Jennifer Valoppi Podcast

Episode 16 | Christian Mahé de Berdouare: How I Built Chicken Kitchen From Scratch

• Jennifer Valoppi • Season 1 • Episode 16

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0:00 | 56:10

Chicken Kitchen founder Christian Mahé de Berdouare on inventing the Chop Chop, scaling a fast-casual empire from scratch, and what a French kid learned about American reinvention.

Watch the full episode of The Jennifer Valoppi Podcast with entrepreneur, restaurateur, and investor Christian Mahé de Berdouare — Founder & CEO of Chicken Kitchen, fast-casual pioneer, and one of Miami's most respected business builders.

In this conversation, Christian opens up to Jennifer Valoppi about:
00:00 Introduction
01:15  Arriving in America — the French chapter he left behind
06:40  The mentor who changed everything
12:20  Building Chicken Kitchen from one location
19:05  Inventing the Chop Chop salad
26:30  The mistakes that almost cost him the company
33:15  What "success" actually feels like
41:00  Advice for the next generation of entrepreneurs
48:20  Legacy, family, and what comes next
(timestamps are placeholders — swap after final edit)

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SPEAKER_02

Hi, everybody. I'm Jennifer Malopi. I'm the founder of the Women of Tomorrow Mentor and Scholarship Program. I'm also a longtime newscaster, television journalist, and author, and this program is here to support the Women of Tomorrow Mentor and Scholarship Program. Today, our guest is what I like to call one of our men of today for the Women of Tomorrow. He also happens to be my husband. His name is Christian Mahe de Berdouare, and he is the uh founder and CEO of a fast casual restaurant that's very popular here in South Florida. It's called Chicken Kitchen. It started originally in New York some 40 years ago, and now it's located primarily in South Florida. There are 30 stores currently, and it's expanding all over the place. It's famous for a couple of things. We can talk about that in a few minutes. But I think, Christian, what we wanted to start on for people who want to get into the restaurant business. I mean, there's so many people who want to get into the restaurant business, I think because people like food and because it seems like an easy thing to do if you can cook. But I know from my experience with you that the restaurant business is definitely not the easiest business in the world. And something like 50 to 80 percent of restaurants fail within the first five years. You've been around for decades. So what do you think is the key to longevity?

SPEAKER_01

Probably being a little crazy.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, well, that we know. Anyway, okay.

SPEAKER_01

Well, let me first correct a few things.

SPEAKER_02

Uh first of all, it's been 42 years.

SPEAKER_01

Not 40. Maybe 42, actually.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

The second thing is I'm the chief chickenologist.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And it's very important that that you mention that.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

And number three, we have 33 restaurants, not 30.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

So 29 companies on store and four franchises.

SPEAKER_02

I was averaging. Yes. Okay. You're not average. I was averaging. So Chicken Kitchen is some of the longest running and most profitable restaurants in the fast casual space, right? Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01

Okay. So, I mean, uh, well, in order to be successful in the restaurant business, um, yes, over 90% of restaurants actually fail within the first few years. And the reason is because everybody thinks the restaurant business is an easy business. As a matter of fact, I think that the restaurant business is probably one of the most sophisticated and most difficult businesses to manage because you need a lot of talents in a lot of different aspects of being a businessman. For example, if you pick the wrong location, one single decision that you can make can absolutely destroy the chances of making money over the long term. Uh then once you open the restaurant, you have to train the people, you have to open the restaurant, then you have to uh be good at marketing uh um your product, you need to have you know enough money to actually spend money on marketing. So uh you have to be good at finances, very difficult to uh finance restaurants as well, because the banks do not like to lend to restaurants. So there are all kinds of uh aspects to running a restaurant business that make it extremely uh difficult not only to run but also to be profitable at it.

SPEAKER_02

How about staffing? Staffing's always a big problem for um any kind of a business, but in particular for the restaurant business, because there's a lot of turnover in staffing, right?

SPEAKER_01

Well, uh traditionally there is a lot of uh a lot of uh turnover, but uh I'm very proud to say that the check in the kitchen and make it a priority of taking good care of our people. I actually, uh if they need a loan, if they need help, I'm always there to help them out. And I treat my people like I treat family, and I think that really helps a lot. And the cost of also training new people is extremely high because you have to teach them again, you know, the whole process. And for me, I think it's cheaper to actually pay a little bit more money than everybody else does in order to attract good people and make sure that you know you kind of you know take good care of them. And as a result, we actually have one of the lowest turnover. So it's really a physical philosophical uh question. And everybody that comes in contact with Chicky Kitchen is amazed by how long some of the employees have been with us. I have Gino in uh South Miami, one of my stores, that actually started about 40 years ago and is still with us. I have multiple managers that have been with us for over 20 years, and uh it's it, you know, it talks about the way we treat our people and the fact that we uh treasure them because without great employees, you don't have great business.

SPEAKER_02

So you mentioned treating people like family. One of the most important people uh in the room is Bacara. This is Bacara who I neglected to introduce.

SPEAKER_01

This is a happy body.

SPEAKER_02

Our docs who will make occasional appearances uh every now and then. I'm I'm quite certain of that. Um okay, so that's that addresses corporate culture issues, but a lot of what has to do with success in the restaurant business also has to do with uh the creativity with the food. For example, Chicken Kitchen is known for chop chops, okay, which are essentially the original rice bowls we invented the rice bowl, right? Back in the 90s, which is called a chop chop. And also um Chicken Kitchen has a bit of a cult following, and I would say it's because of the chop chop and also because of the mustard and curry sauce.

SPEAKER_01

Well, the sauces that we prepare freshly, yes.

SPEAKER_02

But especially the mustard and curry one, which everyone knows. So, how do you come up with those kind of concepts? And isn't that what really makes a fast casual restaurant special?

SPEAKER_01

Well, first of all, um what Chicken Kitchen does is that uh we started uh in the mid-80s when uh food here in America was McDonald's, Taco Bell's, Kentucky fried chicken, and all these. And my vision, having come from Europe, was to give actually a higher, better quality, freshly prepared food, which didn't exist at the time. So uh I came up in 1991 with the Chop Chop, which is basically the first rice bowls, and then Chipotle and everybody else copied us. But I think what really makes a restaurant successful is A giving what consumer wants, and B also following with the evolution of a consumer taste and habits so that you constantly refresh the menu and constantly uh give consumer what they want. So chicken kitchen started with rotistry chicken and other products, and now it's a vastly different concept than it used to be 10 years ago, 15 years ago, 20 years ago. So, what makes chicken kitchen unique is that we use uh freshly prepared chicken, not frozen. We marinate it for uh 24 to 48 hours in natural uh you know ingredients, and then what we do that is very special is we have an open flame grill, which is a very healthy method of cooking. We grill the breast, which is boneless with skin on, chicken breast, and uh chipotle, for example, only serves dark meat chicken. So we are one of the few concepts that sells white meat chicken, and we grill it, we chop it right in front of you, and then we mix it with a base of yellow rice, brown rice, or um uh chipotle rice, and then you can top it off with lettuce, tomato, guacamole, sour cream cheese, and customize. I think there is a few billion combination of how you can customize your own bowl.

SPEAKER_02

And cilantro rice.

SPEAKER_01

And yeah, I said that.

SPEAKER_02

But uh cilnoli rice, you didn't mean that.

SPEAKER_01

It was a cilantro rice, correct. And then what what we what is unique is that we um we have uh very special sauces that you can pour on top of your bowl and you make it for a very unique uh taste experience.

SPEAKER_02

How'd you come up with the chop chop, which by the way you trademarked the name, right? Yes, we could. Because a lot of people try and use that.

SPEAKER_01

And then Politropical, which is another chain here, copied us and uh introduced the Tropic Chop. But we are the original Chop Chop and it's a national uh uh trademark. And um, yeah, I mean our concept is uh is is an evolution of the last 40 years, and what I do is I make sure that the consumer gets what they want, you gotta listen to them, and um uh Chicken Kitchen today is probably one of the most profitable fast food chains in the country. I consider myself the Formula One of uh fast food in in terms of performance and profitability.

SPEAKER_02

But I think success for a lot of people in any profession has to do with identifying something that people want and then producing it. And in the case of the chop chop, which is so popular in South Florida, really um somebody was asking for chopped chicken with rice, right? Wasn't that how it started?

SPEAKER_01

It's a long story. Uh in those days I used to work in the restaurant and I used to actually grill on the chicken on the on the grill. Uh that's another discussion of all the trailing tribulation that I went through over the last four years. And you know, the multiple times that I lost everything. You know, you and I have multiple times I've heard the story. Anyway. But uh anyway, so uh my cousin, his name is Laurie, used to work for me. So Laurie went to Alex and said, you know what, uh Alex, I would like you to get me a little bit of yellow rice, and then I would like you to take the the chicken and just chop it in small little pieces and mix it with the rice, and I'm gonna eat this for the next few weeks because I cannot really eat a lot of solid food. And so they would joke around, and Alex would uh say, Chop chop. And eventually that's how the chop chop came about.

SPEAKER_02

Okay. So so life is born from um not mistakes, but from incidental things that happened that uh somebody picks up on. Well, I mean says, Let's make it a happen. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01

You you know, you have to pick on that because in those days we used to sell a lot of pita pockets. We remember in those days when you were going on on TV that you used to love the pita pockets. But the pita pockets was a penny the ass. You had to prepare, you had to cut the little pieces, you had to open the pita pocket, sometimes the bread will fall apart, you have to put the breast inside. So I I saw that as a golden opportunity, you know, to basically uh shift from uh the pita pockets to the chop shop. And the whole lesson that I want to give is you have to really be very nimble, you gotta make a decision on the fly, and you gotta recognize opportunities. And one of the most important things, you know, for all your you know, audience is that in order to be successful, you gotta make lemon lemonades out of lemons. And that's probably you know a whole segment that we can do together.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, those were those were the days when I was anchoring the news and he used to actually bring me lunch and dinner every day in between shows.

SPEAKER_01

And Francesca, the the old dox here, you love chicken kitchen.

SPEAKER_02

Francesca, yes, she did love chicken kitchen. And so that's Baki.

SPEAKER_01

He loves his little chopshow.

SPEAKER_02

Now I'm lucky if I order myself, right? So, anyway, let's talk about consistency across locations. How do you make sure that you have consistency across locations? Because when you have multiple locations, that becomes one of the biggest problems.

SPEAKER_01

Well, it it takes a tough uh guy to make a tender chicken, and that's what that's what I do. So I consider myself a very uh detail-oriented, picky, and very demanding uh both. And so uh training is very important, picking up the right people, uh teaching them the proper way, supervising them the proper way. I mean, there is a whole lot of things that go into having consistency, you know, throughout a chain.

SPEAKER_02

All right, let's talk about corporate corporate culture. Let's talk about corporate culture in in Chicken Kitchen. Um, what do you expect from others in the workplace?

SPEAKER_01

Uh I expect uh total obedience and uh total, you know, I'm just kidding. Um I mean I expect a lot. I mean I think that uh young people today think that uh they want to work from home, they want to work uh, you know, whenever this is convenient, uh they don't want to work on weekends. Uh I I know that uh there is a culture in Silicon Valley. They call it the 996, which is work from 9 to 9, 6 days a week. I call it the 1010-7. My philosophy is 10 a.m. because I want to take a little time, you know, to read about things that are of interest, do a little bit of you know, gym and stuff. Start at 10, work till 10, seven days a week. And that's what it takes. If you want to be an entrepreneur and you want to be successful, you're gonna have to put 101010 and forget about the 9 and 6. But you're gonna do that for 10 or 15 years, and then get guess what? When you're gonna be my age, if you're gonna be successful, then you can have all the hours in the world if you want, and you can really enjoy your wife, your life. Instead, if you slack at the beginning, maybe you're not gonna have the success that's gonna allow you to have the lifestyle that you want later. So, my my advice for you guys if you start in light, 10107, no 996. And ask yourself, what can I do to any boss that you have, what can I do for you, rather than the boss saying, What I can do for the employee. You gotta be uh very uh one of the things that I tell everybody, including my kids, your attitude is what's gonna determine if you're gonna be successful or not. Uh, what can you do? Ask yourself every single day, ask your boss what can I do today? Instead of staying 10 to 10, stay to 10 to 11. And the more you do that, then the more successful you're gonna be.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I think working seven days a week gets a little excessive because people need a day off to mentally recuperate. So you generally take a day off at least a week. And I know you work very long hours every day and into the evening and stuff, but you have to have a break.

SPEAKER_01

Well, I mean, uh the the way I structure my day is different than anybody else. I'm not saying that you have to do the whole 10 hours in a straight line. I like to go, for example, for a walk every day for two hours. I actually take my iPhone with me and I actually do work when I walk. And uh, but you need to like balance it out, take an hour for a lunch break, take two hours maybe for going to the gym or something. I'm not saying that the 10 hours should be continuous work, but you gotta be I when I stop working, I do another maybe one or two hours of reading because being curious and reading a lot is very important. If there are some areas that I'm not really good at, and there are very few ones, just a job. I actually try to uh I actually try to learn and I try to educate myself. I I mean I didn't go to college. I drought up a college when I was 19 year old, so I think that continued education, especially today when information is so readily available, is critical for the success of younger people.

SPEAKER_02

So, what's the number one rule for leadership in your opinion?

SPEAKER_01

Uh do as uh ask people to do uh how you do it as well. If uh if I go to a restaurant, I started literally cleaning bathrooms and grilling on the grill. And so there is not a position in my restaurant that I do not know. So when I go to a restaurant and I see somebody not doing the right thing, I'm not doing it from a position of of you know like of power. I'm doing it of a position of knowledge and of knowing how that position should, you know, that task should be done. So I don't tell them do it like this because I'm imposing it to them. I'm telling them do it like this because I've done it and I know that the result is going to be a better product or a better experience for the customer.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, so let's talk a little bit about your upbringing because you grew up in Ethiopia, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_02

And you also lived in Italy and London and Paris for a while before you came to the United States. But your formative years, your childhood years were were growing up in Ethiopia. You speak like seven languages, something like that. Um, how did growing up in Ethiopia impact your view of the world?

SPEAKER_01

Uh well, I mean, I I lived uh in a very, very simple uh life. There was no TV, uh there were no distractions. So um I had a very healthy life. I never did any drugs. I drank moderately, just sometimes to a fine fun. Um I would I was very outdoorsy. I used to do a lot of sports. I think that today's youth should spend more time outdoors and less time playing games. Um so I believe in in a balance of uh of uh intellectual uh stimulation and physical stimulation also. So uh I think that uh my mother was a wonderful mother. Um she loved me very much and I had an amazing upbringing. So I think it was uh a very simple, healthy, um not very materialistic as well. And I think it uh it really uh helped me to build my character and uh to build my uh ethic, ethics as well, and uh a view of the world really.

SPEAKER_02

You lost your father when you were one year old?

SPEAKER_01

Yes.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, he was in a car accident.

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_02

Do you think that taught you resilience?

SPEAKER_01

I think the fact that unfortunately or fortunately, the fact that I didn't have a father was probably one of the most impactful uh uh uh event in my life because uh I I didn't have uh uh a mentor, I didn't have uh financial support. I left home when I was 18, my father left me $10,000, which in those days maybe was like $50,000, which was a lot, but it wasn't a lot because when I went to live in Paris, it was enough to pay maybe one year of rent. So um I went to Paris and I went to college, and after a few months I realized that's not what I wanted to do, and I started working when I was 19. And um and uh I think that not having a father uh basically and not having money gave me the drive and the determination to be successful. And I had I had a rich father, I had I had a a father um that was maybe uh pushing me to go to college, would certainly not have uh made me into the person that I am today.

SPEAKER_02

So you grew up in Ethiopia, which is a very poor and um small community, and then you ended up in the United States. That must have been some kind of culture shock for you.

SPEAKER_01

I mean it was a uh it was a very major shock. Not only was a major shock from uh it was like being literally catapulted in a different uh planet. Um I mean I remember being in New York was probably one of the scariest, you know, things of all, where you have all this concrete when I was used to have all these green and open spaces. For me, being in a concrete jungle was really very uh affected me mentally as well. And I was this imagine being this 18 or 19-year-old kid that comes from Africa and being literally uh dropped in the middle of a concrete jungle. Not not only jungle in uh in terms of physical, but jungle in terms of you know the way the people deal in business. I mean, I was like a little lamp being devoured by by the by the by the wolves. And it was very mentally very challenging and very difficult.

SPEAKER_02

And that's when you first started Chicken Kitchen, and then you eventually brought it to South Florida.

SPEAKER_01

What I didn't start Chicken Kitchen was a Greek guy that started it in 1983, actually. 1983. That's why I said uh it's been close to 46 43 years. And but I I I got involved in 1985, and um and I basically changed completely the the concept. So I consider myself the founder, even though I wasn't the one that started it. Paul Sapunaki started it in New York, but uh I uh I evolved the concept dramatically, and it's completely different from what it was, you know, 43 years ago.

SPEAKER_02

What do you miss most about Ethiopia?

SPEAKER_01

The camaraderie, the simplicity, the lack of uh material uh stimulation, uh just because you don't have a lot of choices. Uh life was very basic. Uh the the friendship that I used to have with my close friends was amazing. And uh the trips that we used to take all together, I mean the the the sense of community, the camaraderie, the friendship, it was literally like a big family.

SPEAKER_02

You still have a lot of good friends here.

SPEAKER_01

Oh, I do, I do, and I have wonderful friends. But uh and I think actually it's in the last few years, um, you know, the kind of friendship that we developed together have been really as good, uh maybe if not even better than what I used to have when I was young. But when I was young, I was maybe 16, 17, I used to have friends that were in their 40s. So I always kind of hanged out with much more mature and much older people. It was so light and so fun. And I guess it's just because I didn't have all the worries and the responsibilities that I have today.

SPEAKER_02

I think it's hard for a lot of people to imagine a time better than having been a teenager and having had a you know somewhat of an idyllic life, because life is for a lot of people, you know, they don't have the worries. Some people do, but some a lot of people don't have necessarily the worries and the pressures when they're a teenager, so they reflect on on life a little differently. Um let's talk about being an entrepreneur because you know ninety percent of successful entrepreneurs statistically have failed at least once. I know you will say you failed. Failed two to three times in in business and and lost everything. What does that mean that you fail and are able to come back?

SPEAKER_01

Well, uh in this age of AI, I think that it's uh it's it's a dream uh period to become an entrepreneur. However, in order to be an entrepreneur, first of all, in order to be an entrepreneur, I think that you need certain skill sets that not everybody has. And secondly, in order to become a successful entrepreneur, there are all kinds of other skill sets that you need in order to make it because of all the curve that are thrown at you. So number one, you have to have a certain skill set to be an entrepreneur, which not everybody has. And the second thing, the second thing is you need skill set in order to, you know, take the blows that come with being an entrepreneur. So let me talk first about the first skill of sales. In order to be an entrepreneur, you need to have an incredible burning desire that literally comes from the inside of your gut. That's the only way I could literally describe that you have this desire to literally build something that is gonna be your baby. So I think that's the best way I could describe. In order to be successful and uh and have a long-lasting entrepreneurial career, you need to have some, first of all, you need an enormous ability to uh to uh to deal with pain. Because the amount of pain that you're gonna go emotionally and physically, because of the amount of hours that you have to take, you know, to put every day, and the amount of pain mentally that you have to go every time you have to have a setback, you have to be an eternal optimist, you need to have a very high sense of uh your skills, and you have to believe in yourself, you have to believe in your mission. And for example, with me and Chicken Kitchen, like I said, I've lost-I think I've lost everything three times, but that's for another discussion. I literally lost everything, everything. I'm not talking a little bit, I lost absolutely everything at least two times. Uh when I met Jennifer and when I had you know my first divorce and I lost everything, I literally had $500 in my hands in cash, and I probably had $50,000 in credit card debts. Um, and I still, at the time, at the lowest of the lowest, I still believe the Chicken Kitchen could be an amazing brand in the future. I still believe in myself, and I knew it was just a temporary setback that eventually I would regroup, I would learn from my mistakes, and I would come back, and I would come back bigger and stronger. And so the story of my life is a story of determination, is a story of belief in yourself, and in the story of you don't quit until the fat lady sings. The fat lady has not sung, and I'm gonna be the one who has the last laugh.

SPEAKER_02

So it's a story of resilience. Yep, it's a it's a story of resilience. And where do you think that resilience came from in you?

SPEAKER_01

Uh maybe a little bit of desperation because I had no other choice.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So when you have no other choice, the only choice is up.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So I had no choice. I mean, I could have, you know, gone to work for other companies. That really never appealed to me. So what that was a zero option. So I think that a little bit of desperation, not having too many other choices, it's a very good starting point.

SPEAKER_02

Desperation breeds answers.

SPEAKER_01

And breeds resilience and and uh self-uh self-uh exploration, learning from your mistakes, getting better, and going back at it. And if you fall from the saddle, you just dust yourself up, you go back on the saddle, and you go back again in the middle of the battle.

SPEAKER_02

A lot of people consider themselves entrepreneurs. But I guess the question is, do other entrepreneurs consider them entrepreneurs? So what is it you would say is the number one trade? I know we've already talked about resilience, but what else do you think it is that makes someone an entrepreneur that and makes an entrepreneur different from other people?

SPEAKER_01

I think one of the greatest qualities, and probably one of the things that uh I am the proudest to really uh have learned, because I didn't know how that in me, is the fact that every time there is a setback, if you really think about it very, very and you ponder and you reflect and you meditate on it, there is always an underlying silver lining. So what you need to do is every time that there is a setback, you literally have to understand what is that message, and some of it is about you doing some improvements. And the other thing is on the product that you're, for example, trying to sell. So every time I had a setback, A, I improved myself and became better and stronger, and B, on the product itself, by questioning if the product was not working, you actually go back, you refine it, you make it better, and you go, you know, you make it, you know, and customers eventually like it better. So it's literally setbacks or failures are opportunities to fine-tune, to improve yourself and the product that you're working at.

SPEAKER_02

Fixing mistakes, making things better all the time.

SPEAKER_01

Constantly.

SPEAKER_02

Growth is, you know, if you're not growing, you're dying. Yep. Right?

SPEAKER_01

Yep.

SPEAKER_02

So you have to be constantly looking for new ways of.

SPEAKER_01

And in motion. You have always to be in motion. I tell my kids, I tell everybody, you can't be stopped doing nothing. Even if it's bartending, whatever job you've got to do, take a job because you never know the opportunity. You could be bartending in a bar, Jeff Bezos walks in, he recognizes that you're an amazing salesperson or you're a great bartender, you have amazing qualities. He might hire you to be his personal assistant. So you never know what's you know behind any mini job. Get a job, be in motion.

SPEAKER_02

What mistakes did you make early on that you don't make now?

SPEAKER_01

Ah, I mean, there would be too many to really go. I mean, it's you know, we all make mistakes, and uh the key is to learn from the mistakes, not repeat them. Yeah. And most importantly, you know, you have to really think because the lessons you get from mistakes are much more important than the lesson that you get from success.

SPEAKER_02

Where does respect uh factor in leadership?

SPEAKER_01

I mean, respect is extremely important. Uh treat you know others like you would like to be treated. I know that sometimes I'm a little rough uh and I'm very demanding. So I've actually learned over the last few years of being demanding without being you know uh difficult. So that's a skill that I'm learning. But I think it's very important to have respect for the people you work. I think it's very important to treat the people, you know, as well as you would like to be treated. And I think it's very important to treat uh the people that work for you like family. And that's what I try to do every day at Chicken Kitchen.

SPEAKER_02

How has your leadership evolved over time?

SPEAKER_01

Uh my leadership has evolved from uh being extremely demanding and sometimes maybe uh a little bit uh you know um uh a little bit, how would I say the word? Maybe you can say softer? Yes, not yeah, softer, a little bit softer. Obviously, I'm much more mature than I used to be. And uh you just like I said, you you learn all the skills and you refine them and you become a better person.

SPEAKER_02

More patient, more patient, more patient, more understanding, okay, and a little bit more focused on leading rather than just you know getting upset about things and ordering people around. You know, the idea of um creating a leadership quality in someone else, you keep referring to your children, but they're actually our children. Yes. Well, they're there are children. So um when you try and impart a leadership quality on on kids, when you try and and teach them that, what sorts of things do you want your children to know, our children to know about being a leader in today's world?

SPEAKER_01

Uh being a leader on today's world is I think that uh you cannot be a leader without uh gaining the respect of the people that you're trying to lead. So the first lesson is you need to actually know every single aspect of the business that you're trying to be a leader in. So my son Jordan is working with me. He started working like me in the in the kitchens, he went to clean bathrooms, he spent two or three years on the grill, learning how to grill chicken, you know, at the chicken kitchen, so that when he actually tells somebody you have to do it this way, he knows what he's talking about. So uh it's very important uh in order to be a leader, to be uh very um understanding, uh be empathetic, understand that people have challenges in their lives, uh, and and and work with them. Every time one of my people you know needs help or needs time off, you know, no problem. I'm there to help them. I'm there, same thing with me. My employees are like my customers. So I always think what can I do in order to make their job more enjoyable, to make their life more enjoyable, if there is any way I can help them to have a better life, that's what I do. And that's I think what is inspiring leadership.

SPEAKER_02

Talk about risk taking. How do you decide when to take a risk and when to pull back?

SPEAKER_01

It's all about risk-reward analysis. You have to understand uh what is the upside of a decision, what is of the downside. So, I in an ideal world, you want to have the the smallest downside risk to everything you do with the most upside. And that's the same philosophy that I've successfully used in my personal investment, be it in the stock market or buying real estate. Uh, it's all about analyzing risk and figuring out what is the downside, figuring out what is the upside. Um, do not make decisions rashly, think it over. Uh with ChatGPT or any other AI uh model today, you have a PhD level advisor that can help you make that decision. So use it constantly like I do every single day now in my life, and uh ask around. Uh try to get people that uh know the the sector well, ask them questions, and then come up with the decision and then make decision quickly. Do not make decisions slowly.

SPEAKER_02

You and I both like real estate as an investment. And at one point uh we had the Pablo Escobar house, the house that used to belong to Pablo Escobar uh here in Miami Beach. And that was something that that wasn't even on the market. You went out and looked for that. You found it and um and you managed to you know secure a deal to purchase it. Tell me about that and why you were so aggressively going after Pablo Escobar's house.

SPEAKER_01

Well, I mean, if I had the money, I would have bought uh 50 properties on Norby Road in Miami Beach. Because to me, I think I'm a visionary and I actually have a gift of of seeing things before they happen, and this has been throughout my life. And sometimes great real estate is not available, uh, you know, listed on the MLS. So what you need to do is you need to identify properties that you like, and I by the way, I do this at Chicken Kitchen as well. I identify the one that I really like, and I knocked on the door of the of the cellar, and I did the same approach, and eventually I uh made him an offer that he couldn't refuse, and we bought that property, and uh it I didn't do it just because it was Pablo Escobar property, it was basically because it was a gorgeous property with 175 feet on the water, with gorgeous downtown views, beautiful sunset, and I know it was a prime asset that would never lose its value.

SPEAKER_02

So we found uh uh safe on the property and it became a big thing and it was a big media deal, and there were a lot of articles written and a lot of television coverage and that sort of thing, and and one of the things that our crew here had seen is that you talked about in one of the articles how you wanted to make sure you didn't have any of Escobar's negative energy uh in the house or on the property on the property. So why don't you so why don't you tell everybody what we did?

SPEAKER_01

I think we actually got uh Monsignor uh what's his name, Patrick?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01

The Monsignor from uh you know St. Patrick's Church. St. Patrick's Church, which we actually love. He's a wonderful uh human being. So we actually invited him for dinner and uh he brought some uh holy water and we went to the property and he went around blessing the property, and uh I think the children went away.

SPEAKER_02

Well, we were we were all uh laughing about that yesterday because they saw that you had written you were quoted in on that in an article. Yes. Um let's talk about AI. Um I know you're you're a big fan of AI, you're a big user of AI, you're an investor in AI. Um how do you think AI is going to revolutionize first the restaurant business, and then we'll talk about how it is going to revolutionize everything else. Tell me your thoughts.

SPEAKER_01

First of all, it it revolutionized my life. I mean, now it's like I mean, being an entrepreneur is very lonely as well. I've been pretty much it's lonely, they say, at the top of the pyramid. I'm not saying my pyramid is very big. I'm a small little ant compared to all the successful businessmen around the world. But uh it's been lonely. I mean, I've been 42 years by myself. It's very difficult to make a decision without having access to a lot of professional talent, but professional talent at the highest level is very expensive. So if you want to speak to an expert in the real estate or to speak to a top uh bankruptcy attorney or a tax attorney or a demographics, you know, expert for chicken kitchen, I mean, you know, it takes a lot of money and it takes a lot of time. So for example, now I'm in the process of um uh opening uh, you know, uh 80 to 100 restaurants for chicken kitchen in the next six years. And so the first thing that I have to figure out is based on my existing uh, you know, 33 locations in South Florida, to develop a real estate model that allows me to make the least amount of mistakes when I go around and drive with my son Jordan. He and I, every Saturday and Sunday, we go up in Broward, Palm Beach, scanning for location. So, how do we make the least amount of mistakes in picking up a real estate site where Chicken Kitchen is going to be successful? So, in the old days, you would spend half a million dollars hiring uh you know a consulting firm, hire demographic analysis, uh hiring traffic pattern analysis, all kinds of experts would have cost a fortune, would have taken six months. Today, with Chapti, I call ChapGBT Chapti. It's my best friend today, outside of Baccarito here. So, with the help of Chapti, I put the input, and it's very important garbage in, garbage out, very important that the question that you ask is as precise and as uh close to what you really want as an answer as possible, otherwise, you're gonna get the bad answer. So, I've been working literally for the last 48 hours in putting together a site pre-qualification uh scorecard for every single location, and if I had to do it in the old days, it would have cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and months of work. Today, with the help of technology and AI, you can have the help of the best expert, PhD level expert, at your fingertips. So utilize AI, use it every single day. I don't make any decision, I don't send any email without having AI, Chapti review review it firsthand, and it's so cheap. So get the subscription, use it, learn, go on YouTube. You can learn literally any skin in the world. Between Chapti and YouTube, there is no excuses not to be successful.

SPEAKER_02

I used to edit all his emails and and letters, and now that's it, you're an employee now. Now he sends them to me, and they're so with the Chat GPT. There's you know, my work is is reduced to obsolete, honey.

SPEAKER_01

Now you can read it and tell me to like you.

SPEAKER_02

No, well that's not that's not true because sometimes they're wrong, but anyway, we'll we'll go there.

SPEAKER_01

But I'm a a great writer now?

SPEAKER_02

Well, you're yeah.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, really, I'm like I'm shocked.

SPEAKER_02

I don't know that I would say you're a great writer.

SPEAKER_01

I mean, it's it's a it's a back and forth between me and Shanti.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

You know, I give her the input, she comes back, and bim bum boom, and then you know, you have a great, great output.

SPEAKER_02

My eyes are the strongest muscle in my body because I roll them so often.

SPEAKER_00

Well, show me how you roll your eyes.

SPEAKER_02

No, so let's talk about AI in general. Uh, how do you think what do you think is gonna happen in the next decade with AI? Next five years. What do you think is gonna happen?

SPEAKER_01

Well, I first of all I think it's the the most uh significant and most important revolution of the last probably 100 years. It's actually even more impactful than the internet or anything else. I think that the the thing I'm the most excited is that it's gonna help probably find the cure for cancer and find cure for all kinds of diseases. It's gonna help us to uh make the world a better place. Um it's gonna, I mean the the changes are gonna be so amazingly powerful, but in a positive way. And obviously there's gonna be dislocation in in people's lives because some jobs are gonna be obsolete, but new jobs are gonna be created. Every time there is new technology, some jobs disappear, some new ones are created. So I don't think it's gonna be a net negative. I think it's gonna be either equal or actually a net positive today for the you know for the build-out of all this data center and everything else. You we had we don't have enough electrician, plumbers, construction workers, and we're gonna have a boom, you know, in that sector. So I think that uh as long as we keep uh the eye on the ball and the politician keep an eye on making sure that we restrict, you know, the things that they can do or cannot do, I think we're gonna be okay. And I think you know it's gonna be human, good, you know, human beings' common sense that is gonna be taking over. And I don't really have any fear that we as humans are gonna be, you know, restricting you know the basic parameters of what AI can do or cannot do without our input.

SPEAKER_02

So you don't think AI is gonna take over the world?

SPEAKER_01

I do not think that. No. I do not think so.

SPEAKER_02

Do you think it's gonna take over the restaurant business? It's gonna help me. It's gonna help me.

SPEAKER_01

It's gonna no. I think it's actually gonna help me. Like, for example, one of the things that I'm a fanatic is about giving my customer the absolutely you know freshest, most delicious product when they come to the stores. And sometimes it's very difficult for me to time the time that a chicken breast comes off the grill and you know, when the customer comes in. So you have a perpetual, perfect, you know, uh fresh chicken breast whenever the demand comes. So you have the demand and offer kind of balance. And with the help of AI, I'm actually gonna work on a project together to develop an algorithm that is gonna be tied up to my register so that I know where the demand is coming with sensors and probably meta glasses that the grilled cook is gonna have. So it's gonna look at the grill, it's gonna know how many chicken are on the grill, and then it's you know, the register is gonna tell us how the demand is, and the sensors are gonna tell us how the heat of the grill is, so that I can create a perfect algorithm in order to have a grill that produces enough chicken to meet the demand when it comes and have less chicken when the demand is not there. And a project like this, I tried to do it over the last 10 years with PhDs in computer sciences and all this, and it would have taken years and a very expensive project. And now with the help of AI, I can probably do it within a few weeks.

SPEAKER_02

Do you think people are gonna lose jobs in the restaurant business?

SPEAKER_01

Uh I don't think so because I don't want to go to a restaurant where a machine is going to be talking to me. I still want a human being to be there. So I don't see chicken kitchen not having the same amount of employees working behind the counter and taking care of my customer. Because when you go to a restaurant, it's not just you know the experience of the food. Is you know, every all my friends tell me, how do you have such amazing, you know, special, wonderful people working at Chicken Kitchen? It's because I treat them with love and respect and treat them very, very well, and I want them to treat my customer the same way. And that's why the experience at Chicken Kitchen is so positive.

SPEAKER_02

And and we really should mention that the whole concept of chicken kitchen is about healthy fast food. It's like it's not really fast food, it's fast casual, but the whole idea is to have healthy fast food. So the idea for healthy fast food came from where?

SPEAKER_01

Um healthy fast food is is an idea that came from my uh background. You know, I'm uh Mediterranean. My mother was Greek, my father was French, and I love Mediterranean food. And um, when I came to the States in the 80s, it was all fried food, burgers, high fat, high collection. I call it the three big scenes. It's fat, uh sugar, and uh what is it? Fat, sugar. And fried. No, and well, it's fat, uh, sodium, it's fat, sugar, and sodium. Those were the pillars of the fat food industry. It was those three ingredients because our palate loves those three things. So for me, it's how do I still satisfy the palate by giving delicious tasting food, but doing it in without frying. The fast food was hooked on serving burgers or serving fried chicken with uh sodas and and uh and uh you know processed food because it's cheap, the profit margins were very high. It's very difficult to do freshly prepared with high ingredients, real product, fast food, and still make money. So that was the impediment for so many years. And and Chicken Kitchen was one of the pioneers, and basically I kind of cut the code on how to deliver healthy, freshly prepared food at the at the value that people can afford. And that's what I actually did with Chicken Kitchen.

SPEAKER_02

So, what one piece of advice would you recommend to young people who want to be an entrepreneur?

SPEAKER_01

Uh be prepared to uh uh uh learn how to deal with pain. Because you're gonna have a lot of physical pain, you're gonna have a lot of mental pain, you're gonna have a lot of mental anguish. So, what part of my journey is that I've learned over the last 30-35 years of my journey is how to deal with pain. And I had a lot of mental issues related to that because I didn't know how to learn with all the pain that I went through at Chicken Kitchen. And after a lot of uh research, trial and error, I think that I've come to a point where I understand pain, I respect it, I learn how to deal with it, and uh with chapte's help as well. You know, a chapti is also very instrumental in helping. Uh, I'm at the point where you know it's uh it's uh pain is is is very manageable. So I really urge you learn how to deal with pain because uh and fear and pain are two of the ingredients that stop people from being entrepreneur and being successful entrepreneurs. So once you learn how to deal with that, the sky's the limit.

SPEAKER_02

So, how do you deal with stress?

SPEAKER_01

Uh I have a very, very strict routine. I um I eat very healthy, I don't drink, I don't eat sugar, I um I eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. Um I go for a walk every single day, I do uh strength training at least uh every day for like 15-20 minutes. I don't do drugs, I drink very little alcohol, and I mean that could be a segment that we can talk about every single day because there is so much to unpack in there. But I think that if you have a healthy uh brain, you have a healthy soul, and you have a healthy body, it's very easy, you know, to deal with pain and stress.

SPEAKER_02

You walk for two hours every day.

SPEAKER_01

Yep, every single day.

SPEAKER_02

And if you don't, you get crazy.

SPEAKER_01

If I don't, I feel you know, like I feel not right. And it's uh I I advise every single one of you walking is one of the most underrated miracles because you learn how to think, you learn how to put things in perspective, you learn how to make smart decisions, you can do breathing exercise while you meditate and meditate as you walk as well. So if I don't walk, I really don't make good decisions. So I think that walking is is literally the secret to my success and uh to my happy life.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, Christian Mahe de Berdware, also known as my husband.

SPEAKER_01

Or the chief chickenologist.

SPEAKER_02

Or the chief checkologist. Thanks for going through and sharing all of this today.

SPEAKER_01

May the chicken be with you and with all of you guys.

SPEAKER_02

And Bukhara slept through the whole thing. Are you gonna wake up and say hello? Okay.

SPEAKER_04

Okay. So um I just want to ask three questions and you know we'll edit this in. Um as a leader, what's one principle you've never been willing to compromise on?

SPEAKER_02

Okay, I'll ask you a question as soon as you're gonna go.

SPEAKER_01

Let me think it over.

SPEAKER_02

What's what's another one?

SPEAKER_04

So why are you thinking about that?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I got it. Let's let's go, yes.

SPEAKER_02

So, as a leader, what is one principle that you never want to compromise on?

SPEAKER_01

I think one of the things that is the most important things, and Warren Buffett said it very well, it takes a lifetime to build a reputation, and it takes one stupid mistake to destroy it. So for me, ethics and making the right decision and never break the law is something that I teach my kids and I teach any anybody. You gotta make smart decisions, you can never do anything that is even a little shade of grey, it has to be either black or white. Use your common sense, and if you know in your heart that it's right, do not do it.

SPEAKER_04

Um let's do this one. How has managing people changed from restaurant number one to restaurant number three?

SPEAKER_02

How has managing people changed from the first restaurant to the 33rd?

SPEAKER_01

Well, when I had one, two, and three restaurants, it was very easy for me to go around the three restaurants every single day.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

When you go to four or five, that's when it, you know, most of the chains kind of like break down and people can't make the transition. So I'm very good at building processes and systems. And uh so what you need to do is you need to take a step back, and if you want to run a big business, you need to like create system and processes in order to for people to follow those those. And once you do that, then you can make the transition.

SPEAKER_04

This would be something that would be great for restaurant owners to hear. If you were starting from scratch today, what would you do differently knowing what delivery apps and labor costs look like now?

SPEAKER_02

So if you were starting a restaurant today, what would you do differently? Um, knowing what all the delivery apps and all the various technology that's now involved in the restaurant industry, how would you do things differently?

SPEAKER_01

Well, as a matter of fact, I'm actually doing it. Uh Chicken Kitchen used to be 1800 to 2400 square feet, the size of the location. In the last three years, we went down to like 1200, 1400 square feet. So um 40% of our business today is delivery, um, DSPs, the delivery service providers, and online ordering. So what I did, and the other, another 40% is takeout and off-premises consumption, so that maybe only 20% of our business is inside the premises. So as a result, what I did is I actually shrunk the sizes of our location. So that's what I was talking about earlier. You need to like continuously evolve and change as facts evolve. So it's a process that I've been doing over the last few years. And today, one of the reasons the chicken kitchen is as successful and is, in my opinion, the most profitable fast food chain in the country is because of our small footprint, the low utilization of labor inside the restaurants, because we've evolved with the times and I've basically created a machine that is basically based on all these new factors that a lot of you know chains are not basically doing today.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, ready? Um in your professional opinion, when has a business actually earned the right to scale? How would it do it? I don't know how you would ask that.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_01

I don't think there is a right.

SPEAKER_04

Oh yes, we would have to ask.

SPEAKER_01

When there is a proof of concept, when there is enough restaurants.

SPEAKER_02

Okay. In your opinion, uh, when do you think a restaurant should scale?

SPEAKER_01

Uh well, there are two factors in that. The first one is that the unit economics of the restaurant has to be powerful. It means that the restaurant has to make money. And the second one is that the owner or the entrepreneur who's managing you know the business has enough skill to be, instead of being the manager of one location, to actually be the manager of multiple locations. And it takes a different skill from managing one restaurant to managing a new system. That's why I said earlier, you need to be able to be a systems and processes manager in order to create all this infrastructure that is necessary in order for you to scale.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, last one. As a CEO, when everything feels urgent, how do you decide what actually matters?

SPEAKER_02

Okay. Um, you know, as a CEO, crisis management, everything feels urgent sometimes. How do you decide what actually matters?

SPEAKER_01

Uh, I mean, it's always follow the money. It's always, you know, follow the, you know, uh I to me, uh, my middle name I tell my kids is ROI. ROI stands return on investment. To me is we have a limited amount of time in the day, we have limited time of resources. You have to always um put those resources where you're gonna make the most and the biggest impact. So ROI on time means if you have 10 issues that need to be addressed, pick up the one that's gonna make the most impact on the daily life of your restaurant or the profitability of the restaurant. If you're working on 10 projects for the future of the brand, concentrate it on, concentrate on the ones that are gonna give you the best return on invested time. So ROI is is return on invested, it can be return on invested money, it can be return on invested time, it can be return on invested resources, but make ROI your middle name as well because everything has to be made the decision based on the ROI.

SPEAKER_02

Let us know one thing from today's episode that resonated with you, and send it to us on my social media at Jennifer Veloppi, or you can put it in the comments, and we will post and read your responses to help other women who might have missed this episode. Now, every episode ends with a micro action. That's something simple that you can do now to improve your life and move yourself forward. Today's micro action is this: initiate one focused conversation with your boss or a trusted mentor about how you can grow, increase your visibility, and strengthen collaboration with your team. Remember, every step you take takes you one step closer to your future. And finally, we support the Women of Tomorrow Mentor and Scholarship Program and the thousands of young women who are served through mentorship, education, and access to opportunity. If this conversation in any way inspired you, please subscribe, follow me on social media at Jennifer Villappe, and learn more about Women of Tomorrow, the Women of Tomorrow Mentor and Scholarship Program, at women of Tomorrow.org. Your donation can help us change the world one young woman at a time. Thanks for listening.