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Stew Leonard, Jr. Visits OneLegUpAlex Media Ahead of September 27th QVC Appearance ! · OneLegUpAlex Media

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  Speaker 1: Here's your host, Alex Garrett.
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  Speaker 2: All right, one leg up, Alex Media, with the one
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  Speaker 2: and only Stu Leonard. Oh, my goodness, Stu Leonard Jr.,
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  Speaker 2: I'm so honored to have you on the show today.
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  Speaker 3: How are you, sir?
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  Speaker 1: Hey, it's a pleasure. It's nice to be with you.
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  Speaker 3: I always love hearing your commercials.
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  Speaker 2: They're very entertaining, and you're a very charismatic guy. So
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  Speaker 2: to have you on my show means a lot. So
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  Speaker 2: tell us about what you're doing in the next month.
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  Speaker 2: I hear you're going to be on QVC.
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  Speaker 1: Well, first of all, right now what I'm doing, you know,
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  Speaker 1: between our stores, it's all about pumpkins and apples right now.
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  Speaker 1: That's what everybody's clamoring over right now. And one of
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  Speaker 1: the things that sort of we did, my sister Beth
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  Speaker 1: started our bakery in the store like 40 years ago. And,
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  Speaker 1: you know, we have eight stores now and, you know,
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  Speaker 1: two out in Long Island and Farmingdale in East Meadow.
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  Speaker 1: And we have these big bakeries in there. And so
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  Speaker 1: one day our apple farmer said, hey, I got this
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  Speaker 1: great apple cider. And we said, hey, okay, cool. We
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  Speaker 1: started making some donuts with it. And they have taken off,
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  Speaker 1: you know, people love these donuts. And one of the
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  Speaker 1: reasons is it's the apple cider. It's like a special
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  Speaker 1: recipe that our apple farmer made. The guy's like a
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  Speaker 1: little bit of a wacko, but when you talk to him,
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  Speaker 1: he's like a mad scientist chef-like, you know? Hey, I'm
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  Speaker 1: putting Honeycrisp in there for sweetness, and I'm putting Granny
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  Speaker 1: Smith in there for tartness, and I use some Rome apples,
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  Speaker 1: you know, from New York here for body. So I
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  Speaker 1: was sitting there listening to the guy, and I was like,
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  Speaker 1: this guy's like a little crazy, but he's like, Got
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  Speaker 1: a little apple cider recipe there. So when I, QVC
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  Speaker 1: saw how many donuts we were selling and they asked
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  Speaker 1: if we wanted to go on and promote it. And
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  Speaker 1: so we said, fine. First time we went on, we
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  Speaker 1: sold out. Second time we went out, we sold out.
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  Speaker 1: Now they want me back a third time on the 25th. Amazing.
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  Speaker 2: Now, if I'm not mistaken, one of the highlights of
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  Speaker 2: Sue Leonard's is, isn't there like a cow in the
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  Speaker 2: commercial or something like that?
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  Speaker 3: Tell us about that.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, that's also the ringtone on my phone, you know,
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  Speaker 1: that I have. But, you know, my grandfather started 100
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  Speaker 1: years ago in dairy farming. So for me, cows have
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  Speaker 1: been part of my life, my entire life. And we
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  Speaker 1: had a dairy plant. We bottled and processed, homogenized and
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  Speaker 1: pasteurized the milk. And that went along for years and years.
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  Speaker 1: And we added produce and meat and fresh fish. And
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  Speaker 1: like I mentioned, my sister with the bakery and the
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  Speaker 1: dairy with our milk and everything. So we've always had
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  Speaker 1: a close love affair with dairy. you know, cows, you know, so, um,
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  Speaker 1: you know, I, I'm a, I'm a moo kind of
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  Speaker 1: a guy.
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  Speaker 3: I love it.
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  Speaker 1: All right.
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  Speaker 2: Now I understand from what I saw on Instagram and
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  Speaker 2: all that, um.
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  Speaker 3: I believe a couple of the Knicks came up to Westchester.
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  Speaker 3: Is that correct? I mean, have you guys been getting
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  Speaker 3: the champions up there?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. You know, we just had up there, uh, Friday
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  Speaker 1: was Mariana Rivera. And what a amazing guy he is.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I even said to him, I mean, here's
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  Speaker 1: like a superstar, I guess one of the best pitchers, right,
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  Speaker 1: in baseball. And he was so humble. He came to
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  Speaker 1: the store. He's coming up with a hot sauce, by
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  Speaker 1: the way.
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  Speaker 2: So you guys are selling the hot sauce is what
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  Speaker 2: I'm hearing. You guys are selling the hot sauce?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what I said to him? He's so cool.
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  Speaker 1: I love the guy. I said to him, I'll tell
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  Speaker 1: you what. He said he went to one other store
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  Speaker 1: and he was boasting how he sold 600, you know,
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  Speaker 1: jars of his hot sauce for this one store. So
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  Speaker 1: I said to him, Mariana, how about this? How about
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  Speaker 1: if I guarantee right now that we'll sell 1,000 when
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  Speaker 1: you come visit Stoon Leather? And I said, but... you
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  Speaker 1: have to dress up in the cow suit, you know,
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  Speaker 1: because we have those costume characters and one of them
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  Speaker 1: is a cow. He's like, oh, I said, how about
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  Speaker 1: 1200 jars of your sauce? So, I'm hoping, gosh, would
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  Speaker 1: I love that if he could be in the cow
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  Speaker 1: suit with the hat on, I could get in that.
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  Speaker 2: The greatest closer to baseball in a cow suit would
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  Speaker 2: be incredible.
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  Speaker 3: All right, I got to ask you this. What's it
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  Speaker 3: like doing those commercials?
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  Speaker 2: Because I love hearing you on radio, and I feel
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  Speaker 2: like you have a love of radio, right?
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  Speaker 3: That's what it sounds like every time I hear your commercials.
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  Speaker 1: Well, we've always had a lot of success with radio
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  Speaker 1: on your station, you know, and all the stations. I
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  Speaker 1: think just for any... You know, you have to, you know,
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  Speaker 1: get out there, you know, and let people know about
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  Speaker 1: you and what you're doing. You know, at Stu Leonard's,
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  Speaker 1: I promise if somebody comes for the first time, they're
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  Speaker 1: coming back, okay? So the challenge, how do you get
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  Speaker 1: them to visit the first time? And, you know, radio
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  Speaker 1: is one of the things, but you know what's really
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  Speaker 1: taken off is social media now. You know, with Instagram
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  Speaker 1: and TikTok and everything. So, you know, promoting your business
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  Speaker 1: just in general. I mean, we were just a little
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  Speaker 1: small one little dairy store back, you know, in the 70s.
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  Speaker 1: And now we have eight larger stores. And a lot
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  Speaker 1: of that has been the publicity and radio and print.
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  Speaker 1: You know, it's helped us.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I'm sure seeing the expansion now, you're still Leonard Jr.
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  Speaker 2: So is this a generational chain here that we're talking to?
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, oh man, is that tough? I just
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  Speaker 1: turned 72. And we have a little plan here at
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  Speaker 1: the store to hand the baton off over the next
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  Speaker 1: three years. And I have my nephew, I have seven
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  Speaker 1: of our next generation in the business with us now.
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  Speaker 1: which is a full-time job, by the way, managing the
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  Speaker 1: seven kids. And so handing the baton off is tough
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  Speaker 1: because also my daughters, you know, work here. And so,
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  Speaker 1: you know, I'm promoting one of my nephew to CEO,
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  Speaker 1: and my daughter, Blake, is going to be president. And
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  Speaker 1: I just thought, hopefully next week I'm going to meet
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  Speaker 1: with Danny Wegman, Because he has his two daughters, Nicole
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  Speaker 1: and Colleen, are also CEO and president. So Danny's going
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  Speaker 1: to sit with us and explain sort of how his
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  Speaker 1: family handles transition and generational change like that.
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  Speaker 2: Now, I've got to ask you this, because I've been
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  Speaker 2: sort of seeing an Orthodox girl, and I know she
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  Speaker 2: does kosher. Does Sue Leonard's accommodate all different kosher as well?
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  Speaker 3: How does that pan out?
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  Speaker 1: Well, you know what, as you mean, as far as
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  Speaker 1: the kosher foods, you know, we will definitely offer them
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  Speaker 1: at the holidays, you know, and we have kosher meat
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  Speaker 1: downstairs now. But, you know, we don't have a big
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  Speaker 1: kosher department, even though my mother is Jewish. OK, because
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  Speaker 1: she was born in Germany and came over. Technically, I'm Jewish.
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  Speaker 1: If your mother's Jewish, you're Jewish. So but you know what?
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  Speaker 1: We have to just look at the store for what sells,
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  Speaker 1: you know, and we have about 2,500 items. Most supermarkets
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  Speaker 1: have 70,000, 100,000 even sometimes. So we have very limited items,
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  Speaker 1: so we have to stick for the best sellers. So
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  Speaker 1: at the holidays, challah bread, there's a lot of, you know,
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  Speaker 1: potato pancakes with catering, you know, so beef brisket. So
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  Speaker 1: there's a lot of items that sell really well around
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  Speaker 1: the holidays, but on a day-to-day basis, it doesn't do
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  Speaker 1: the sales for us to justify keeping it in the store.
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  Speaker 1: And one of the reasons is we want to keep
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  Speaker 1: it fresh, so we're looking for high turnover of every
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  Speaker 1: single item.
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  Speaker 2: My final question to you, Stu Leonard, I want to
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  Speaker 2: thank Michael for arranging this and all that.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. It seems like a real fair, like the kids
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  Speaker 3: have rides and all that. I mean, it's more than
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  Speaker 3: just a grocery store.
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  Speaker 2: It's like a whole atmosphere, isn't it, at Stu Leonard's?
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  Speaker 1: Well, you know, my father was always enamored by Walt Disney.
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  Speaker 1: And I can't tell you, our family vacations when we
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  Speaker 1: were younger was always going to one of the Disneyland properties. And,
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  Speaker 1: you know, I think just the whole experience of seeing
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  Speaker 1: how happy people are when they're at Disney was something
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  Speaker 1: that we just wanted to create in our food store.
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  Speaker 1: So we have a lot of animation, you know, singing
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  Speaker 1: for the kids. And, you know, we have a little
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  Speaker 1: animal farm in some of our stores right out in front.
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  Speaker 1: We have, you know, we're doing a big toucher truck event,
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  Speaker 1: you know, where the city brings in their big tractors
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  Speaker 1: and stuff and the little kids come and, are able
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  Speaker 1: to get in the back of an ambulance or sit
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  Speaker 1: in the seat of a big backhoe or something like that.
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  Speaker 1: So we want to make it fun, and we want
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  Speaker 1: people to come through the store and smile and have
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  Speaker 1: a good time. And then we do make a lot
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  Speaker 1: of our own products fresh right here at the store.
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  Speaker 1: So that's a show. So you can look at everything.
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  Speaker 1: Mozzarella balls are being made. They're making lobster rolls right
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  Speaker 1: in front of your face. You know, we're baking. We
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  Speaker 1: have a big open bakery. It's like a big open kitchen,
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  Speaker 1: I guess, when you come to Stu Leonard's. Well, you
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  Speaker 1: know what?
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  Speaker 2: I got to make a trip up there, and I'll
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  Speaker 2: let you guys know when I'm up there because I
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  Speaker 2: want to meet you, Stu, and see the legend in person.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you. Hey, where are you located?
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  Speaker 2: Right now I'm in the city, but I'm normally in Jamaica, Queens,
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  Speaker 2: but I could take a, what a train up to Westchester.
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  Speaker 3: And all that fun stuff.
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  Speaker 1: Oh yeah. Yep. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Well, we'll connect for sure. And thank you for joining
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  Speaker 2: me at one look up Alex media. I'm so honored
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  Speaker 2: to have you today.