Are we going to get in trouble?
What if Shake Shack had a different name? Custard's First Stand, Dog Run, Madison Mixer, Park Paradise. Some pretty bad names, right?
Danny Meyer admits to some bad ideas. That was one of them on the way to the name that is now iconic on 700 restaurants. As much as he is now running a global business, New York is home.
No one is in New York by accident. They want to be the best at the thing they do. His name is synonymous with food and particularly with hospitality. His book is called What Could Possibly Go Right. He talks about the mindset he's developed as a leader who sets expectations instead of leaving people to guess what he wants. Great people want to be part of a winning team.
Danny gives us an inside look at the way he's able to move on when things go wrong.
Of all the stories that I wrote about in What Could Possibly Go Right, that was the least fun one to live through, but it was the most fun one to tell. It is all on the menu on this week's Morning People.
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Danny, thank you for coming in.
I'm so glad to be here. Thank you, Pat.
They are. I always start with the question, are you a morning person?
I am very much a morning person, sometimes more so than I would like to be.
It seems counterintuitive with somebody who is in a business that primarily happens at night.
Well, actually, you know, we take Daily Provisions for example. We serve most of our meals at breakfast time. So I get up early and I just cannot wait to capture the day.
Did part of the concept behind Daily Provisions come because you do get up early and felt like more could be done there?
In fact, that's right. I live in the neighborhood, I work in the neighborhood where the first Daily Provisions is on 19th, right next door to Square Cafe. And I asked myself, what would I like? And I said, I want a better cup of coffee. I want a really good bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich. Occasionally, a cinnamon curl. And there it was.
How often do you enjoy the cinnamon curl?
Probably once every two weeks and then a maple curl in between.
Okay. Your businesses are so associated with hospitality in New York City and I want to separate those two things. There are aspects of what you did particularly when you started that seemed so well suited to New York City. Could your story have happened somewhere else?
That's such a good question. You know, when I first opened Union Square Cafe, I was 27 years old and a lot of my friends who first of all said, "What the hell are you going into that business for? You'll never make any money. It's going to go out of business. And if you had to do it, why would you do it in such a competitive city as New York? Why not just go back home to St. Louis or some easier place?" And in retrospect, all these years later, I think it would have been harder anywhere besides New York because New Yorkers love restaurants and they loved restaurants 41 years ago when I opened Union Square Cafe. New Yorkers have access to the best ingredients in the world. They have the most sophisticated restaurant goers. They've got restaurant critics, media. So in a lot of ways, I feel like it was advantageous to open here. But they're not wrong with the notion that New York just chews through restaurants that don't measure up. I mean, look at how there can be a location that in the period that your restaurants have existed has been 10 different concepts with 10 different owners.
That's true. That's true. I think no one is in New York by accident. Everyone who's here is self-selected because they want to be the best at the thing they do. And I think quality does rise to the top. That's why you are in the seat you're in.
Thank you. Thank you for saying that.
The other thing that you mention so frequently is that you were in the hospitality business almost that you happen to serve food, but at the end of the meal, someone wants to feel like they were taken care of.
True. And I learned that a long, long time ago because way before there was the internet, like the first 10 years of my restaurant career before opening Gramercy Tavern, the only annual report card we got was the Zagat survey. And the Zagat survey used to ask what do you think of the food, decor, and service. And then they asked a fourth question. Now name your five favorite restaurants. And every single year, I would watch my one restaurant, Union Square Cafe, would gradually get higher and higher and higher on the list of New York's favorite restaurants. And we got all the way up to, I think, number three or two one year. And that same year, our food came in 10th, our service came in 12th, and our decor came in 65th. And I said, "How does 10 + 12 + 65 equal..."
And that's when I realized there's some things Zagat was not asking about. You had to have really good food, decor, and service. But that wasn't going to make you someone's favorite. Those were the things people expected.
The favorite restaurant was almost a proxy for the hospitality.
The favorite. Yeah, exactly. That was the part where someone said, "This place makes me feel so good that it's my favorite." That's a very personal thing to say. And by the way, Pat, if someone were to say, "This is the best milkshake in the world, the best chocolate milkshake in the world," I agree with that, but I bet you a thousand people would say, "I know a better one." No one can or will argue with me if I say this is my favorite milkshake in the world.
So, want me to try some right now?
Sure. Sure. Then, well, I'll have the vanilla.
No punishment. Thank you. Did they measure up with the preparation? That was your second Shake Shack location ever on the Upper West Side that was acquired from about an hour ago because we decided we should have...
Pretty good for being 1 hour old.
Yeah. Yeah. It's still cold. It's still cold. We got it straight here. My nephew the first time we went to that location when I lived on the Upper West Side had a sip of the milkshake and he was much younger. He was a kid and he said, "Uncle Pat, this milkshake is too chocolatey." What do you mean? There's no milkshake in the history of the world that I've ever found too chocolatey. But he said, "No, I like the black and white milkshake because it's not as chocolatey."
You know what? We did not open with a black and white milkshake, but we listen to people like your nephew. We use like the world's best chocolate in this milkshake, and it has a punch. And that was my fault because I said, I don't want to have a meek. If it says chocolate, drink it.
Let's punch him in the face with a wonderful chocolate.
Well, since we're on the Shake Shack topic, this was a one-off New York City hot dog in the park that has grown into this publicly traded global chain. Take me back to the initial moment when this seemed like an opportunity to serve some food in Madison Square Park.
Well, initially before opening 11 Madison Park and Tabla, I wanted to bring the park to life because that was our front yard. We had big windows overlooking what was a pretty...
Pretty not attractive and not safe park.
Yeah. And so we did what it took with the Madison Square Park Conservancy to bring the park up and then we said we got to give people a reason to use it. I always thought food should be there. We waited because in the administration before Mayor Bloomberg, they said, "All right, you can have food in the park, but all the money goes back into the city's general fund." When Mayor Bloomberg came into office, he and his parks commissioner, Adrien Vanipey, said, "We will let you do this in a way that the proceeds from your kiosk," right by then it wasn't called Shake Shack yet, "can actually go right back into this park." And I said, "You're on. We'll do something." Because if we could have a business that not only attracted people to use the park, which keeps it safe, but would also generate income so the park could stay safe and beautiful and programmed. That's a great business model. But I had no idea it would turn into a chain.
But you weren't necessarily in that moment looking for direct profits. You just wanted the park to be a prosperous place so that the neighborhood would benefit.
It was in fact it was 5 years before we opened a second Shake Shack.
I made a note about what page this was on, which was page 62. Okay. The rejected names for Shake Shack. Custard's First Stand, Dog Run, Madison Mixer, and Park Paradise.
It's pretty bad names, right?
I mean, Shake Shack is better.
I think Shake Shack is way better.
What's your second choice out of that list?
Shake Shack and everything else.
Can you imagine any other name for that business at this point?
No, but can you imagine any other name than Pat for yourself? I think we become who we are. And I will say there was one scary night after naming it Shake Shack and opening it. I happened to be home on a Saturday night and I was scrolling through all the cable channels waiting to watch SNL on TV because when you had to wait and actually watched it at the appropriate time. Yeah. And all of a sudden I land on the movie Greece which I've probably seen eight times before this through my life. And it just so happened to be the scene where Olivia Newton John and John Travolta are singing You Better Think Twice. And in the background there's an amusement park with a ride called Shake Shack. And I said to myself, are we gonna get in trouble? Did I like subconsciously have this name on my mind from having seen Greece? And it literally only lasts for about two seconds, but there it is.
Wait, one of the amusement park things is the Shake Shack where they go through.
Have a look sometime next time you watch.
Nope. Nope. Will you now?
And I think by now we probably have the right to use it.
The expansion of Shake Shack to stadiums was interesting and you aligned with Citi Field and people all of a sudden were trying to schedule an earlier arrival or putting off dinner because here was a way to experience Shake Shack without having to line up in Madison Square Park.
