Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / From Civil Engineer to Pizza Empire: Matt Stanfield's Seven-Location Journey at Mattenga's

Transcript

From Civil Engineer to Pizza Empire: Matt Stanfield's Seven-Location Journey at Mattenga's · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:14
adversity. My name is Anthony Codispotti
0:17
and today's guest is Matthew Stanfield.
0:20
Matt is the Co founder of Matanga's Pizzeria.
0:23
He and his wife, Anga, open their first store in Shirts,
0:27
Texas in 2014. After walking away from steady
0:31
engineering jobs, Matanga's now dishes up pizza, pasta and wings
0:36
across multiple San Antonio communities.
0:39
They use real ingredients, treat their staff like family and make
0:43
every guest feel at home. Community service is baked into
0:47
the brand. Each year, the team donates more
0:49
than 500 pizzas to local schools and nonprofits.
0:53
In 2025, Metangos won Pizza Today's Pie Award for best use
0:58
of social media. Matt brings an engineer's
1:01
mindset to the kitchen. He studied at the New Mexico
1:04
Institute of Mining and Technology, and he still loves
1:07
testing dough formulas and new processes that keep the lines
1:11
moving. Now, before we get into all that
1:13
good stuff, today's episode is brought to you by my company,
1:17
Add Back Benefits Agency. You know, if you run a business,
1:21
you're likely stuck in the cycle of rising insurance premiums.
1:25
You're paying more, but your team is getting less, and many
1:28
people can't afford coverage at all.
1:30
We do things differently. We offer a solution that
1:33
provides your restaurant employees with unlimited access
1:36
to doctors, therapists, and prescriptions that is always
1:40
free for them to use. But here's where you really need
1:43
to pay attention. Our program is engineered to put
1:46
money back into your company's pockets.
1:49
We recently helped the client increase net profits by $900 per
1:53
employee per year. Results vary, but the
1:56
consultation is free. See if you qualify today at AD
1:59
back benefits.com. All right, back to our guest
2:02
today, co-owner, Co founder of Mattengo's Pizzeria, Matt
2:06
Stanfield. Thanks for making the time to
2:08
Share your story today. Thanks for having me on, I
2:10
appreciate it. So Matt, you and your wife Anga
2:14
were both engineers before the pizza business.
2:17
What kind of engineering were you both involved in?
2:20
So she's the smart one, she's got the electrical engineering
2:23
degree and I'm the civil engineer.
2:26
And so we, we did that together at New Mexico Tech and had like,
2:29
you know, 2 overlapping classes and economics.
2:32
And what was the other one? I think it was music.
2:36
And so yeah, that that's our background.
2:39
I worked at a mining company before.
2:40
She stayed at the college after and before we moved to Texas.
2:44
And is that where you guys met was in college?
2:47
Yeah, yeah. We met, got married junior year,
2:50
my junior year. OK.
2:51
And when you moved to Texas, was that specifically to start the
2:54
piece of business or did you still have engineering jobs that
2:57
you were moving for? No, actually we, we changed
3:00
career States and everything in that same two weeks span.
3:04
We, we jumped off a Cliff, which I would not recommend with an,
3:09
an 18 month old and A and an 8 month old boys at the time.
3:13
But you know, sometimes when you're, you're committed, you
3:16
got to go do it. So we wanted to be in business.
3:20
We had tried a an online business in New Mexico.
3:23
I wasn't working. We needed more experience.
3:25
I'm like, oh, you know, how hard can a restaurant be?
3:29
Yeah, exactly. We when you don't know, you
3:32
don't know. And they're like, oh, I got, I
3:34
got energy. We got time.
3:35
So. Sometimes it's that naivete that
3:37
gets people to take those first steps, yeah.
3:40
Yes, yes. Now what did I get myself into?
3:42
I mean, you know, I could hear myself think that, you know, for
3:45
the first two years in business for sure.
3:47
So what was that first online business that you guys tried and
3:50
why do you think it didn't work? It was actually lab coats and
3:55
which is very ironic, but now that I think about it, and we
3:59
were putting prints on the back because every time you go to the
4:02
doctor or the hospital, you know, it's a white lab coat.
4:05
And I'm like, why? Why not use this canvas?
4:07
We don't, you know, who cares about it being clean and white,
4:10
like put something funny on there.
4:12
And so we had some funny designs and stuff like that, but it, I,
4:18
we didn't know enough about business, I think or sales to to
4:21
make that work like we needed to at that time.
4:24
Do you think that idea has legs or would have had legs if you
4:29
had had more sales and marketing experience?
4:31
Like knowing what you know now, would that have worked at the
4:34
time? I don't know.
4:37
I think it would have been interesting being ready for for
4:39
COVID. It definitely could have done
4:42
something. Then you know all the doctors
4:43
and nurses. I really don't know if it would
4:47
work still or not. I mean, you still look at lab
4:50
coats and you know you're still playing white, still plain and
4:55
boring. I don't know if it's personality
4:57
of the people in them or if it's just the hospital standards.
5:01
Well, I guess that way you can see if they're clean or not.
5:04
I I don't know. All right, because this I don't
5:07
have to worry about that. You can see on my, you know, our
5:10
uniforms, I've got a pizza slice, you know, we got
5:13
gunslingers, Texas, all kinds of things, so.
5:15
You've you've kept it fun and colorful, so OK, talk about
5:18
jumping off that Cliff. Where did the idea come from?
5:22
How did this all unfold that you've got two kids under the
5:25
age of 2 and decide to drop your careers and move states all at
5:28
the same time? So in that part of New Mexico,
5:32
it was not a lot of things happening.
5:34
And we really wanted to be in business, loved hospitality.
5:37
We were having people over to the house all the time.
5:39
So in December of 2013, we decided to come visit.
5:43
Texas had never been really, I mean, I don't count the airport
5:46
or driving through the Panhandle.
5:50
And you know, we wanted to come see what Texas was all about San
5:52
Antonio, Austin, Dallas. And so over Christmas we came,
5:55
we spent San Antonio. I love San Antonio, great town,
5:58
perfect for kids. Went to Austin.
6:01
I hated Austin. I don't know if it was a hotel
6:03
we picked it just did not work for us.
6:05
Then we went to Dallas and I'm like this is this is like
6:08
Southern California 2 point O I'm not just in.
6:11
Terms of like congestion and the size.
6:13
The way, the way it was built, the way it felt and I was like
6:16
this, it'd be too difficult to, to, you know, stand out in that
6:22
big a market initially. I think so.
6:25
And I'm originally from Orange County, California.
6:26
So it, it was the same builders, I think built a lot out there.
6:29
And so I was like, no, this is not, not for us.
6:32
San Antonio's got the right, right mix of, you know, the
6:37
relaxed but still opportunity and rapidly growing.
6:41
And I mean, when we moved here in 2014, I think San Antonio was
6:44
just over a million and we're at 2,000,000 plus right now, so.
6:47
Oh my gosh, I had no idea it was growing that fast.
6:50
Oh yeah, it's been crazy. It it's nuts.
6:54
So. And so how did the pizza
6:56
opportunity come about? So you decide, San Antonio's the
6:59
place. Why pizza?
7:01
Why there? We were looking at businesses in
7:03
our price range. We knew what we'd get for our
7:06
house and like, OK, we can and we'd save some.
7:08
So I'm like, OK, well, what can we do?
7:11
And so restaurants were generally in the price range
7:13
that we could go into. Seemed like a good idea at the
7:17
time. So and hospitality, we're
7:18
already doing it. So it seemed to it seemed to be
7:21
a good idea. When you say you were doing
7:23
hospitality, you were just having friends over friends,
7:27
family to the. House, we, we LED a college
7:30
ministry actually. And so we had college students
7:32
that were in that ministry over all the time, regularly and
7:37
friends and stuff like that. So yeah, it was, it was pretty
7:40
consistent, like two or three times a week.
7:43
But you didn't have any experience in restaurants or
7:46
specifically in a pizza? Business or employees or really
7:50
anything? Yeah.
7:51
OK, you had a lot to learn. I worked at a desk and, you
7:54
know, on at the mine, I checked on things and, you know, managed
7:58
the air permit and did stuff like that.
8:00
Like it was not, yeah, it was not the same.
8:03
This is great because I think, you know, people listening,
8:06
they're like, oh, I can't do that because I don't have any
8:08
experience or, you know, experience certainly would have
8:10
helped you guys here in the early days and, and we'll talk a
8:14
little bit about some of the in between stuff.
8:15
But you know, here you are several years later, you've got
8:18
multiple locations. You you figured a lot of things
8:20
out and you guys are doing well. So what was the state of the
8:24
business when you first bought it?
8:27
So it was sold to us by the business broker as a it's like a
8:30
cash cow. It's doing great.
8:33
When we actually got into the business and we didn't know
8:35
looking at the PNL, we we didn't really know what we were looking
8:39
at. And so when we actually took
8:42
over and found out what was going on underneath the surface
8:47
of the business and then had to adjust from there, it was it was
8:51
a nightmare and it was way under break even versus the so-called
8:54
cash cow. So probably by half of what
8:59
should have been actual sales. So what they just straight up
9:03
your eyes and the financials or what?
9:06
The PNL, like they give you APNL like oh, you know, I'm paying
9:09
these people. We got this sales coming in,
9:11
sales tax, you know the stuff going out.
9:15
But like the previous owner had like two registers up front.
9:19
One was cash only and the cash only one is.
9:23
It's very easy to not report. Put it right in your pocket.
9:28
Right in your pockets, you don't pay sales tax on it.
9:30
You And then he had there was actually a homeless guy living
9:35
in the restaurant at the time. And he he was the dishwasher and
9:40
the guy would pay him like $20 a day.
9:43
And he he slept in the restaurant, showered in the dish
9:46
pit. Like it was the things that
9:48
happened in restaurants or, you know, if people, people that
9:51
don't work in restaurants can you have no idea what goes on in
9:56
in our industry. So he was the 1st.
9:58
Guy I had to fire and and I had to, you know, it, it took me a
10:03
month to figure that out. I'm I wasn't that good with
10:06
people. I'm an engineer.
10:07
I'm better with a computer. So had to fire him.
10:10
And then the day I fired him, his, you know, he had a van
10:13
somewhere. It got towed as well.
10:14
And I'm like you, you know, you just you, you feel for it.
10:17
You like, feel terrible, but you can't keep living in the
10:20
restaurant. Your your bar of soap was out on
10:22
the you know, like, yeah, it was, it was not, not a good
10:25
situation. The previous owner actually told
10:28
us that he thought we'd be out of business in six months and
10:33
that his name was still on the lease and he would just take
10:35
back over after he got paid. And we had, you know, we had
10:38
moved, committed everything. And so, yeah, that was that was
10:42
very motivating when he's. When did he tell you that I.
10:46
Kicked him out after the first week he was he was causing
10:51
problems not it was not good you.
10:54
Kicked the previous owner out. Yes, he was supposed to give us
10:57
a month's worth of training. One of the funniest training
11:01
stories is terrible. So yeah, this is what not to do.
11:05
There's a Restaurant Depot you can go to where you can you buy
11:09
food supply restaurant if you're not big enough or busy enough to
11:12
get like Cisco or Benny Keith to deliver to you.
11:16
So you go to Restaurant Depot and if the can is dented food
11:21
service your your health safety says that you can't use it
11:25
because if it's dented, it can get a bacteria in it.
11:28
So his training was to go in and drop 5 out of eight cans on the
11:33
ground, get a dent in them and then get $7.00 per can off.
11:37
And that was how he ran cheaper cop the goods sold.
11:41
I am not kidding you. This guy's a piece of work.
11:45
Yeah, and you go, oh, you get a case of pizza boxes.
11:48
Tear two of them so that they're not useful.
11:50
Get a discount like it was. It was crazy.
11:53
So yeah, after the first week he was out.
11:56
So Matt let. Me just keep telling us and then
11:58
I didn't want to, you know, pay him the rest 'cause it he wasn't
12:01
doing the training that he was obligated to.
12:03
And so it was. It was not a fun situation.
12:05
So they presented the business as it was a cash cow, very
12:11
lucrative, lots of money coming in.
12:13
You found out quite to the contrary, you know, pretty
12:16
quickly after you took over when you guys were doing your due
12:19
diligence. And you know, I'm going to put
12:21
you on the spot here and this isn't to to make you feel bad.
12:24
You guys didn't know what you were doing at the time.
12:25
But did you see tax returns from the previous years?
12:30
Yeah, we saw tax returns. OK.
12:32
But then, then, then they told you, oh, but there's a lot of
12:35
extra cash coming in that you don't see on the tax returns.
12:38
Is that kind of how the story was laid out?
12:40
I think I didn't understand the connection between the tax
12:43
return and P&L. They showed similar return, but
12:48
reality is, is different. You know, if you payless sales
12:52
tax, you can show a higher return even though you're
12:57
collecting it on behalf of the government.
12:59
OK. So yeah.
13:02
Looking back, knowing knowing what you know now it what would
13:07
you have done differently early on?
13:08
What would you what? What questions would you have
13:10
asked? To find out all that well, I
13:16
would have checked to make sure everybody's on payroll and not
13:18
living there. That would have.
13:22
Been ask around to see is anybody showering in the sink
13:25
here? Yeah, yeah.
13:27
Is there a bar of soap in the sink?
13:28
I mean, that's, I don't know to catch the numbers.
13:32
Knowing what I know now, I would have looked at the cost of goods
13:34
sold and I've been like, oh, you can't run a 12% like you can't,
13:38
or that low a number like something's wrong.
13:42
You know, I would have seen the labor number in the PNL was
13:45
definitely artificially low. And it's because when you pay
13:49
cash under the table to employees, you you don't, you
13:51
can't report them on the PNL because then you have to pay the
13:54
other taxes. So.
13:56
So you guys had the deck stacked against you, right?
14:00
You didn't. Know we went from college
14:01
ministry at church to disaster pizzeria, all these kinds of bad
14:06
things going on. And the guy who was supposed to
14:09
train you, you had to get rid of 'cause he's a disaster too.
14:12
So how were you guys able to start cleaning up the business
14:16
and getting things in order? So the key was we had, my wife's
14:22
parents had moved and lived with us.
14:24
And so we had three of us working at the restaurant, one
14:28
of us with kids at home because we had the two boys at that
14:31
time. We have 4 now.
14:33
And so just had to start grinding really.
14:38
We read a book, I think it was Michael Shepherd's book.
14:41
He's pretty famous in the pizza industry from back then.
14:45
And we read his book and we're just like, OK, I'm, I'm not
14:47
smart enough clearly to handle this.
14:49
I'm just going to follow the directions in this book that it
14:52
started growing sales. It took about two years to get
14:56
through that mess. Like I didn't know how to buy a
14:58
sign for a building, but we thought that the old brand would
15:02
be a good brand to keep. And, you know, it had decent
15:06
reviews and supposedly, you know, sold well.
15:11
Very quickly we realized we needed to change the brand and
15:14
we could not keep that name. So we learned for six months
15:17
under that initial brand and then we said under new
15:20
management and under new ownership and put a new brand on
15:25
it. And why put a new brand on it?
15:28
The reputation of the old one was not.
15:30
It was not as good as you thought.
15:31
It was not going to scale. It was not.
15:33
It was not good. OK.
15:35
What's funny is if I talk to people who've lived in the area
15:39
long enough, they remember the restaurant that was 2/2 times
15:43
before us, but they don't remember the one in the middle
15:46
and then they remember us. OK, 'cause what?
15:48
That space has had three three different concepts in it.
15:52
So the name of the pizza chain now is Matenga's Pizzeria.
15:57
Combination of your first name and your wife's first name, Matt
16:01
and Inga. So and it sounds Italian, right?
16:05
Extra bonus there. How did you decide on that
16:08
though? Was it just sort of like first
16:10
thing that came to mind or did you deliberate what, what did
16:12
you like about it? I don't really remember the
16:16
process where we came up through that, the lab code business, we
16:20
had called it La Benga and we put my wife's name on there
16:23
because she was mainly wanting to do that one I had.
16:27
And so I think it just kind of flowed out like, oh, well, this
16:30
sounds kind of Italian. We're looking at names.
16:32
You know, you can't be, you know, Mario's Pizza, Like
16:35
that's, you know, like, how are you going to get a logo
16:38
trademark? How are you going to do anything
16:39
with that? And so, OK, well, you got to
16:42
come up with a new you got to come up with something new to
16:45
get something different. Otherwise, you know, yeah, Joe's
16:47
pizza anything was not going to, you know, Alamo pizza.
16:51
I think there was at the time there was 1.
16:53
So it's we couldn't use like Alamo, Alamo City if I did
16:56
shirts pizza. Well, that's not going to go
16:59
into San Antonio. So it's not a.
17:02
Scalable as big as it is. Yeah, we had to come up with a
17:05
name and yeah, I we had put it on the LLC when we started the
17:09
LLC because it's just, we call ourselves Matt Manga.
17:12
So it just, it worked so. And then I tell the story.
17:16
It's an island in northern Italy, so.
17:21
An island. They're they're not a lot of
17:22
islands in northern. Italy, maybe if you're, if
17:25
you're bad at geography, you just say yes.
17:27
If you're good at geography. Like yeah, I got it.
17:29
I do have some beautiful lakes up there with tiny little, you
17:32
know, islands in the middle. I'm sure at some point we'll, we
17:35
will have to go to northern Italy and, you know, get a buy a
17:37
sandbar and just put a sign that says Mctanga on it.
17:40
So, so in those first six months, as you guys are figuring
17:45
things out the hard way, 'cause you don't have, you know, this
17:48
guy there to train you, you pick up this book by what was his
17:52
name, Matt Shepard What, what was his first?
17:53
Name that That one's Michael Shepard.
17:55
Michael Shepard And this was sort of like the Bible on how to
17:59
run a pizza business. Yeah, I'm trying to remember the
18:02
title. I remember the author.
18:04
I probably have it here somewhere.
18:06
Well, we'll find I'll find it online.
18:08
But tell me, aside from that book, what did you guys have
18:12
like anybody else to sort of lean on during this time?
18:16
Like some mentors, people in the community were like, hey, let us
18:20
help you out a little bit. We had joined, Michael
18:24
Shepherd's book says to join the Chamber of Commerce.
18:26
We didn't know what that was, but we looked it up and they had
18:28
1. And in his book he also says to
18:31
join the Lions Club. So we looked up both and we
18:33
joined them. I didn't know what the Lions
18:34
Club was or the Chamber of Commerce was.
18:36
It sounds very, you know, very, I don't know old, old school.
18:41
So we joined both. The Chamber of Commerce was very
18:45
good. We had got connections the in
18:48
part of the networking group, there was this lady who was a
18:50
manager of another restaurant and she was like, you guys don't
18:53
know how to hire. You don't know how to do
18:54
anything. You don't have to price a menu
18:55
like you need to, you need to redo all of this.
18:58
And and she was able to provide a little bit of guidance there.
19:01
Ironically, in the Lions Club, the, the health inspector for
19:05
the City of shirts was a member. So that actually worked out very
19:09
well that we I had a good connection with the health
19:12
inspector because I did not know much.
19:15
So he was able to come in and hey, you need to be doing this,
19:18
you know, instead of giving us a a hard time.
19:21
So that actually worked. That was that was a good idea.
19:24
So following directions, I don't know, it's just sometimes it's
19:28
just easier. So again, I'm going to highlight
19:30
why I love the beginning part of the story where I know it was
19:33
really hard for you guys because so many people discount their
19:37
own abilities that say I can't do that.
19:39
I don't have the experience, I don't know what I'm doing.
19:41
And again, like experience would have been incredibly helpful in
19:45
these early days, but don't let that stop you if you've got a
19:48
dream, if you're heading in a direction because there are way
19:51
there. You know this book, so I just
19:53
found it's called Growing Pizza, How to Plant the Seeds to a
19:56
Successful Pizzeria by Michael Shepard.
20:00
So they're all kinds of resources, whether they're books
20:02
or blogs or YouTube videos to watch.
20:05
And I love what you did and just sort of going out in the
20:08
community and was like, I don't know what the Lions Club is or
20:10
the Chamber of Commerce, but I'm going to go find them.
20:13
And and then you just sort of raised your hand and you talk to
20:15
people and you ask questions and you know, who can help me?
20:19
So at what point in this trajectory?
20:23
Did you feel like you can kind of breathe a little bit where
20:26
there was actually some positive cash flow coming in?
20:29
I'd say we started in March of 14.
20:32
I I don't think we got there till really of August of 16.
20:37
OK, that's a long time when you've got 2 little kids at
20:40
home. Oh yeah, it was, it was, it was
20:43
a long while. We, we didn't get to a point.
20:46
I don't think we got to take a day off until October, November
20:50
of 2015 and we're seven days a week business.
20:54
So like being able to hire somebody, train somebody,
20:59
learning all of that from a scratch.
21:01
What's a labor law? How do you pay sales tax?
21:03
I mean, there's a lot of, there's a lot of things, little
21:06
things that take time. So in 2016 we got to, we did it
21:13
like a a retreat. We'd gotten some business advice
21:17
and stuff like that. And we're like, oh, we need to
21:18
go do a business retreat, kind of do some planning.
21:20
Like, OK, what is the most annoying thing in our industry?
21:23
OK, what's training people how to make pizza and how to take an
21:25
order? Like we're hiring people, they
21:28
leave hire, you know, constantly.
21:30
We've probably had, I don't know, 12115 hundred employees in
21:34
the last 10 years go through the business.
21:36
So I mean, we have it's restaurant, it's a lot hire a
21:41
lot of 15/16/17 year olds. So we did that and my wife,
21:48
she's got a very good obsessive personality.
21:50
And so she would go at 56 AM and record the videos on how to, you
21:56
know, take an order, how to do stuff.
21:58
And when she was doing that, she'd get, you know, once we did
22:02
that, we systematized it. We got a taste for the systems
22:05
and we're like, oh, OK, so if I can systematize this, then I
22:08
don't have to put as much effort into the next time because it's
22:11
here's a go watch this video. And they were YouTube videos.
22:15
I mean, our, I don't know if it's still listed or not, but
22:18
our how to stretch pizza video, I think is one of the highest
22:22
views on our YouTube channel for the, for the company.
22:25
And I think at one point was like top five in YouTube when
22:29
you type in how to stretch dough for pizza.
22:32
Publicly listed YouTube videos you weren't keeping with
22:35
private. Well, they had removed the
22:37
private listing or whatever, YouTube made a change and it
22:40
went public. And then that one did well,
22:42
'cause we, you know, when you're training people, OK, watch this
22:45
two or three times until you get, and it's terribly shot.
22:49
Like the video quality is not good.
22:51
The, I don't even remember. It was probably one of the early
22:54
iPhones that we shot that video with.
22:57
Like it was just, you know, we didn't know anything about
22:58
lighting, sound, but we tried. The content was there, people
23:03
could, you know, piece together what you were doing and you
23:05
know, it was good instructions. So you talk about, you know,
23:09
you, you hire a lot of young people.
23:11
There's a lot of turnover. What in the, you know, past 10
23:16
plus years, you guys have been open.
23:17
What have you learned to help improve that process, whether
23:21
it's from a hiring perspective or a retention standpoint?
23:25
Hiring, The key is to hire an HR department and, and get that
23:31
going. We've systematized everything
23:33
like there's either a training checklist, playbook, video
23:36
combination for every, almost every task that I can think of
23:40
in the business, from how to wash dishes to what is a bell
23:45
pepper and why you shouldn't touch the seeds and then touch
23:47
your eyes. Like there's a lot of things
23:50
that we put into those systems for getting people our industry.
23:53
I pretty much accepted the fact that we have high turnover in in
23:57
the industry. It is very normal.
24:01
We've got some key people. I think our longest lady we
24:05
have, she's been with us nine years, almost 10 years of that
24:10
time. So I mean, you can get people
24:12
that last a long time, but when you focus and pizza, you have
24:16
the industry and then you have pizza.
24:18
Pizza is at the, you know, a lot of people.
24:21
And this is the way I think about the business and way I
24:23
tell people, managers when they're hiring and stuff like
24:25
that. A lot of people will say I had
24:27
my first job in pizza. Like was your first job in
24:30
pizza? No Wendy's.
24:33
Wendy's. OK, but it was fast food, right?
24:35
It was it was a restaurant. So, so many people.
24:38
First job was in pizza, 16 years old running deliveries.
24:42
I hear that story a lot. They shouldn't be running
24:44
deliveries at 16 now you can't. You have to be 18 with two years
24:49
driving experience. And they're so hard to find
24:51
these days. It's almost a Unicorn.
24:53
But they're either either think of that time very fondly and
24:58
still make pizza at home, or they hated that time and it was
25:01
the worst of their, you know, experience and then they moved
25:04
on. So I see it as like, OK, we want
25:06
to make sure that we set up things well and have we want to
25:11
be on that good experience, like, you know, where they want
25:13
to come back and, you know, work at the summer during college or
25:17
something like that. And we've had a lot of that.
25:20
So what is it about touching the seeds of bell Peppers and
25:24
touching your eyes? This is the thing I don't know.
25:27
Oh, you don't know. Oh, so because there's capsaicin
25:29
is on the seeds in the bell pepper?
25:31
Even if bell pepper has enough capsaicin to to make it irritate
25:35
your. Eyes.
25:35
If you touch your eye, it will burn.
25:37
It's not as bad as a jalapeno or habanero, but it there's still
25:41
enough in a bell pepper that it will burn.
25:43
I have made that mistake before with the habanero and it was
25:46
brutal for many hours. Yeah, I didn't realize that bell
25:49
pepper could have the same effect.
25:52
It's lighter, it's lighter, but it is there.
25:54
Sometimes people, you know, talking to a 16 year old boy and
25:57
you're like, hey, man, don't do that.
25:59
Oh, you know, whatever, whatever.
26:01
I'm like, yeah, just hey, touch that, touch your eye.
26:04
Let me know how it goes. And there's buddies over there
26:07
like don't do it. Don't.
26:10
Learn from my mistakes. So at what point?
26:13
Did it on accident. That's how I learned, you know?
26:15
Yeah, yeah. Some of the most painful lessons
26:18
happened that way. So Matt, at what point did you
26:21
feel like things are going well enough that you were interested
26:24
in opening a second location? That took us till 2018, I think
26:30
we started in 2017. But you know, you go get a build
26:34
out quote. You got one location doing all
26:38
right finally. And you're like, OK, I want to
26:41
go take a class. So we went and took some
26:43
classes. I think that year 2017, maybe
26:47
2018, there's a guy named Pizza man Dan who is running a class
26:51
on how to get to 3 units and being able to hire a, a unit
26:56
manager for that because that's ultimately where you go.
26:59
And he says the number one pitfall in the industry is that
27:02
second store, because you, you go from being in one store 8090
27:10
hours a week, the whole time it's open to now you got to
27:13
split time, but you can still kind of be in both places, but
27:17
you've got to pull back. And if you don't learn that
27:20
skill set or you put the second location too far away to where
27:24
you can't manage it, or it's too big or the expenses are too, too
27:28
much, it'll, it'll sink your first store and you'll be out of
27:31
business. And so I was like, OK, I got to
27:33
find I went to look at a build out, like how to go build out an
27:37
empty shell space. I think the estimates and I wish
27:40
I'd have done it because now it seems cheap.
27:43
The estimate I think it was like 520,000 for like 3200 square
27:49
feet, like a big it would have been nice end cap corner, a
27:53
beautiful looking space. It seemed like a good good part
27:56
of town. Like, you know, but I don't
27:58
really know. You know, there's things you
28:00
learn and experience on where to put a location, where not to.
28:03
I saw that price tag, how much the payment would be.
28:06
And I was like, this is going to sink.
28:07
This could sink us if we screw this up.
28:10
And do we really want to risk, you know, we moved states, we
28:14
moved everything. Do we want to risk that or not?
28:18
And we just had our daughter in 2017.
28:20
So we're three kids, have an infant.
28:23
Yeah, that's not a good idea. And we ended up going, we're
28:26
literally around the corner as our second store got a message
28:30
in 2018, hey, I'm selling my pizzeria.
28:32
You want to buy it on, on Facebook?
28:35
And I'm like, well, how much is the rent?
28:37
How much is, you know, you know, how big is it?
28:40
It's 800 square feet, 1700 a month in rent.
28:43
I'm like less than a mortgage. I'm in my wife's like, this is
28:47
not a good idea. We shouldn't do this, blah,
28:49
blah, blah. And my second son was like,
28:52
yeah, we got to do it, let's do it.
28:55
How old was your second son? At that time, let's see 18, he
28:59
would have been 5 live in five. So he's on the the board of
29:05
directors there. He gets a vote in this process.
29:07
Yeah, you know, apparently, yeah.
29:09
He's very, very much like Mama, so, you know, anyway, so yeah,
29:14
he was, he was like, let's do it, let's do it.
29:16
I'm like, I think it's a good idea.
29:17
It's low risk. What's the worst case, 1700 a
29:19
month. I mean, that's an office space
29:21
with an oven I get to play with. Like worst case it's a it's a
29:25
pizza lab. In my opinion, it's still one of
29:28
the most profitable stores we have so.
29:30
So obviously you move forward with it.
29:32
What was your wife sensing that she thought there was this was a
29:36
bad idea if there? Was there was there was issues I
29:39
think we bought it for gosh, I think it was 24,000 dollars,
29:43
$25,000. I think we paid cash and then we
29:47
got into it the first day we opened so and bought it August
29:50
1st is when we took over opened it August 18th of 2018 and it
29:57
was 101 in the kitchen in the whole building.
29:59
Couldn't figure out why and then discovered that the AC and it
30:04
was designed for the insurance agency that was in that space
30:07
before and not for pizza ovens. And so you know when you, when
30:12
you're pumping 500°, I mean it's 90,000 Btus an hour into a space
30:19
and you don't have the right AC It's it's not good.
30:21
So that first month and 1/2, it was 100° to try and work in
30:25
there with an infant. We had an infant with us, just
30:31
difficult. And so anyway we survived that.
30:38
I'm like, OK, I got to get somebody cheap.
30:40
Hey, do you know anybody that does AC that can do this low
30:43
price because I didn't plan for this.
30:46
We ended up putting like $75,000 into it.
30:48
Had to put new AC unit, more refrigeration.
30:52
The refrigeration died obviously in 100° heat.
30:55
It's not designed for that. So you know, you survived, you
30:58
did it. But we, we left the big store to
31:01
go work in the little store all the time.
31:03
And so you end up with challenges.
31:05
It took us another three years to go to our third store.
31:10
OK, so you had been looking at another location to do a new
31:14
build out, but in the meantime you get this Facebook message
31:17
says, hey, you want to buy my business real cheap And so you
31:19
guys went that direction instead.
31:21
So you had the two, it took you three years before you were
31:26
ready to open that third. Why?
31:31
Why so long? Was it just it took that long to
31:33
kind of figure out how to run a second operation?
31:37
Yeah. And to commit to getting debt
31:39
and and that expense that it was, you know, it wasn't super
31:45
easy to get over that. And that business that that
31:50
second location did not really do well until COVID.
31:54
COVID was great for that business.
31:56
Why? And in 2021 we had Snowmageddon
32:01
and that was great for that location also.
32:05
Why did COVID flip a switch for that business?
32:09
Because pick up pizza, we were one of the only things open.
32:12
It was close that's in a neighborhood versus our first
32:15
locations got a lot of businesses around.
32:17
It's good for lunch. So it, it took people being home
32:22
for a few months to help it get going.
32:26
And then so I guess it was four years actually for our next
32:31
location. But so, and then Snowmageddon
32:33
happened in 21, which is because San Antonio was not prepared for
32:37
snow in any way, shape or form. They were using Rd. graders as
32:41
snow plows. We got, I think, I don't know, 3
32:45
inches of snow and, you know, lost power.
32:49
The road shut down, the whole city shut down really.
32:52
But that was our only store that I could get open and nothing
32:56
else was open in that whole neighborhood.
32:59
So everybody came. We sold out of product 3
33:01
consecutive days and then it's been rolling ever since then.
33:06
So how many locations today we're recording this the
33:09
beginning of 2026? We have 7 right now so we added.
33:15
I tested a ghost kitchen in 21 that did not work well.
33:20
I closed that in 22, but we had started building a a restaurant
33:28
in 21. We got open January, I think
33:31
January 5th of 22 that opened in New Braunfels.
33:37
That was our third store. I did a build out, had a little
33:39
bit of a loan on that one. Still pretty low cost.
33:42
And then I was like, OK, I'm closing this ghost kitchen.
33:44
I've got an oven mixer. I need to go find a space to go
33:49
put that in. So hey told the broker hey go
33:51
find me a space. He came back with three options
33:56
and I said yes to all three, which was a dumb idea.
33:59
Oh. Boy.
34:00
So in 22, so we opened that one in New Braunfels.
34:04
It was profitable from day one. And then we're like, OK, I got
34:08
to find this other location. And so I did that.
34:11
I found one and then I talked to this other landlord.
34:14
He's like, oh, I've got this space over here.
34:16
And I talked to this other landlord and I've got this space
34:18
over here. So we went to six locations from
34:24
three in January, and by June I opened two in the first week of
34:29
June that year. That was not a good idea.
34:31
OK, I want to come back to that, but stick a pin in it for now.
34:36
You said that you had tried a ghost kitchen and it didn't
34:39
work. Ghost kitchens were the rage for
34:41
a little while and now I feel like they've gone away.
34:44
Why? What happened?
34:46
Expenses are too high. So the ghost kitchen, the way
34:49
they work is you're trying to rely on 3rd party delivery,
34:52
right? The third party delivery rips
34:54
off restaurants to to no, no small extent, I don't know if
34:58
you're familiar with it, but they charge the restaurant
35:01
2030%. Usually 30% is there what they
35:05
take from the restaurant and then they charge the customer on
35:07
top of that. So whatever you're paying a
35:09
DoorDash is likely 50% higher than what you could get by just
35:13
walking into a restaurant. And so you've got those fees
35:18
then with a ghost kitchen. And then plus DoorDash charges
35:21
you for marketing. So like if you are in the top
35:24
placements on search there you have a marketing campaign going
35:28
on that is an additional cost in addition to that 30%.
35:31
So it can be 3040% to sell food. Wow.
35:35
Which our gross profit isn't that high, let alone net profit.
35:38
So it's just trying to bump the top line in hopes that the the
35:43
bottom line sticks around. And so that's the problem with
35:48
DoorDash. On top of that, the ghost
35:50
kitchen was OK. Here's your rental rate for your
35:53
kitchen and I don't remember what it was a few $1000.
35:57
It seemed low compared to like a rent of a big space.
36:01
So you know, $3000. But we have a guy that's at the
36:05
front counter all the time to pick up your food and manage the
36:08
DoorDash drivers so you don't have to.
36:11
And so there's a service fee utility.
36:13
It ended up being like $7000 a month, which is, I mean, that's
36:19
a lot. And then we were only able to do
36:21
1000 to $1500 a week in sales through DoorDash, which has the,
36:25
I mean, it was just a losing proposition.
36:28
And but I was trying to be downtown San Antonio, trying to
36:30
be, you know, available to huge parts of the market because
36:34
DoorDash delivers far, they take the food too far.
36:38
And it was not. It didn't work.
36:40
You know, I've talked with a lot of restaurant owners and coming
36:43
out of COVID, people's dining habits have changed, right?
36:47
They got used to doing take out. And so things have not fully
36:52
returned back to quote UN quote normal where you've got a lot of
36:56
people coming in. There's now a bigger portion of
36:59
the business that is take out or these third party delivery
37:04
services and they all complain about the margin that like a
37:09
DoorDash or an Uber Eats takes. But what's the solution here?
37:14
Like you feel like you could you kind of have to play because
37:18
they've got so much traffic coming through their apps.
37:22
How do you say no to them? It's it's very difficult so and
37:26
you can't even do first party delivery either.
37:28
So you have in the industry, there's three PD, which is third
37:32
party delivery and there's FPD, which is first party delivery,
37:36
Domino's, Papa John's, they're all supposed to be first party
37:39
delivery. That's where they deliver from
37:42
the store. There's no third party driver,
37:44
no DoorDash, nothing like that. They want you to order on their
37:46
app, right? So I think in about, I think it
37:52
was really 2020 that accelerated this.
37:55
But the third party companies now the schedule is you can work
38:00
whenever you want to. You don't have to go work inside
38:03
the building, go make a pizza, go clean the dishes, go do
38:06
anything. So people would rather just do
38:09
the third party delivery. And so in 2020-2021 was
38:14
especially bad in 22 for hiring in our industry because people
38:17
were still getting COVID payments, you know,
38:20
unemployment, whatever it was, it went for two years.
38:22
So that spiked labor. We pay significantly more and I
38:27
can't get drivers. So if I can't get drivers, I
38:30
have to use third party and we use them as a fulfillment
38:33
service even like it's our app but we're sending it via third
38:37
party because I can't hire drivers.
38:40
Then the COVID also killed the insurance.
38:43
So my delivery insurance went from around 8 to $10,000 a year
38:48
for first party delivery to 60 to 80,000.
38:52
Oh my gosh, that's insane. Yes, so that's between car
38:57
repairs, the lawyer billboards, thank you.
38:59
They're so expensive. So I mean, how many pizzas do I
39:03
got to sell to, to make $80,000 payment on insurance for a
39:08
driver to go? So there's your delivery fee.
39:12
And so then it becomes economically it makes it makes
39:16
sense to do the third party delivery at the fixed price.
39:20
So we can fulfill with say DoorDash or Uber for a fixed
39:24
7875650, some of them. And so they'll call a driver, we
39:29
pay 650 and it just goes that. And so we send it, we fulfill
39:36
via that instead of going through first party delivery
39:39
anymore. Hang on, Matt, I want to come, I
39:42
want to go back because I'm trying to understand, help me
39:44
wrap my head around how the cost of the insurance etcetera went
39:50
10X like what happened? What?
39:53
Where are these big cost? Increases.
39:55
I don't know what happened in the background of insurance, but
39:59
I think like half of the companies dropped out of the
40:03
market for doing hired. It's called hired not owned
40:07
policy because I got my drivers using their cars.
40:10
Domino's has been doing it since the 80s.
40:14
But hired not owned policy, half the companies decided to stop
40:19
riding the policy and the ones that stayed in the business, I
40:22
mean no competition. You're going to raise prices and
40:26
then you have extra costs, so. You're not only does your cost
40:30
go up, but you have no competition.
40:32
So then your margin went in my that's what I'm thinking
40:36
happened. I don't, I don't know but.
40:39
Well, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but there's part of me
40:41
that wonders if DoorDash and Uber Eats got in bed with some
40:45
of the insurance companies there to help put squeeze.
40:49
I would believe it. You know what they just did with
40:51
DoorDash and Yelp? No.
40:54
So here's here's how they screwed the consumer this way.
40:57
So Apple map. So you have Google and apple map
41:01
are the main maps you use on your phone.
41:03
You do a lot of searching. Hey, I want to go to the nearest
41:05
pizza place near me. Let me pull it up on my map.
41:08
Whatever I use Apple map did a deal where they show Yelp
41:13
reviews, which we all know how accurate Yelp is.
41:16
There's no, no Karen is on Yelp complaining about anything.
41:19
It's, it's very 100% accurate. And in the industry we don't
41:24
really like that company they've called us for to spend money on
41:27
ads in order to be ranked higher for years and we have to ignore
41:32
them, dodge them, etcetera. And it's impossible to get bad
41:37
fake reviews off. It's very difficult.
41:40
So Apple goes to Yelp and then DoorDash just did a deal with
41:45
Yelp and I don't know if it went through or not, but it was going
41:49
to be where DoorDash is recommended by Yelp for delivery
41:53
service and their ordering platform.
41:57
See what happened. So instead of going to
41:58
matangas.com over here, you're now going to DoorDash
42:03
Marketplace, which is marked up as I talked about, up to 50%
42:07
marked up. So moral of the story for those
42:11
folks listening, patronize your local restaurants and pizza
42:16
establishments directly. Go to their website to order and
42:20
whenever possible, just drive by and go pick it up yourself.
42:24
You're going to help them stay in business.
42:27
So let's go back because you you talked about you open basically
42:31
three locations right around the same time.
42:34
What was that period like for you?
42:36
Oh, that was, that was nuts. By the way, I think DoorDash, I,
42:40
I think drones is the only way out of the third party delivery
42:44
because Gen. Z decided to not get driver's
42:48
licenses. And so the pool of drivers from
42:52
a millennial at, you know, when we were 18 to 24 versus Gen.
42:56
Z is now 18 to 24. That pool of drivers is less
43:01
than half because they can get driven around with Uber and
43:05
other things. So I think it's going to take
43:06
drone delivery to mess with that.
43:10
Adding three stores in in in a four week span was a very bad
43:14
idea. We had hired some people from
43:17
Domino's that were supposedly like district manager, trainer
43:22
certified. They could help us expand.
43:24
They were able to recruit people better than we were able to
43:26
recruit to get those stores open.
43:29
And so I had them going to stores.
43:31
I was going all over San Antonio.
43:33
Our stores at that time were I think 35 miles and, and one way
43:40
from New Braunfels to to the West side of San Antonio.
43:44
And so tons of traffic, just a ton of driving, you know, get up
43:50
early and come back after close at midnight or 1:00 AM.
43:54
So, and we close at 9:00. So it's a, it was a long time, a
43:58
lot of driving. We hired them.
44:00
They did not match the same quality standards that we had.
44:04
And so, and we lost some of the culture we'd built with the two
44:07
stores. And so it was, you've mentioned
44:12
like, you know, not valuing yourself enough, not valuing
44:15
your opinions and, and your skill set enough.
44:18
I think that was the central mistake we made was oh, these
44:22
people, they come from a solid franchise, the number one
44:25
franchise. They should be able to help us
44:27
with systems recruiting. They're they're going to have
44:29
the right obsession with quality.
44:31
It was in fact the opposite. So that really it really hurt
44:36
us, set us back. It took us two years.
44:38
We didn't add another store until 24, so 23 we just added a
44:44
food truck and that was really just to be able to go to events
44:47
and do things. So I mean, it was it was a mess.
44:49
We're, we spent a lot of the last two years rebuilding the
44:54
culture that we needed and the way we needed the focus,
44:57
obsession with quality Texas hospitality, got to be able to
45:01
talk to a guest. So it, it was, it was not fun.
45:05
And we decided to have a kid in 2022.
45:07
Just, you know. Of course you did 'cause you
45:09
just. I I was trying to get one kid
45:11
once that ratio died at 4:00. So, you know, I tried.
45:16
My wife wasn't willing to continue that stressful trend.
45:19
Yeah. So here we are, beginning in
45:22
2026. What do your future plans look
45:24
like? I'm looking at three stores this
45:27
year if I can the. Hang on a second Matt, you just
45:32
told me opening 3 stores together said four years ago was
45:36
the worst experiences of your life.
45:38
Why repeat it? I guess I'm really slow at
45:41
learning. I'm not going to open them in
45:44
the same month. I'm going to open one 1/4.
45:47
OK. Maybe 20 and if I don't get to 3
45:50
and I only do 2, then I'm OK. This last year in 25 we opened
45:55
no stores. We actually closed 2 which were
45:59
not performing well that we should not have opened.
46:02
One of them was the one we opened last in 2022.
46:05
One of them was when we opened in 24.
46:07
Was supposed to be a kitchen and a bar.
46:10
Closing two stores. Our sales actually went up 20%
46:13
after we closed the distractions.
46:15
Wow, why? That combination of things
46:19
really, but Dave Portnoy came out to one of our stores that
46:22
was very, very helpful. So shout out to him when he
46:26
comes in. It makes a difference.
46:28
People follow follow his videos and stuff like that and then we.
46:32
Just Dave Portnoy from Barstool. Barstool.
46:36
Yeah, he has. I don't know if you're familiar.
46:38
He does One Bite is like a podcast he does just rating
46:43
cheese pizzas around the country.
46:45
He's very. Specific.
46:47
He's very particular. We we rated a 7.1 and I think
46:52
that was the dough was not good that day.
46:54
I was not happy with the dough, but I wasn't there.
46:56
My wife was there, but he gave us a 7.1, which at the time in
47:01
Texas, that was considered a very high score.
47:03
So. OK.
47:06
And so how did you get Dave and Dave Portnoy to come in?
47:09
He was here for the final four. We did not invite him.
47:12
You know, you don't get to invite him.
47:13
He he chooses, he uses his app, I think to look at pizza places.
47:18
He usually doesn't go to chains either.
47:20
We have, you know, 7 locations so.
47:25
So and so that really helped to pour fuel in the fire that put
47:29
you guys on the map. Distraction the, the
47:32
underperforming stores, you know, there's going to be labor
47:34
issues, there's going to be employees having problems with
47:37
each other. There's going to be, you know,
47:39
out of product. This issue, that issue, when you
47:41
get rid of the underperforming ones and just cut your losses,
47:46
which was very painful for me. I didn't want to accept defeat.
47:49
You know, I'm like, it'll work, It'll work in six months.
47:51
Oh, it'll work. You know, just just like that,
47:54
that that proverb, the, the tree will bear fruit next year.
47:57
Let me, let me fertilize it some more.
48:00
Cut it down. How did you eventually get to
48:03
that point in making that decision?
48:05
Because any business owner that's been there, you put your
48:08
blood, sweat, tears and money into something.
48:12
And, and, and for people who haven't done this, they feel,
48:15
they think you're being dramatic, but it feels like a
48:17
child. It feels like your offspring.
48:20
And so shutting it down there's there's like a mourning process
48:25
that takes place. It's really, really hard.
48:28
How did you get to that point? What helped you get through it
48:30
afterwards? I think once you shut down the
48:34
first one, you, you know how to process the emotions.
48:37
So the second one wasn't so bad, but the one that we, we closed,
48:42
it was next to a Barber shop. And it they had fired a Barber
48:46
and he got drunk or on drugs or something and came and shot up
48:50
their Barber shop next door and put bullets into our store.
48:55
And we just at the that finally pushed me over like, Hey, you've
48:59
got a, you put a Ferrari dealership into the wrong
49:03
neighborhood. You are not going to sell
49:04
anything over here. You need to, you need to get
49:06
out. And so I mean, it took literally
49:10
getting shot at, I guess to let that one go.
49:13
And then the second one was like, OK, I know what happens
49:16
when I relieve the distraction. So I, I know we can go forward.
49:21
It's going to suck, but I don't know.
49:23
So that's my, was my process. And I closed the ghost kitchen
49:27
before also, but that one was a that one was easier because that
49:31
was just a financial drain every single month.
49:34
Yeah. Well, and, you know, listeners
49:36
of the show and Matt, you're aware, you know, my favorite
49:39
question to ask is about a big, serious challenge you've
49:42
overcome and how you've gotten through it.
49:44
I wonder if this is the topic that you would choose to dive
49:48
into, or if there's something else that comes to mind.
49:51
No, I think that one's, that one's up there.
49:53
That was probably the hardest thing we've ever done is, you
49:56
know, we'd hired those Domino's people to help us out.
49:59
They left. This was the hardest one.
50:02
The hardest thing was in 2022 fall, they left to go open their
50:08
own franchise, their own store, and they tried to take as many
50:12
of our employees as possible to the point of shutting down
50:15
stores. And so it was a bit vindictive I
50:20
think on their part. And so the one store lost all of
50:25
its management team and almost everybody else that worked
50:28
there. I think we were left with two
50:29
people. And so I went back to seven days
50:33
a week. I lived there for the next two
50:34
months basically to keep that store alive.
50:37
And it really, you know, that pressure of I am not going to
50:42
fail. We did not close that one.
50:44
That one's actually doing really well.
50:45
And that's the one that Dave Portnoy came to.
50:49
So it was a good thing we kept it open.
50:52
That store was a problem, was a problem, was a problem.
50:56
Spent a lot of time at that one keeping it alive.
50:58
Just kind of, you know, kind of gives you that that enemy of
51:02
like, you're not going to punch me in the face and get to win.
51:06
Like, I know how I'm going to win and it's not going to, it's
51:12
not going to stop us. So that was 22.
51:14
They went, opened a competing franchise, then they didn't get
51:19
along with the franchise and then they built their change the
51:22
name of it to their own brand and they went out of business
51:26
this last year. So I outlasted them.
51:29
Is there a part of you that takes a little bit of
51:31
satisfaction in that? I mean, you can't, not if you're
51:34
a real competitor. You know, they, they, they tried
51:38
to hurt the family a lot. You guys did the.
51:42
Thing that's trying to put my kids out of a house, out of
51:44
food, like no, yeah, that's no. You guys did things the right
51:49
way, the honorable way, Yeah, and and you outlasted them.
51:52
It really stretched you for a period of time, put you in a
51:55
tough place. But here you are today,
51:57
thriving. Yeah, you got to, you got to
51:59
commit and be like, no, we, we, we jumped off the Cliff.
52:02
We're not not going backwards. So there were times you want to
52:06
quit, but not you can't. It gives you a drive, a fire you
52:10
like, no, I'm we're going to be here.
52:11
We're going to grow. So how much of that fire just
52:15
came from, I don't know. Hey, this is my family versus I
52:19
just want to prove them wrong. I want to.
52:22
I want to beat them specifically.
52:25
I think it sounds good to say the family and that's some
52:28
motivation, but I think the I'm going to outlast them is the
52:33
really where it goes. I, I think if we're, you know,
52:36
if we're honest, that's, that's where it is, you know, and then
52:40
once they did that this year, it's like, OK, what's my next
52:43
fire? What is your next fire?
52:46
You know what's the? What's lighting the thing in
52:48
your belly today? It's not as specific when you
52:54
have that, that face. So it, it's, it's something
52:58
different. It's like, OK, I, I know I need
53:00
to grow. It's you know, some of the other
53:02
pizza chains. It's like how am I going to
53:04
compete? So we were at PMQ, which is
53:09
another competing magazine with the pizza today.
53:12
Those are the 2 industry magazines.
53:15
We are PMQ event and Marco's CEO.
53:19
You familiar with Marco's pizza? Pretty fast growing, have decent
53:23
food. CEO got up there.
53:27
It's a room 100 pizza, you know, 150 whatever, pizza guys, pizza
53:32
owners, all of us have multiple locations.
53:34
We're growing. And he said if you don't have a
53:37
location in your neighborhood soon from Marco's, if you don't
53:40
have a location already, you will soon.
53:42
We're coming to for your town. Like that was the Marco CEO and
53:48
one, I admire that he's going to get up there and say that and
53:51
two, it's like, OK, buddy, where's your headquarters?
53:55
Because I'm coming to your town too.
54:00
It's that competition. I mean in business you there,
54:02
there has to be a competitive spirit.
54:04
Someone's working 24 hours a day to take it all away from you.
54:07
If you're not paranoid, you're not going to stay in business.
54:10
And people who aren't in business, if you just have a job
54:14
and you're sheltered from this, you don't understand, you don't
54:17
feel it. So you've got a competitive
54:20
spirit, you are willing to roll up your sleeves and work hard.
54:23
All that's clear. Your wife has a podcast.
54:28
What's the name of it? She has making dosho.
54:31
Making dosho. But this what we're doing right
54:35
here, this interview today, not really traditionally your thing,
54:38
this puts you a little bit outside your comfort zone.
54:40
Yeah. Yeah, 100%.
54:41
She's the one that has been doing all the videos talking.
54:44
I'll, I'll do the random funny pizza videos that that we turn
54:47
into ads like, you know, wearing a Santa suit in July in Texas.
54:51
That that's me, you know? So why not this today?
54:54
Why? Why are you here with me today?
54:57
I've committed in this year's year of, of bold being bold for
55:01
me and going and do those kinds of things.
55:03
And so it's not normally where I am.
55:05
And I'm like, I, I've got to go, got to go do something.
55:08
So I appreciate you having me on as the the first one this year.
55:12
So you know it, that means a lot.
55:15
But yeah, I I want to be way bolder in the industry in with
55:20
the team, with customers. You know, if that Marcos guys
55:23
come in building locations here, I got to be boldly looking for
55:27
locations. So yes, I'm going to open 3,
55:29
just not at the same time in in five weeks.
55:32
I love it. That's that's not a good idea.
55:34
Well, and I love this, being bold and putting yourself
55:36
outside your comfort zone, right?
55:38
That's where the growth really happens for people.
55:42
Yeah, I think, you know, a lot of people make New Year's
55:44
resolutions. It's better to to make a, a
55:48
vision board and this is where I'm going to be and this is who
55:51
I'm going to be, what I'm going to look like.
55:52
And you know, I want to be that different person, but I am that.
55:56
Now how do I How do I carve away that statue?
56:03
Matt, I've just got one more question for you today.
56:05
But before I ask it, I want to do 3 quick things.
56:08
First of all, anybody listening, you gotta check out Matengas and
56:12
they've got a great website that has online ordering.
56:14
You can see all the locations there.
56:16
It's matengas.com, MATTENGASMATTEN,
56:23
g.as.com@tengas.com. Also as a reminder, if you want
56:27
to get more restaurant employees access to therapist doctors and
56:30
prescription meds that, as paradoxical as it seems,
56:34
actually increases company's net profits, reach out to us at Add
56:37
back benefits.com. Finally, if you're enjoying the
56:41
show, a quick comment or review on your favorite podcast app
56:45
goes a long way towards helping others discover the podcast.
56:49
So thank you in advance for that.
56:51
So Matt, last question for you. A year from now, you and I
56:55
reconnect and you were celebrating something big.
56:58
What is that specific big thing you hope to be celebrating a
57:02
year from today? That big thing a year from
57:06
today, this is a public commitment.
57:09
I will be known and I as being very boldly speaking truth in
57:16
the industry, which is like third party delivery.
57:20
A lot of people don't want to talk directly about what it is.
57:23
I'll talk about it. I got no problems with that.
57:27
So hope I'm going to be 50 lbs lighter, which in the pizza
57:31
industry is very difficult to achieve because we have
57:33
unlimited access to pizza and I like it.
57:36
So those two things is going to be the biggest victory and we'll
57:41
have three locations open and operational by January 2027.
57:47
I love that all three of those are big.
57:50
That first one that you talked about boldly speaking in the
57:53
industry. What do you think that looks
57:56
like? So for me, what it looks like,
58:00
we were on that cover of Pizza Pizza Today magazine as Pizzeria
58:07
of the Year in August of this past year, which is pretty cool.
58:13
It's a huge recognition. I'm very grateful to have that.
58:16
But as part of that, they asked us to do the keynote at Pizza
58:21
Expo in Las Vegas. And so I don't know if you've
58:24
been to Pizza Expo or if your listeners have been to Pizza
58:27
Expo. Even if you're not in the
58:28
industry, you should still go once it is like 4 football
58:33
fields full of everything, pizza, cheese, ovens, dough,
58:37
technology, desserts, I mean everything.
58:40
It's really fun experience in Vegas, they have pizza
58:45
competitions going different doughs different, you know, all
58:49
kinds from that to stretch, how fast you can, how big you can.
58:54
And so we're going to be keynote is the second day there, which
58:59
is huge honor. And so you're all invited for
59:01
that, you know, just just because I, I will be there and I
59:05
have to work on preparing for that.
59:07
And so that's that's what I'm talking about is that's kind of
59:11
first opportunity for, for that and it's a little bit of
59:13
pressure and I'm looking forward to it.
59:16
That's an. Incredible opportunity.
59:18
Keynote speaker at the industry's premier trade show
59:21
event 100% and the only 11 years and the magazine that you were
59:28
on the cover of Pizzeria of the Year.
59:30
Why do you think you won that award?
59:34
I think there's a lot of factors.
59:39
My wife is a huge part of being on Pizzeria Pizza, pizzeria of
59:43
the year. A lot of our marketing campaigns
59:45
are get a lot of awards. You mentioned the the most
59:49
recent, the Pie award from Pizza today.
59:52
So that is a big part of it. We've always been as an
59:56
engineer, we have a systems mindset.
59:59
We didn't get to talk about that as much today.
1:00:01
But systems is something that we apply with a different
1:00:04
perspective than say a traditional chef or restaurant
1:00:08
industry would. So that's given us a unique
1:00:10
perspective on the industry also.
1:00:14
Tremendous. Matt Stanfield from Mattengo's
1:00:17
Pizzeria and San Antonio, TX, I want to be the first to thank
1:00:20
you for sharing both your time and your story with us today.
1:00:23
I really appreciate you. Thank you so much for having me
1:00:26
on. I I appreciate it and appreciate
1:00:29
you asking all the questions and hosting it.
1:00:31
It means a lot. Thank you.
1:00:33
Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories
1:00:36
podcast. Thanks for learning with us
1:00:37
today.