Ep. 52 - The Secret Recipe Behind Hutch's Success

Join us as we uncover the spicy transformation of Jason and Candra Hutcheson, the dynamic duo behind Hutch's Hot Chicken, Bentonville's first Nashville-style hot chicken haven. With Jason's fascinating journey from law enforcement to the culinary world, and Candra's leap from nursing to restaurant ownership, their story is as flavorful as their famous Three Piece Tender dish. Learn how they turned their passion into a thriving family-run business that's been embraced by the local community.

During our chat, we share laughs over Matt's bourbon picks, particularly his questionable choice of George Dickel, and celebrate the power of word-of-mouth marketing that has fueled Hutch's success. We explore the nuances of Nashville-style hot chicken, the challenges of maintaining food quality, and the sweet triumphs of homemade banana pudding and indulgent milkshakes that keep customers coming back for more. With a focus on family involvement, Jason and Candra reveal how their son, Colton, plays a crucial role in managing the bustling kitchen, balancing business with personal life, and fostering brand loyalty through personal interactions.

We wrap up the episode with exciting plans for Hutch's future, from potential expansion to going mobile and creating engaging video content. This episode promises a rich tapestry of personal stories, business aspirations, and shared experiences, painting a vibrant picture of what it takes to turn a dream into a delicious reality.

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:11

Welcome to the B-Team Podcast. I am your host, josh Safran, with my co-host, matt Morris and our permanent guest Rob Nelson. We're here every week to talk to you about all things Bentonville, bourbon and business the B-Team Podcast Be here. Welcome to the B-Team Podcast. I'm your host, josh Safran, with my co-host Matt Mars and Bobby.

Speaker 2 0:32

I'm here. We're not going to let him talk today, you're just going to do it for him.

Speaker 1 0:36

I didn't want him to introduce himself, I just said and, bobby, I mean here we go, here we go, we're starting Well, thank you for coming here. Do you have my new contract yet? We're not ready for season two quite yet, and so there's a lot of options to fill in your spot, okay.

Speaker 2 0:53

We can start interviewing right now.

Speaker 1 0:55

There's two people here, anything would be better than you sitting next to me. I love it. Well, we're here every Thursday for all things Bentonville, business and bourbon. And I got to apologize to Matthew because we've got a new thing on the show. We film three times in a day and everybody's responsible to bring in bourbon. You're putting out all our secrets. Well, I'm sure you know we're heading to season two. I mean, you're putting out the dirty laundry. Well now, we always try to figure out what's somebody going to bring, and Matt's been bringing terrible bourbons.

Speaker 2 1:28

I wouldn't say that he brought the Lot B the last few times.

Speaker 1 1:32

The Lot B makes up for all the times.

Speaker 2 1:34

It was kind of it's been ditch to ditch.

Speaker 1 1:36

The last few times, the dry fly. And then what was the other one you brought before that? That wasn't very good. It was our brown water. It was like brown water. It was like water with brown food coloring, whatever it was. Remember you had the box and you I don't know what it was.

Speaker 2 1:48

It wasn't very good, I think you won it or something. Oh yeah, I did win that one, and so you get this great bourbon collection.

Speaker 1 1:55

That was good. Yeah, I liked it Anyway. So I was dogging you before we filmed today because I didn't think you brought anything good in. You brought a very expensive, nice bottle.

Speaker 2 2:04

Yeah, I mean, this was just for us. Some dickle, george dickle, I thought you'd be in a Mr Dickle over there.

Speaker 1 2:12

You'd bring the dickle.

Speaker 2 2:13

Yeah. So let's try it. Let's try it out. I'm going to go ahead and pour my own first. So selfish, I'm so selfish. Yeah, I mean, you want to introduce the guests. Why do they're? Thank you, yeah.

Speaker 1 2:30

While we're pouring. This is Condra.

Speaker 3 2:35

Candor, Candor See.

Speaker 1 2:36

I knew it was going to be around and Jason from Hutch's Hot Chicken Right, did I do that right?

Speaker 4 2:46

Yes, you did All right, one of the new hot chicken spots in town, the hot chicken spot. We are the first Nashville-style hot chicken in Bentonville, that's right.

Speaker 1 2:51

But there's been a lot of chicken plates popping up and I got to tell you yours is really good. We went in without Matt.

Speaker 2 2:58

We'll come back to that here. Cheers. Welcome to the BT Podcast.

Speaker 4 3:02

Cheers and tables. Ignore these two knuckleheads. I break out Windows, doors and things. Here's our permanent guest.

Speaker 2 3:15

We're hired. I want that seat right there.

Speaker 1 3:20

You haven't brought anything that's funny, except for the smartest pencil.

Speaker 2 3:23

I mean you're hogging the show half the time. I'm sorry, it's like the Josh show Robin Madder just here to support you. How is it? It's pretty good. You said it's a little proof. Yeah, 92.

Speaker 4 3:41

You got a shot, I will take a sip of it. We have to work tonight, so I don't know Chicken will be better.

Speaker 2 3:46

Chicken will be better. You'll be loose back there.

Speaker 1 3:53

Pretty good. Yeah, it's pretty good, nice job, thank you. You just picked that up in a store Mm-hmm Sitting on the shelf.

Speaker 2 3:58

Yep sitting on the shelf Up shelf Just looking right at me when I went in there and then you saw the price and you said I'm going to buy it anyway.

Speaker 1 4:04

Yeah, because what was that? $2.50 a?

Speaker 2 4:06

bottle. I don't remember what it was. Good though it's very good, yes, okay, so let's get back to the chicken now.

Speaker 1 4:14

Let's get back to the chicken. Let's get back to the chicken, guys.

Speaker 2 4:19

So how did you come across this fine couple? So I was driving home what probably two months ago, and I looked over and saw that there was a hot chicken place. So years ago we started going to Nashville and one of our favorite things to do there is have hot chicken, and I had always told Carrie I was like I wish we would get a hot chicken place. So I called her that day and she was like well, that's perfect, because we had family coming in from south arkansas. So I went in and got a bunch of hot chicken and while I was waiting because I had a big order, andrew was talking with me and everything that led to this and we, we love going there. We love your guys's chicken. I love that. It's like a, a family, your whole family is doing it. And so, yeah, it's right behind the five guys, right on the corner of 102 and Walton. Yes, and how long have you been open? About three months.

Speaker 3 5:14

Yeah, we had a restaurant in Harrison for three years A hot chicken place Same.

Speaker 1 5:19

Thing. How did it do there? It did good. Did you close that one?

Speaker 3 5:24

We did. We always wanted to retire to this area and Jason was a state trooper. Thank you for your service, he retired from that and this building opened up and we knew this was our long-term goal, our interim goal. So we just kind of kicked it into high gear, didn't we?

Speaker 1 5:38

So the chicken business isn't new for you guys. You've been doing it for a long time.

Speaker 4 5:41

My Like you've been doing it for a long time.

Speaker 3 5:43

It's three years old but it still feels like wow, we're still very much newbies in the business.

Speaker 2 5:46

You would never know by eating your chicken.

Speaker 4 5:50

We are the first brick and mortar Nashville style hot chicken in Northwest Arkansas if you consider Harrison Northwest, which really it is, and I beg people to put hot chicken places.

Speaker 1 6:00

So what's the difference?

Speaker 4 6:01

between hot chicken and what other people do. It's how it's prepared and the spice. We have our own spice, created ourselves.

Speaker 3 6:08

But you can also get no spice. A lot of people are confused. We specialize in spice Nashville style hot chicken but not everybody can handle spicy food. If you're out there listening and you need original, you can get it, no spice also.

Speaker 2 6:24

But that's good to know because I agree, some people. When our family came, I got some that didn't have any spice and then I got some. We only went halfway and they go one through five. What number did you?

Speaker 1 6:35

go through.

Speaker 2 6:36

You went to three, we did three, I did three. Actually, I did three and one Three is the most popular. Yeah, the three was gone first. Yeah, out of the house. Have you done the four or the five? No, no.

Speaker 1 6:48

Does anybody come in and order? Oh, yes.

Speaker 2 6:50

Yes.

Speaker 4 6:51

And just the sweat pouring off your brow with the five.

Speaker 3 6:54

How loud is the five? It depends on the person.

Speaker 4 6:58

I can't do it, that's fair. You can't do it. I tried half the tender and I said you know, guys, this is for these other folks. So I like to be happy when I eat and hurt a little bit. That's why three's four to me, but four and five, five. I just can't do Four. I can, once in a while, four's doable, very doable. It's just, you know a lot of my comfort zone. Help me out.

Speaker 3 7:19

We have a Calbee, we we have a. Calbee. We call her our adopted daughter. She works there with us.

Speaker 1 7:24

She moved from Harrison.

Speaker 3 7:26

She comes in and has a level five tender on the stent every day. She's 20 years old, she loves it.

Speaker 2 7:32

And they also have, which is a big deal to us, especially the kids, but me too Like you have your ranch is really good which? Is a big deal, because if it's not good ranch, it changes it now oh, I spend 80 on my time making ranch you probably wouldn't banana pudding.

Speaker 3 7:52

In fact, I've had to cut our staff off from banana pudding especially it raved about the banana pudding when we were there.

Speaker 1 7:57

Everybody was talking about we didn't order it. It would kind of be healthy. Yeah, yeah, it was just lunch.

Speaker 3 8:01

I finally told the staff. I'm like if you're eating the banana pudding, you're learning to make the banana pudding.

Speaker 1 8:08

It goes a white way. So I'm consuming to make. But you guys are not just chicken tender strips, you guys are like whole chicken too right, the whole nine yards. Quarters, breast wing quarters and leg quarters At the same heat. You do one, two, three, four, everything or none.

Speaker 4 8:21

Yes, and catfish. You have wings as well too. We do the jumbo ones. Everything we have is jumbo. The only thing smaller is the owners. We're like five foot.

Speaker 2 8:30

Well, and we didn't. So Carrie, my wife, the other day, she was like Matt, you never told me there was catfish. She's a huge catfish lover and I'm not a big catfish lover but she is fish lover but she is. So she's like you didn't bring any catfish and I was like so selfish well, I wasn't gonna tell you about the cat.

Speaker 4 8:48

Now, the catfish also have the heat levels, can't? Uh, it does we do one level of spice with that? Uh, but a catfish is, you're not. Yeah, is it a fried or it is fried, it's catfish, farm-raised us, us grown, so it's farm-raised catfish.

Speaker 3 9:01

And pretty much everything we have is fried, jason says the cardiologists love it. We do have some grilled chicken For the health of the catfish.

Speaker 2 9:09

For those that are like me and you have some greens right, A side of greens or something.

Speaker 3 9:16

Every now and then we have a special. Yeah, we have some really good turnip greens and shrimp. Our shrimp is really popular.

Speaker 2 9:25

And you can get different levels of spice on that and they're ready to popcorn shrimp okay small, it's jumbo so is it the same breading you use on chicken or different? No, it's different.

Speaker 4 9:33

Different, okay, because the breading on chicken is amazing well, we uh get all of our chicken fresh, nothing's frozen and that makes it different for 24 hours minimum, and then we hand. We have our own breading. We came or you came up with whatever. Somebody came up with it. It's our own breading, so that's how we do it.

Speaker 2 9:51

And I think that's why it's so yeah, so good. Like well you, rob likes bone-in, which it is Bone-in, is it's more work? Yeah, it's more work, but it reminds you of how good chicken is with bone-in. That's right At Granny's house, because we're all spoiled and we're like I just want the tenders. And then you have a bone-in and you're like not the tender, the dark meat bone-in is where it's at. You had a chicken one way or the other. I did the strips, I think, but you didn't do strips, did you?

Speaker 3 10:25

No, I did. The smaller portion was on the dark meat. Oh yeah, that's what I had, and it was great not to weirdly talk about breading, but that's important because so many times the breading is too thick yeah, it's too thin. We hear that all the time.

Speaker 2 10:33

You're breading us no it's right on, spot on, thank you. I'm hungry, so what made?

Speaker 1 10:46

you get into chicken. I mean you're, you're a state trooper like how do you fall into chicken?

Journey From Music to Restaurant Business

Speaker 4 10:49

I'm gonna tell you a long story but it'll last about a minute. Okay, I was gonna raise in arkansas. I left when I was 21 to be in the music business in nashville. So I left in october of 1984 Tells you my age and I got a job with the country legend, Tom T Hall, in January of 1985. Worked with him 13 years, but anyway, in Nashville there was only one hot chicken place called Princess. We would go there and eat it and I just got addicted to it. Then there were other things popping up and I would go to all of them as well. And then fast forward. I worked with everybody, from Tom to Taylor Swift, and that was my last job. I was her tour manager and I moved back to Arkansas. And my other dream was being a state trooper. At 50 years old I went through troop school, Really To move back to take care of my dad because my mom passed away.

Speaker 1 11:36

Wait.

Speaker 4 11:36

So you had no background in police at all, I was a reserve deputy in Williamson County for about 10 or 12 years and I always liked police work. My oldest brother was a state trooper in Arkansas in the 70s. So when I was 15, I thought I'd have a cool job. I went to Nashville and that was that story. I didn't come back for 30 years. So I spent 10 and a half years as a trooper in Troop I and during that time we opened this restaurant.

Speaker 1 12:02

I can't be that hard can I?

Speaker 4 12:04

She was a nurse for 23 years and died hard. She didn't do anything, you know, so I talked her into that.

Speaker 3 12:10

We're way too spontaneous anyways. I mean, we dated for three months before we got married.

Speaker 4 12:17

It felt like three years For her, not you. I got you.

Speaker 3 12:24

Talked about opening up a restaurant for a few months and then all of a sudden just did it and well, I went to see Tom T Hall visit him.

Speaker 4 12:31

We were dating and Tom said, hey, why don't you get married in my house, you know? And okay, kendra, will you marry me?

Speaker 1 12:36

that's kind of how that works, because the old man is going to give us our wedding at his house and give.

Speaker 4 12:41

Rolls Royce for a dinner. That's what happened with us. We got married and opened a chicken place. Can we open a restaurant? Yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 3 12:48

How hard can it be? So there we are, here we are.

Speaker 2 12:51

Restaurant business is hard. I was going to say how hard can it be? We?

Speaker 3 12:55

talk about that a lot. We're the type of people Kit, you've heard his background and my background was nursing for 22 years and we're kind of like, yeah, we can handle anything. No, I mean 13-hour shifts as a nurse. No. Somebody calls out Breaking the eat the restroom breaks on your feet all the time. You know, constantly critically thinking. Nothing could have prepared me for the restroom.

Speaker 1 13:17

My wife left nursing to come. We own a barbershop Same thing she's like. I thought I'd seen it all.

Speaker 3 13:23

Yeah.

Speaker 1 13:23

And then you're your own business owner.

Speaker 4 13:25

Oh yeah, but we can turn it over somewhat, but we don't do that. We're family owned and operated and we're always there Because it's got to be right and you're in the food industry, it better be right going out. So you're both there all the time.

Speaker 3 13:36

I guess with shifts.

Speaker 4 13:37

Well, we do with our son and Kelby.

Speaker 3 13:41

We work opposite. When we're not there, they're there.

Speaker 4 13:43

Or sometimes they're there together. You know it depends on what day it is, Because we trust them completely and you have to make it right. You know this is too important to let it go bad, because your food has to be right Everything.

Speaker 2 13:58

That's what's so hard about the restaurant business is, sometimes you get one chance and you know how it is. They can come eight times times and the ninth time it won't be good, and then they don't come back and you're like exactly, and then they'll leave a bad review on.

Speaker 1 14:10

Google.

Speaker 2 14:11

So, josh, you gotta be kidding me.

Speaker 1 14:14

The reviews are like it was really really good. Three stars. I'm like what, what?

Speaker 3 14:19

Right Really.

Speaker 1 14:20

What. That's all they have Right Really, and it's a person and they have thousands of reviews and they're all three stars. I can't give you four or five. I know and then you get the one that comes in and is like you know, my wait time this time was three minutes longer than it should have been and they only gave me well, they didn't give me any ranch and they gave me a one star.

Speaker 2 14:38

And you look at it, you're, you're a miserable human being, and that's why they're at home on their couch writing reviews.

Speaker 3 14:45

You wouldn't believe how many times I've told my staff that I'm like. The food can be great, the customer service is great. If you miss a ranch, we're getting a two-star review. So I preach on that all the time.

Speaker 4 14:55

But the last thing here we've been very well received here and we're very thankful that people are very niceonville. Yeah, I think Northwest Arkansas is pretty good.

Speaker 2 15:08

I mean you get a few from back east that are hard to deal with.

Speaker 1 15:11

Oh, did you yeah.

Speaker 3 15:16

Well, none of us knew that. Us too, because Harrison's a small community. I knew a lot of people, you knew a lot of people. We both have a lot of family there, but moving over here we didn't know anybody except our kids that moved with us.

Speaker 1 15:29

How are you guys marketing the business? Is it just word of mouth, do you guys? We have a sign on the door. That's the best marketing, because that spot is a little bit off the road, right?

Speaker 4 15:37

It is. We need signs on the road. We haven't done that yet. We're going to, we're going as we can and put them off, because you told us it was there and I said, rob, let's go.

Speaker 1 15:46

And where is it? I knew where it is because that place has turned over multiple times over the years and I was like, oh gosh, because I've been here 13 years and I think there's been six or seven different things in there.

Speaker 4 15:55

Really Wow. And I'm like I know where it is and we walked in and I mean it's it and we're getting a lot of repeat customers.

Speaker 2 16:06

Which, honestly, that's probably more important than spending all this money on marketing to get one person to come in one time.

Speaker 4 16:13

And the $5 we're giving you guys is going to be really worth it.

Speaker 1 16:16

I mean, you're going to blow up in the B-Team podcast. You may run out of onion rings tomorrow. Oh, that'd be awesome.

Chicken Restaurant Expansion and Catering

Speaker 3 16:26

I don't know if I can't Stop killing those onions. Harry, let's go. We have a pretty big following On our Facebook page also, which you know, Third age group. I'm told it's funny. We do laugh, because a lot of that Is our Harrison friends Loved us over there so sometimes we'll get a lot of likes on a post and I'll go through and I'm like man, Like 80% of those are the ones that looked at Harrison, which is great and it's so sweet.

Speaker 1 16:49

But it only has three months. You only have three months. Give it another six months and it'll be 60%, I mean between the three of us.

Speaker 2 16:55

we have a few hundred followers, so we'll repost it, You'll be right.

Speaker 1 16:59

I mean, once this podcast goes out, not be able to open the doors and there's going to be a line outside like a New Air Jordan release. The line will be around the corner.

Speaker 2 17:08

Well, and I think it's a good location. It's just like you said, it's fun, it's people knowing that it's there and, like you said, I think word of mouth is better because it takes a little longer but it's better going in.

Speaker 4 17:24

Yeah, we've had a slow increase since we've been there. It takes a little longer, but it's better going in. Yeah, we've had a slow increase since we've been there. And then people coming in they bring their family or somebody said, hey, somebody told us about it. So that does mean a lot to us and that makes us feel really good.

Speaker 3 17:32

One lady came in from Bella Vista early on and she has like 10,000 followers. And every single day, almost every single day, we have someone come in that I read about you on her page.

Speaker 1 17:49

That's you, I'm glad you liked our food Very bad. When we have restaurants in here, they always talk about how hard it is to staff people. How hard it is with so many restaurants popping up. The service industry, good team, fully staffed. I mean, how are you guys done with that?

Speaker 3 18:02

We have a great team and everybody we have now started with us. Three months ago we haven't. That's huge. We lost one but we lost her like within the first week.

Speaker 1 18:12

She's still alive. She's still alive.

Speaker 4 18:15

May she rest in peace.

Speaker 1 18:17

She was supposed to speak to that.

Speaker 2 18:19

I was thinking too much, she choked on a chicken burger. It's fine as long as she's okay.

Speaker 1 18:23

She may not be a chicken burger, it's fine, she's okay. She may not be with you guys.

Speaker 3 18:28

The rest of our team has been with us since we opened over here and they're great, they're really great.

Speaker 2 18:37

And then Colton, our son, is our general manager.

Speaker 3 18:39

He does a great job. He does a good job. And Kelby which, yeah, she's amazing she worked with us in Harrison from day one. That's her first job. Yeah, I did her senior pictures because I was a photographer then and I was talking about opening up a restaurant and she's like hey, I may be looking for a job, and she's been with us ever since. Now we're all over here together. We've got a great staff.

Speaker 2 18:59

That's wonderful. So for our viewers right that may be not very familiar with hot chicken, how would you compare it to a buffalo hot wing? Good question what separates it?

Speaker 3 19:14

You want to go ahead with this? Oh, because I've never had a buffalo hot wing.

Speaker 4 19:18

You've never had a buffalo or a chicken wing. Okay yeah, hot wing Chicken in general, the Nashville style. Yeah, you kind of read about Princess how that came about. It was kind of a neat story how this first came about, because I think one guy cheated on his wife and she wanted to fix him by making him hot chicken and ruining his day. But he loved it.

Speaker 2 19:38

So that's how Princess was born. Yeah, that's how he's kept you around all this year. Does that get me?

Speaker 4 19:44

Yeah, so we have different vats of hot, hot or grease, level one, two, three, four and five, and I keep. We keep it hot and we have our own spice. That recreated that is like, is the Nashville style. We had to figure out what my taste buds like and we rented it and that's where it is. So we take the chicken out of the fryer. If they want spice, we'll dip it in that vat, let it drip, put it on the plate and send it. That's how it's prepared and the spice, that's how it's done, oh yeah, and specific to what you like.

Speaker 4 20:13

Yes.

Speaker 3 20:13

Like you asked earlier, how hot's the hot?

Speaker 2 20:15

Well, that depends on you. Yeah, fair.

Speaker 3 20:17

So I think that's a good way to answer that.

Speaker 2 20:28

Okay, well talking, thank you. Is there butter? Like I don't want the whole recipe because you wouldn't share with me, but is there butter? Butter in the, in the hot sauce? No, no. So natalie, which was a huge which, there's a lot of butter in chicken wings like in, uh, buffalo whaley, oh yeah, a lot of butter. So natalie's allergic to dairy and when I first I first went there I was like does this have any dairy and milk? You're like no, I know it doesn't. Your batter doesn't have any. Another thing a lot of people. That's huge. It is for us. We have a lot more. She can't have ranch.

Speaker 3 21:01

A lot of our sites they can do. I do tell people our breading was, you know, manufactured in a place where it may have been contaminated by some type of dairy product, but we don't add anything to it. We have a lot of people that can eat our chicken sandwiches, even down to the buns, like we're very specific. That's where our nursing background comes into, you know. You know, they tell us us, they let us know.

Speaker 2 21:26

we'll make sure that mine doesn't touch anything that's had any butter in it or anything and it's a big deal because for us, because we, we can't go to a lot of restaurants yeah and when natalie finds somewhere she likes like here guys, she wants to go there all the time because she knows she's, well, she's just afraid the first few times that it's going to be well, it's a risk, you know it's.

Speaker 3 21:48

They say it's okay, but I'm I'm gonna have a reaction. Some people have mild reactions, but some people have anaphylactic I have a few food allergies myself.

Speaker 2 21:56

So, yeah, yeah, yeah, we have to be very careful when we go out with you, right, that's right, check with you, you right. Yeah, you crying again. Um, we have to put. Yeah, we have to put our. That's urban. We have to put arms on the chair that I've been known to fall out of the chair.

Speaker 1 22:19

It was. That's a whole other story.

Speaker 2 22:21

It was number five. Chicken knocked him right out. Oh, josh and I found out it's not good to laugh at everyone that happened. We both slept on the couch that night Did you wait until after it happened.

Speaker 3 22:32

We were kind of important Like, wouldn't you?

Speaker 1 22:34

laugh, no, no. He went straight down and we were dying laughing. We thought he was being funny. And then he gets back up and was like huh, huh, and we kept laughing and our two wives were like you guys are assholes, we're like we know, you know that but this is damn funny.

Speaker 2 22:49

Well, there's eight other people in the room. I had to help myself back on the chair because no one was moving.

Speaker 3 22:53

That's terrible, but it was after you had the number five, chicken.

Speaker 2 22:56

It happened really quick.

Speaker 1 23:00

Do you guys do catering? We do Okay. So how does that work?

Speaker 3 23:04

We have a catering menu HutchinsHotChickencom and again Kelby handles our catering and we have a lot of people that just place large orders and want to pick it up themselves. We can deliver, we can do the full setup. We've got all the catering equipment.

Speaker 2 23:18

Super Bowl's coming, yeah, and it's really good. Leftover it's really good too. So we always get a bunch of them. Do you know what catering is? I just order a bunch and go pick it up. I'm too cheap to get a woodland. I can go in there and I can give them a hard time.

Speaker 1 23:37

Is the catering a very limited menu or is it a full menu just larger quantities? It's a full menu, that's nice.

Speaker 4 23:45

We're getting a lot of bookings down with that. We also have a room we just opened up. It's a private room for birthday parties.

Speaker 2 23:53

At your place.

Speaker 4 23:54

Yes, we have a room adjacent to our we should have had the podcast there. I didn't know. This is hot off the press.

Speaker 1 24:00

I didn't know this.

Speaker 4 24:03

We could do another podcast, guys. We may have to do that, but anyway, if anybody wants to come in and book it, we don't charge for it. How many people? 20. Something like that. That's a good number, that's great.

Speaker 2 24:11

We could have like a chicken challenge.

Speaker 4 24:12

But we don't charge for the room. Just tell us when you want it or go online and book it, and we'll reserve it Right.

Speaker 3 24:17

Good to go and people can come in and decorate it. Or if it's a business meeting, we have a podium, sounds like we need to have our next business meeting.

Speaker 2 24:27

I like it.

Speaker 1 24:28

I like it too. Do you guys have liquor license? Alcohol no.

Speaker 3 24:32

We don't.

Speaker 1 24:32

Can you bring your own how?

Speaker 4 24:34

does that work? How does that work at State of Arkansas? I should know.

Speaker 2 24:37

Yeah, I don't, as a former state trooper you would think Well, I never dealt with bootleggers. I don't know, Days are yeah over there. You just turn your head the other way.

Speaker 4 24:46

Well, I'm important, I'm just going kid, get out of here.

Speaker 1 24:48

Whatever happens in that private room happens in that private room. Pass me a little bit.

Speaker 2 24:51

Yeah.

Speaker 3 24:57

We are thinking about getting our liquor license. We've been so busy and, you know, one day a month you have to go down to a class in Little Rock. That's 15. And we honestly haven't had the time to do this since we opened, because we're at the restaurant.

Speaker 1 25:09

Do you get a lot of asks or requests for it?

Speaker 3 25:11

Yeah, quite a bit.

Speaker 2 25:14

Well, because, like hot chicken, it would be nice to have beer, even if you just have beer and wine. We wouldn't do this.

Speaker 4 25:22

But I'd be careful. I'm just concerned that people come in and already had two million or wait to serve one or two more, put them over the limit, and I don't be in charge of that. That's kind of a concern of mine, being especially a trooper, and just got to be careful.

Speaker 3 25:35

Yeah, because he can tell, Like you know, sometimes the other day somebody came in. I had no idea and he's like oh, they've been drinking.

Speaker 1 25:46

Because that's what he's trained to do. Yeah, I can tell now you've been drinking, I'm good.

Speaker 2 25:50

I'm really good, I love that you guys do the cater. I never even thought about that Super bold, back to the liquor.

Speaker 3 25:57

it's not that we're judging or anything, it's just we're not wanting to contribute anything to a community that could be harmful.

Speaker 2 26:05

It's a whole other level of the business aspect that you have to deal with. Keep the chicken good and if they want to go have a drink, they can take it. It's one less headache for you to deal with. What you should do is get together with Trailhead Brewing, right up the street and have a deal where you have your little menus there and when we're there having a cold beer, you get some hot chicken. Uh-huh, trailhead Tony.

Speaker 1 26:32

There's a lot of businesses in town that would do that reciprocal type stuff with you guys. Really, yeah, I think that would be interesting and funny. We can put you in touch with Tony.

Speaker 2 26:40

Okay, I'd be interested. The social project, too, would be great. Yeah, 100%, because a lot of if you're a bar, you can't. It's like they don't have normal. All they have is beer and wine. So it would be nice if you could incorporate that.

Speaker 1 26:58

Hot chicken at Loveless.

Speaker 2 27:02

We got to get them on the podcast. That would be good. I think Trailhead would be that's where I would start it, because that place is always packed. What do they have? Popcorn Popcorn. And I think Trailhead would be that's where I would start it, because that place is always packed. What is that? Popcorn Popcorn? I think pizza. You've got a little pizza oven in there, but be able to sit there with some hot chicken, especially summer's coming.

Speaker 4 27:21

Bobby's an entrepreneur, but he's on to something I will.

Speaker 3 27:26

We've been talking about it. We're just weighing all the pros and cons and we just want to do it responsibly.

Speaker 2 27:30

Oh, of course.

Speaker 1 27:32

What's been your biggest challenge in the first three months? Getting open, getting the word out.

Speaker 2 27:38

I thought she was going to point at you.

Speaker 3 27:41

She's like that guy right there is my biggest challenge.

Speaker 4 27:44

He's like did I say three months? I can't let the watch go off, you know. He's like did I say three months?

Speaker 3 27:48

I can't literally go off. You know, actually I love having him down there because you know, when he was a state trooper he was working all the time he was on call and he'd come in before shift and after, but now he's down there all the time and I love it.

Speaker 2 28:02

Yeah, it's awesome.

Speaker 3 28:03

Jason just falls into any role that you throw at him, and he does really good at it.

Speaker 2 28:10

Yeah, that's great. What would you say? The number one item on the menu is like right now, today. What's your number one seller?

Speaker 3 28:12

Three Piece Tender which comes with two sides and a level three every day since the day we opened Three Piece.

Speaker 2 28:18

Tender, so everyone kind of just goes middle of the road.

Speaker 4 28:22

You know, trying to some people get different. You can mix levels, like if you have three pieces, you do one, two, three or whatever. I think if you try the four at night you think you could pull off a four.

Speaker 2 28:29

I might go five. No, I'm going to try a five, just so I can say that I have.

Speaker 1 28:34

Are you all going to go down tonight? I think we're going to come down tonight, I don't want no tenders, I want the whole deal.

Speaker 2 28:46

He likes the whole thing. We I just cleaned my teeth with it. I like that you guys are there because I think it, I think I don't know. I think as a customer, it means a lot more when you let people know what's in there.

Speaker 1 28:59

I mean, there's no doubt.

Speaker 2 29:01

All our top restaurants I would say that we go to on a regular basis, typically the owners there.

Speaker 1 29:07

And we talked about this often in the podcast here, whether it's Bill and Sheila, or whether it's Barry or Weezy, there's something like the waiter comes over, brenda. Yeah, when the waiter comes over, it's nice. When the manager comes over, nicer when the owner comes over, like oh the owner came over and shook my hand and said hi, there's something about that.

Speaker 4 29:23

But we care.

Speaker 2 29:29

We really do, but which is also hard because you gotta be there all the time. Oh, it's very hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah and our. You just thought you retired.

Speaker 4 29:32

You didn't retire that's my third career. I'm thinking next year I'm gonna do like a little tire shop.

Speaker 3 29:38

Do something for us colton's helping a lot with that colton's amazing he's I mean he's stepping in, pulling the hours? And we're trying to pull back more and and he'll be more the front person. He's young, he's smart, he's so good at digital marketing. He is.

Speaker 4 29:56

We're still 40 hours a week. Don't get me wrong, we're in the 40 plus. Before it was almost double that we're coming back Today. We normally are there, but now we're here. We're going to go right straight there from here, so there's a little bit of break. We can do things like this, what's next?

Speaker 2 30:11

Do you think one store, or do you see multiple here?

Speaker 4 30:14

I would love to expand. I think what we have is we're trying to brand it. I think we have in Harrison we had a great following and we just wanted to go over here and we tried to keep that one open.

Speaker 2 30:33

We drove back and forth. It's tough. We couldn't do two hours every year.

Speaker 1 30:35

One way we just had to close it down. I hate that, but if you have one in rogers, yeah, we can manage it, and four of us on the campus, I think it'll be a home run yeah, you'd love to expand.

Speaker 1 30:44

I think we can, soon, I hope the hard part with the expansion is you want to do it, you gotta make sure you get all the bugs out and the kinks. We're six years in and we finally decided to expand, thank you. But we had to really really make sure that the P&L was where it needed to be and the right people and the brand recognition. And it's hard to be in two places at once. You guys are part of the secret sauce, right, and it's hard to be in two places at once. You know you guys are part of the secret sauce. You know you could talk about your chicken seasoning and the natural hot but, like you guys, people want to see you Can't be in two places at the same time.

Speaker 4 31:16

All right. Well, with four family members, we'll probably be, the fourth, but we can all kind of do that.

Speaker 2 31:21

Yeah.

Speaker 1 31:21

Now, like we could be dinners at the house, like because I find in our business it's always a topic it's hard to get away from it. How do you guys kind of how?

Speaker 2 31:39

do you guys not talk chicken? How do you guys not talk chicken when you walk in on this door? We don't talk about how to stick it in.

Speaker 1 31:47

It doesn't work.

Speaker 2 31:49

Because otherwise you're sitting around the table doing this.

Speaker 4 31:51

I know I can't think of anything to talk about.

Speaker 2 31:55

It's true, though.

Speaker 3 31:56

My daughter, gordon. She kind of has a no restaurant talk rule with us. I don't want to hear about it. Jason is such a hard guy.

Speaker 1 32:06

What else is there to talk?

Speaker 3 32:07

about Even today he was talking to her. Well, yeah, she's at that age where it's a guessing game, like do we talk to her in the day or not, yeah, she's a teenager, oh yeah.

Speaker 1 32:17

We were all there. Oh yeah, she's there all day.

Speaker 3 32:20

So today he asked her about her youth group at church there you go.

Speaker 4 32:29

And you know, you would think he was just asking about our youth group, but I knew he was leading up to chicken. When they come in at 8 o'clock, we can stay open an hour late for them, you know.

Speaker 3 32:35

It is hard to talk about anything other than the restaurant, because we're HR, we're marketing we're cooks. We're clear. I mean we're there Saturday night until 1 o'clock in the morning doing dishes.

Speaker 1 32:45

You guys are on inventory. You're ordering all across the place o'clock in the morning.

Speaker 2 32:57

Yeah, it's something you love it has to be something you like, do and, but as hell this man, you're gonna have to get some of that or else you'll definitely have burnout oh, they're driving crazy yeah we enjoy it though.

Speaker 4 33:08

We love what we're doing. We love the feedback we're getting. That's the reward. You know. People are happy, they seem to be happy, and we just keep going to the next one, and our reviews have been great. We've been very blessed with that. Nah, I don't know.

Speaker 1 33:23

It's a great community to open a business because people are very supportive of all the new stuff here and it's the shiny new object. Everybody goes, and then you want those people to be like I don't want to move to the next shiny. This is my place now, and so the fact that you guys go there on a regular basis is wonderful, and I do think we should pop over there tonight. Let's see you have a five. What's that A five? I want to see you have a five, if you promise not to fall out of your chair.

Speaker 2 33:53

I can't promise anything. Ron's going to come in and she's going to slide away.

Speaker 3 33:59

Can we talk about our specials we're doing during the week? So this is your guys' time To talk about whatever you want to talk about so during the week, monday through Friday, we're doing a different special every evening from 4 pm to closing. So Mondays is our milkshake Monday.

Speaker 1 34:16

Whoa, whoa, whoa. I didn't know, you guys did milkshakes. We are out.

Speaker 3 34:19

So those desserts we were talking about, the homemade banana pudding, our brownies that we sell out of every day, chocolate chip cookies those turn into milkshakes All homemade stuff.

Speaker 2 34:32

Banana pudding milkshake it's amazing, I've had the banana pudding milkshake. I haven't had the brownies because we were gone.

Speaker 3 34:38

I know the brownies sell out every day. It's crazy Tuesdays we're doing $2 tender days. On Tuesday evenings you can get a la carte tenders for $2.

Speaker 1 34:49

Matt will be there every Tuesday. I promise you that.

Speaker 3 34:52

Wednesdays we do dollar wing days. See how many get a la carte wings for a dollar. As he said, they're jumbo Thursday, which is tonight. Kids 10 and under eat free. It's two kids meals for one adult meal.

Speaker 2 35:06

Can we pass for 10? Just try it on.

Speaker 4 35:09

Yeah, I'm saying a 10-year-old, and I'll be yours, baby.

Speaker 3 35:13

Maybe if I hadn't seen you, but I would have heard you, I was just kidding. And then Friday evenings will be all-you-can-eat catfish.

Speaker 2 35:21

Oh, we know where Carrie's going to go. She'll be there by herself.

Speaker 1 35:26

That's smart for length. She'll be there by herself. That's smart for length. I mean. That's smart for leading up to those things. That's good.

Speaker 3 35:29

Yeah, we did all. You Can Eat Catfish and Harrison on Fridays. They were really good, and if you've never had our hutch puppies, oh no, we did.

Speaker 2 35:36

We did order those. Those were amazing. They were amazing. You ordered those, I ordered those. Yeah, I love a. It's clever, I like that. Is it like your own special batch, or what is it?

Speaker 3 35:53

It's our own special, but the name is funny because I don't even know why we didn't want to just say hush puppy. Just me and a couple of the girls were like oh, we got to call them hush puppies. Jason said you are not name of the referee. That's right. Name is referee. That's we need hutch puppies t-shirts. People ordered them so much in Harrison that they couldn't even say hush puppy anywhere else.

Speaker 2 36:18

They're like everywhere I go now say hutch puppy, that's amazing.

Speaker 1 36:24

They're really good we got.

Speaker 2 36:25

We had amazing. Well, I remember we left there really full.

Speaker 1 36:28

Well, you ordered them. He goes. I'm going to order a side of the hush puppies, or the hush puppies I like. Every time I'm like, hey, rob, what's over there? I kept eating his hush puppies.

Speaker 3 36:35

It was fantastic. What's really weird?

Speaker 2 36:42

is that's one of our. Get a hutch puppy.

Speaker 3 36:45

And even our catering orders. People order like I'm not kidding you, how many puppies did I make that one day? 140?

Speaker 4 36:52

She lost them.

Speaker 2 36:56

So good.

Speaker 3 36:57

Some things have surprised us the brownies selling out every day, the hutch puppies being a big seller.

Speaker 1 37:02

Are you guys? Closed Sunday we are now.

Speaker 3 37:05

We're thinking about. We've got some more staff that we've hired. We're thinking about opening on Sundays.

Speaker 1 37:12

So you guys are open Monday through Saturday.

Speaker 2 37:13

Yes, okay, and lunch and dinner yes, which is nice because a lot of restaurants are closed in Benville on Monday.

Speaker 1 37:20

Yes, monday is a big thing. Yeah, you pull up a galop and you see what's open Monday. It's very fun.

Speaker 3 37:25

Yeah, it's slam. Yeah, we do pretty good on Monday.

Speaker 1 37:28

What's the Monday special?

Speaker 3 37:30

Milkshake he just wanted to hear that again, all of these milkshakes are hand dipped, though I guess who gets to do it. So last Monday we were there. Oh my gosh, thank god Fulton, my son, and Calbee. They knew we would be in a bind because we already had a private party in the room. It was just me and Jason in the kitchen, and I'm not kidding you, I got like 8 milkshake orders, I mean all at once. I had a big. It was just me and Jason in the kitchen and I'm not kidding you, I got like eight milkshake orders, I mean all at once.

Speaker 4 37:59

So I was back there.

Speaker 3 38:00

I had a big tub that I'd already dipped some ice cream out of, you know, so I could throw the bottles in there, but it didn't last a whole time. Luckily, colton and Galby walked around the corner and I'm like oh, thank God because it's time consuming.

Speaker 1 38:13

If we show up tonight, when we show up tonight, can we just pretend it's Monday?

Speaker 4 38:16

No, that was a fast one. That's like when I asked my wife. I get to know just as fast as that. Welcome to my world.

Speaker 2 38:28

What flavor ice creams do you have for the milkshake, or is it just one?

Speaker 3 38:32

So we do everything's made with vanilla, but we do chocolate milkshakes. We got it.

Speaker 2 38:37

Uh, peanut butter, plain vanilla of course uh chocolate chip the brownie or the banana? The banana, I think you have to have the banana pudding though how do you not? They're really, I would do, like chocolate banana pudding, and can you mix them custom, can you?

Speaker 2 38:52

he's like he's like no, I don't want you to come in, I'm not we'll just go back there and make our own don't mind us, we're the B team. We're happy for ourselves it's okay, I can do that it'd be nice if we had some B team hats and we could show up in there. Yeah, I want a Hux puppy t-shirt. I want a B team hat. I'm not sure you're going to keep your job he was funny, he was good.

Speaker 1 39:16

I want a Hux Puppy t-shirt. I want a B-team hat. That's okay, I'm not sure you're going to keep your job. He was funny, that's fine, he was a joke.

Speaker 3 39:21

He was good, he was very funny.

Speaker 1 39:23

All right, how do we find you guys? Websites, instagram, facebook.

Speaker 3 39:27

What do you guys want to play?

Speaker 1 39:29

Hutchishotchickencom.

Speaker 3 39:32

H-U-T-C-H-S, h-u-t-c-h-s Okay, no, e. H-u-t-c-h-s that's good. Hutchishotchickencom, and then we've got a Facebook Hutchishotchicken. We're on Instagram. We're on TikTok Heck yeah, we haven't done a lot with the TikTok.

Speaker 1 39:46

That's what it's all like, listen to me Milkshake Monday TikTok yeah, you need out making those can you do your Boyz II Men song you mean.

Excitement Over New Business Expansion

Speaker 2 40:17

No, it wasn't Boyz II Men. What was it that you sang? It was the boy band we did. Yeah, let's give him the opening, Just like I want him to tell you, honey, what he thinks about it. I want it that way.

Speaker 1 40:29

Tell me why. I don't know why we're doing this again. It was bad the first time. More nickel, more nickel. Well, thank you guys for coming in. It was a pleasure. You guys are excited for your new business. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2 40:47

Cheers, cheers. Thank you, congrats. Thank you so much, guys. That was easy, that was fun. Thank you, but congrats, thank you so much guys.

Speaker 3 40:58

Thank you, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 41:06

Once we get to where we could go mobile it would be fun to do a Deal. Well, if we come in tonight, we should take some video and pop it in. Yeah, yeah, let us know.

Speaker 3 41:19

I do know one thing you're gonna want out of that video. Well, I called Tom an old man. I.

Speaker 4 41:29

Called him he caught us up.

Speaker 3 41:33

Huh, yeah or no Egg, I don't know. I need to find that out.

Speaker 4 41:35

I'm not sure, we just got it. We just heard that you guys did great.

Speaker 1 41:41

That was fun. Thank you, that was awesome.

Speaker 2 41:46

Your food is. You guys do a good job, thank you.

Speaker 4 41:50

The kids.

Speaker 2 41:53

We talked on the show. It's a big deal when you go out and talk to people and the kids left. They were like I can't believe you used Taylor's. You know that's. You know kids are about the Taylor Swift stuff. Yeah, the Bill and Mark Because then they leave and they tell all their friends that you did stuff with Taylor and then they want to go. You know, it's just, it's no balls and it's snowballs, it's a big deal.

Speaker 4 42:13

Behind the plaque she wrote a thing to me. Sometimes I'll take it off the wall and let him read it Dude.

Speaker 2 42:19

I wrote that, yeah, you showed us that it was cool. Natalie got in the car and she was like I can't believe that. It's kind of cool, it's part of my life. For you it's not probably as big of a deal, but it's pretty neat for you. Know, for you it's not probably as big of a deal, but it's pretty neat for you know a couple of people to get to do that no that's true, I've been traveling.

Speaker 3 42:42

Well, yeah, that's what I told him too. The other day I was even looking at all of his pictures. I'm like you got to meet and hang out with Patrick Slazy.

Speaker 1 42:48

Yeah, may he rest in peace. He was a good guy. Yeah, he was a good guy.

Speaker 3 42:55

Thank you guys so much, thank you that was fun.

Speaker 1 42:56

You guys did great, thank you.