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Tom’s Watch Bar Looks to Raise Sports-Bar Game · Choppin’ It Up by Bloomberg Intelligence

• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Chopping it Up.
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: I'm your host, Mike Halon, the senior Restaurant and Food
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: Service analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. Our research and that a
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: bi's five hundred analysts around the globe can be found
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: exclusively on.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: The Bloomberg terminal.
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Quick shout out to my friend Age for letting me
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: use this track Still Dreaming for our new podcast intro.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Check them out on Apple Music and Spotify. He's great.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Today we're joined by Brooks Shaden, co founder and co
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: CEO of Tom's Watch Bar. It's nice to meet you, Brooks.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: Congrats on the new gig man.
• 0:44
  Speaker 3: Thanks Mike, pleasure to meet you as well, and thanks
• 0:46
  Speaker 3: for having me.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: Short thing, can you describe Tom's Watch Bar for the
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: listeners that aren't familiar with the brand?
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Tom's, as with a lot of things,
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: is a startup that we created, you know, years ago
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: and evolved into what it is today. But at its core,
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: Tom's is what we call a super sports bar. And
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: you know, what we've found in our past is that,
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: you know, in the consumer business, it's really hard to
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: create new things. So what we tend to do is
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: find existing things people are familiar with. Twist the frame
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: a little bit and just bring something new. So we
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: took the sports bar category and tried to bring something new,
• 1:21
  Speaker 3: and so we are all about sports entertainment and bring
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: in a great sports watch experience to fans. Very cool.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: So this may be the most important question I have
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: for you. What's the audio for Sunday Football?
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: What's what do you go with?
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: It's it's funny you say that it is a constant
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: and never ending debate about what to put on for sound.
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: So that the short answer is it depends on the game.
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: And what we really try to do is curate both
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: the screens and the audio. So we have have as
• 1:53
  Speaker 3: many zones as possible. Because these days there's so many
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: games people are watching. How do you split it up
• 1:58
  Speaker 3: so you can watch one game in one second, one
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: game in another segment and listen to the sound. And
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: then for other sports like baseball, this sound's not so exciting,
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: so you got to turn the music. Sure, So it
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: really depends on what the game is. You know. We
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: find for basketball, it almost it doesn't even matter what
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: the commentary is. They want to hear the squeaking of
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: the shoes and just feel the energy from the stadium.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: I mean, that's our overall big goal is we want
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: it to feel like it's the next next best thing
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: to being in the stadium, and so we we want
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: to create that experience and getting the sound on as
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: part of it. But yeah, it's it's always a little
• 2:33
  Speaker 3: debit with the debate. Yeah.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know, first it's the local team and
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: then if not, maybe game of the week. You know
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: here in New Jersey, nobody wants to listen to commercials,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: so you know, usually have a DJU going for the
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: for the commercials.
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we know, it's fun. We really actually do that
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: as part of the focus for our brand. We call
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: it the run a show and we have DJ's or
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: mcs on for just that reason, because yeah, downtime in
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: between which game do you turn on? And a perfect
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: example too, you'll get NBA games on TNT. If nobody's
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: paying attention, the game ends. Next thing, you know, you have,
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: you know, some TV show that's played. So it's it's
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: always a battle to make sure that we keep that
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: energy cool. All right.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: So from the picks I've seen, I haven't been able
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: to make it to one yet, but from the picks
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: I've seen, it looks like a gambler's paradise.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: Is that something that you're really leaning into.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, the sports betting and fantasy leagues. There's just
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: so many tailwinds behind sports right now, and it's it
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: really was what we were trying to build upon. You know,
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: entertainment and entertainment experience is such a big thing, but
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: what we wanted to do is lean heavily into entertainment.
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: That was not something new. You know, we're not producing
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: the content, we're just trying to feed off of it.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: And so what sports betting was one of the big ones,
• 3:48
  Speaker 3: and what we've noticed it brings is a ton of
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: fan engagement. You know, if you've got to bet on
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: the game, people tend to be a little bit more engaged.
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: It doesn't even matter how much it is. And even
• 3:58
  Speaker 3: more importantly, notices people aren't just watching one game. You know,
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: you may be in Denver and you're watching the Broncos.
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: You gotta bet on the game, but you'd probably have
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: your fantasy quarterback in a different game and you got
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: to bet on some other game. So we have it
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: takes a lot more than just having a lot of
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: TVs on this the wall. We are very meticulous about
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: designing the screen so that you're always looking at multiple
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: So you might be watching the Broncos on the big screen,
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: but there's lots of other clusters of screens around so
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: you can watch the game. We make sure that we've
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: got you know, really powerful Wi Fi because everyone wants
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: to make sure they're signals strong enough to get the
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: real time bets in and so that's been a really
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: big piece of fan engagement. The other funny one too,
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: is people are betting on different things. You know, it's
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: not just who wins the game. They stay and watch
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: the end of the game because they want to see
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: the spread or did their quarterback get the number of
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: yards or whatever it might be. So it's it's really
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: added to that that fan engagement. So yeah, we're not
• 4:54
  Speaker 3: trying to get directly involved in sports betting obviously, but
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: we partner with them a lot and promote it and
• 5:00
  Speaker 3: just make it part of that energy.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, player Props will have you watch in a game
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: that's you know, that's a team's down thirty points in
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: the fourth quarter, for sure.
• 5:09
  Speaker 3: I got to say, though, the one thing I've noticed
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: is that it's pretty remarkable those those odds pickers and
• 5:14
  Speaker 3: spreadmakers are really really good and accurate. You get, like
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: you said, the games, you know, teams up by twenty
• 5:22
  Speaker 3: points and everyone's there still cheering because it's a twenty
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: point spread. It keeps people on their seats and drink it.
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: So that's that's what we care about, Yeah, for sure.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: And I've read the chain places a strong emphasis on
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: emerging sports and emerging leagues like the WNBA Formula one,
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: UFC soccer.
• 5:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, that's the other big tail. One we've been
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: noticing is the number of events is growing, but also
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: the number of sports. So perfect example, right now, we're
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: in college football season. Right we got the twelve game
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: College Football Playoff, which didn't really exist before. That's twelve
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: new games or ten or nine new games that they
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: didn't have before in our big games, and those are
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: huge days for us. So it's it's a lot. Each
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: league seems to be adding games. You have, NBA has
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: a playing tournament, so they're just extra games. And then
• 6:14
  Speaker 3: the other leagues that people are watching more, I mean
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: the w n B A and the tailwent on that
• 6:18
  Speaker 3: has been unbelievable. I mean that the hyper Caitlin Clark
• 6:22
  Speaker 3: and all the energy she brought to the league is real.
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: You know. We uh their opening game I think this
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: year was at our Mopeakan Sun We have a location there.
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: They sold out the game. Place was packed for the
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: opening day of NBA. I was. We just on Monday
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: opened our next location in Indianapolis. I was glued to
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: the TV for the w NBA Draft making sure she
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: got drafted. To the DNA fever anyone was the last
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: time you kind of put on your calendar w NBA
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: drafts and then you know, a lot of the other
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: obvious ones like soccer, Formula one are big popular sports
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: that are starting to fill in the rest of our calendar.
• 6:58
  Speaker 3: You know, uh, I don't know if you watch a
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: few weeks ago, but the Mike Tyson J. Paul fight
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: right the hype in the marketing they put around that,
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: regardless of what you think about the fight itself, it
• 7:09
  Speaker 3: was a big driver. And so that weekend we had
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: that Tyson Paul fight. There was a Nuggets game that
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: afternoon on Saturday was college football. That night was a
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: UFC fight. So the more sports that keep coming, even
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: with one hundred and fifty TVs, we have a hard
• 7:25
  Speaker 3: time actually keeping all of these groups hordened off and
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: to your point, the sound, who's showing what and on
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: what level. So it's been a really exciting part of
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: our business. And then it also leads us to how
• 7:38
  Speaker 3: we design the space where we go, what our locations
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: look like, what markets are good for it. But it's
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: been a lot of fun. We spend a lot of
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: time on Mondays and Tuesdays planning ad for what the
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: sports calendar looks like for the week.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, typically sports bars have to hire capex needs due
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: to the av setup. So how often do you need
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: to replace the HD screens?
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's interesting that the screen have actually lasted fairly well.
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: You pay a little bit more for the commercial grade
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: of screens, you know. Sometimes we often say it'd be
• 8:07
  Speaker 3: easier if you just say, let's buy the cheap ones
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: from Costco and replace them every six six months. But
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: it's what we've really tried to do with the total
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: buildout is let's skinny down the spend at other places
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: because the reality is, if we're doing it right, the
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: place is packed, so you don't see the floor, and
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: they're mostly looking up at the screens and so they're
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: not paying attention. Do you have, you know, Italian light
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: fixtures that you imported for thousands of dollars. They're probably
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: gonna get broken anyways, So we try to skinny down
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: on a lot of the other finishes, make the place
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: a little bit bulletproof, quite frankly, because it gets busy
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: and growded, and so we can spend more money on
• 8:45
  Speaker 3: the av and a lot of what we're seeing as
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: well is it's less about the screens himself. It's all
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: the technology behind it. And as that continues to evolve,
• 8:52
  Speaker 3: it's getting cheaper and allows you to do more stuff. So,
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: you know, at some point we see the vision where
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: rather than having you know, if you go back a
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: while ago, you had a manager in the store with
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: remotes running around all the TVs. Now it's all controlled
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: from an iPad in the store. We'll get to a
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: stage here soon. We we'll have you know, immediate coordinator
• 9:11
  Speaker 3: centrally controlling all of the TVs at every screen around
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: the country.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: So very cool.
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: So what's on the menu, Yeah, so it's at its core,
• 9:19
  Speaker 3: it's typical sports bar food. You know, we've evolved over
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: time what works and what doesn't work. We've tried to
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: bring some other things onto the menu, to try different things,
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: to be a little bit of an elevated sports bar concept.
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: But the reality is people kind of want the same stuff.
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: So our goal has always been let's bring a better
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: version of what people want. So we're going to have,
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: you know, Burger's wings, but let's do a better version
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: of let's do jumbo wings, Let's have a variety sauces.
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: You know, we got a background on the burger business.
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: Let's do a great burger to make sure that people
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: get that. But on top of that, let's make a
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: few more premium products. We have a prime rig French
• 9:54
  Speaker 3: dip that's amazing, a little bit higher price point, but
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: people are willing to pay that to have a little
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: bit better experience. And then we'll round out the menu
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: with some great salads. We do an ahy two in
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: a tower, a poke bowl, some things like that. So
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: you avoid that kind of veto vote because the other
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: trend that we've seen, as we're talking about with the
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: breakfast sports, it's not just you know, college kids coming
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: to watch I mean, that's not really our audience. We're
• 10:20
  Speaker 3: trying to bring a little bit better experience, but we're
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: also saying a much more balanced approach. So our guest
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: mix is about fifty to fifty male female, and so
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: we're trying to bring a menu both on the food
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: side but also the alcohol side that has you know,
• 10:36
  Speaker 3: a course light, but you also have some cocktails real
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: elevated as well. So really trying to round it out
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: without going too broad.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: What is the alcohol percentage?
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: So we run on average across all locations about fifty percent.
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: It's north of that during game days and on weekends,
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: a little slower outside of that, but it runs north
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: of fifty percent, which is an interesting business. It's a
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: heck of a lot easier to run a bar sometimes
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: is making a lot of food. Yeah? Yeah.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: Does that percentage make site selection more difficult in some states?
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know if it makes it difficult, but
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: it definitely adds a different element to how we look
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: at real estate. So it's interesting as we look a
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: lot of the other traditional metrics you might look at
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: we've looked at in our past. You can say, great,
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: there's lots of rooftops, there's tons of population, lots of traffic,
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: but are they all at home in bed By seven
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: and eight o'clock, we're at our core. We're a bar,
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: so we've got to make sure that we're in those
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: markets that have enough of a population that's going to
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: be out at night. And again, we're not at one
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: or two o'clock am type of bar, but we are
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: heavy dinner. A lot of places we don't even do launch,
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: So we just got to make sure that we've got
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: those statistics. The nice part is these days there's so
• 11:49
  Speaker 3: much analytics out there. You know, we're not just looking
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: at the population. You can look at census data to say,
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: what's the average amount spent on alcohol, how many people
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: you know, how much do these restaurants to do post
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: four o'clock, What is the percentage of people that are
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: in fantasy leagues. You can start to get really more
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: specific with where to go. And the other piece is
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: is finding sports fans. You know, every market around the
• 12:15
  Speaker 3: country is really different with their sports loyalty. We opened
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: up in Minneapolis about two years ago now, and you know,
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: downtown struggled post COVID, and so we were a little
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: cautious about what it was going to look like in
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: the downtown market, will people come out, And we couldn't
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: believe We're blown away. It was four times what we
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: thought it was going to be. And a lot of
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: it is you just have these sports fans what I
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: call it multi generational. I was in the restaurant early on.
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: We're nowhere close to the Viking Stadium, but it was
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: like a sea of purple in the place, and there
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: was a grandfather, his son, and grandson all in their
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: jerseys out and so you just have that. The sports
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: is in the DNA. So that's our two big goals
• 12:57
  Speaker 3: is outside of the traditional restaurant real estate stuff is
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: are there's lots of sports fans. Do they love their
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: sports and do they stay up past you know, drink
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: an hour?
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah? How big is your off premise business?
• 13:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not something we've really pushed heavily on. It's
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: a very very small piece in some of the downtown markets.
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: We kind of learned it around the COVID timeframe. Two.
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: We're about entertainment, it's about being in the place with fans,
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: and so trying to sell food off premise just really
• 13:26
  Speaker 3: wasn't something that we realized was going to be a
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: big part.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: Cool and how many units are there?
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: Where are you strong geographically if you are, and who's
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: the core customer?
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah. So right now we are at thirteen, just open
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: the thirteenth in Indianapolis. We have seven more on the
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: docket for twenty five, might add a couple more, so
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: targeting to be around twenty and then doing in that
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: range of ten plus a year after that. You know,
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: like a lot of things, you start off small, get
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: the concept right, turn the dials, pull the levers, and
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: we kind of reached that state where it o got
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: the concept rate, we've got the unit economics rate, the
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: box works, and now we're starting to grow. But initially
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: we were really opportunistic about finding what we call centers
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: of gravity, so by stadiums, by convention centers, tourist aarius,
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: places where there's already a lot of people and they
• 14:19
  Speaker 3: may not know the name, but they know what a
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: sports bar is. They just we like to design it
• 14:24
  Speaker 3: to look like what we call the bug light effect.
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: Lots of glass, lots of TVs show the bar lighted up,
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: so even if they don't know what Tom's is, they
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: can walk by and go, oh, that's a sports bar.
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: I'm gonna go out of watch my game. And so
• 14:35
  Speaker 3: that was really because of that. We're all over the country.
• 14:38
  Speaker 3: Grif we are in La Portland or casino north of Portland.
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: We're opening up in Seattle. Down to Orlando. On I
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: drive DC, We're in LA and LA Live. We're in
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: a casino Mohegan Sun which I mentioned, Minnesota, Houston. We've
• 14:58
  Speaker 3: hit kind of all the four corners and so now
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: the strategy will be to start finding more of those locations,
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: but then filling in around.
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: Okay, cool, I'll be in LA this weekend. I'll have
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: to check it out.
• 15:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, we're literally right across from Crypto Dot Chrown.
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: It just still doesn't quite roll off the tongue yet
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: from Staple Center Bench, but right across the street. So yeah,
• 15:16
  Speaker 3: come on in, We'll love that.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: How big are the restaurants and how much they question
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: to build?
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, again, it's a little bit of a range. So
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: you know, on average, I would say our sweet spot's
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: about eight to nine thousand square feet, but we've got
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: some as large as twelve thousand, and we've got one
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: as small as four thousand. We're really trying to cater
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: towards what the crowd is there. So a only line
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: when the Lakers were playing across the street, you know
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: you wish you had fifty thousand square feet, you'll take
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: all the people as you can get. Yeah, other properties,
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: the smaller ones in a casino in north of Portland,
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: it's more constant day park traffics, so you can kind
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: of keep it full all day long. So it's a
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: pretty wide range. But that's sweet spots in that kind
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: of eight to nine thousand square feet. The build cost is,
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: you know, it really ranges. It's so so diverse across
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: the country. But as I was mentioning before, we've really
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: engineered with a lot of the experience we have here
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: about how to get the kitchen really tight and right.
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: What we've learned too about the sports business, we get
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: we get a lot in surges, so you need as
• 16:15
  Speaker 3: many seats as possible. Because we're a bar heavy, we
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: can get away with the slightly smaller kitchen keep that
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: cost down a little bit. You know, concrete floors, basic finishes,
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: you keep it nice. You know, we don't want to
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: we really don't want to be that old school sports
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: bar that's nothing but wood and stinks like old beer
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: and jerseys on the wall. But you don't have to
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: spend a lot of money on expensive finishes, so you know,
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: we've got the ROI really dialed in, and I think
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: have opportunity to get it even more improved.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Cool, and it seems it seems like it would be
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: a great fit for casinos because when I've seen the pictures,
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: it looks like a very high end sports book.
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's funny you say that. It's it's one
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: of our biggest focuses right now. We have three casino
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: locations right now. We're in Ohegan Sun in Connecticut, and
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: then Mohegan Sun built with a partnership out north of
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: Portland a casino called al and A. And then we're
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: in the New York, New York casino with MGM, right
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: on the strip. It's a great location. When we first opened,
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: the T Mobile Arena wasn't even there. Now they just
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: opened up, you know, right next door. It's it's a
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: great partnership because what we've we've found, at least with
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: the casinos as well, the sports betting business isn't a
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: huge margin business. They need volume and it's more of
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: an amenity. So what we really do is partner with
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: them to help draw people in to come watch the game.
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: Now they've got them in betting and go into the casino.
• 17:39
  Speaker 3: You know, if you've been in the casino, you kind
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: of want to take a break from the floor every
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: once and like go watch your game, grab a burger,
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: just relax a little bit. But the other piece we're
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: talking to we are probably in on Li with about
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: fifteen different casinos right now, and a lot of it
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: is exactly what you mentioned. They've got these giant, old
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: school sports books. There's a lot of horse races and
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: dogs races on the screens, and there's five guys probably
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: sipping the same coke that they've been drinking for the
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: last four hours. And it's not that that has to
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: go away, but how do you really integrate our sports
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: bar and do it to add some energy and make
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: it a more exciting place to be. You know, if
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: you've ever been out to Vegas during March Madness, you know,
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: well it's just Mayhem and the sports books. If you
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: go two weeks before that, it's quite in that same scenario.
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: If you can create that energy, we can really bring
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: something special to them and and vice versa. Cool.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Mandalay Bay this was years ago Buddy's bachelor party,
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: but Mandalay Bay sports Book was one of the best
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: places you could possibly watch, like fifteen twenty years ago.
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: You know, you and I may have been high fiving
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: each other years ago and didn't even know it. I
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: was probably there standing next to you for sure. Man.
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: It's an exciting time, right, you know, and it's a
• 18:53
  Speaker 3: great reminder of what we're in the business to do.
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: It's that energy we're trying to bring because if you
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: think about it, these days, anyone can buy a TV
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: and put up on their will, right, you can get
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: all the stats on your phone. Sports fans go out
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: because they want to be part of a community and
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: with other people. You know, why do you fly to
• 19:10
  Speaker 3: Vegas to go watch March Madness Because you want to
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: be part of that energy. And that's what we're trying
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: to do and bring around the country is create that
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: same entertainment and energy in a sports bar. And so
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: you know, even though we are obviously a restaurant and
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: our revenue comes from FMB and our operational execution is
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: about a restaurant, our demand and our sales, all that
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: is really driven by sports fans. We promote events, you know,
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: March Madness is it is our biggest month across the
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: entire country. Because of just that reason, people are coming
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: out for events and so it's it's a really fun
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: part of the business. It's it's not just hey, our
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: burger's better than somebody else, you know, eat lunch here
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: instead of there. We are very in a very targeted
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: way reaching out trying to find sports fans. If it's
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: an AVS game on Thursday in Denver where all the
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: apps fans out, how do we talk to you come
• 20:04
  Speaker 3: in for that game, and it's day by day, week
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: by week, completely different. But the nice part these days
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: is you can get really targeted with who you're going
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: after versus just everyone eats and I want you to
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: eat my place supposed to someone else. So it's a
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: it's a it's a really different business, but a lot
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: of fun.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: Is there any other unit economic data you'd like to share?
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I think the the interesting part, as
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: I mentioned before, is we've tried intentionally to not be
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: very formulae because every market will the design will work
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: a little bit differently. So we've got some restaurants where
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: we've got our restaurant that does fifteen million in sales
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: and we've got as low as four million. Auv's kind
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: of in that seven million dollar range, but we very
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: intentionally design those so that the ROI is fantastic on
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: both ends, you know. And one of the things we've
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: found in this business, if you try to design towards
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: a really big AUV, some markets may not quite be that,
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: and you'll lose money. If you design towards the lower
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: end and you do more great, But we've really made
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: sure we can make money at every range of the spectrum.
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: The alcohol miics is a big part of that, making
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: sure we remember that we're of our as much as
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: we are a restaurant, so we've got great margins, which
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: also allows us to fluctuate throughout the year because there
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: are seasonal times in this business. In the middle of
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: the summer and it's just baseball, you're going to have
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: lower sales, and we just know that if we've engineered
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: the P and L to make sure that that works
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: at the low end and the high end that works
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: as well. So it's the four wall economics are better
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: than anything I've ever seen in this business. And now
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: it's ready to go stamp them out around the country.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: Good stuff.
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: What percentage of your new store gms are brought in
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: from existing restaurants.
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, the short answer is we try to
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: make it one hundred percent internal. We adopted a what
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: we call the operating partner in regional operating partner program,
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: which is you know, there's others that do it. We
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: have a big base of folks from Texas Roadhouse. My
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: co CEO, Shannon McNeil, phenomenal operator, has been in those
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: business for decades. Came from Garden that was a Texas Roadhouse,
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: helped grow Cheddars and it's been a game change of
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: force because it really creates that ownership mentality. And because
• 22:18
  Speaker 3: of that, we have people clamoring internally for the next
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: big spot, and not only for the new, next new location.
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: It's people looking to upgrade. So the operating partner who
• 22:30
  Speaker 3: runs our small casino that does well, he wants to
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: upgrade to, you know, the big fifteen million dollar casino.
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: And so it creates this nice, healthy competition as well,
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: and so we we call it. Shannon loves to use
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: the phrase this is invitation only, and he's got people
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: from his past knock on the door saying, hey, I
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: want to come join you. Guys, We're like, well, we'll
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: let you know when you get the end. So it's
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: it's it's created a nice internal feeder system as well.
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: You know, there are certain markets where it's it's better
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: to have somebody that's local from the market and really
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: knows put people there. So we might go external in
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: certain markets just for specific reasons, but we really try
• 23:07
  Speaker 3: to keep a really heavy internal promotion system to keep
• 23:11
  Speaker 3: that one up going.
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Darden and Texas Road to House know how to
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: run restaurants, that's for sure, man.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: So that's some good pedigree.
• 23:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they sure do. You know. It's it's been a
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: phenomenal benefit to our team, and I think really, quite frankly,
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: the core of part of our successes. We've got a
• 23:28
  Speaker 3: really great, balanced and unique complementary skill sets on our team.
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: So Shannon with that kind of background and it's just
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: a phenomenal leader of people, and it just him as well,
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: but he brings the next layer of management with him,
• 23:42
  Speaker 3: and they bring their bench and all of a sudden
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: you start building out this really big, wide breadth of
• 23:46
  Speaker 3: operating prowess. But then the rest of our team you
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: just bring all this great experience across whether it's finance, accounting, operations, strategy, growth,
• 23:56
  Speaker 3: real estate, you need all of those different pieces, and
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: so having folks like that, with that kind of pedigree
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: on our team really really makes a difference, especially when
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: you're just starting out.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: How's your employee turnover?
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: It's great, It's really good. You know it. Again, it
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: really depends on the market. But one of the things
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: that really helps is is, well, probably the biggest thing
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: that helps is exactly what I just talked about. As
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: you'll know well within this industry, having the right leader
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: in the restaurant is absolutely at the core of what
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: we do. You know, there's a very big difference from
• 24:26
  Speaker 3: our past concepts of a manager running a smash burger
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: you know burger place that does a million dollars a
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: year versus a ten million dollar restaurant. I mean, that's
• 24:37
  Speaker 3: a different level and caliber of managing. And so we've
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: been very careful to get the right people in house,
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: and they really help with that retention because they're great leaders,
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: lots of experience. I mean, most of these guys would
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: be a regional running you know, ten twenty thirty restaurants,
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: but here they're operating one and they know how to
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: keep people. The other big part is we're a big
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: bar business. So there's lots of and you know, the
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: numbers I hear from some of the servers on some
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: of our bigger weekends that they walk away with is
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: kind of mind blowing. It takes me back to college
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: days and thinking about the amount of money that I'd
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: make it a year and they'd make it in the nights.
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: So it's another piece that really helps. And it's just
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: a fun business, you know, it's not just constantly serving
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: food in the typical restaurant business. They're wearing jerseys, they're
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: high five and in trash, talking with people and the
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: crowd about whatever game's on. It's just a funness. So
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: that that turnover is high in this business. It's a
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: natural part of it, but we've managed to keep it
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: relatively low compared to any other things we've done.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: Or the end of day, great and how are you
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: looking to drive Seemstar sales growth in twenty twenty five.
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: A lot of it is what I talked about before. Again,
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: it's different from traditional restaurants, so it's not just how
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: do we get people to come out and eat or
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: gain a bigger share of the burger or wing category.
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: It's really making sure we're promoting all of the different events,
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: and I would say it's really two things. One, make
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: sure you know it's obvious. In Denver, the Broncos around
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: on Sunday, people are going to come on watch in
• 26:06
  Speaker 3: your la. The Lakers are across the street. You're going
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: to get people, So make sure you give great service,
• 26:11
  Speaker 3: great execution, get people through the door. You know, if
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: you've got a ticket to the Lakers game, you probably
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: spent a lot of money on. We got to make
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: sure we get you in, get you out, get your fed,
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: get your check to you fast. I mean that that
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: operational design that we put in place to handle those
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: kind of surges is really important and it's a really
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: big part of what we do to make sure that
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: we can get quick turnover. And then on the converse,
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: when people are coming in to watch a game, they're
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: not in a rush to get in or out necessarily,
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: but we've got to make sure that we We've to
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: very specifically to design the service system, the service model
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: to have servers and stations always there with you. You know,
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: that worst thing you can have is an empty drink
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: when you're trying to watch a game and you're looking
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: around for the server, trying to find them. So there's
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: a lot of operational pieces we try to make sure
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: that we are very meticulous about, you know, a lot
• 27:00
  Speaker 3: little things that add up. And then the more macro side,
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: it's about what are the others, you know, don't miss
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: out and promoting the Jake Paul fight, the UFC fight.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: Is there a big soccer match coming on that we
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: didn't think about and it's on at nine am on Saturday,
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: or you know, whatever the events may be. It's really
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: about looking forward to see what other sports are out there,
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: so we bring people in for more of those events,
• 27:23
  Speaker 3: you know right now, or our marketing team and was
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: looking out my door a minute ago. They it's really
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: quite funny as the bowl predictions keep changing and who's
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: going to go to what Bowl, who's going to be
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: in which game, They've got like the matrix up on
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: the wall and are there on the phone constantly calling
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: because there's like six hundred different scenarios who's going to
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: play in which game? And they're on the phone calling
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: alumni groups saying, hey, come, we'll carve off a space
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: for you. We want you to come in and watch
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: your team in our space. So it's those are the
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: kind of things that we're doing to really drive sales,
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: to let people know, outside of the obvious games, come
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: come watch with us, we're gonna we're gonna take care
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: of you and your fan.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's great, it's uh, it's definitely adds another level
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: of planning and and you know, uh, strategy when when
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: you're so closely tied. You know, I covered Buffalo Wild
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: Wings for a long time, and you know, the number
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: of big events every quarter was something that was talked
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: about on each and every earnings call.
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's it is, it's at it's great. It's
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: the challenges we found and it's just what we have
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: to do. Every market's different too. You can't have one
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: global national marketing plan. It's here's the marketing plan for
• 28:38
  Speaker 3: this week or this month for this location. Because you know,
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: if the Nuggets are in the playoffs, that's a different
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: that people in LA may not care about quite as much.
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: And so we do a lot of research. We use
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: a lot of analytics on finding out where the fans are.
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: You know, the obvious games are obvious, it's that next
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: layer of games, the next layer of fans. We get
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: a lot of traveling teams too. You know, it's interesting,
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: especially for the Bowl games or even NFL games that
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: the team that travels in to see them. You know,
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: there's a fan club group called the Niner Empire Packers
• 29:12
  Speaker 3: fan clubs. They travel in and so we'll get just
• 29:15
  Speaker 3: as busy, if not busier with the away team coming
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: into visit. So it's it's a really focused and detailed
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: plan by location by market, but it's uh, keeps on
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: your toes.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it sounds like fun. Man. All right, So last question.
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: It really screws up all of my my sports affiliations
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: when I grew up in Chicago as a as a
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: Bears fan and Bulls fans. But now it's it's all
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: about whoever's across the street and in the market.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: There you go, man, all right, it's a last question
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: with your favorite order.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: My favorite order, I mentioned it before our Prime Rib
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: French dip is is unbelievable. It's a it's a big
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: old sandwich. It'll it'll put you asleep afterwards, but it's
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: it's a great one that and we you pair it
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: with we have a signature to handled forty outs beer mugs,
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: so you take forty ounces as a beer and a
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: big primary French tip. You'll you'll you'll be fat and
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: happy to watch the game for the weekend.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you're making me hungry, man, I haven't eaten yet. Awesome,
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: So looking forward to trying that. Whether it's in LA
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: this weekend or in Orlando.
• 30:17
  Speaker 3: Ahead of ICR, Yeah, we'll be we'll be down there
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: for for ICR and presenting and and we have a
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: really cool location on International Drive. We actually built it,
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: believe it or not. It's on the top floor, the
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: tenth floor of a parking garage right at the top
• 30:32
  Speaker 3: of the International Drive. So we have this great, big
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: patio looks right out towards where Universe is building their
• 30:37
  Speaker 3: their opening in May, their next theme park, Epic Universal.
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: So that's this beautiful view out over there.
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: All right, very cool. Thanks for doing this, Brooks.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: Where can the audience go to find their nearest Tom's
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Watch Bar and what social media platforms should they follow
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: you on?
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks for having Mike really appreciate it. We Tom'swatchbar
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: dot com is the website has all of our locations.
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: Like I mentioned, we just open up and eat Annapolis.
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: We got stuff and Moore coming next year. We are
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: on all the social platforms, primarily Instagram, Facebook. We're on
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: all those and constantly sending out messages with whatever the
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: game is it's coming on this weekend, trying to stay
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: in front of it. So come on out and watch
• 31:14
  Speaker 3: your favorite team at Tom's Good.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Stuff And thanks to the audience for tuning in.
• 31:19
  Speaker 2: If you liked the episode, please subscribe and leave us
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: a review.