Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Food Brings Us Together: Meghan McNeil on Building Memorable Restaurant Experiences | Restaurant & Franchises Series

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Food Brings Us Together: Meghan McNeil on Building Memorable Restaurant Experiences | Restaurant & Franchises Series · The Inspired Stories Podcast

• 0:03
  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 Kotaspodi and
• 0:17
  today's guest is Megan McNeil, the General Manager of Maple and
• 0:21
  Ash. Founded in 2015 and based in
• 0:24
  Chicago, they are a modern steakhouse known for high
• 0:28
  quality meats and unique dining experiences.
• 0:31
  Their mission is to create unforgettable moments for
• 0:34
  guests, offering an unparalleled blend of culinary artistry and
• 0:39
  warm hospitality. Under Megan's leadership, Maple
• 0:42
  and Ash has expanded its brand reach and developed bold,
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  innovative menu offerings. Over the past 10 years, Megan
• 0:50
  has played key roles with various high profile restaurant
• 0:54
  concepts, honing her expertise in leadership, menu design, and
• 0:58
  customer satisfaction. She's dedicated to elevating the
• 1:02
  dining experience, ensuring every guest feels like AVIP.
• 1:06
  Her achievements include guiding Maple and Ash through notable
• 1:09
  industry recognitions and spearheading successful
• 1:13
  initiatives that keep patrons coming back for more.
• 1:16
  Megan's passion for food combined with her commitment to
• 1:19
  an elevated service approach, makers stand out in the culinary
• 1:23
  world. Now before we get into all that
• 1:25
  good stuff, today's episode is brought to you by my company,
• 1:28
  Add Back Benefits Agency, where we offer very specific and
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  To find out if your company qualifies, contact us today at
• 1:54
  ADD Back benefitsagency.com. All right now back to our guest
• 1:58
  today, the General Manager of Maple and Ash, Megan McNeil.
• 2:01
  I appreciate you making the time to Share your story today.
• 2:04
  Hi, thanks for having me. All right, so let's go back to,
• 2:08
  I don't know, kind of the genesis like how were you
• 2:11
  attracted into the hospitality industry?
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  What? What drew you in?
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  Yeah, so I'll be perfectly honest.
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  I started off as a Hostess at a small Italian restaurant when I
• 2:21
  was 16. It was my first job.
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  And it that just kind of happened that way.
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  It was close to my high school and that's where we started.
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  And then I spent kind of like the rest of the time trying to
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  get out of the restaurant industry.
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  When I, when I went to college, I wanted to be, I wanted to do
• 2:37
  event planning. So that kind of was in the same
• 2:40
  world. But I, so I went to school for
• 2:43
  communication studies and I worked in restaurants from 16
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  honestly until now. But like I said, I, I spent a
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  lot of time kind of trying to get out of it.
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  I think that at that time in the world, it wasn't really like,
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  you know, people didn't see it as much of A career as it is
• 3:03
  now, especially in Columbus, OH. It just wasn't the same.
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  And so, so, yeah, I was a teller at a bank.
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  I was, I sold wedding dresses. I, I did all kinds of other
• 3:15
  stuff. I worked at a preschool the
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  whole time, was still working in restaurants.
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  So like I said, trying to find my, my niche and find something
• 3:23
  else. And I finally realized like,
• 3:27
  well, this is what I love to do and this is what I'm good at.
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  And I've been doing it for a long time now and in a lot of
• 3:32
  different veins. So.
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  So yeah, I kind of, I fell into restaurant management at at one
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  point and it just kind of stuck. And that was like, you know, my
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  early 20s, so. So it was like a magnet that
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  just kept drawing you back. Yeah, I couldn't, I couldn't get
• 3:49
  away from it. I couldn't get away from it.
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  And and it just kind of kept developing And I, I was working
• 3:56
  at a, a restaurant in Delaware, OH, called Eighteen O 8 American
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  Bistro. I started there when I was like
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  20. I just turned 21.
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  I started working there and I was serving and I was still
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  going to college and then I stayed there for a while and I,
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  and after I graduated, like I said, I had a communication
• 4:14
  degree and my, my boss at that restaurant hooked me up with a
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  wedding planner in the city and I, and I kind of did an
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  internship with her. So I was like trying to find
• 4:25
  that. And then he kept talking to me
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  about like needing an assistant and he was almost like, it was
• 4:31
  almost like a joke, but he's like, I, I really need an
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  assistant. He's the chef and owner, so I
• 4:36
  was like, OK, well, whatever, I'll do that.
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  That sounds that sounds good. Let's try it.
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  So I still I kept serving and I was his assistant for a long
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  time. By the time I left eighteen O 8
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  in Veritas, I had been there for like collectively 8 years, But
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  so his name's Josh Dalton. He owns some restaurants in
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  Columbus and I I honestly a lot of where I, where I'm at to him,
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  he taught me a lot by making me learn a lot myself and like,
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  yeah, figure it out, figure it out.
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  So that job really like kind of solidified how much I love this
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  industry and like why I love it. I got to work with food a lot.
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  He also owned Veritas. So I did a lot of events with
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  Veritas, which was like a small 18 seat restaurant.
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  It was called Veritas Tavern at the time.
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  It was, yeah, like I said, like 18 seats, 5 tables.
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  I forget all the logistics, but it was, yeah, it was very small,
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  but they were doing like big things and they were getting
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  recognition from Columbus being out in Delaware.
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  So, yeah, we just kind of like kept chugging along and we ended
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  up rebranding Veritas and moving it to downtown Columbus.
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  And that was kind of the last big project I worked on with
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  him. But throughout my time,
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  throughout my time there is really kind of where I like
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  learned more about myself, myself and my management style
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  and like what I really love about the industry, which is
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  food and that it brings us all together.
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  And I, I always say this and it still rings true with being at
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  Maple and Ash and being with the, the Maple hospitality group
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  that I've been with for six years now.
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  People are always going to go out to eat, whether it's someone
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  dies, someone graduates, someone gets married, it's Tuesday, like
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  whatever it is, people are coming out and, and we get to be
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  a part of that and we get to meet all these people.
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  And, and I mean, I don't know a lot of people that food isn't a
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  big part of their life. That's just kind of like the
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  circle that I've surrounded myself with.
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  I'm engaged to a chef, like that's just part of my world.
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  But I do, I think that whether it's a huge part of your world
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  like me or whether it's, you know, you're just a regular
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  person that works wherever you work it, it brings you, it
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  brings us all together. And that's kind of, you know,
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  Josh helped me learn that about myself.
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  And so, yeah, that's kind of where I like was like, OK, this
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  is where I'm meant to be. And that kind of just evolved
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  over time. So you said this is where you
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  learned more about yourself. This is also where you learned
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  sort of how to develop your own management style.
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  How would you describe what that is?
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  Yeah, I would describe my management style as firm, but
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  fair. I definitely don't like assert
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  my authority on people hardly ever.
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  But I feel like I treat people with respect and I I lead by
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  example. So I in turn earn respect from
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  them. And yeah, I'm going to, I'm
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  going to, you know, sniff out the if there's something that's
• 7:47
  not right, we're going to get to the bottom of it.
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  But you know, one of the, one of the, one of our pillars at Maple
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  Hospitality Group is fail fast. And I talk about it a lot
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  because it's my favorite one, because the whole point is to
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  like get people to feel empowered to make decisions and,
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  and that, that the company does that for me.
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  And I in turn do that for my for my employees as well.
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  But yeah, I want, I want to give people the, I want to make
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  people feel empowered to make decisions and know that they
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  know what they're talking about. But I also want to hold people
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  accountable. And if you're not, if you're
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  doing something that you're not supposed to be doing, you know,
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  we're going to get there. And I also like to, I like to
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  talk things through with people. I, you know, I still to this day
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  will talk to a manager of like, you know, if they go and deal
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  with the guest recovery situation, I'll be like, tell me
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  about that. Like what happened and how did
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  and how did you work through it? And it's not because I want to
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  check them, it's because I want to learn and I want to know kind
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  of how did that go? And you know, what can, what can
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  I learn from this? What can we do differently?
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  So like I said, firm affair, I definitely try to like be one
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  with my team and, and build people up and, and make people
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  feel empowered to kind of make their own decisions and do their
• 9:08
  own thing and and coaching them along the way.
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  And would you give a lot of credit then to Josh, Josh
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  Dalton, who like, was he, did he sort of teach you these ideals
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  or did you just sort of see these kind of evolve in
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  yourself? I think I kind of saw them
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  evolve in myself. I think I, I've witnessed a lot
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  of, I mean, I've witnessed a lot of leaders and I kind of noticed
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  the things that made me feel good and the things that did not
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  make me feel good. And I also witnessed like when
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  I, when I saw the best result from other humans was like when
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  these, this was the way that they were treated.
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  Transparency is also a huge thing for me or for me, I guess
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  I should say. You know, I just like to like to
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  put it all out there and sometimes I might share too
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  much. But I think that it's important
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  that we're all on the same page and that, you know, I think if
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  we, we treat our staff well and we, you know, level with them
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  and we're, you know, no one's like afraid or anything like
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  that, I think we're going to get the best result and in turn, our
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  guests are going to get the best result.
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  OK, so born and raised in Columbus, got first job, you
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  know, 16 year old is a Hostess. Kept trying to leave the
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  industry, kept getting pulled back in.
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  Finally realized I love this, this is what I want to be doing.
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  How did the opportunity come about to move to Chicago?
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  So I, OK, well, I was going through a divorce and I, I had
• 10:44
  always loved Chicago. I always wanted to live here.
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  And I was kind of like, I think now's the time.
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  That sounds good. And I, I had grown a lot in my
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  role with Josh. I had gone from his assistant to
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  still his assistant, but also basically like general manager
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  of that restaurant for, I don't remember what my title was, but
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  that's essentially what I was doing.
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  And I, I think I just kind of got to the point where I'm like,
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  I have really grown a lot and I think I've kind of done what I
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  can do for right now. And I wanted to try something
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  new. And I, my fiance now, he was a
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  good friend of mine at the time and he already lived in Chicago
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  and he was working at Maple and Ash.
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  And they had just opened the edit concept, which is no longer
• 11:33
  a part of Maple Hospitality group, but it was for, for some
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  time. And they had just opened in like
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  July. And I came for they needed some
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  help. And he was like, I'm going to
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  connect you. And I came for an interview with
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  Danny Grant. And next thing you know, they
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  were offering me a job. I was like, this is unreal.
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  I can't believe this is happening.
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  I was a floor manager position at at a Bucktown and that's and
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  I've been with this company ever since.
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  So, so yeah, that that's kind of how the the jump to Chicago came
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  about. I just kind of took a leap.
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  So how many years then have you been with Maple and ash?
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  Like 6 1/2 I've been with, I've been with Maple and ash a year.
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  Oh, my headphone fell out. I'm sorry.
• 12:16
  I've been with Maple and ash about a year and a half and I
• 12:19
  was, but I've been with the company as a whole for about 6
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  1/2 years, since September of 2018.
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  And. The parent company is known as.
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  What then? It's known as Maple Hospitality
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  Group. Originally when I came on it was
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  what if Syndicate and then there was a a bit of a split a couple
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  years ago and then Maple Hospitality Group is kind of
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  what came out of that. And how many different
• 12:45
  restaurant concepts fall under that umbrella?
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  Currently we have the Maple and Ash brand and we have Monarch
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  and Kasaku in Dallas. Monarch is like an Italian
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  upscale Italian restaurant and Kasaku is a sushi concept that
• 13:02
  is like right above it. It's like a swanky cocktail bar
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  and and sushi concept. And then we have Maple and Ash.
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  So we have a Maple and Ash in Chicago, we have one in
• 13:12
  Scottsdale, and there's one opening up next month basically
• 13:16
  in Miami. Are you involved with any of
• 13:19
  those other locations or your focus is right there in Chicago?
• 13:23
  Currently, my focus is Chicago. We're actually I'm a part of our
• 13:27
  advanced operations team, we call it advanced Maple OPS.
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  So I am a part of the conversations with the other
• 13:35
  restaurants and we're kind of currently working on a new role
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  for myself. So I will be kind of moving away
• 13:41
  from just the Chicago market and will be expanding a bit to be
• 13:45
  company wide. But my home is definitely here
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  and I won't be going anywhere as far as Maple Chicago goes.
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  That will definitely always be my home base.
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  OK, so tell us about the Maple and ash concept.
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  I've never been there before. Many of our listeners haven't
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  been. What can they expect from the
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  ambiance to the food that the entire experience?
• 14:06
  Yeah, so we we definitely pride ourselves on hospitality and
• 14:13
  creating amazing guest experiences.
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  We really want to make people feel connected to us and great
• 14:21
  relationships are being built. We also the environment itself
• 14:26
  is very like sexy and cool. We cook almost everything over
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  our wood fired hearth and when you walk into the restaurant,
• 14:34
  you'll initially the the one in Chicago.
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  You'll like initially walk through the bar when you're
• 14:40
  being led to your table. And we try to take everyone past
• 14:44
  our open kitchen and the hearth is the center of that.
• 14:47
  It's very cool. It's obviously got flames going
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  and the kitchen's back there working hard.
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  So that's a great thing to walk people by.
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  And then we like to take as many people as possible through our
• 14:58
  atrium, which is kind of the focal point of the restaurant.
• 15:03
  And it's, you know, it's definitely a desired place to
• 15:07
  sit. Everywhere is amazing.
• 15:08
  But that is definitely like our most desired place to sit.
• 15:12
  When you sit down, you're greeted with a welcome cocktail.
• 15:15
  We call it our amooze booze. And then you get a a nice little
• 15:20
  snack. Currently that snack is house
• 15:22
  made chips and a French onion dip with caviar.
• 15:27
  So it's like a it's like a fun play on a classic, just like you
• 15:31
  would be receiving when you enter your friend's home, we
• 15:35
  like to greet you with with a little treat and to get the
• 15:39
  party started. So, so yeah, that kind of can
• 15:43
  tell you what, what our our goal is and that's to give people a
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  really awesome experience with amazing ingredients, amazing
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  food, and make you feel like we're inviting you into our
• 15:54
  home. That's really, that's really the
• 15:57
  the main, our main goal is for you to feel super comfortable.
• 16:01
  So I'm looking at your website here and trying to get an
• 16:05
  understanding of the vibe. I get the sense as this is a
• 16:07
  place where you're kind of dressing up a little bit.
• 16:10
  This is a nice night out, kind of an.
• 16:12
  Experience. Yeah, absolutely.
• 16:14
  And I think a lot of it's a great place for celebrations.
• 16:17
  We do a, we do like a customized happy birthday menu, happy
• 16:23
  anniversary menu. They're kind of all printed out.
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  We do them custom with names and that's something that people can
• 16:29
  like request upon when they make their reservation.
• 16:32
  They can kind of put that in there.
• 16:34
  So it's definitely big for celebrations.
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  We do have a lot of regulars that come in like frequently
• 16:40
  just for like regular nights out.
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  But but yeah, it's, it's absolutely a place where I
• 16:46
  think, you know, people like come to be seen and, and come to
• 16:50
  have fun, but we also try to take the, the like, pressure out
• 16:54
  of that part of it. And again, it's like you're
• 16:56
  meeting up with your friends. You're, you're, you know, we're
• 16:59
  there to say hello to you and make you feel welcome.
• 17:02
  But it's definitely a, it's definitely a, a place where
• 17:06
  you'd want to look your best and, and, you know, come to have
• 17:09
  fun. I looking at this fire roasted
• 17:13
  seafood tower that seems amazing.
• 17:16
  I was going to ask, is that your favorite thing on the menu?
• 17:19
  Actually it is. I know that's probably, of
• 17:21
  course it is, but it's definitely my favorite thing
• 17:24
  next to the Wagyu beef carpaccio, which is insane.
• 17:28
  But the seafood tower is 100% it is it's so unique too, because
• 17:33
  you know, a lot of places have see through towers, but most of
• 17:36
  the time they're cold towers, which is obviously amazing and
• 17:39
  delicious as well. But ours has definitely got a
• 17:43
  little extra love with the the fire roasted elements and the
• 17:46
  chili butter and it's it's it's rich, but it is very good.
• 17:50
  So. Lobster, king crab, Golf shrimp,
• 17:54
  Manila clams. I don't know what Manila clams
• 17:57
  are, but I'm sure that they're even better than regular.
• 17:59
  Clams we. Got roasted oysters, seared
• 18:02
  scallops. Yeah, you're.
• 18:03
  Yeah, it's boxes. It's phenomenal.
• 18:06
  We also do, we call it a pasta back.
• 18:09
  We it's, we serve it with our our Ed gaff menu, which is kind
• 18:13
  of like our plan a tasting menu, but we also it's available upon
• 18:18
  request. And basically when you're like
• 18:20
  almost done with the seafood tower, you have all that
• 18:23
  delicious butter left in in the tower that sits on the table and
• 18:27
  we bring out a pan of pasta house made pasta and we add it
• 18:32
  into that sauce and then we serve it back out.
• 18:34
  So it's kind of like getting every last drop.
• 18:38
  Yeah, it's awesome. The question I want to ask right
• 18:40
  now is what key decisions or actions do you feel like helped
• 18:46
  you secure this role? Listening to your story up to
• 18:50
  this point, I almost get the sense that you feel like beyond
• 18:54
  lucky to be where you are. Yeah, I I definitely don't.
• 19:00
  I think that I do this a lot and I don't want to take away
• 19:03
  anything from myself because I have worked hard and, and I I
• 19:07
  definitely feel deserving of it. But however, I do feel insanely
• 19:12
  lucky. I the getting the opportunity to
• 19:16
  start at ETA and be with, with this these owners and be a part
• 19:21
  of this team was really like, I couldn't have asked for a better
• 19:24
  place to land. It really aligned with myself,
• 19:28
  with my management style, with my personality, just like so
• 19:32
  many things about it felt right. And I have, and I always tell
• 19:37
  people this like when I'm interviewing new managers or
• 19:40
  anyone really, if you like the opportunities with this company
• 19:43
  are there. And if you come in and you work
• 19:47
  hard and you, you know, you are yourself and you, you know, you
• 19:52
  kind of take the bull by the horns, the opportunities will
• 19:54
  come. We're, we're growing and there
• 19:57
  are definitely there are the opportunities are definitely
• 20:01
  there. But yeah, I, I, I came in and I,
• 20:05
  I. Aligned myself with the brand
• 20:08
  and I learned as much as I possibly could and at the time
• 20:11
  that was at a but I've done the same thing when I came to Maple
• 20:15
  and and if I don't know the answer, I asked for help and I
• 20:19
  just kind of I don't know I chug along I, I think that this
• 20:23
  industry is definitely a place where if you are not in it 100%,
• 20:27
  you can't do it It's it you have to be passionate about it.
• 20:31
  You have to love what you're doing.
• 20:32
  It's, it's hard. It's opposite hours of most of
• 20:36
  your, you know of most other people, you know, and you have
• 20:40
  to find a place that feels like home.
• 20:43
  I know that sometimes it's like not the best thing to call it a
• 20:46
  family or, or say things like that.
• 20:48
  But in this industry, you are spending a lot of time in, in
• 20:52
  this environment and with these people.
• 20:53
  And so at least finding people that you really align with and,
• 20:58
  and like the core values are you align with is really important.
• 21:01
  And I feel lucky to have found that like immediately upon
• 21:04
  entering Chicago because there are so many amazing restaurant
• 21:07
  groups. But but yeah, I feel, I do feel
• 21:10
  really lucky. But I there has been a lot of
• 21:12
  hard work that has gone into it and a lot of like self
• 21:15
  reflection. I'm going to guess that if I
• 21:17
  were to interview the folks that you work for that they would
• 21:21
  probably say something very similar about how lucky they
• 21:24
  feel to have found you. I mean, the length of time that
• 21:26
  you've been there and the way that you've worked up and now it
• 21:30
  sounds like there's there's a new role kind of evolving for
• 21:33
  you. Yeah, it.
• 21:34
  Sounds like a pretty good match. Yes, I think so too.
• 21:38
  I feel I feel that way as well. So when you join the Maple
• 21:43
  Group, you already had significant restaurant
• 21:46
  experience under your belt. What was something about leading
• 21:49
  a high profile restaurant like this that maybe still caught you
• 21:53
  by surprise? Yeah, I, I that is something too
• 22:00
  just about the industry in general.
• 22:01
  Is that it? It's always different.
• 22:05
  And, you know, I think I was really nervous going into Maple
• 22:09
  and ash. I, I felt almost like I don't
• 22:12
  know what I'm doing because I've never worked in a steakhouse
• 22:15
  before. I had some fine dining
• 22:18
  experience with Veritas and you know, I've worked in a couple
• 22:21
  different styles of restaurants, but steakhouse is not one of
• 22:25
  them. And Maple is like all, you know,
• 22:27
  all its own. It's it's very unique.
• 22:30
  So I think the thing that surprised me the most is how
• 22:33
  much everything translates. It's it, it is very different.
• 22:37
  It is very unique. But once you've like been in a
• 22:41
  lot of these scenarios, you learn the steps of service in
• 22:44
  that restaurant and you learn the clientele and then you can
• 22:47
  take everything that you already know how to do and put it into
• 22:51
  place there. So I think honestly, that was
• 22:54
  the biggest surprise to me is that, oh, I can do this and I do
• 22:57
  like it and it's, you know, it's different.
• 22:59
  I, I wouldn't have necessarily thought like, oh, that's the I
• 23:03
  want to go work in a steakhouse. That's not necessarily where the
• 23:06
  trajectory was for me. It's not that I didn't want to,
• 23:09
  it's just not necessarily something that was on my radar.
• 23:12
  And then once the opportunity arose, I was excited to to try
• 23:16
  it and I was nervous and all the things.
• 23:19
  But yeah, I think that that is definitely like the most
• 23:21
  surprising thing to me is how much everything translated.
• 23:24
  So is it because that hospitality and food prep and
• 23:29
  food service and food delivery kind of follows a relatively
• 23:33
  standard framework? Obviously something's a little
• 23:35
  bit different here versus there, but but you know that you've
• 23:39
  got, I don't know, you know, the food has to be accounted for and
• 23:42
  it's got to be prepped and you know, it's got to be ready and
• 23:46
  it's got to be hot and all get together at the same time.
• 23:48
  And you've got to take care of your customers and deal with,
• 23:51
  you know, people who get a little upset.
• 23:53
  Like it's all kind of the same rough framework, just with, you
• 23:57
  know, a little bit of customization around it for the
• 23:59
  brand. Absolutely.
• 24:00
  And and they're definitely things that are different.
• 24:03
  You know, like when I was at there, the expectation is higher
• 24:07
  at Maple and ash than it was at ETA.
• 24:09
  And it's not because it's, you know, it's not that ETA was like
• 24:13
  a worse product or wasn't, wasn't great, but people are
• 24:16
  spending a lot of money to come to Maple and ash.
• 24:18
  And so the, the expectation is higher.
• 24:22
  And, you know, there are, we're doing like similar volume that
• 24:27
  we were doing at. It's definitely busier, But but
• 24:30
  the amount of people coming through the building is
• 24:32
  relatively similar, but the amount of dollars is a lot more.
• 24:36
  And people are, you know, people save up.
• 24:38
  And we frequently talk about this at pre shifts.
• 24:41
  You know, we do have a decent amount of people that are there
• 24:45
  every week, multiple times a week that, that, you know, come
• 24:48
  and hang in our lounge that have full dinners, you know, that do
• 24:51
  that do a wide range of things at Maple multiple times a week.
• 24:54
  But there are also so those people who save up all year to
• 24:57
  come have their birthday dinner and we want I want everyone that
• 25:01
  comes in to feel the same amount of love and the same amount of
• 25:06
  excitement and and that and that also comes from the top down.
• 25:09
  That's something that is very ingrained in us at Maple
• 25:12
  Hospitality Group and it always has been.
• 25:15
  But but yeah, I think too, something else that was nice for
• 25:20
  me going in to Maple and Ash as the GM is that I had already
• 25:24
  worked for the company for so long that I I had that good
• 25:28
  foundation of like I understand what the expectations are not
• 25:34
  not necessarily from the guests or in that realm, but like from
• 25:37
  my bosses and from the company as a whole.
• 25:40
  So I had like a, a little extra layer of like, oh, I don't have
• 25:43
  to figure that part out because I know how to, I know how to be
• 25:46
  AGM in this company. So I was able to focus on
• 25:50
  learning, learning our guests and and kind of the ways in
• 25:55
  which Maple is different than any other restaurant I've worked
• 25:58
  in. You know, Megan, a lot of our
• 26:00
  listeners are looking to make their own mark.
• 26:03
  What advice would you give to folks who are trying to advance
• 26:07
  their career in this industry? I think 1 big thing is, is not
• 26:16
  to give up, obviously, which sounds so silly, but as after I
• 26:19
  said it out loud, but is to really like find your place and,
• 26:25
  you know, wherever you're working.
• 26:27
  And this kind of goes for anybody, I guess.
• 26:28
  But wherever you're working, there's an impact that you can
• 26:31
  make. And so like, figure out what
• 26:33
  that is and figure out how you can make sure that it feels
• 26:37
  important to you. And, and you know, don't be
• 26:41
  afraid to go with ideas and, and, and like I said, too, find
• 26:45
  a place where you feel comfortable to do that because
• 26:48
  not, you're not going to feel comfortable everywhere.
• 26:51
  And I think if I think the self reflection piece and like
• 26:54
  understanding if like, if you're comfortable where you are and,
• 26:59
  and also not being afraid to take a little risk.
• 27:02
  Like I, I, like I said, was nervous to go to Maple and ash,
• 27:06
  but I'm so glad I did. I could have easily been like, I
• 27:09
  can't do that. That's out of my wheelhouse and,
• 27:12
  you know, gone to do something different.
• 27:14
  But now I have this amazing experience under my belt.
• 27:17
  So like it. I think everything I'm about to
• 27:19
  say is so cliche, but taking risks and not giving up and just
• 27:23
  like really finding, you know, finding yourself.
• 27:28
  I do think it's I'll be 35 in March and I feel like I'm
• 27:31
  finally like, OK, I know I know who I am and I at 22 I for sure
• 27:37
  thought I knew who I was. And now I'm like, no.
• 27:40
  So I guess just like not being afraid to evolve, taking risks,
• 27:44
  and really just kind of trying to find your place in it all.
• 27:47
  And the other thing that I like that you said sort of at the
• 27:49
  beginning of that answer was figure out how you can offer
• 27:52
  value. You know what?
• 27:53
  Yeah. What is it that you can bring to
• 27:55
  the table every day rather than a, you know, what can I take?
• 27:58
  It's like if if you can show up and bring value to the company
• 28:02
  and your Co workers and your bosses and your customers.
• 28:06
  You know, I hear the story over and over again from folks.
• 28:09
  The rest of it tends to take care of itself.
• 28:11
  Yeah, absolutely. How much involved are you in
• 28:18
  sort of, I don't know what I would call the growth of the
• 28:24
  business, making sure that there's people in the restaurant
• 28:29
  every night, you know, marketing what you know, whatever it is
• 28:32
  that you guys are doing sort of behind the scenes to make sure
• 28:35
  that you got butts in seats. Yeah.
• 28:39
  So as the general manager, I'm pretty involved in that.
• 28:42
  We have marketing meetings every week and we have, I'm in
• 28:46
  constant communication with the marketing team.
• 28:48
  The nice thing too about our company is that we do have the
• 28:51
  autonomy to like do cool things that we want to do and bring new
• 28:55
  ideas to the table. And you know, we are constantly
• 28:59
  working on how can we bring people in and get new people to
• 29:04
  come, obviously and obviously and continue to get the people
• 29:08
  who do come in to come back. Like making return guests is
• 29:10
  very important. But I get to be a part of those
• 29:14
  conversations. And that's another thing that I
• 29:16
  do love about the company that I work for is that we we are a
• 29:20
  part of that. And it's not just it's not just,
• 29:23
  you know, somebody from the top who's not in the restaurant
• 29:26
  everyday telling us what we need to do.
• 29:29
  They they absolutely want us to be a part of the conversation.
• 29:34
  And like I mentioned before, too, I am on our advanced Maple
• 29:37
  OPS team. So we talked about it at a
• 29:39
  little bit of a higher level, which is the, the other GM's
• 29:43
  aren't necessarily on that team, but even even if they even for
• 29:48
  the GM's that are not, they're still a big part of the
• 29:50
  conversation. And they we definitely are heard
• 29:53
  as far as like that won't work in my market, you know,
• 29:56
  obviously, because what works in Chicago, it doesn't necessarily
• 29:59
  work for Scottsdale. So we kind of like work together
• 30:02
  as far as like, oh, we're going to do this new cool thing.
• 30:05
  Is that something that would work for you guys there?
• 30:07
  And then maybe it's like, well, we'll tweak it a little.
• 30:10
  So we're definitely a huge part of the conversation and, and
• 30:14
  it's fun to like come up with new events or, or you know, we
• 30:19
  just developed a, we're calling it nightcap at Maple and Ash.
• 30:23
  We just developed this for our lounge to just kind of keep
• 30:28
  people wanting to stay longer. There's lots of different
• 30:32
  avenues in our restaurant and you can come and have a
• 30:35
  beautiful, filling, full, luxurious dinner.
• 30:39
  And then you can instead of, you know, going to a bar down the
• 30:42
  street, you can just pop into our lounge for a totally
• 30:45
  different experience. And you didn't have to go far
• 30:48
  and you get to stay hang out with us.
• 30:50
  So we just developed that and that was a joint effort between
• 30:55
  multiple people on our corporate team, the marketing team,
• 30:57
  myself, my other managers. It was kind of a collective
• 31:02
  effort of like what what can we do to to work on this
• 31:06
  initiative? That's so cool.
• 31:07
  I love that you've already got them there.
• 31:10
  How can you get them to stay longer?
• 31:11
  Because you're right, that's a very common dining experience.
• 31:14
  You have a nice dinner, you're having a good time.
• 31:16
  Hey, let's let's go get a drink somewhere and continue the.
• 31:19
  And. Why do you have to like, go
• 31:21
  across the street or find new parking or grab a cab across
• 31:24
  town? You can just stroll into the
• 31:26
  lounge, you know, right? Just right down.
• 31:28
  The hallway. So what are maybe some fun
• 31:30
  things like that that you guys have tried and found success
• 31:34
  with to get people in the door in the first place?
• 31:38
  Yeah. Well, something we also have a a
• 31:42
  first floor restaurant called 8 Bar.
• 31:44
  We recently kind of rebranded that.
• 31:46
  It was, it was around pre pandemic and then during the
• 31:51
  pandemic that space transformed into just Maple and ash patio.
• 31:55
  And we did rebrand it in July back to 8 Bar with a little bit
• 31:59
  of an elevation to it, revamped the whole menu.
• 32:03
  So one thing that we did down there, I just want to highlight
• 32:05
  because it was it's, it's a nice little happy hour.
• 32:09
  We do hand rolls and chicken karate and some like mini
• 32:14
  martinis, which a lot of places do that, but it's it's
• 32:17
  definitely a fun thing. So we started doing that for 8
• 32:20
  bar to try to get people in. We also do tower hour in
• 32:24
  upstairs at Maple and Ash. So those amazing seafood towers
• 32:27
  that we were talking about earlier, we have a smaller
• 32:29
  version of them that are $45.00 for open until 6:00 PM every
• 32:34
  day. So, and then we also have have
• 32:38
  discounted cocktails at that time as well.
• 32:40
  So it's really like giving people a, a chance to like try
• 32:45
  that out and have a couple drinks before, before dinner or
• 32:50
  before heading home or whatever it is.
• 32:52
  Tower hours been awesome. I know the, the Maple and
• 32:54
  Scottsdale's tower hour is like insanely busy.
• 32:57
  Ours is great. Ours is busy as well.
• 32:59
  So that's been a fun thing. Last year we did a which this
• 33:04
  isn't necessarily bringing in new people, but I but this was a
• 33:06
  fun thing that we tried out for the first time.
• 33:09
  We did an event called Taste the List.
• 33:12
  And this was really developed by our wine and beverage director,
• 33:17
  Amy Munwiler. She had this idea and she, it
• 33:20
  was like really her brainchild and she loved it.
• 33:22
  But we have a courtyard space and what we did was like we
• 33:26
  basically set it up with a bunch of different tables of a bunch
• 33:31
  of different of our vendors that we get our wine from and people
• 33:36
  could purchase tickets. They came in and they got to
• 33:38
  just like taste around the room and taste our list.
• 33:41
  And it was, you know, all highlights of our wine list.
• 33:44
  They could buy bottles after if they wanted to.
• 33:46
  We did it like in the spring. It was so fun.
• 33:49
  And it was really targeted towards like people who used, we
• 33:52
  used to have a wine club back in the day.
• 33:53
  So it was really geared towards those people.
• 33:55
  But we definitely saw some brand new faces.
• 33:58
  And so, yeah, I will say too, it is it is an interesting thing to
• 34:06
  try to to do these different events and bring in new people
• 34:11
  and not be gimmicky. Like, you know, you want to be
• 34:14
  true to your brand and true to true to the restaurant and just
• 34:18
  like really highlight what you do really well as opposed to
• 34:21
  like trying to do all these random things.
• 34:24
  But we do definitely try to like have fun with certain holidays.
• 34:29
  Like we're throwing a Galantine's brunch, which we did
• 34:32
  last year, which was so fun. That's on February 16th, so like
• 34:36
  right after Valentine's Day. So Galentine.
• 34:39
  Bring in kind of go out with your girlfriends kind of a
• 34:41
  thing. Yes, yeah.
• 34:43
  And we bring in like a fashion illustrator.
• 34:45
  She'll be in the in our lounge this year.
• 34:47
  We're doing a lipstick print reader, which I'm really excited
• 34:50
  about. It looks so cute.
• 34:52
  A lipstick print reader. You like kiss a piece of paper
• 34:55
  and she reads it. It's like a tarot card.
• 34:58
  Calming. Yeah, exactly.
• 35:00
  Yeah, either until like last year.
• 35:03
  So I'm like, we got to do this and then we have a DJ come.
• 35:06
  So yeah, it's just really like and again, we're not doing
• 35:10
  anything different as far as like food or beverage goes.
• 35:13
  We'll have a couple like, beverage features for
• 35:15
  Valentine's Day, but we're just like doing what we do really
• 35:18
  well and adding some extra fun to it.
• 35:21
  And we do like a Santa baby brunch every around Christmas
• 35:25
  time. My fiance loves that one.
• 35:27
  He's a big Christmas fan. And we bring in like, the best
• 35:30
  Santa. He's awesome.
• 35:32
  We bring in a jazz band. And again, brunch is brunch.
• 35:36
  You're still getting your amazing brunch spread from Maple
• 35:40
  and Ash. But exactly.
• 35:42
  Exactly. So yeah, like I said, finding
• 35:44
  ways that we can be true to who we are, bring in new people,
• 35:48
  bring people back, get people excited, but not go too far away
• 35:53
  from from ourselves. So mini martinis, is it just a
• 35:57
  smaller version of a martini? Is there anything else that's
• 36:00
  sort of different about OK? No, it's just classics that are
• 36:03
  small. OK.
• 36:04
  And and same shape of the glass, just very very tiny.
• 36:08
  Yeah, they're actually in our, they're just in like a smaller
• 36:11
  coupe glass. OK, yeah, can drink more of
• 36:16
  them. Right.
• 36:17
  Well, and, you know, that's The thing is, I mean, a martini
• 36:20
  usually is a little bit of a stronger drink, you know,
• 36:22
  depending on where it's poured. And so, yeah, sometimes you
• 36:25
  aren't sure if you, you know, want to commit to that much of a
• 36:29
  drink. So right, a little one and then,
• 36:31
  oh right, fun is going, so let's have another little one, right?
• 36:34
  Exactly. Exactly.
• 36:36
  Yeah. So people kind of like to know a
• 36:40
  little bit behind the scenes, especially if they're in the
• 36:43
  restaurant industry and, you know, kind of looking for some
• 36:45
  tips, like is there a particular tool or a piece of software or a
• 36:51
  framework that is really helpful to you in running the business?
• 36:57
  Yeah, I mean, there's a few. I would.
• 37:00
  I love our reservation system. We use 7 rooms, which I had
• 37:05
  never used before coming to Etta.
• 37:09
  We used it there as well. It's really intuitive there.
• 37:14
  We have a lot of capabilities with like posting tickets for
• 37:19
  events that we're doing or adding upgrades if people want
• 37:23
  to, like those birthday menus that I was speaking about,
• 37:27
  that's like an upgrade. It's a free upgrade, but that's
• 37:29
  something that we have the ability to add in.
• 37:32
  We also that the nightcap that I was mentioning, we added some
• 37:36
  packages to that like a champagne and caviar pack
• 37:39
  package and a martini tree package.
• 37:41
  And those things are like super easy to add into our reservation
• 37:44
  system. And like I said, it's very
• 37:46
  intuitive. It, it's kind of like obviously
• 37:50
  our host team does a great job of plotting the day and all
• 37:53
  that, but it, it really allows us to plan well.
• 37:57
  And so I love 7 rooms that that works really well for our
• 37:59
  concept. And then I don't use this
• 38:02
  anymore, but I absolutely love Toast.
• 38:05
  If you are a, if you are opening a restaurant or you are a
• 38:11
  manager in a position of getting to have a say in what point of
• 38:16
  sale system that you use. I'm obsessed with Toast.
• 38:19
  I love it so much. We used it at the apparently the
• 38:24
  capabilities with like how we fire to the kitchen don't mash
• 38:27
  at Maple and ash, so we can't use it there.
• 38:29
  But the reporting side of things is amazing.
• 38:32
  It's so user friendly. Their support is great.
• 38:35
  So I'm going to toast plug because I love it that much that
• 38:39
  that's been and also too that software really helped me.
• 38:43
  I feel like it helped me build my confidence too, because I
• 38:47
  came in to ETA and I had used breadcrumb before, which is
• 38:50
  really similar, but I came into ETA and everyone's like, wow,
• 38:53
  you're a toast whiz. And I'm like sure, OK, but I
• 38:56
  just tried a little and it was easy.
• 38:58
  So it worked. So yeah, I would say we also use
• 39:03
  Restaurant 365, which has a lot of capabilities with reporting
• 39:07
  and I it makes it easy to like dig into a certain GL code and
• 39:12
  things like that. So, so those those three are
• 39:15
  probably the things that have helped me a lot.
• 39:18
  That was a pretty glowing recommendation for Toast.
• 39:21
  You'd almost think that they were a a hidden sponsor of this.
• 39:24
  Show I know, sorry if I shouldn't have done.
• 39:25
  That no, no, I asked. This is the information that we
• 39:28
  want. This is valuable to people who
• 39:30
  are listening. So maybe let's talk about a book
• 39:35
  or a podcast or a course that has been helpful to you, that
• 39:40
  might be helpful to some other folks that are listening.
• 39:42
  Yes, 100% unreasonable hospitality.
• 39:46
  I I also love setting the table, which I think you know a lot of
• 39:49
  people if you're in this industry at this point, you
• 39:51
  should have read it. If you haven't, do it.
• 39:53
  But, and even if you're not honestly, but unreasonable
• 39:57
  hospitality, I loved it's it came out recent or more
• 40:00
  recently, I guess, and I listened to it actually on
• 40:03
  audiobook last year and I it was so cool because it.
• 40:08
  I obviously could relate to a lot of it and it was cool to
• 40:12
  hear his story. And but also too, I think that
• 40:17
  it would resonate with a lot of people, like no matter what
• 40:19
  industry you're in. And the idea of like
• 40:22
  unreasonable hospitality is honestly in the bigger picture
• 40:27
  is just like thinking outside the box, like be unreasonable
• 40:30
  and you know, like do, do cool things and try new things and
• 40:36
  like, how can you push the limits?
• 40:37
  It's really like the overarching, you know, I don't
• 40:40
  want to speak for him, obviously, but overarching theme
• 40:43
  of the book. I, I loved listening to it.
• 40:45
  I, I think that it, it inspired me a lot.
• 40:48
  It was very helpful. So that's definitely a high
• 40:52
  recommendation for from me. I do like love podcasts, but I
• 40:57
  mostly listen to like smart lists.
• 40:58
  So not necessarily like business focus.
• 41:01
  But I will say too, I have been loving master class.
• 41:07
  It not even necessarily for like work, but just like something
• 41:12
  that I've been really trying to focus on for the last couple of
• 41:14
  years is like self-care and positive, like self talk.
• 41:19
  I think for me specifically, I get in my own head a lot.
• 41:24
  I was very nervous for this today.
• 41:25
  And as we're moving through, I'm like, this is I'm just talking
• 41:28
  about my life. It's not, you know, but but
• 41:31
  yeah, I think that I do think it's also important for the
• 41:33
  industry as a whole to focus on self-care and self love.
• 41:38
  And, you know, there's a lot of drugs and alcohol and there's a
• 41:41
  lot of temptation and there's a lot of things that if you don't
• 41:44
  make yourself a priority and you don't make your health and all
• 41:49
  that a priority, it would be very easy to get lost in the
• 41:53
  sauce, as they say. So.
• 41:55
  So yeah, that's been something that over the last couple of
• 41:58
  years specifically for me, just, you know, getting in a good
• 42:02
  routine for myself, my my younger sister just became a
• 42:04
  restaurant manager. And that was one of the biggest
• 42:07
  things that myself and my fiance said to her was like, get a
• 42:10
  routine, figure out what it is. It's going to be different every
• 42:14
  day. But like, you know, you know,
• 42:16
  you know what you're doing on Thursdays and, and it just helps
• 42:20
  keep you grounded and, and keep you sane, to be honest.
• 42:22
  So yeah. Are there specific things in
• 42:26
  your routine that you try to do every day or?
• 42:30
  Mostly, yeah. Well, definitely make working
• 42:33
  out a priority. I do not work out every day.
• 42:35
  I'm not going to sit here and tell you that, but but
• 42:37
  definitely making making working out a priority for me, honestly
• 42:41
  mostly for my mental health. Like getting a good workout in
• 42:44
  makes me feel great. And yeah, I guess just like
• 42:50
  taking, taking time for myself, I try to like do the same
• 42:55
  morning routine and night time routine, like the same
• 42:57
  supplements and like my coffee is like my favorite part of the
• 43:00
  day. I got an espresso for Christmas
• 43:02
  and I couldn't be more excited. So like just honestly, something
• 43:06
  again that I've been focusing on over the last couple of years is
• 43:09
  like, I'm again, probably going to sound cheesy and stupid, but
• 43:13
  is like romanticizing things. Like everything is exciting and
• 43:18
  my coffee and my Chobani Creamer in the morning is the thing that
• 43:22
  makes me excited. So yeah, just like trying to
• 43:25
  enjoy all the things and and have fun with everything.
• 43:29
  I think it's great when we can find wonder in the world around
• 43:32
  us and the small. Things like you're.
• 43:34
  Yeah, brings you so much joy. Yeah.
• 43:38
  Yeah, right. That's fantastic.
• 43:40
  You know, the book that you mentioned Unreasonable
• 43:43
  hospitality. I've had a lot of my guests
• 43:45
  recommend that and folks who aren't even in the hospitality
• 43:49
  industry. One, the first time I heard
• 43:50
  about it, one of my guests, it was at a Morgan.
• 43:53
  He's not, he's not in hospitality.
• 43:54
  He's got a tech company. He sent me a copy of the book
• 43:57
  because he's like everybody I meet.
• 43:59
  I I think it's so powerful. I send.
• 44:01
  I send people a copy of this I and I, I heard you say that you
• 44:04
  drew a lot of inspiration from it.
• 44:06
  Can you think of maybe an idea that you got from that book that
• 44:10
  you were able to kind of bring into real life?
• 44:12
  Yes, OK. They he was talking about this
• 44:17
  position that they had have maybe at I believe it was 11
• 44:22
  Madison Park called the dream Weavers and that is basically
• 44:26
  like part of their door team and they focus on like how can we
• 44:30
  make cool like different experiences for people.
• 44:34
  I think one of the things he talks about is like they heard,
• 44:38
  they overheard a table talking about that they had tried all
• 44:41
  these great restaurants in New York, but they hadn't gotten
• 44:44
  like a street hot dog. So they somebody went out and
• 44:47
  got a street hot dog and they like presented it fancy on a
• 44:49
  plate. And, and so like the Dreamweaver
• 44:53
  position of just kind of focusing on those unique guest
• 44:58
  experiences is definitely something that I've tried to
• 45:01
  implement at Maple and Ash. We, we haven't like fully
• 45:04
  figured it out yet, but we definitely are like working
• 45:08
  towards that. It was it.
• 45:09
  It's just like a good reminder that that's what it's all about.
• 45:13
  And like, let's have some fun with these people and let's like
• 45:17
  take some context clues and get to know for our host team
• 45:19
  specifically, like get to know them while you're walking them
• 45:21
  to the table. We can learn a lot in that 2
• 45:24
  minutes and we can really make, you know, turn some people's
• 45:28
  days around and experiences around and all that stuff.
• 45:32
  One other thing that I thought was really cool was called a
• 45:38
  hangover kit. And they basically it's just
• 45:42
  like a little bundle of stuff that you might need if you have
• 45:46
  indulged a bit too much the night before.
• 45:49
  And so we did start doing that at at Maple.
• 45:52
  We don't do them a lot. We don't give them out a lot.
• 45:55
  And it's definitely like you want to make sure you're giving
• 45:57
  it to the right crowd. You don't want to offend
• 45:59
  somebody or, you know, whatever. But, but like just kind of, I
• 46:03
  guess the overarching thing that I, that I took away from the
• 46:06
  book was like having and, and, and also something that I've
• 46:10
  learned from Maple in general, Maple hospitality group as a
• 46:13
  whole is like, let's have all these things in our arsenal.
• 46:17
  Let's like have all these little things that we can pull out and
• 46:21
  do for people, because then you're, you're giving unique
• 46:24
  experiences to everybody, but you're not reinventing the wheel
• 46:27
  every time. If it's not broke, don't fix it.
• 46:29
  Like you know that that kind of thing.
• 46:31
  But just like continuing to try new things.
• 46:34
  And if it works, it pops in the arsenal.
• 46:36
  If it doesn't work, then you don't do it again again.
• 46:37
  So just kind of that mentality is what I probably took away
• 46:41
  from the book the most. Yeah, it's fun to experiment
• 46:44
  with some of those creative. Ideas.
• 46:46
  Yeah. Megan I In my own personal
• 46:50
  experience, I've found that a lot of my growth has come from
• 46:53
  some of the bigger challenges that I've gone through, personal
• 46:57
  stuff, professional stuff. What's a challenge that you've
• 47:02
  gone through? How did you work through it and
• 47:06
  what did you learn going through it?
• 47:10
  Yeah, so I mentioned this a little bit earlier, and this is
• 47:13
  obviously a very personal thing, but I did go through a divorce.
• 47:17
  I was married when I was 23 and I got divorced when I was 28.
• 47:23
  And honestly, that was a huge challenge for me because like I
• 47:29
  said, I thought I knew who I was at 22.
• 47:31
  And as you grow you, you do change.
• 47:34
  And unfortunately we just didn't grow in the same direction.
• 47:38
  And, and I think the one of the largest challenges for me and
• 47:44
  aside from just that in general was I had to like be true to
• 47:49
  myself. And it's very hard to do that.
• 47:52
  It takes a lot of courage and you know, our lives were
• 47:55
  obviously very intertwined and our families are very
• 47:58
  intertwined. They still are in some ways.
• 48:02
  And so like for me, coming to the conclusion of like, this is
• 48:07
  the only choice that I have and this is the best decision for
• 48:10
  me. And then what am I going to do
• 48:13
  with that afterwards was it was the hardest thing that I've ever
• 48:16
  had to do. And then on top of that,
• 48:20
  deciding to move to Chicago, I was terrified.
• 48:24
  It was, it was terrifying. But I, I think I just kind of in
• 48:28
  that moment was like, I have nothing to lose and I have
• 48:32
  everything to gain. And I, I knew I needed to make a
• 48:35
  change and, and I did that. And then when I got here, I
• 48:40
  realized like, I can do anything.
• 48:43
  And I know, again, I know that sounds cliche or whatever, but
• 48:48
  you know, if you take a big leap like that, it really does.
• 48:52
  I never would have dreamed that I would move to Chicago, that I
• 48:55
  would have lived here for six years now and love the place I'm
• 48:59
  at in my life and feel fulfilled personally, professionally, you
• 49:04
  know, all of those things. I didn't, I didn't realize that
• 49:07
  that that I could get to this place.
• 49:10
  So taking that risk was, was huge and it was scary and it was
• 49:14
  very hard and very emotional. But I, yeah, I, I, I'm so
• 49:20
  thankful for where I'm at because of.
• 49:22
  It what you just described are three of the biggest stressors
• 49:26
  that happen in life happening back-to-back to back.
• 49:30
  You're divorce, moving to a new city, starting a new job.
• 49:36
  These all happened in very close time to each other.
• 49:42
  Yeah. Who or what were you able to
• 49:45
  lean on and find support during this time?
• 49:50
  Yeah, I mean, my parents are insanely amazing and that it was
• 49:55
  hard for them to, when I made that decision.
• 49:57
  And I think it was hard for them to separate, like how they felt
• 50:02
  and how I felt. And so they, you know, kind of
• 50:05
  had to realize like, OK, this isn't about us.
• 50:08
  We'll feel our own feelings, but we need to be supportive.
• 50:10
  And they 100% were in every way. So that was huge.
• 50:17
  And, and then also my old boss, Josh that I had mentioned
• 50:22
  before, he had, you know, always like just throughout, not
• 50:27
  necessarily this specific thing that was happening, but just
• 50:29
  throughout my, my time with him, he really, you know, taught me
• 50:34
  to like trust my, my own gut and trust my instincts.
• 50:38
  And so that was amazing. And then my now fiance, who was
• 50:42
  a good friend of mine at the time, like knowing that I was
• 50:45
  going to come to the city and be able and like I, I already had a
• 50:50
  friend was, was amazing. And somebody who understood my
• 50:55
  work and what I was going to be doing and kind of like knew some
• 50:58
  of the same people and all of that.
• 51:01
  The, the, those are definitely like the people.
• 51:04
  I have amazing friends, like every, everyone in my life has
• 51:07
  been, has been really supportive for the most part.
• 51:09
  I like I said with everything, I feel really lucky.
• 51:12
  And when I think about it, I'm like, wow, you know, I, I've
• 51:15
  definitely been been very blessed.
• 51:18
  But but yeah, those are definitely the people that
• 51:21
  impacted me the most. What advice would you have for
• 51:24
  somebody listening that's going through their own struggle right
• 51:27
  now and not sure how to get through it?
• 51:31
  Yeah, that one's tough because I feel like thinking back, I don't
• 51:37
  even know how I did that. Like I don't even, it feels like
• 51:40
  a whole other lifetime ago, but kind of along the lines of the
• 51:45
  same thing that I just said. It's like you got to really like
• 51:48
  a lot of self reflection, a lot of like what actually do I want?
• 51:54
  Because that's kind of where I, I kind of came to was like, I'm
• 51:59
  doing a lot of stuff because it's what everybody else wants
• 52:01
  me to do. And I needed to figure out what
• 52:04
  I really wanted to do and what was going to fulfill me and make
• 52:07
  me feel good. And, and I, you know, I also had
• 52:12
  a lot of my identity wrapped up in, you know, who I was as a
• 52:16
  wife and who I was in the job that I had back home.
• 52:21
  And so, yeah, I had to just kind of like reflect on myself and
• 52:26
  what do I want out of this and what do I think I'm going to
• 52:28
  gain? And so I think just being really
• 52:30
  honest with yourself, and that's going to be hard.
• 52:33
  And but I think that is like my biggest piece of advice is
• 52:37
  really take a look inward and, and, and be true to what you
• 52:42
  really want and try to eliminate as much of the outside noise as
• 52:46
  you possibly can. You touched on something that
• 52:49
  I've noticed in in my own struggles and talking with other
• 52:52
  people about things that they've gone through is what an impact
• 52:57
  sort of that loss of identity component can have on someone.
• 53:02
  And you just mentioned, you know, a lot of your identity was
• 53:04
  wrapped up in being a wife, and a lot of your identity was
• 53:07
  wrapped up in the job that you had at the time.
• 53:10
  And now you're transitioning away from being a wife, and now
• 53:16
  you're transitioning away from being in that particular job.
• 53:20
  And it can be really, what's the word, destabilizing, confusing.
• 53:27
  Like this was how I fit into the world.
• 53:29
  This was my role. This is, you know, this is the
• 53:31
  role that I play. And, and, and now that sort of
• 53:35
  lattice, that infrastructure is gone and you've got to figure
• 53:37
  out a new world and you got to figure out a new place in this
• 53:41
  new world. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 53:45
  I mean, you said it really well. And I think that luckily for me,
• 53:50
  I I started this new job that took up a lot of my time.
• 53:53
  And it also gave me all of my best friends that I have now in
• 53:58
  Chicago. I met Aneta, so like it.
• 54:02
  It gave me a new sense of purpose, it gave me a new thing
• 54:05
  to focus on, and I just realized how much I loved it.
• 54:11
  But yeah, that was definitely jarring to, to go from feeling
• 54:16
  like, you know, you know, exactly what the next 10 years
• 54:20
  look like to I have literally zero clue what the next 10 years
• 54:23
  look like. But for me, that was honestly
• 54:26
  exhilarating. I had from a very young age, I
• 54:29
  thought, you know, I'm, I'm getting married young, I'm
• 54:31
  having a lot of kids, I'm, you know, doing XYZ and I am not
• 54:35
  having any kids. And I didn't, you know, like
• 54:37
  that, that didn't pan out the way that I thought it would, but
• 54:41
  I, like I've said, I'm very happy with where I am.
• 54:45
  And I feel like I went through all of those things and I, I, I
• 54:49
  wouldn't change any of it. I, I, you know, yeah, I went
• 54:54
  through all that stuff. And I think that it's kind of
• 54:55
  helped me discover who I am so. You.
• 54:58
  You are. Which I'm still learning.
• 54:59
  Because of what you went through.
• 55:01
  Absolutely, yeah. So, Megan, every successful
• 55:06
  business, successful restaurant has a great team behind it.
• 55:10
  Almost by definition, it has to, yeah.
• 55:12
  What is your approach to attracting and retaining good
• 55:15
  talent? Yeah.
• 55:17
  So I mean, again, it makes it easier being with Maple
• 55:21
  Hospitality Group, being at Maple and Ash, it's a very
• 55:23
  desirable place to work. I think that our I think that
• 55:27
  our culture is great. We obviously we do, I shouldn't
• 55:31
  say obviously, I guess you don't know, but we treat our staff
• 55:33
  very well. We've really taken the last few
• 55:37
  years to better our, our benefits and all of that stuff.
• 55:40
  So that, that piece of it is like, well, people want to stay
• 55:43
  once they get there because, because it's a great place to
• 55:46
  be. But for me, kind of going back
• 55:50
  to so a couple things kind of going back to what I mentioned
• 55:52
  about my management style is, you know, really leveling with
• 55:56
  people and like we're all on the same page and and unders and
• 56:00
  having like an open door policy. When I first started as the GM
• 56:04
  at Maple and Ash, there had been a lot of turnover within the
• 56:06
  management team. And so I knew that that was that
• 56:09
  was hard on the on the hourly staff for sure.
• 56:13
  And so one of the things that I really wanted to do was like I
• 56:16
  opened it up to one on ones with anyone who wanted to talk to me.
• 56:20
  I didn't make it required, but anybody, anybody that wanted to
• 56:24
  sit down with me, I, I opened up that door and, and we chatted
• 56:28
  and I learned a lot from that. And then I was able to implement
• 56:31
  some things that were not hard to do.
• 56:33
  It was like very simple things, but it just needed somebody to,
• 56:37
  to hear that they, that it was needed and, and then make it
• 56:39
  happen. So I think, you know, being,
• 56:43
  being present with your team, listening to what they need and
• 56:46
  being, you know, approachable and available is huge.
• 56:50
  One other thing as far as like hiring goes, I, I bring in
• 56:56
  everyone like I, I'm actually, currently looking for a manager
• 57:00
  and actually 2, but I'm looking for managers and I printed off,
• 57:04
  there was, I printed off like 40 resumes.
• 57:07
  And you know, of those resumes, some people appear more
• 57:10
  qualified than others. Some people, you know, somebody
• 57:13
  might in my position might look at that and be like, why are you
• 57:15
  even calling that person? But I think it's really
• 57:17
  important to talk to everyone. You never know.
• 57:20
  You never know based on a piece of paper.
• 57:22
  And I also say you never know based on one interview.
• 57:26
  I'm, I told my, my current management team, like, listen,
• 57:29
  we're going to be meeting a lot of people over the next few
• 57:32
  weeks. I'm bringing in pretty much
• 57:34
  everyone that I talked to for a stage, which is it's kind of
• 57:37
  like a working interview. They come hang out with us for a
• 57:39
  few hours during service. What's it called?
• 57:42
  It's called a STAJ. Yeah.
• 57:45
  And it's essentially a working interview.
• 57:46
  And I, I tell people when I'm interviewing them that these
• 57:50
  like sit down interviews with myself, with the director, with
• 57:52
  all these people. Like that's for us, that's for
• 57:54
  us to get to know your knowledge and, and get to know, you know,
• 57:58
  your background, that kind of thing.
• 57:59
  But the STAJ, while we are learning from it as well, it's
• 58:02
  really for them. I want them to come in and see
• 58:05
  what a busy service is like at Maple and like, does this feel
• 58:08
  like a place that you want to be?
• 58:10
  Get to know the team a little bit, ask questions.
• 58:13
  So I think those are really important.
• 58:14
  And again, I can learn. We you can learn from that
• 58:18
  coming in and we can learn a lot more by you getting to know all
• 58:21
  these people rather than just me talking to you for 30 minutes.
• 58:24
  So, so that's I think a big piece of something that I try to
• 58:29
  live by when hiring is like, don't judge a book by its cover
• 58:33
  and bring in as many people as possible.
• 58:36
  It gets everybody more experienced and it also, you
• 58:40
  know, you might meet somebody that you didn't know was going
• 58:43
  to be the one and then they are so.
• 58:46
  I think that's great. You know, in my own career as a
• 58:49
  business owner, that's something that I've put a big emphasis on
• 58:53
  is there's some people interview well, there's some people who
• 58:57
  don't interview well, and the performance in that doesn't
• 59:01
  necessarily translate into how they perform as a team member
• 59:05
  and how they perform in their work.
• 59:07
  And so my environments are a bit different than yours, but I
• 59:11
  always try to find, you know, are there some test tasks that I
• 59:15
  can pay somebody, hire them to do so I can see the quality of
• 59:19
  their work, see how they interact, what questions they
• 59:22
  ask and just get a better idea of that dynamic.
• 59:24
  And so I love that you guys are incorporating that same kind of
• 59:28
  thing in into the restaurant. I think it's.
• 59:30
  It's awesome. One more question for you Megan.
• 59:34
  But before I ask it, I want to do 2 things.
• 59:36
  First of all, everyone listening today, I know that you love
• 59:38
  today's content because Megan has been an awesome guest.
• 59:42
  Please hit the like, Follow, share, subscribe button on your
• 59:45
  favorite podcast app so you get to hear more of these great
• 59:47
  interviews. Megan, I also want to let people
• 59:50
  know the best way to get in touch with you.
• 59:51
  What would that be? Me personally, you can.
• 59:56
  You or the brand or to continue to follow your story or the
• 59:59
  Maple story, what, whatever. Your Yeah, so Maple and Ash
• 1:00:04
  Instagram at Maple and Ash is our Instagram handle.
• 1:00:08
  You can follow along with a lot of stuff there.
• 1:00:11
  You'll see things about our new openings, which there's multiple
• 1:00:14
  coming this year. I'll only say Miami because I
• 1:00:17
  don't want to share too much, but there's definitely a lot
• 1:00:19
  more coming. So follow us so you can find
• 1:00:21
  that out. And I, I mean, on my business
• 1:00:25
  cards, I put my cell phone number, which I won't share
• 1:00:28
  here, but we're very open. And I would love to hear from
• 1:00:31
  anybody, somebody that's going to visit Chicago or that lives
• 1:00:34
  here that hasn't tried Maple and Ash.
• 1:00:36
  Please reach out to meitsjustmmcneil@mapleandash.com
• 1:00:40
  is my e-mail address. I get a lot of emails, so I'm
• 1:00:44
  there to that one. And yeah, I'd love to hear from
• 1:00:46
  everyone. I do think that I recently had
• 1:00:49
  in the woman that does my mom's hair, Lisa, She came to visit us
• 1:00:54
  at Maple and she'd never been in before.
• 1:00:55
  She brought her mom and her sisters and they just had the
• 1:00:58
  best time. And it's so fun to bring people
• 1:01:00
  in who haven't necessarily had a a dining experience like what we
• 1:01:05
  offer and to just like, see it on their face when we're just
• 1:01:08
  doing what we do every day. So yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 1:01:13
  OK. So last question for you, Megan.
• 1:01:15
  As you look to the future, what are some of the most exciting
• 1:01:18
  changes that you're looking forward to, whether that's for
• 1:01:22
  the Maple brand or for the industry in general?
• 1:01:25
  Yeah. So I'm excited for, I'll talk
• 1:01:29
  about the Maple brand first. Obviously, so excited to see new
• 1:01:33
  markets and hopefully get to travel to those markets and kind
• 1:01:36
  of see how it all translates and how it all works.
• 1:01:39
  Because like I mentioned before, you know, Maple and ash in
• 1:01:41
  Scottsdale, it's the same, but it's very different because it's
• 1:01:44
  for that market. The Maple and ash in Miami,
• 1:01:47
  based on the renderings and the videos that I've seen so far,
• 1:01:50
  it's going to be absolutely gorgeous.
• 1:01:51
  So I'm excited to see what we can do as a company with our
• 1:01:54
  growth. So that's very exciting and I'm
• 1:01:57
  excited for the next couple of years in the restaurant
• 1:02:01
  industry. I think it's going to be, I
• 1:02:04
  think it's going to be a little challenging, but I think it's
• 1:02:07
  going to be amazing. Obviously we're like in a
• 1:02:09
  recession right now and especially a place like Maple
• 1:02:11
  and Ash, people don't have to spend their money on that.
• 1:02:13
  So really focusing on hospitality, and we say it a lot
• 1:02:18
  at work, but like getting back to the basics and, you know,
• 1:02:22
  focusing on what people really love about dining out and making
• 1:02:27
  them feel good is going to be so important because there are one,
• 1:02:30
  lots of places to choose from. But two, people are being
• 1:02:34
  cautious with how they're spending their money.
• 1:02:35
  And I want you to feel, I want people that are coming to Maple
• 1:02:39
  to feel valued and that we appreciate that and that they're
• 1:02:42
  getting, you know, what they're paying for.
• 1:02:45
  But I do think something that, you know, when I was thinking
• 1:02:48
  about this kind of question, I think during the, the pandemic,
• 1:02:54
  some of the like special touches as far as hospitality go got a
• 1:02:58
  little lost, rightfully so. It kind of had to happen like,
• 1:03:01
  you know, QR codes for menus and things like that.
• 1:03:04
  I, I really enjoy the, I really enjoy the, the like more old
• 1:03:10
  school mentality and, you know, getting a real menu at a
• 1:03:13
  restaurant, obviously not knocking anyone that uses the QR
• 1:03:16
  code, especially for certain concepts.
• 1:03:18
  It's absolutely awesome and it works really well, but for a
• 1:03:21
  place like Maple and Ash specifically, it wouldn't make
• 1:03:24
  sense for us to, to have AQR code on the table and be, you
• 1:03:28
  know, doing all these other stuff, all these other things.
• 1:03:31
  So I'm just kind of excited to see how that evolves.
• 1:03:34
  Like do people lean lean more into the old school way of
• 1:03:38
  things? Do we see kind of more that
• 1:03:42
  there's a really cool company called Sunday that does the, the
• 1:03:45
  QR code thing super well. I, I'm hoping to maybe work with
• 1:03:49
  them someday for a bar brand. So yeah, there's just like
• 1:03:53
  there's a lot of cool things out there and I'm excited to just
• 1:03:56
  kind of see how those evolve and learn more about them and just
• 1:03:59
  kind of see what's coming. Yeah, I can tell you love to
• 1:04:01
  experiment with new ideas, have some fun and let's see what
• 1:04:05
  works. Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:04:07
  Yeah. Well, Megan, I want to be the
• 1:04:09
  first one to thank you for sharing both your time and your
• 1:04:11
  story with us today. I really appreciate it.
• 1:04:14
  Absolutely, thanks for having me, this was fun.
• 1:04:16
  I love podcasts, so I was like all about it.
• 1:04:19
  Terrific. It was my pleasure, folks.
• 1:04:21
  That's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast.
• 1:04:24
  Thanks for learning with us today.