and so much Conflict. And then it was like so much money that have been that but then Something has shifted with, uh, the people that were working for me, so it was like I was in charge, but Steve, now Steve was in charge, so it was like you had two bosses, and it was. One of these people were his wife, one was his son-in-law, the other one was his church member person, so it was just, and you were the prison project.

Speaker 2: 1:06:04

It was a disaster.

Speaker 1: 1:06:05

Now I shouldn't say that, but okay so it wasn't a happy day for me.

Speaker 2: 1:06:08

Well, it wasn't a happy day.

Speaker 1: 1:06:10

No, it was an awful day.

Speaker 2: 1:06:11

So did a lot of people come.

Speaker 1: 1:06:13

Yeah, actually, the news came. The came did a news story. Well, joe brumbott, from shepherds fault. He called me the day we opened, early that morning and he said I have a contact, a friend at fox six that wants to come and do a new story on chiro's. And I said Really. And he's like, yeah, they want, they want to do it today on opening day. So I said well, awesome. And he said, well, they want to tell your story. And I was like, okay, I'm fine with that. Up until that time, my, my story had not been like public. They made my story public that day but they did um, like a. It was on every one of their broadcasts that night and I think the next day too it was pretty cool, that's really neat.

Speaker 1: 1:06:56

Okay, but I but the people that came the first day I wanted to do a soft opening. I didn't want to do like you know, try to get. We got to figure this out right. It was mostly all people I knew.

Speaker 2: 1:07:05

Yeah, but it was a neat day. Well, you just said it wasn't a good day for you.

Speaker 1: 1:07:10

For me it was awful, so I just wanted to throw up the whole time, just like I. I was like I had a premonition that I've gotten myself into something that's going to be a disaster, and it was something that I don't want to be in. I don't want to be controlled by Other people so to me that's really sad.

Speaker 2: 1:07:27

I mean, what would you say like for other people? Like what, what's? What was the biggest takeaway? Like what's the lesson? You feel like you learned and you would want someone else to know?

Speaker 1: 1:07:37

That you don't do it. You don't do it At all costs, like you don't move into something you don't, you don't push through something at all costs and give up your freedoms, give up. You know I made a lot of concessions during that time, yeah, things that I would never do again, like I would never, ever even come close to getting involved in a situation like that again. Yeah, but uh, you know, once you get in, you're in yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:08:02

So, but I don't want to make it all Bad, it was, it was exciting, the restaurant part, you know, uh, sounds like it. No, I mean, I mean I it would get more exciting, but I was scared. Yeah, you know, I was scared. Well, that's a lot of bill, so and it felt like everything was falling On me, right. But then Steve got a lot of like say I guess, so maybe you mentioned this, but just so I understand.

Speaker 2: 1:08:32

So, from the very the initial talk with Steve To when you opened, how long was that period of time? Like 18 months 18 months, so everything it was a long drawn-out process.

Speaker 1: 1:08:45

Yeah and then time, you know, I would say what am I doing, you know. But we got there, we opened up. I believed if I built it they would come, but, as you'll find out in the next episode, always had been gone from there for about 15 years and they didn't come.

Speaker 2: 1:09:06

Some people came.

Speaker 1: 1:09:08

No, no, I mean my, my friends came, yeah, like church people. I wasn't even that big of a church, wasn't big enough for church to To support a business right but we got there.

Speaker 1: 1:09:19

We'll talk about the next one. I learned a lot Stuff that I still use this day. You know you gotta push through and keep going, but a lot of good came out of this. Um, so we're here. We got Kairos, I got the restaurant, I got the girl. You know I started this off saying you know, every dream of mine that I thought ever had was coming true.

Speaker 2: 1:09:40

You got the restaurant, you got the girl, but you were tired and terrified.

Speaker 1: 1:09:43

No, in the end, what I thought was my dream became more of like a nightmare or not. Maybe not a nightmare, but a very bad dream more about that next time. Thanks for tuning in, guys. We'll see you next time, see you soon. Bye, hey guys. Thanks so much for tuning in to the straight out of prison podcast. For more exclusive content, head over to our website team jonesco slash podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:10:06

Yes, you can subscribe by clicking on the become a patron button and that's going to give you access to our for real.

Speaker 1: 1:10:12

Real, which is very different than the highlight real Some very juicy content there good stuff, or you can look us up on facebook and instagram straight out of prison Podcasts.

Speaker 2: 1:10:24

Yes, that takes the story to a whole new level where you can see Some of the people that james talks about in his story and see some of the places that he's been. I've been loving it in your prison recipes. Yeah, all the things, good stuff.

Speaker 1: 1:10:38

We'll see you soon guys.

Speaker 2: 1:10:39

Thanks, bye.