The Pre-Shift

Two hours into portioning sauce into cups, Joe Fontana decided he was done doing the work and needed to start building the system. In this episode of The Pre-Shift Podcast, we sit down with Joe, founder and owner of Fry the Coop, a Nashville hot chicken concept with 10 Chicago locations and an 11th on the way, to talk about how he built a business that could grow past one restaurant. Joe shares how a meatball concept he couldn't fund led him to a simpler menu, why he trains with one page inst...

Andrew Scott, founder of Owner Shift Training and former multi-unit restaurant owner, walks us through the expensive mistakes that nearly took him under at his fifth location—and the systems he rebuilt to stop being the operating system his restaurants depended on. You're driving across the city for the third time today because someone forgot to order lettuce. Your phone buzzes at 6 a.m. with a no-call-no-show text. You can't even make it out of the city limits for a family visit before you'...

Getting workplace law advice after you get a complaint is like fixing a schedule after the shift's over. In this episode of The Pre-Shift Podcast, we sit down with Felice Ekelman, a principal at Jackson Lewis who leads the firm's restaurant industry group, to talk about the compliance mistakes that catch multi-unit operators off guard. Felice walks through why state and local rules don't travel with you from one location to the next, what "audit-proof" really looks like on paper and on the fl...

Growing from one restaurant to nine teaches you that what worked at one location might not work at another. In this episode of The Pre-Shift Podcast, we sit down with Sam Aguilar, Brand President of Oak & Stone Restaurants, to discuss what it actually takes to scale a multi-unit concept without losing your culture along the way. Sam shares how Oak & Stone built a communication system that cascades from his weekly one-on-ones all the way down to the pre-shift, plus why he tracks two la...

The Pre-Shift Podcast is back! Tom Schmidt, co-owner of Salt + Smoke BBQ, talks with host D.J. about shifting from hands-on restaurant work to leading an eight-location, 550+ employee business, a transition he says truly began around the fourth location and felt like a “phantom limb” loss of how he measured success. He explains how delegating to partners and leaders—especially co-owner Haley, a director of operations, and later hospitality, HR, finance, and catering roles—enabled growth while...