Black Entrepreneur Blueprint 523 - Jay Jones - What Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Waffle House

[00:00:12] Welcome to Black Entrepreneur Blueprint, the number one podcast and resource for Black entrepreneurs. I'm your host Jay Jones and Black Entrepreneur Blueprint was created specifically to educate and inspire Black entrepreneurs to launch, build, and grow successful,

[00:00:30] sustainable businesses. Join us as we help build an economic power base in the worldwide Black community by building and supporting Black-owned businesses. If you're currently an entrepreneur or want to be an entrepreneur, you're invited to join us each and every week here at Black

[00:00:48] Entrepreneur Blueprint. Welcome to the BEB family and get ready to elevate your entrepreneur IQ. Welcome to the Black Entrepreneur Blueprint episode number 523. I'm your host Jay Jones and today we have another outstanding and informative show in store for you. Today we're

[00:01:13] going to be doing a rebroadcast of one of our most downloaded episodes from July of 2023 titled What Entrepreneurs Can Learn From Waffle House. Today's show topic is what entrepreneurs can learn from Waffle House. That's right, I said it guys, what entrepreneurs can learn from Waffle House.

[00:01:35] Now if you live anywhere in the southeast or up and down the east coast and you drive down I-95, you know, north heading south, you have seen the signs for Waffle House. Waffle House has

[00:01:49] basically become an iconic sign or brand over the years since its inception in 1955 and it's been in the news a lot guys for numerous reasons including its innovation, discrimination charges, and oh yeah

[00:02:03] those Waffle House fights. So today we're going to discuss some of the good things that Waffle House does in terms of entrepreneurship and how you can take those things to help scale and grow

[00:02:17] your business. Now before we get to today's content let me just share a few things with the Black Entrepreneur Blueprint family. First and foremost I want to welcome all first-time listeners to Black Entrepreneur Blueprint. Welcome to the BEB family. Please stick around until the end of today's

[00:02:33] broadcast and I'm going to share all my social media contact information and resource links such as the link to my latest book Unlocking Chat GPT, The Ultimate Prompting Handbook for Beginners. You can go to unlockingchatgpt.com for more information. Guys you know AI is here and you

[00:02:55] got to be in front of the curve. The problem is most of the time we're behind the curve when new trends and new things take place when it pertains to business and entrepreneurship. So go to

[00:03:07] unlockingchatgpt.com and check out my new book. Also don't forget to take advantage of three days free access to BEB Academy which is our online learning portal designated to help you elevate your entrepreneur IQ. We have online courses, master classes, PDF downloads and resources that

[00:03:29] are designed for anybody who is in entrepreneurship or wants to be an entrepreneur. So make sure you go to the main website blackentrepreneurblueprint.com and on the front page of the website

[00:03:42] you'll see BEB Academy and go ahead and take a look at it and get three days free access to everything inside the academy. Now let's get ready for today's content. So let's talk about

[00:03:56] the Waffle House and what entrepreneurs can learn from that. Now it's funny because when we go on trips down south say we're going to visit my my mom's family in the Carolinas or we're going to

[00:04:08] Florida or whatever we always stop at a Waffle House because myself and my oldest daughter we love the Waffle House. My youngest daughter and my wife they love Cracker Barrel so my oldest daughter and I are always talking about Waffle House or bus because when you're traveling you

[00:04:26] can get in there quick if it's not crowded and get on out and get back on the road and so that's one of the things we always talk about when we're traveling where are we going to stop especially

[00:04:37] when the girls were little. So let's talk about the history of Waffle House and how it started. So in 1955 the first Waffle House location was opened by the two founders Joe Rogers and Tom

[00:04:50] Faulkner. Now Joe Rogers was a short order cook who worked his way up to management in a small chain out in Connecticut I believe and then he decided to move to the Atlanta metro area. When

[00:05:03] he moved here he met a gentleman named Tom Faulkner who was a real estate agent so they became fast friends and then they came up with the concept of opening up a Waffle House and so Rogers concept

[00:05:16] was to combine the speed of a fast food restaurant with the sit down or table service and around the clock availability. Okay so Faulkner suggested naming the restaurant the Waffle House because waffles were their most profitable item on the menu and that's literally how it started and so

[00:05:35] I want you guys to understand anything that you start starts from a concept first. So when you look at these fully developed companies or these emerging companies remember they all started with a concept so don't be overwhelmed or frustrated because you have this idea and you can't even

[00:05:56] see how you're going to get to the next level let alone be a multi-million dollar a billion dollar company. Everybody starts from the same place now our resources and information may be

[00:06:07] different but everything starts with the concept. Now let me just give you a little bit of information and some some highlights about Waffle House because if you're not on the east coast there are some

[00:06:20] out there you know toward the the central America and all that but not really on the west coast. Now Waffle House is a privately owned company and they're believed to generate over one billion dollars a year in their over 2,000 locations so they have 2,000 plus locations and they generate

[00:06:39] over 1 billion dollars a year. Now remember this is a privately owned company now the company claims that they're the world's largest seller of several of its menu items including waffles, ham,

[00:06:52] pork chops, grits and t-bone steaks. It also claims that it serves two percent of all the eggs in the United States. Now here's a pretty crazy fact now they said if you took all the sausage patties sold

[00:07:06] by Waffle House in one single day and you stacked them on top of each other it would go to four times the height of the Empire State Building. That's how much volume they do and remember this

[00:07:18] is a privately owned company so we don't have all the data of a publicly traded company but it's estimated to do over one billion dollars a year in revenue and it has 2,000 plus locations. So

[00:07:32] any of you guys on social media you may have seen all like the fights and all of that stuff at Waffle House but if you've never been to a Waffle House you know that they're very small footprints.

[00:07:45] They have a counter they have several tables and many times they're they're packed and they're especially packed after you go clubbing stuff like that if you're out late at night because they're open 24 7 365 and we're going to talk about some of the things that you can learn

[00:08:04] from Waffle House. The first thing that we want to talk about is you need to know your concept and know your customers. Know your concept and know your customers and if you don't know these

[00:08:16] two things guys you're not going to be successful plain and simple. So the concept was to combine the speed of a fast food restaurant with table service so when you go into most restaurants you

[00:08:29] got to sit down the waiter or waitress comes by hey what do you want to drink then there'll be another five or ten minutes before they come back and then you order and if you don't want that if

[00:08:40] you don't want to take that time to relax and say you're traveling then you want to get some someplace that has quick service okay so their concept once again is to combine the speed of

[00:08:51] fast food with table service. Now many of the locations guys are located off of major interstates and highways that attract travelers and the after hours crowd so I've stopped at tons of Waffle

[00:09:05] Houses on that I-95 corridor going from Philly down to South Carolina even down to Florida and Georgia and all that stuff so that's one of the staples I go to when I'm traveling as I mentioned

[00:09:17] earlier because you can get in and out quick and most times they're found on the highway so if you're traveling with a family and you don't want to spend a whole lot of time sitting down waiting

[00:09:30] at a regular restaurant you go to Waffle House and their stores are designed specifically for that they want you to get in and out and they have limited seating now that's one of the things I

[00:09:42] don't quite understand but I know there's a science to it because they're super successful so key number one or tip number one that you can learn from Waffle House know your concept and your customers now check this out Rogers said this he said we're in the people business

[00:10:00] not the food business we're in the people business not the food business so he said that's why they say hello when you come into the store it's almost like Chick-fil-a hey welcome to Waffle House

[00:10:13] you know have a good day or whatever seat yourself and now the way the store is built out if you've never been in one it's an open concept store so you can actually watch the people cook the food

[00:10:25] the counters are low so you can talk to the people behind the counters that are your waiter waitresses or who are cooking the food the chefs and so everything is designed for communication

[00:10:36] so number one know your concept and your customers so the concept once again is we want to be a place where people talk and communicate now I've been in Waffle Houses all over this country I flew into

[00:10:50] Memphis one time and I was hungry it was breakfast I said you know what there goes a Waffle House I went straight to the Waffle House had great conversation with the locals in there

[00:11:01] and that is the concept know your concept and your customers so the concept was to combine the speed of fast food with table service and once again they they wanted to focus on we're in the people business

[00:11:14] not the food business things are about experience now right people are spending money for tons of different experiences so if you go into the Waffle House now I'm gonna tell you not all of them are

[00:11:25] nice not all of them are friendly you know there's jokes out there me and my kids joke all the time I ain't never seen a Waffle House that didn't have grease on the floor right because they're rocking

[00:11:36] like that most of them are put in in strategic locations or all of them excuse me are put in strategic locations and they're doing crazy volume and what we're talking about today guys is what entrepreneurs can learn from Waffle House number one know your concept and your customers

[00:11:52] number two get in front of your ideal traffic get in front of your ideal traffic who is your ideal customer and this pertains to anybody so in order to make money you have to be in front of the people

[00:12:06] that are your target audience right so Waffle Houses are strategically placed in high traffic locations to maximize their signage and we're going to talk about that in a minute so where there's traffic guys there's money where there's traffic there's money so um the CEO of Starbucks

[00:12:25] wrote a book and he talks about where they place their locations and we place our locations he said on the corner of main and main meaning high traffic location so anywhere you see a Starbucks

[00:12:39] you know it's a high traffic location and that's the thing get in front of your ideal traffic I don't care if you're selling physical products digital products or services if nobody sees or knows about your product or services you're not going to sell it where there's traffic there's

[00:12:56] money so make sure you understand that and number three this is something that goes along with getting in front of your ideal traffic Waffle House does not advertise at all do you hear me

[00:13:11] they do not advertise so Waffle House spends zero dollars on advertising their visibility guys is their advertising so if you've seen them if you're driving down I-95 you'll see big signs they're usually very high if you can't see the physical building big Waffle House signs I know

[00:13:33] going through Virginia there's one that's probably about 150 feet high I don't even know the part of Virginia Waffle House big yellow sign with black letters Waffle House okay so they spend no money

[00:13:47] on advertising at all so that goes back into their strategy get in front of your ideal customers right so their big yellow signs on the highway are bright just think about small local stores and this

[00:14:00] is what when it comes to strategy in terms of advertising or not advertising just think about small local stores that you may see in a village and I'm going to give you a real life example

[00:14:11] we were in Asheville North Carolina several years ago and they have a nice small town feel too and we were on the main street or downtown and they had a ton of these little shops out there

[00:14:25] shops that didn't advertise obviously because they had a lot of tourists that came in so once again they didn't advertise because the visibility was there so just like Waffle House you know who spends zero dollars on advertising visibility is your advertising so if you don't spend money on

[00:14:46] advertising you better be in a serious location where there's traffic that's why people spend money to have stores in malls well they used to anyway malls now are deteriorating and declining

[00:14:59] but back in the day when malls were hot you could have a store there and you didn't have to advertise outside of that because people were already coming to the mall so if people are already on

[00:15:11] the highway traveling which is one of their customers or types of customers all you need to do is put up a sign so remember number one know your concept and your customers and a lot

[00:15:22] of customers to Waffle House are travelers number two get in front of your ideal traffic if you're on the highway and you have big signs up there you're getting in front of your ideal traffic number three they don't advertise because they're located in the right place to

[00:15:37] catch the right type of customer number four create a clear brand identification create a clear brand identification so just like you guys would recognize the Mickey D symbol or the sign that

[00:15:54] you know it's there just like if you see a BMW badge you would see that just like if you saw the Gucci symbol you know exactly what it is so what Waffle House has done they've created a bright

[00:16:07] yellow sign and they use the color yellow because it stands out so if you look at any of the stores they're going to have a big sign and they're also going to have yellow as their main color

[00:16:19] with Waffle House written in black so you need to know and understand that when you're creating something you want to create a clear brand identification now many times it's going to

[00:16:30] take a lot of money and a lot of time because you have to imprint that in people's minds and brains so just like McDonald's I don't care where you are throughout the world when you see those golden

[00:16:43] arches and that M you know that's McDonald's and that comes from the plethora of McDonald's stores and locations they have throughout the world so the visibility factor so they're physically visible if you have an online brand you need to be digitally visible so that's what you need to

[00:17:02] do you have to create a clear brand identification you can do it with imagery you can do it with wording BMW the ultimate driving machine so you know you look at the BMW logo and and you know

[00:17:16] that tagline the ultimate driving machine Burger King we do it your way even though I don't know how they're still in business because they really fell off all right but those are some of the

[00:17:28] things that you need to think about when you're building your business let's look at a number five thing or tip you can take from Waffle House be accessible and available be accessible and

[00:17:42] available how many times have you gone somewhere and they were supposed to open at a certain time and damn they're not open you're going to the barber shop you're going to the beauty salon

[00:17:53] you got a nine o'clock appointment the store isn't open even though they said they're supposed to be open that's not good right so be accessible and available all Waffle Houses are easily accessible from major highways and major intersections and they're open 24 7 365

[00:18:13] they never close so once again understanding and knowing your customers right they never close so you know you don't care it could be four o'clock in the morning anywhere you could be in Kentucky

[00:18:26] some rural area in Kentucky if there's a Waffle House you know you can go out there and get something to eat be accessible and available Waffle House is so accessible and available

[00:18:39] they have backup generators at every location so they don't care if it's a disaster and that's one of the things they pride themselves on as a spot where people come to meet so if there's a power

[00:18:52] outage in an area now remember they started in Georgia so if there's you know tornadoes wind storms rain or whatever if they're power outages you know that you can always go to a Waffle House

[00:19:04] and they will be open unless it's just a disaster where they can't be there but that's how serious they take being accessible and available how accessible and available are you for your business

[00:19:18] now I get it you can't be there 24 7 365 per se and it's all going to depend on what type of business you have but your customers and prospective customers need to understand when you're accessible and when you're available if your office hours are nine to five make that

[00:19:38] clear if you have after hours you know office hours or emergency lines if you're a dentist doctor whatever your profession you may have that but people need to know that you're accessible and available when they're spending money with you or trying to spend money with you

[00:19:56] now let's talk about number six and there's only eight of these guys systematic growth plan Waffle House has and had a systematic growth plan so after they opened their fourth corporate location they started to franchise and I mentioned earlier currently they have over 2,000 locations

[00:20:18] nationwide now peep this game as it pertains to franchise ownership because years ago I actually tried to find out about franchising and it's funny because what they said is that you cannot apply to

[00:20:33] be a franchisor you have to be selected so they're making it exclusive they understand that each of these stores is a money maker it's a gold mine you can't even apply to be a franchise owner of

[00:20:48] Waffle House they have to select you now how they go about selecting you I have no idea maybe it's almost like the McDonald's model where you work yourself up you know from the from the bottom and

[00:21:00] then you're a manager or regional manager or something like that but they make it super exclusive to get in that club now what happens when people make things exclusive they make it more desirable

[00:21:12] just like having a black card from American Express just like being a member of an elite social club something of that nature so so having a systematic growth plan has enabled them to grow

[00:21:25] to over 2,000 locations what is your systematic growth plan how are you going to scale your business are you going to scale it by adding affiliates are you going to increase your your

[00:21:38] sales per item are you going to add more items to your menu or to your portfolio how are you going to systematically grow and scale your business that's number six and what we're talking

[00:21:52] about guys is what entrepreneurs can learn from Waffle House and I'm not talking about fighting because I know on social media a lot of videos show people getting it in the Waffle House people behind the counters fighting with the servers fighting with the cooks is crazy number

[00:22:10] seven create proprietary systems now this was crazy when I learned this create proprietary systems now we all know about systems in general but do you have a proprietary system now I'm going to

[00:22:25] read this so I don't mess it up Waffle House uses what they call a mark system to signal chefs what they need to cook next and here's an example like a packet of grape jelly on the plate

[00:22:38] tells the chef they need white toast a mustard packet means pork chop a butter packet means a waffle now the position and the orientation of the items placed on the plate also mean other

[00:22:52] things so for example if you put grape jelly on the right side of the plate it means a sausage omelet I don't know how they remember that that's more than an NFL player got to remember in

[00:23:03] terms of the playbook all right but all businesses need systems now this happens to be a proprietary system so if you've ever been into a Waffle House you'll see after they take your order they'll

[00:23:16] start calling out stuff they'll be like uh two scramble with cheese patties ba-ba-ba-ba whatever it is but I always wondered how did they manage that because you have people screaming these orders

[00:23:29] out you know one after the other and I understand they do have the yellow tickets they put up for the chefs but if you've ever been in there you'll see that they put the plates right in front of the

[00:23:40] stove in order and I never realized that based on what they put on the plate and where they put it on the plate tells the chef what they need to cook next so that's pretty that's pretty neat so that's

[00:23:52] what's called a proprietary system now you don't necessarily have to have a super proprietary system like that but in order to grow your business and learn from Waffle House you need to create systems

[00:24:06] and I'm not going to go into crazy in-depth today but there are three systems minimum that every business needs a sales system a fulfillment system and a referral system a sales system which is the

[00:24:23] lifeblood of your business you need to systematically be able to generate prospective customers and then be able to convert those prospects into paying customers that's your sales system your fulfillment system is providing the product or service you just sold them so if you're doing online sales then you

[00:24:43] need to make sure that you have a fulfillment arm or you're fulfilling the product that they just bought now I just ordered something from Amazon that was literally supposed to be delivered yesterday

[00:24:54] and now they're telling me oh it's delayed you might get it on the tomorrow or the day after and there's no tracking information and this was a prime this wasn't something coming from China

[00:25:05] something like this this was a prime deal and I'm like come on man but you need to have fulfillment so my expectation was that it was supposed to be here tomorrow so I'm not too happy but I understand

[00:25:17] stuff happens and the last system that you must have is a formal not just a referral system a formal referral system I'm not talking about writing your phone number on a napkin and telling

[00:25:32] somebody hey if you like our product or service give it give this number to your friend I'm talking about a formal referral system which could be something as simple as hey let me text you this

[00:25:43] link and you can send it out to your network of people that may be interested in whatever product or service that you're selling so for example I'm getting back into the mortgage business

[00:25:54] so I'll have a link so if somebody's interested in learning how to prepare to buy their first home I'll say hey you know somebody buying a home send them this link just text it and I'll have them go

[00:26:05] to a landing page and there'll be some type of resource that's going to help them go from point a to point b so create a formalized referral system not just writing or handing out business

[00:26:18] cards that's good but something that's formal where you can capture information and you make it easy for that referral partner to get that information out to their network and last but not least and we're talking about what entrepreneurs can learn from Waffle House number eight you can

[00:26:36] learn about control like I said earlier Waffle House is a privately owned business a multi billion with a b billion dollar business that does over a billion dollars a year in sales and they're privately owned they took no outside equity or anything and so that's what you call

[00:26:59] bootstrapping and being able to continue to grow now once again in order to do that they did franchise so they did generate revenues outside of selling their food to the franchisee who obviously have

[00:27:14] a franchise fee to pay and royalties to pay but as a franchisor you're building your brand as you continue to bring on new franchises and once again that's why they have over 2,000 stores

[00:27:28] and do over a billion dollars a year in revenue and once again we're not even quite sure how much they're doing but it's been estimated I think over 1.2 or 1.3 billion dollars I've had a friend

[00:27:44] that actually used to work at Waffle House and she was telling me the daily receipts at Waffle House now of course they're going to vary based on location and traffic but we're crazy the daily

[00:27:56] receipts there were stuff you wouldn't believe because most times you just think of people going in there for breakfast but you got to remember if you're young I know my daughter when she was

[00:28:07] going to college in North Carolina a lot of times she would go to Waffle House there was like two or three of them right near campus so after they finished partying three o'clock four o'clock in

[00:28:18] the morning they walk all over the Waffle House or whatever and they go get their grub on and they go home and sleep and so once again Waffle House knows its customers now before I get to the last

[00:28:31] quarter to show real quick guys let me just share all my contact information and resource links now I started at the top of this show I mentioned my new book is out Unlocking the Power of ChatGPT

[00:28:43] the ultimate prompting handbook for beginners you can go to unlockingchatgpt.com for more information I also mentioned BEB Academy everything I'm about to tell you is on the website so go to blackentrepreneurblueprint.com blackentrepreneurblueprint.com if you're lazy

[00:29:03] take the shortcut go to bebconnect.com it's going to take you to the same place so you'll see BEB Academy there you'll also see Brand Builder Academy Elite if you're interested in building a physical

[00:29:17] products brand or a digital products brand that is the platform on the program for you also pinpoint and monetize your genius your genius is the intersection of your passion and your talent

[00:29:29] the problem is most people don't know how to monetize it so those three programs are on the front page of blackentrepreneurblueprint.com website so go there now if you want to connect with me anything long hit me on my email jjones at blackentrepreneurblueprint.com that's j-a-y-j-o-n-e-s

[00:29:51] at blackentrepreneurblueprint.com facebook blackentrepreneurblueprint twitter jjones001 j-a-y-j-o-n-e-s 001 instagram I got two ig accounts the first one is jjones4real j-a-y-j-o-n-e-s the number four r-e-a-l second one is black entrepreneur blueprint also connect with me

[00:30:16] guys on linkedin you can find me by typing in jjones black entrepreneur blueprint and also don't forget youtube i have additional content on youtube guys that is not on the podcast so go to

[00:30:29] youtube then type in black entrepreneur blueprint and hit that subscribe button for any first time listeners we drop a new episode every monday morning at 5 00 am eastern standard time so make sure wherever you're listening to this make sure you hit the subscribe button we get dropped on all

[00:30:48] your major podcast platforms and youtube every monday 5 00 am eastern standard time now let's get back to the last part of the show waffle house or bus baby that's what i talk about when we're

[00:31:02] traveling up and down the road but i just want you guys to understand that you don't have to be a genius or rocket scientist to be able to make money as an entrepreneur they're selling sausage

[00:31:14] eggs and waffles for breakfast and then they have a lunch and dinner menu it's nothing complicated about that it's all about strategy remember an entrepreneur only does three things they think create and they execute thinking is the easiest we all think about man i got this great business

[00:31:33] idea all right that's cool the creation phase is harder let me create this business let me create the products or services let me create this system to be able to be successful then you have

[00:31:45] the execution phase that's putting it all together and now you're starting to do commerce that's trading dollars for your products or service think create and execute and in that execution you're going to look to scale okay it's almost like my tagline black entrepreneur blueprint launch

[00:32:05] build and grow think create execute they're pretty much the same thing but what you have to understand guys is it doesn't take a genius to be successful as an entrepreneur and i know we're inundated with

[00:32:18] all types of different stimuli all day every day but you need to stay focused identify something that you're looking to do and then you work at it and remember expect to fail and have setbacks

[00:32:32] failure only truly comes when you quit now there are certain times you need to pivot and there are certain times you actually need to quit and reevaluate your ideas we're not going to do

[00:32:43] anything on that today but i did do an episode a couple months back called pivot or quit and i really go in depth about what what you need to do or how you identify when you pivot and how you

[00:32:56] identify when you quit and revamp and come back out with something else but yeah waffle house is an amazing story you know despite all of its uh notoriety which could be good or bad be it the

[00:33:09] fights be it the discrimination lawsuits or whatever we're focusing right now on some of the positive things that waffle house has going for it and how you can utilize those things to

[00:33:21] help build your business real quick number one know your concept and customers number two get in front of your ideal traffic number three they do not advertise because they're basically placed in front of the traffic okay uh number four create a clear brand identification number five be

[00:33:40] accessible and available number six systematic growth plan make sure you have that number seven they've created proprietary systems you don't necessarily need proprietary systems but you need customized systems based on your business and number eight control waffle house is a privately

[00:33:59] owned company when you give up control guys that means your business can go anywhere and i'm not saying you need to be a control freak but if you're the founder and you're you understand where

[00:34:10] you want your vision to go you need to have some semblance of control doesn't necessarily need to be 100 it could be 51 it could be 75 but you're the driver remember three things think create and

[00:34:25] execute and every level you go to gets a little harder so that's why you have to build a team around you now before we close on out guys i say this each and every week but it's true

[00:34:37] we get more and more downloads because of you the beb family i appreciate you guys so much please continue to spread the word about the podcast the blog the website black entrepreneur blueprint.com we want that to be the resource for black entrepreneurs go on to the site

[00:34:55] hit the learn tab there's a drop down we have all types of resources for you guys right there at your fingertips you can hit the learn button you can go to strategy and mindset e-commerce marketing

[00:35:06] all types of different resources to help you elevate your entrepreneur iq if you forgot about all my contact information go to the about page hit right under my my bio you'll see all my links

[00:35:20] to my social media remember guys it's not about me it's not about you it's about us it's about building an economic power base in the worldwide black community by building and supporting black owned businesses love you guys see you same time next week peace