Buddy's Burgers: Building More Than a Restaurant

Jeremy and Catherine, dream team power couple and owners of Buddy's Burgers and Martha's Ice Cream, join Double R to share the story behind one of Florence's favorite gathering places.

From food trucks and farmers markets in Colorado to opening two successful businesses at the Naturally Outdoors trailhead, they discuss entrepreneurship, taking risks, working together as a married couple, and why they believe Florence's best days are still ahead.

If you enjoy conversations about local business, community growth, and the people making Florence a better place, this episode is for you.

👍 Like, subscribe, and share to support more conversations highlighting the people shaping our community.

Transcript

Meet The Makers Behind The Food

SPEAKER_03 0:12

Thank God for Buddy's burgers. Martha's ice cream and Martha's guys, we needed it. We needed it so bad. We've got Jeremy and Catherine with us today. Everybody knows them. Happy to be here.

Reeves 0:26

I mean, this is an episode I've been looking forward to for a long time because I think what you guys are doing and where you're located. When I visit bigger cities, there are restaurants and spots like where y'all are located that really accentuate a city. And so I just love what y'all are doing. Thank you. And uh it's really cool for Florence.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

We needed it badly. Absolutely. Well, I mean, we're just glad that we were able to get in there. Like the the way that it all kind of came together.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

It was really meant to be for sure.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

That location is um because it was a barber shop before you guys went in.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

It was, yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

Yeah, I believe I got my hair cut there before. So yeah.

Reeves 1:06

Can you take your hat off? Or yeah, you don't want to do that.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

No, I'm just kidding. You don't have so much hair left.

Reeves 1:12

We're we're we're brothers, my guess.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

Yeah, it was kind of kismet, actually. Like, we I think you went and got your hair cut, and we were like, boy, this is such a cool area. Plus, we were already like customers at Bean Bar. Um, and then a friend called us and said that Hunter Morgan and Scott Murphy were looking for a new tenant in the barbershop because they were going to be closing soon. So yeah, like such a blessing. We really, we really lucked out.

SPEAKER_03 1:42

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

From Belmont To A Pierogi Truck

Reeves 1:44

So before that happened, to kind of bring us up to date to that point in your life, wherever you feel like you need to start, so that we understand, you know, Jeremy and Catherine and and how you got to be buddies and Martha's ice cream.

SPEAKER_01 1:58

Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, we were both going to school in Nashville. We both went to Belmont. Um, we were both musicians, but um, Catherine decided that trying to be an accountant and an entrepreneur was a better idea.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Yeah, that's my music was a hobby, still is, still is.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

I uh I decided to waste a little bit of time trying to be famous, but that didn't work out. Um, but by the time that Catherine had graduated and I'd had enough of not being famous, we uh I went to culinary school with the intent of moving to Denver, Colorado, where I was grew up, um, to start a food truck because the the brewery and food truck scene there was just really exploding. And then it's about 2012 we got open. Um so I don't know, there was a handful of breweries, and then all of a sudden there was 350.

SPEAKER_03 2:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:50

And none of them would have their own kitchen build-outs. They didn't want to spend the money, so they would just have food trucks come in and serve the food because you have to have food at a drinking establishment. Uh so it very quickly got very competitive, and there was a thousand food trucks before you could blink. So we did that for a long time. And then Catherine was working as an accountant supporting us because the food truck was not making any money. Wow, really.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Um yeah, I would I would work until five or six in the afternoon. I was doing hospital accounting.

SPEAKER_03 3:24

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

And then um, I would go to the food truck.

SPEAKER_03 3:27

Wow. I always thought food trucks made money. It seems like they'd make money.

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Well, maybe they do, maybe some.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Yeah. Um, we were very specialized. I'm Polish um by descent. And uh so growing up, we made pierogies, which are a handmade dumpling. We make the dough from scratch and the fillings, and it was a big production. So I was really into that idea, and that's what we did. And we just had a little five by nine trailer, but not like burgers that we've come to realize. You can you can only sell so many pierogies. Oh, yeah. Um, okay.

SPEAKER_03 4:02

And I grab a bag when I go in, the buddies. Well, that's them in the freezer right there.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

Yeah, well, and that's that's when it got good. When Catherine left her job and decided to come work with me, making no money. Yeah, we had discovered the farmer's market scene in Colorado as well, which there are many, many of those, and we could package and sell them, and people would come every week and buy bags upon bags because they realize they're fully cooked and frozen. You just heat them up, kids love them. We started filling them with different things like a pizzarogie or like a green chili monterey jack cheese pierogi or pulled pork pierogi. And we found that people really reacted to that. And Catherine kind of took the lead on being the market person, and I just made a bunch of pierogies.

Farmers Markets, Packaging, And Goldbelly

unknown 4:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

Then by the end, we were making 15,000 a week. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

We were doing 12 to 15 farmers markets a week.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

My goodness.

SPEAKER_00 4:57

Much every neighborhood in like in and around Denver basically has a farmer's market.

SPEAKER_04 5:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Um, and that was really interesting. We learned a lot about food production, um, packaging, freezing. We even started shipping um frozen through.

SPEAKER_03 5:16

So you'd sell them online sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Yeah, we worked, we started working through a company called Goldbelly, which is a really big um artisan food, like frozen food company, basically. Um you can get Texas barbecue shipped to your door. Or I think every, I think these days everybody is using Goldbelly. It's like such a big thing. But we, they had only been in business for a short time. Um, and a customer of ours said, we're about to move to Brooklyn, and we're gonna miss your pierogies because we buy them every single week. You should start selling through this company called Gold Belly. And I reached out to him, I was like, absolutely not. We're like so small. It was, we were working out of a commissary kitchen, we were doing it all ourselves. We had like one person that was working in the kitchen with us. Um, obviously, everything was handmade, it was very labor intensive. And I was like, I don't think that we have it in us to start shipping. Um, but I reached out to them anyway, and they took us on. So that's how we know how small Goldbelly was at that point. Yeah. Um, I guess that was probably like 2017, maybe 2016.

SPEAKER_03 6:29

And um they're a packaging.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

It is a packaged food company.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

And they ship it out. Yes. That's pretty much just an artisan website. Oh, they collect all of these regional uh they try and make it like people who are very well known. So that becomes like a gift that people give. It's like, oh, so-and-so moved to Idaho. Let's send them a New York pizza from Joe's or whatever.

Reeves 6:54

So we could do that with real estate. I mean, we give a lot of real estate gifts. That sounds like a really specialized.

SPEAKER_00 7:01

Yeah, you can send Magnolia cupcakes from New York or um, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

Yeah, all the a lot of the Texas barbecue places, big name stuff, and then a bunch of chefs now work directly with them. Um, and we ended up by the end, we were private labeling for one of the celebrity chefs um and making the product that was being sold. Oh. And we had really gotten into everything was about shipping, you know, buying dry ice and just sitting in a room and packing boxes. And we were still doing, we had started buddies, and once that took off, we got out of it. It seems so buddies started in Denver. Well, the idea, yeah. So we got to the point where we finally opened a brick and mortar and it built out our space in Aurora, where I think your wife might be from. That's right, yeah. She is. And right, Andrew.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

It took us two years to fill down the space. It was beautiful.

Reeves 7:57

Is that no? That was Aspen where Dumb and Dumber went. Yeah. Sorry.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

I wish we had been in Aspen. That would have been so much cooler to that.

SPEAKER_03 8:07

$25,000 a month rent for a closet.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but

Opening Weekend Then COVID Hits

SPEAKER_01 8:13

we ended up finally getting to where we opened up our brick and mortar, where we had enough room in the back to do all our production and a front of house with a bar and a whole venue and everything, and built it out, and then got shut down for COVID two days after opening.

Reeves 8:27

Two days after opening. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:29

We opened Friday the 13th, thinking that was a good idea.

Reeves 8:32

Yeah. So I mean, it sounds like y'all had really begun developing some significant momentum.

SPEAKER_00 8:37

Oh, yeah.

Reeves 8:38

Open this, and then the world shuts down. And you're in Colorado, and what's that like? And and then how do you get to Florence from from there?

SPEAKER_01 8:47

Well, it was I would easily the darkest time in our uh past. Um a lot of bad stuff happening all at once. Uh, we had Buddy already, who was three years old.

Reeves 9:00

Um, so before Buddies was a burger, he was a kid. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

But he just happens to have a cool name. So that's why we named our our burger shop after him.

SPEAKER_04 9:10

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

But um, I will say that, you know, I think everything is meant to be. And we, although the COVID shutdown was a nightmare for everybody, and especially us, and our our sweet little restaurant that we had spent so much time building and talking about, and um, we even had a bunch of press from it because we had been in Denver making pierogies at all the farmers' markets and our food truck, we had like real interests. So that was um going to be really cool. But what we realized is, or what we quickly realized was even though the restaurant was shut down in Denver, we still had this whole frozen packaged business that kept us, um, we kept all of our people employed. We didn't have to fire one person. I mean, thankfully we were getting like some PPE money to help us with payroll. But um, we were also able to um employ all of our um.

SPEAKER_03 10:13

If you wouldn't have had that piece of the business, you wouldn't have been able to keep anything like that.

SPEAKER_00 10:18

No, so we shut our doors. They shut us for I think it was a year and a half. It was like it was a long time because they opened us back up and then closed us again. Um, so it was kind of hard to for for that movement. But um we were able to, we were basically driving to people's houses and dropping frozen packages of pierogies on their doorsteps.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

There's no basically about it. No, we were doing that. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 10:46

It was pretty uh crazy.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

By the time it was winter, um, and there was no farmers markets to do, and the restaurant was shut down, it was like who wants pierogies? And we would just go drive around and deliver them whenever we could. Wow. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 11:02

Um and then we were shipping still through Gold Belly.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Shipping that was bolstered by the so like the frozen product was in some ways better than the shipping and stuff. Yeah. Um, but the weight of having your own space and the cost of that, um ultimately it w it it was a losing situation even then, even when that part of the business was doing it. Um yeah, it was uh a lot of lessons learned and a lot of hard work um for a few days and woke up um and had a conversation about why don't we just move here?

SPEAKER_00 11:48

And uh we had been talking about like when we retire, okay, we should move to the beach in South Carolina. But this is also like we came from Colorado, this is like September during COVID, and we got to South Carolina at like at polymer. Everything's open, and everybody's just wandering around.

Reeves 12:08

Like the whole universe, like people are still living?

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Yeah, it was very extreme difference.

Reeves 12:16

That's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

And we had always said, like, when we retire, we're gonna do this, we're gonna maybe open up a shop at the beach. Um just that's when we get older. And then Jeremy was like, why would we wait until we're older to enjoy our life and do what we want to be doing? And so we said, okay, we'll give ourselves what, like 12 to 18 months to make the change, the switch to moving to South Carolina. And then we did it in like four months or something.

SPEAKER_01 12:50

Well, once the wheel started turning, it's hard to stop. Well, the conversation was like, you want to do this, Catherine's like, absolutely. I said, Okay, well, we're gonna go downstairs and tell your parents right now, and we're gonna tell as many people as we can. Because if we keep it to ourselves and say we'll get to it at this point, it'll never happen.

Reeves 13:08

Yeah, it'll never and Catherine, you're from Florence, so there's there's that context, you know.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

Her parents have been trying to get us to move to Florence since the day I met her. So they were very excited. Yeah, um, but we we made a point to to make it something that we couldn't take back.

SPEAKER_03 13:25

Uh that was a good idea.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

And then she took it to a whole nother level because we went back to Colorado and I had to keep on working, and then she came back in November, two months after that, I think.

SPEAKER_00 13:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Um to visit her parents, and I stayed in Colorado. And while she was there, she was like, There's this house for sale. Um, maybe we should go look at that. Um, and she never came back to Colorado. Wow. Really? So I finished out our lease till March traveling back and forth um to visit, and um she bought a house without me ever seeing it.

SPEAKER_03 14:00

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

And um we it was the best move ever. It's down the street from her parents, literally in the same neighborhood. That's awesome. Um, got it for quite the deal in the middle of COVID. Yeah. And um, we were opening buddies a year later. The pieces started falling into place.

Reeves 14:17

Yeah. So you so you're both together. This would be March of 22 or 23. 20.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

This was 2020.

Reeves 14:27

Oh, 20 to 21. So would it have been you moved here in 2021?

SPEAKER_00 14:32

We moved here in 2020.

Reeves 14:34

2020.

SPEAKER_03 14:35

2020, yeah.

Reeves 14:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:36

And then we had our second child in 2021.

SPEAKER_01 14:39

Yeah, okay. Yeah, so the shutdown happened in March of 20 of 20.

Reeves 14:44

Yes, one was 2020. Yeah. We were living in September of 20. Well, it doesn't matter. God, it's not. It doesn't matter. Yeah, it has been about six years ago. But within a year of COVID happening, we were in Florence.

SPEAKER_03 14:58

Yeah, nice.

Reeves 14:59

Yeah. You came with the idea. Well, you were pregnant or I was, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

I was pregnant with my with our second child. With Martha. Martha. Martha.

SPEAKER_04 15:10

Martha. The ice cream girl.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Yep. And uh we needed help. Um, and being in Colorado, it was everything was shut down. The community completely crumbled.

SPEAKER_04 15:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:20

Um, which is, you know, the case with everybody's story, it seems like, at that time. Um, but we moved here, and what we had decided is we had a restaurant manager in Colorado and that was gonna continue to do shipping of the pierogies. Gary was traveling back and forth, like basically two weeks on, two weeks off. Um, and he did that for a full year. And then we, I guess probably, I don't know what the timeline was, maybe six months or so after we had been here. We

Landing In Florence And Building Buddies

SPEAKER_00 15:55

ran into um Hunter and Scott, um, discussed the opening of Buddies. Um, the turnaround on that was so fast.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

We just did our four-year anniversary yesterday. We did happy anniversary. That's cool. Congratulations. There's the math. We opened July 21st of 22.

Reeves 16:17

Yeah. Four years. And you've always been in that in the spot at the trailhead at Naturally Outdoors. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:26

And then almost two years ago, we opened Martha's.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

Yep. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:30

Our ice cream shop.

Reeves 16:31

Yep, which is right there as well.

SPEAKER_03 16:32

Is your mom named Martha?

SPEAKER_00 16:34

My grandmother's name was Martha's.

SPEAKER_03 16:35

Your grandmother. So there was a one day me and my little girl were at Martha's.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:41

And we were talking to this lady behind us the whole way in line. And then I find out it's your mom. Like my little girl's doing gymnastics moves for her and stuff. Your mom's loving it. And then my little girl realizes, hold on. Is that Martha right there? You know? So anyway, your mom's super nice.

SPEAKER_04 17:00

She's the OG.

SPEAKER_03 17:01

She is. She is really nice.

SPEAKER_00 17:03

She is wonderful.

SPEAKER_03 17:04

And she stands in line. She doesn't just go back there and make her mom as great.

SPEAKER_00 17:07

Oh no, not at all. She got yes.

SPEAKER_03 17:10

Yeah, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

People um people know her name is Kim, but my kids call her Kiki, and all of our employees call her Kiki as well.

SPEAKER_03 17:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:20

So it is really fun. Yeah. Um, she's wonderful. She watches our kids. She obviously is born and raised in Florence as well. She is, I would say, our family historian. She knows everything about everything in Florence and everyone. She knows where people lived, um, all of the tales of our family and what we did here. It's really we need to get her on this. Yeah, you yes, you guys we need Kiki. We learn a lot of stuff. Kim Turner is uh she is a legend.

SPEAKER_04 17:52

Yeah. Come on, Kiki.

Martha’s Ice Cream Flavor Philosophy

Reeves 17:55

Before we go back to Buddies and kind of understand more of that business and and how that developed, tell me more about the ice cream and and what was the idea behind ice cream and how how did you get into that?

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Well, I think it always starts with food-wise, what my curiosity is. Um, I went to culinary school very quickly, um, but I didn't start until I was um 25 because I was trying to be a musician before that. Um, so I didn't get the opportunity to kind of work my way through restaurants. And by the time we were getting into food, it's like we need to make a living. So I I take on something I want to get really good at. Something like ice cream making or um now maybe pizza or pierogies, it was like, you know, making the dough, doing everything from scratch, that whole process that I can really focus in on and really make it quality um to kind of make up for the lack of I would say, maybe restaurant experience that I've had. Um so ice cream was just something that I wanted to make at home and started really getting into and reading books, and we would just make different kinds of ice cream all the time. And obviously we were selling milkshakes at Buddy's and just buying a nondescript vanilla ice cream and then turning them into three different flavor milkshakes.

SPEAKER_03 19:16

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Um so once I started to get into that, we realized that was something that could be really good. We used to love to go to all the ice cream shops in Denver. There's some really, really good ones. Okay. Um so we had just got into it and started making fun flavors and talked to Hunter and Scott again, who have been fantastic, and they uh they thought it was a good idea too, a good addition to that whole community there. So they actually gave us about like 400 square feet.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

Yeah, y'all nailed that little spot. The way you fit it in there. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:48

I mean, that's that was uh Hunter's uh and Scott's idea to to kind of just add on to that. Otherwise, we didn't know where we would put it.

SPEAKER_00 19:57

But I wanted to put it in that corner, yeah, yeah. But convincing them to give up some of their space in that corner is yeah, but they agreed to it.

SPEAKER_04 20:07

It fit perfect, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

And then they allowed us to put that door into naturally outdoors.

Reeves 20:13

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

Um, I I think opens the space up more and drives more business for all of us. Um, but really opening the ice cream shop, we both love ice cream, as he said. But we used to go to this one particular place in Denver called High Point Creamery, and they would make their own ice cream, all of their mix-ins. It was really, really well done. Kind of a Jenny's concept if you're familiar with Jenny's ice cream.

Reeves 20:43

I had it last week in Charlotte. Yeah, I mean, it's delicious, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:48

They always have lines. Um, and uh, we felt like Florence needed, I mean, obviously, there are other ice cream shops here that are doing great business. Um, but we wanted something that people would come in, they could taste the different flavors, and especially kids. Like I think that I we built the ice cream shop, or my whole focus was how do we make children and adults feel comfortable and feel excited to be there, um, which is one of the reasons that it's so colorful. Um, and it has like the waffle cone things on the um so are you kind of the branding genius behind all of this? Well, I I like I wouldn't say I didn't go to school for branding or anything, I but I love it.

SPEAKER_03 21:36

You're do you've you've done a great job, and I and it's not easy to execute like branding. I tell Reeves a lot, like keeping it simple is so important, but hard to do. Yes, cool and simple, and you've done an awesome job with that.

SPEAKER_00 21:50

Well, I wish that I could say that I am a graphic designer, but I'm not. I have ideas, and then I work with amazing graphic designers to help put those those ideas to paper.

SPEAKER_04 22:02

Right.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

And they, and then um Morgan Walker, are you familiar with Morgan, who's an artist in town? She helped me design Martha's.

SPEAKER_04 22:12

Oh, cool.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

I had an idea and she is a friend of mine. We're also like 13th cousins or something.

SPEAKER_04 22:18

Kiki knows we still, yes, Kiki knows the connection.

SPEAKER_00 22:23

But we she helped me put um pick out all of the colors and create the face of the um of the ice cream scoop counter. And so I can't take full credit for anything that I do. I always have amazing people that are helping me do it. But I do have the ideas and the drive and what I'm what vibe I'm trying to go after. But again with Martha's we wanted kids to come in and be excited. And I didn't want an ice cream shop where the parents left being feeling concerned about what's in the ice cream. Why is their kid getting like let's say cotton candy flavored ice cream. What where's that flavor coming from? What is it made of? What's actually in the ice cream? And why is it doused with gummy bears?

SPEAKER_04 23:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

Because really you you buy them ice cream. It has gummy bears or MMs or whatever on it, which is wonderful. It's a great it's a great memory you know from growing up but they're just eating the candy and throwing it away why did you take them to get ice cream when it's covered in candy.

SPEAKER_04 23:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:34

So we don't offer those types of toppings. We make all of our mixins in-house from scratch. We make our own cookies in the milk and cookies ice cream. We don't use Oreos the tangerine dream is awesome. That's my go-to tangerine popsicles and Jeremy actually takes like tangerines and zests them into the ice cream.

Reeves 24:00

Oh wow um yeah I mean this is artisan ice cream and I think what y'all are telling us is we can eat as much of it as we want to go healthy healthy.

SPEAKER_03 24:09

It's a superfood I think it's a superfood yes has the ice cream shop done as good as you were hoping or like better or how how's it done?

SPEAKER_01 24:20

I think we're happy with with what it is especially as a component of buddies ultimately but I think that over time we hope that it becomes that kind of hangout of its own and like when you see a Jenny's or whatever you have that line of people who just come because they want to come get ice cream and it doesn't really have anything to do with buddies. Yeah um the way that it's set up it obviously some people don't realize that we own both but it's it to us it seems like just a natural progression. Go to Buddies and if you want some ice cream then you're going to go to Martha's too um but I think there's definitely room to grow and people it's it it it's strange to me that um so many people don't know about it still wow um hopefully things like this will help but like there's it's just true of anything that I'm always I'm always surprised when I meet new people and say that we have a restaurant called Buddies and they say what where is that really I'm like I'm like oh it's you know naturally outdoors and bean bar and then they understand where that is like yeah there's a burger place there you should go check it out. So I think there's lots of room to grow still that's awesome in Florence that's crazy.

Reeves 25:25

I mean I think the trailhead is just one of the best places that Florence has to offer and like you said there's it's just a cool place to go walk the rail trail have a milkshake get ice cream eat buddy's burgers do some shopping get a coffee I mean it's so much are there any other uh ideas or thoughts y'all have around developing that space out and you know or we we will do any and everything that we can in that area and we have a great relationship with uh Hunter and Scott.

SPEAKER_01 26:01

There there are no plans of of adding structures at this point. I know Hunter has uh big hopes for the area and and we would love to to develop we have endless concept ideas um that we would love to do in different places but I mean doing anything there would be top of the list but you know yeah it would at this point you know there's there's just nowhere to do it. So

Neighbors Pizza Plans And Pop-Ups

SPEAKER_01 26:29

tell us about the new venture though yeah the exciting new venture neighbors neighbor's pizza yes that is the the new yeah it's our new restaurant on the horizon yes that's awesome we're very excited yeah and our second pop up will be happening at our farmer's market space at the city farmers market oh really okay on Sanborn Street that's like our production kitchen that we have where we do the ice cream and we're used to the do the pierogies and all that um at six o'clock tomorrow we'll have a few different pizzas Thursday the 23rd yeah okay cool yeah I gotta come check that out come by um but yeah I've it's another thing that I've been in the lab trying to perfect uh it's quite the process you can get into with making pizza dough um so but you're gonna have a brick and mortar we are in talks we haven't signed the lease yet but we do know a location in the five points area and um we're very excited to work with uh Chris Scott and PLC that we've been working on with oh yeah which just is another we've been very lucky with our landlords from our landlord in Denver um was an amazing lady um her and her husband um took care of us and especially going through the whole COVID thing we were able to get out of our lease and and move on to do what we wanted to do here. Hunter and Scott have been amazing. Yeah and now working with Chris Scott we know that we've got another great person to be uh dealing with so we've been very lucky.

Reeves 28:01

If you had to guess when do you think this will actually open I would say early next year.

SPEAKER_01 28:08

Yeah I think that once the lease is signed it'll probably take six to eight months to get open.

Reeves 28:14

Yeah uh and that's it could be it could be quicker wow but in our experience um construction just seems to take longer yeah yeah yeah so I'm interested you know hearing y'all story and hearing how you started kind of in Colorado post school and that type of thing and then how you made it back to Florence. What's it

Marriage, Roles, And Risk Tolerance

Reeves 28:35

like? I guess it's a twofold question one owning a small business and trying to operate just talk a little bit about that and then we'll talk a little bit about Florence specifically and and how it feels doing that in Florence. But just kind of take us through what it's like owning a small business and and being married and working together.

SPEAKER_01 28:57

Well I I I don't know that we are the the norm but we've worked together every day for 13 years. And we love what we do. And it's it's it gets a little bit tiresome I think for especially for Catherine that every conversation has some aspect of business in it. Yeah for me it's that is true that is for me it doesn't really bother me but you know she's also a mother I'm a father but like she has uh other things that she would like to focus on from time to time.

SPEAKER_03 29:34

Right.

SPEAKER_01 29:35

But if you don't have a relationship like this um and are working together in this business it can be very difficult. But in general if you don't love it or enjoy what you're doing and are ready to work hard yeah it can be pretty brutal.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah we we have found that um obviously with any relationship or working partnership you focus on what's what you're good at. I don't pretend to be a chef or be a recipe creator the way that Jeremy is I also am kind of bad with numbers.

Reeves 30:13

So as an academic as a worse academy that's good.

SPEAKER_00 30:22

Just put it negative number yeah I was uh I went to school for accounting knowing that I could get a job but in reality accounting is kind of like a series of like rules that you're following right but um it was it was definitely not something that I wanted to be doing um and I am a worker bee um but we both are but especially in accounting I found myself struggling to do the work and to be driven to do the work. So I focus on HR because I also love talking to people. When I was in college especially or even like I worked at Porter's gift shop for five years. When I was 14 I got a job at Porter's uh they employed me every day until I um went to college and then I came back one summer and worked for them for a little bit as well um I loved the customer service aspect of it um but you also get to a certain age I think where you want to decide like where do you what do you want to be doing and working in an office seemed like very cool. And um anyways I found out quickly that I'm way better with people than I am at with numbers. But Jeremy is obviously he's great with numbers he's good with um costing everything recipe creation he's such a researcher and like the amount of focus that he puts into creating the quality of um recipe that we are going to like the buddy burger it seems like it's just a simple burger but the amount of time and and energy that he put into creating that um I think really it says it says enough for itself. Yes whereas I'm HR I do vibe like I I try to create a vibe and a feeling in our restaurant um try to instill that in our in our staff.

SPEAKER_03 32:28

I think it's the trust that we have in each other's kind of lane that I know that if I say I'm gonna I'm good at this this is what I'm interested in and she says well I think we should make it look like this and this is how we should do it then we both say okay it's it's just we believe you need both of those personalities and y'all make a power team together.

SPEAKER_01 32:49

It wouldn't really work just one of you it needs no I mean I think what she does is is more um directly um responsible for any success than just having good food. I mean I think anywhere it's more likely that you're gonna remember the experience than you are exactly what you ate. Yeah obviously it's important but having the culture the kind of people that are gonna um are gonna do the job the way it's supposed to be done that they're gonna be a a good um good uh ambassador to what we're trying to do and having that there and that standard there every day so that it goes across the whole team and the customers feel it.

Reeves 33:35

Oh yeah is would you say that it felt like a risk moving from Colorado to here to open a restaurant or did it just feel like okay this is going to work and how how would y'all rate your like risk meter willingness on a one to ten scale like are you different?

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Are you both willing to jump off a cliff kind of thing how what's that like I'm a zero okay I'm a zero use the brakes okay so gotcha I'm like this is gonna be wonderful and perfect and she's like this is going to be the worst thing that's ever happened. Yeah yeah and we meet somewhere in the middle yeah we find over time and and thought and process we both become I mean I stay here and then she gets closer to me at yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah which is great because who knows what would I've gotten what I would have gotten us into if she just said yes to everything.

Reeves 34:29

Yeah but again that goes back to the the beauty of you know two are better than one you know whether it's marriage or whether it's business or anything else. And uh Robert and I talk about that all the time with the real estate that we do and and the complimentary styles that we have and we're not the same. And you need somebody who's willing to go jump off a cliff and you know pull the person who's not willing to jump and then sometimes that person needs to be pulling the person back from jumping off the cliff. Yes. So that's that's really cool.

SPEAKER_03 35:00

You know the last episode we talked about Florence being kind of like still in frontier mode you know like there's still so much opportunity here. Oh yeah and with what you guys are doing there's not a lot of competition you know there's not a lot of cool trendy local restaurants and so I think you know the new pizza place is gonna do great it's gonna be awesome.

SPEAKER_01 35:24

Yeah I'm really we're really excited to be able to kind of add to the conversation of of what's happening in Florence and you know Elliot's came and yeah and town hall's great and then there's OG places like Stefano's who've made it work for 30 years which is incredible. And then you know and all the work that those guys did between Tubbs and King Hefe like there's this groundwork of we can do great things and we're just happy that we're here at a time where we can jump in there. And you know Florence has been amazing for us. Obviously with Catherine's history here she grew up here we were able to plug into the community pretty quickly yeah um and that space that we got is fantastic but you know we've created enough goodwill to where I think people will be interested in what we do next.

SPEAKER_03 36:11

So it doesn't feel scary anymore to us I don't think I think we're just excited there's not a genny's here you know those big yeah guys to compete with so like the door's still so open for you guys to create your your thing. Yes yeah which is interesting.

Reeves 36:30

It is I I again I really just love what Florence I think has to offer and I think you guys are a big part of what Florence has to offer. I mean small business owners who are doing taking risk and creating great products that the community can enjoy. Yeah I mean y'all are doing an awesome job.

SPEAKER_00 36:50

Thank you. Thank you I will say that Florence has a uh it's a really strong community that they are typically everyone is willing to be a part of of new things. Yeah there's obviously a lot of chain restaurants unfortunately um but coming from and coming from here like I I grew up here just like you guys did you you have this feeling of like I I need to get out and I need to experience new things things that are different than this small town and it's not just Florence related obviously anybody from any small town can feel the same way. And I got out there I experienced and saw how like things that worked and things that didn't work in certain communities and you see how communities flow really well um there being like businesses within neighborhoods and um that kind of like business zoning within like where people live and where people can get out and walk and ride their bicycles. Which I think is something that Florence is really missing. Yes. I I wish that or I I I do wish but I also would like to eventually figure out how to create that within a Florence community an old neighborhood maybe or somewhere that's like a neighborhood that's closer to downtown that you can see that there is some of that old zoning within the neighborhoods um I think Maple Park yeah yeah I think you've been following the I love Maple following the new Maple Park social media I don't know who's running that but there is um I did I I think is it like similar to the downtown Florence people or something there's a Maple Park something and it's it's like yes hold on and what you want to do would would work. Yes I I think so I think it's it's hard to get some people on board uh around here it is um yeah but the more that we move towards growth and all of these um being at Buddies we see so many people day in and day out I work front of house usually if I'm working there and I love to walk around and talk to the people that are are dining with us. And typically like nine times out of 10 they're from somewhere else and they're thinking about moving here or they just moved here or they moved here a year ago from California or New York or um the middle like the Midwest or something. And I think that all of those people from other places can help us create that. Yes and they're more willing to buy in older neighborhoods that need those houses need preservation. So I I think we can make it work it just it takes a little bit of vision within the city.

Reeves 39:54

Yes and I think you're exactly right Catherine and and I think there probably have is it's easy for us as relatively young people to to you know throw throw rocks on old people but you know there's probably been some you know stuck in the mud kind of attitude but I think as people see what Florence can become and and get a vision yeah and take some examples for what like Charlotte or Charleston or some of these other cities that are close to us in the districts they're creating I think Florence is prime for those types of settings and and already what's going on with where you guys are at with Buddies and Martha's I think that's a district that can continue to accentuate and being right off the rail trail yeah a lot of people can walk and get to that district and and really enjoy that and and I see that as being a really cool thing. I think downtown has a lot of opportunity and is doing a lot of good things where neighbors pizza in I don't know where it's going but you mentioned around five points I think there's some opportunity there. And even if as I'm sitting here I'm thinking if we could get a pedestrian bridge to cross over Cherokee into the country club neighborhood and then create more of a walkability into some a district over there and maybe where the old Skyview restaurant was, make that some parking and some stuff so more people is easy for people to drive into and get out of yeah that could be a district oh yeah the West End district near Windsor Forest could become something so there's opportunity if we have the right visionary leadership.

SPEAKER_00 41:35

Oh yeah absolutely absolutely if you want me to get on my soapbox do it talk about sidewalks I will but I don't need to no you we might not want to do that.

SPEAKER_03 41:46

That's what this podcast is for and we're the next generation to make it happen. Yeah so let's let's do it we've got to do it we got it and we believe in Florence just like y'all do.

Reeves 41:56

Yeah you know we believe we're here forever um you know I I lived five four years in Dallas Texas and it was awesome and I loved living in Dallas but you couldn't give me a million bucks to go back there. I want to be in Florence and I I am excited about what this city can become.

SPEAKER_03 42:14

The city leadership listens to this podcast. They tell me they're excited about it. I was there yesterday and they want to see exactly what we're talking about. So it's not like we don't have inroads and can make we you know it's just a function of making things happen.

SPEAKER_00 42:31

Oh yeah and money I mean I understand that everything costs money.

SPEAKER_03 42:35

That's right. But um but the wrong the money will come if the vision's there and it and it makes sense.

Reeves 42:43

There's enough money in this city to make those things happen.

SPEAKER_01 42:45

Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah as they're running new sewer lines we'll get your sidewalks yeah that would be awesome yeah all right so before we close up one more thing about neighbors I just want like so pizza what what's what can we expect as far as the type of pizza and how it's going to be cooked and that type of thing because yeah so I already have our pizza ovens in our production space and we use a Pizza Master oven which is a really high powered uh electric deck oven which is really cool um it's a more of a New York thin crust style pizza we it's a four-day process on the dough so we start with essentially a sourdough starter a quick sourdough starter called a Poolish and then ferment it um cold fermented for 72 hours after that um so it's light it's airy it's crispy that's gonna be awesome going for a no flop Dave port and I uh shout out um but it will be pizza centric but that's not all it is it's gonna be more of a upscale could be date night um full service restaurant with small plates and a couple of platters and a and a classic cocktail bar. Nice So it's a whole experience. The kids are welcome, but like more grown up than buddies for sure. Okay. And it's it's gonna be twice the size. We'll have about a hundred seats.

SPEAKER_03 44:10

Nice.

SPEAKER_01 44:11

Um and uh so we won't be quite so much at the mercy of the elements. Um buddies, it's great. It's a little seasonal, you know. When it gets too cold, people don't want to sit outside. When it gets too hot, people don't want to sit outside. And we have very limited seating inside, so we're looking forward to having that kind of year-round thing. So pizza centric, really great quality, New York stylish um crust and uh a whole experience with great changing small plates and a great bar. So that that that makes I'm hungry and thirsty.

SPEAKER_00 44:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 44:48

Yeah, yeah. We're very excited about it.

SPEAKER_00 44:50

We think it'll be something that Florence needs.

SPEAKER_01 44:52

Oh, yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

You know, obviously we have some great restaurants that you can go and eat at. A lot of them are more casual, or either it seems like there's like a big jump between like casual and then it becomes way more expensive. Yeah, town hall time and like you need to dress up and stuff, hopefully, we'll hit somewhere in between between town hall and Victor's.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

Perfect. Um, so and we will continue to do pop-ups until we open the restaurant. Okay, okay, so you'll be able to experience as it progresses. Um hopefully we'll start doing some things more than just pizza, but mainly the pizza. Um a couple of times a month or weekly. It kind of depends on how Buddy's is doing. If we're needed to be working over there, it might be uh detrimental. But um, yeah, it'll be a consistent thing that people can come and try until we open the doors. That's awesome.

The Fries, The Standards, The Future

Reeves 45:45

One uh one other thing I gotta ask about, just because I love them, the the kind of I don't know what do you call them, the potato skins, chips, oh yeah, fries everybody. How how did you because it's a little bit unique from any place I've ever seen. So tell us about the origins of that.

SPEAKER_00 46:02

That's Jeremy.

SPEAKER_01 46:03

It was just doing a burger concept, I think a lot of them are kind of make or break on their French fries. Yep. Like everybody loves an in-out burger but hates their fries. Um, McDonald's fries is king, no matter what you think about the rest of the menu. Um and, you know, love shake shack and they had done the crinkle cut, which isn't something you see very often. So I was trying to just figure out maybe something that no one else is doing or has never tried before. So I got the idea of there's a steak chip and there's um there's a steak fry and there's a potato chip, or there's and I like the idea of being able to dip into things. Yeah. So we took kind of the Belgian French fry approach to this quarter inch thick, long cut, the entire size of the potato french fry that we soak overnight and then fry twice to try and get this kind of chewy, crispy, all the above texture thing that it is, it's both chewy and crispy.

Reeves 47:04

You kind of nail it, and yeah, that's it's what well done. Great job.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

We uh I'm glad it worked out. Um yeah, it is our most labor-intensive thing.

SPEAKER_03 47:15

Uh yeah, that's not easy to execute.

SPEAKER_01 47:17

So there is constantly a little bit of me that's like, what if we just did a regular French fry? Right, yeah. Um, but it's it's kind of stand out.

SPEAKER_00 47:27

Yeah, it's too late now.

SPEAKER_03 47:28

If you went to Buddies and got a regular fry, you would just feel like what in the hell's going on here?

SPEAKER_00 47:33

Right?

SPEAKER_03 47:33

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:34

Why would you even want to go back?

Reeves 47:36

Well, for the burgers, because they're excellent. They really are good.

SPEAKER_03 47:39

Thank you. Yeah, all I can say is thank you guys for coming back to Florence and what you're doing. Lord have mercy, we needed you here. Yeah, thank you guys.

SPEAKER_01 47:49

We hope to do lots more. We're not going anywhere.

SPEAKER_03 47:52

Awesome, awesome. Well, we need to do a yearly update with you guys. Sure, yeah. Once neighbors is rocking and rolling, we need you back on here.

SPEAKER_01 48:00

Absolutely. You can tell us how bad it was.

SPEAKER_03 48:02

No, no, no, no, no.

Reeves 48:04

So Robert and I, do y'all know Philippe and Rachel Lang by any chance? Philippe Lang.

SPEAKER_00 48:11

I'm so bad with names.

SPEAKER_03 48:13

You probably knew them.

Reeves 48:14

So they sell Italian pizza ovens.

SPEAKER_00 48:16

Oh, yes, I know them. Yes.

Reeves 48:17

Yeah, what's it called?

SPEAKER_00 48:18

Um they moved. They moved, yeah.

Reeves 48:20

They moved in Forini. Yeah. So we were selling his house, and we were meeting with him at uh Bean Bar, and somehow he sold us two pizza ovens.

SPEAKER_03 48:35

Oh god, I think we just bought a four thousand dollar pizza.

SPEAKER_04 48:40

So now we both had pizza ovens. I've used mine twice.

SPEAKER_03 48:44

Oh my gosh. It was it was okay. It's a lot of work. It yep.

SPEAKER_01 48:47

Yeah. That seems to be what I'm drawn to, is yeah really labor intensive.

Reeves 48:51

Yeah, you love labor intensive stuff.

SPEAKER_03 48:53

Yeah, it does.

Reeves 48:53

Reach uses his way more than yeah, we probably use ours every 10 days, but I've got three teenagers, uh, two teenagers and a kid in college. And you know, anytime they want to have friends over, it's just a fun thing to do with everybody. But uh we're definitely not doing a 72-hour dough.

SPEAKER_01 49:10

We're doing like a so I'm I can't wait to go check out neighbors and well, we're doing our pop-up tomorrow, and I've got a bunch of doughs. I can get you one.

SPEAKER_03 49:19

Oh, we might get a little spare dough, yeah.

Reeves 49:22

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 49:22

For sure.

Reeves 49:23

Yeah, yeah. You probably will even be able to sell those dough balls. I mean, anything's possible, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:30

To the public, you know, kind of we seem to not be able to get away from packaging things either. Yes, we can throw you back into some more packaging. Yeah, you know, work with what you know I guess.

SPEAKER_03 49:41

Yeah, that's awesome. That's great. All right, thank you guys so much. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 49:45

Thanks for having us on. It was fun.

SPEAKER_03 49:47

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Awesome.