Hello and welcome to the top floor podcast. This is the Denver edition and I am your host Darren Cantall. And this is our very first episode. And I'm happy to welcome Mr. Juan Pedro. How did I do with the R? Not bad. It could have. So maybe a C plus. That's all right. I've read worse. All right. Fair enough. I appreciate that. So instead of reading a bio, we're going to ask a few questions to get to know one and to start off one. Where did you grow up? I grew up outside of Worcester, Massachusetts and that area until I was about 16 years old. And then from there, I was a hockey player and went to a scholarship to play at a prep school. And haven't really lived in Worcester since then. And I think that was probably 1989. And yeah, so I've been moving around since. Where do you live these days? Denver, Colorado. Yeah, right in Sherry Creek. And I've been in this neighborhood for about six years. And prior, I lived in Lohai, which is historically known as North Denver. And that's what I still refer to it as. And Lohai is one of those fancy gentrification. You know, how do we sell more real estate type acronyms? So, but we are, it's North Denver for sure. And that's where we have a lot of our restaurants. Yeah. Let me ask, I'm a New Yorker. I know you're from Massachusetts. There's something to say about the Northeast vibe. What do you think about that vibe of the Northeast compared to Denver's vibe? Well, it's a lot different. That's for sure. And there's a reason why there's a lot of people from the Northeast that live in Denver, because it does present a little bit more of a relaxed lifestyle, you know, educated populations. And so, so that's good. I think one of the complaints, a lot of people from the Northeast have when they go to other parts of the country is, you know, they feel those places may lack culture and just interesting conversation and interesting people. And I think, you know, I think Denver, you know, has a lot of super intelligent, forward-thinking residents. And between Denver and Boulder and Fort Collins and Colorado Springs, you know, you've got plenty of, you know, sort of urban outlets and art music and food and, you know, the other thing is Denver is a big sports town. And I think as a New Yorker and as somebody from Massachusetts, from New England, sports are a big part of our culture as well. So, they're pretty similar. Where they're really different is probably just diversity. There's a lot of diversity in thought in Denver, but there's not a lot of diversity just in terms of, you know, folks from different ethnic backgrounds. So, you know, New York obviously is, in my opinion, the greatest social experiment in the history of the world. And Boston is actually much more diverse than what people think. You know, it's got a ton of college students from around the world as well. A lot of people that stay to work in research and science and whatnot. But I would say the Northeast is definitely a lot more intense. People are more career focused than they are in Denver. We're a little bit more lifestyle focused. I think that the work ethic is in the Northeast much different than anywhere in the country, not just Denver. I think it's, you know, I think people take a lot of pride in their work ethic, where I think the rest of the country, and I can speak because I live in Denver. I think it's probably a large portion of the population. It takes a lot of pride in working, doing their job and living and going to the mountains and doing their activities, you know. So, I think those are probably the major differences. Yeah. I'm always taken by how direct we can be in the Northeast. And sometimes our directness outside of the Northeast is taken off putting or even aggressive or mean sometimes when often that's not the case. Yeah, I would say, you know, I lived in Minneapolis in Minnesota for a while. And, you know, one of the things that I really noticed when I was out there was just how nice on the surface people were and just how kind they were to you. And I really like Minnesota, but I'll tell you one thing right now, you know, if I ever needed anything, I'm calling. I'm calling somebody from Massachusetts. Because I know the clown scratch and run through walls and do whatever it takes to have my back. And I think generally, you know, my perception of other areas of the country is, you know, that deep sense of like loyalty towards somebody that you have to earn. You know, I mean, you got to earn it in the Northeast, right? You don't necessarily have to earn your friendships and other parts of the country as much. But it's, you know, those relationships are super deep. I would also say that people are a little bit more, you know, comfortable making fun of one another, nickname people. And I mean, I've been literally been the guy's weddings that I was like, Oh, that's your last name? I had no call. You know, and it's just, you know, I just knew him as, you know, whatever, some nickname that they've known for 30 years, you know. So it's, it's definitely a lot different. Do you have one of those nicknames? Me? Oh my God, I've got a lot of things. I don't think any of them are, are nicknames. You know, my mother was, was in the convent prior to meeting my father. And so she was a sister of Notre Dame and Springfield mass. So I get called son of none a lot. That's one thing. And then do you remember Happy Days? I do. Yeah. So for a short period of about two years, you know, people called me Pazzi, because I would get a reminder that Pazzi from Happy Days, I've been called Epstein from Welcome Back Coder. Remember when we were on Epstein? Yeah. So yeah, I've got like, and I'm not even Jewish, but I went to a, you know, the prep school I went to was largely Jewish. And so they would call me Epstein there. When you say you're not even Jewish, it reminds me a story of my mom. So my mom's Italian and she has various centric tastes. It's very much my mom. And she told me this funny story that she had a carpet cleaner that had, he used to like give her paper notes, like invoices, then he moved to a computer system. And when he printed off his invoice, he didn't realize that the notes were transferred to the invoice. So my mom saw his private notes, and it said nice Jewish woman. But that thought was hilarious. My mom's not even Jewish, like you were saying. Anyway, yeah, that's hilarious. Funny family story for me at least. Yeah. So yeah, yeah, it's, it's funny. You might get in trouble if you did that in California. But yeah, I mean, you know, I love the East Coast. I miss a lot of the East Coast. I really like Denver. I think Denver is a cool city. And it's got still sort of in its infancy, you know what I'm saying? I mean, I think it's still got a lot and way to grow. And, you know, we're still sort of influencing what it's going to be. You know, in New York, you know, New York is what it is. You know, Boston is what it is. Philly is what it is. But Denver is, you know, Denver is in the early stages of writing its book. Yeah. Well, let's, let's segue from that. Because I think that's a good bridge to one of the things we talked about earlier, which is, and I'm going to, I'm going to butcher this and you're going to make it more succinct. But you've talked about how for those involved deeply in hospitality as you are. And sorry, let me stop myself. Because now I'm going too far down the rabbit hole. We haven't even introduced what you do. So let me pause. Stop. Okay. What do you do? I run a hospitality group based out of Denver with restaurants and bars and coffee shops and, you know, we've got places at clubs, you know, places in New Orleans as well. And we're one of the faster growing independent restaurant groups in the country and started it in 2010 with Highland Tappenberger, burgers and beer. And, you know, today have 21 stores and 14 concepts. And I think eight coming in the next six months. Wow. Okay. Okay, busy time. Yeah, no, yeah. So. So for those of us in Denver, what are some of the stores that you have locally? Um, so we have, you know, Highland, the Tappenbergers is four of those. We have Bardot, which people probably recognize us most for, I would say, because, you know, that was the first restaurant that we opened as culinary creative group with Max as our partner. It was just a brilliant chef and developed Carrie Baird, who was a finalist on season 17 of Top Chef. And it was a super popular, you know, chef in Denver and beyond. You know, she's definitely got pulled beyond Denver. I've walked around other cities, Chicago and New Orleans with her. And, you know, cities that have a strong sort of history of worshiping their chefs and they recognize herself. That's great. You know, we've got Latin concepts and Mediterranean concepts and cocktail bars. Forget me now, it's a big one in Cherry Creek that a lot of people identify us with A5 down down or Japanese Leaning Steak House. You know, got an incredible new place called Kimoya, which is sushi. And it also has a hot Japanese kitchen and really, really, really cool bar called bar kumo, which does late night food between like 10 and one, like ramen and udon and katsu sandos and things like that. So yeah, aviano coffees. Yeah. All right. You want to give a sneak preview to the new concepts coming out or is it still under wraps? No, they're not under wraps. They're public. You know, in low high, we have magna cusina, which is a Filipino concept that we're doing with Carlo La Magna, who is, you know, was a food and wine magazine. I think it was 2021, you know, one of the chefs of the year, I think they picked 10 nationally, you know, grew up between the Philippines and Detroit, just a great immigrant story and really one of the top chefs, you know, in the country, in my opinion. And we're very fortunate to be able to partner with him and bring his food to Denver. And then on the roof of the novel rhino building, we have saree gorgeous, which is our new cocktail bar, which will be on the 12th floor facing west with a basically a view of everything from Colorado Springs all the way to Fort Collins to be honest with you. So beautiful city views and 45 foot operable glass wall opens up to a patio. So that's, you know, should be an iconic place for the city of Denver. I almost view it as a gift to the city of Denver. So it should be awesome. We have, we're joint venturing with Sterling from Aspen. They have a club up in Aspen that's wildly popular up there. Andrew Sandler is the owner. And, you know, they're going to do taking over the space that's sort of in the back of the Clayton Hotel, which was recently a Michelin rated hotel in Cherry Creek. So there'll be like a super high end like lounge club vibe table, you know, bottle service, table service type feel, which I don't think we have very much of if any in Denver today. But as you know, growing up in the Northeast, you know, we had a lot of that and they were fun, you know, nights out where people got dressed up, you know, spent a little bit of extra money and made memories. And in the front of that, we're going to put bar Amorina. Amorina is a term of endearment from, you know, you're a Italian. So, you know, little love, you know, sweetheart, man to his wife. And we're going to do an Italian themed cocktail bar. So lots of Negronis and espresso martinis and spritches and things like that. But we're going to do a hand stretched mozzarella bar. So we'll have warm hand stretched mozzarella that we're making in house and a couple of handmade pastas and, you know, few other snacks. But, you know, it's definitely a place where you can go and have a light dinner and have some cocktails. And I think the ladies are going to love it for, you know, events, you know, bashful rats and baby showers and things like that as well. But that's also on the bottom floor of the Clayton. And then we have four going into the airport, 30 days, two avianos, a Mr. Oso and a Bardot. And we have two going into Boulder, a Mr. Oso and an aviano in the New Moxie Hotel in Boulder. So you're seeing a theme of us going in the hotels. That's a big part of our growth strategy moving forward. So Awesome. So many places we could go. So coming back to the question I was going to ask earlier and thank you. I obviously got ahead of myself and didn't even give you a chance to introduce your business. You had mentioned that hospitality as an industry is really a cross section of a lot of current affairs, not necessarily political per se, but topics of importance, immigration, food security, housing, amongst others. It's a it is a political industry. So I wouldn't necessarily not say political. I mean, it was deemed an essential business during COVID, right? And, you know, we feed over 60% of Americans in restaurants on a daily basis. So that's a astonishing number, you know, given that we have a lot of folks over the age of 75 and a lot of kids under the age of like 15, right, that are, you know, probably eating at home. So, you know, I don't know exactly what the numbers are for adults, but it's pretty high. I eat out almost every night. I don't know about you. But, you know, to address what you were saying, what I think you were saying was, when we had spoken last, we had talked about the issues of the day and the issues of the day, specifically in Colorado, our rural workforce development. And by the way, some of these are every city in America, affordable housing, immigration, food insecurity, wellness, health and wellness, you know, restaurants touch upon all of those and influence all of those quite a bit. And they're great platforms for your community, you know, people do their fundraisers at restaurants and they just are really, really, really like, you know, kind of the cornerstones of how we function as a society. You know, when you are going to meet your friends out, you're typically going to a restaurant, right, or you're typically going to a cocktail bar. You're going to take your family, you know, celebrate a birthday, you're going to go to a restaurant. If you're, you know, you're mourning friends and you're getting together with people, you're typically going to a restaurant. So, it really serves as a lot more than just a place where you go and you grab a burger and a beer. So, maybe give us a window into how you and your leadership team operate. And what I'm most interested in, at least with this question for now is your company's going through great growth. You have found some focus on hotels. My guess is you didn't just summon that up with a magic wand. My guess is there are some deep conversations with you and your leadership team. And I wonder if you give us a little window into how the team interacts and how you came to the decisions you did to grow. Yeah, you know, we're good at conceptual development, which is a very rare skill set. And we probably took that to a bit of an extreme in that, you know, having 14 concepts and 21 stores is, you know, I think, you know, by any measure, a risky decision. But fortunately, we've been able to be successful in doing that. And, you know, when you take a big risk and you're successful, you know, people start taking a lot of notice and what you're doing and want to want to figure out, you know, why and how and how they can do the same thing. And, you know, so we get a lot of calls for, you know, advice and whatnot. My advice is don't do it the way we did it. But, you know, find a couple things that work and grow them. And, you know, we're about creating opportunity for people. But we're really more like an incubator for artists. You know, I wouldn't even necessarily call us a restaurant group so much. You know, I was a headhunter in the late 90s and tech during the dot com era. And I did a lot of that work in New York and in Boston. And in fact, that's how I was discovered Denver. I was transferred here in 99 to open up an office for that particular company. But what happened in the dot com era was, you know, you had this like, just explosive time and technology where we went from these big mainframe computers and for point of reference for those who don't know what a mainframe computer is. I mean, just, you know, if you ever watched Star Trek or whatever, those big things that people were, you know, on walls that people were like putting things into and pressing buttons. And then you went to client server development, which was a little bit more agile, really meant to be support for businesses like mutual fund companies and accounting firms and law firms and whatever. And then you built these internal systems and they would store data and like that type of stuff. And then there was this thing called the world wide web, which, you know, people will probably kind of laugh at, no shit, we have the world wide web, but you know, it was only 25 years ago, right? I mean, like, think about the last 25 years, what you're able to do online now, even with AI coming on and all that type of stuff. But the problem was that all these kind of like advanced development languages came out in the 90s. And the young kids, of course, because it was new and sought as the future, learned them. And the older generations, because they needed to care for their families and needed stability, just continued to do what they were doing. And all the money started getting dumped into these young e-commerce companies. And these kids were, you know, sometimes college dropouts, 18, 19, 20 years old with these great ideas. And, you know, the checks were astonishing. I mean, we're not talking about a million bucks here. We're talking sometimes, you know, 50, 70, 100, 200 million dollars going into these companies. And how do you justify, given a 21 year old, 100 million dollars to sell Wall Street online, right? When they don't even make their bed when they get up in the morning, right? And it's like, so they created these like incubators. And they said, okay, you have this great idea. You have the knowledge, you have the know how we're going to make you rich. And we just need you to code program and Java. And we need you to build this for us. And we're going to provide all the administrative support for you and all the sales and marketing support, you know, human resources, human capital support, you know, we're going to fund you so that you can hire people and all this type of stuff. We just need you to stay focused on this. Well, that's kind of how we viewed restaurants. When we got into them was we had all these incredible chefs or artists, we have all these incredible artists that are producing all this incredible food and plating it beautifully and being really innovative with different ingredients and doing all kinds of cool stuff. But they didn't really understand the math, like, right? And so restaurants got this reputation as being extremely risky investments. And it was really just a product of people that understanding cash flow and not having the right support to grow their businesses, because it's a very labor intensive expensive business to run. So that's what we did. We kind of created an incubator, similar to the .com era where eBay and Apple and all these guys started in these big tech spaces. And we've just done it sort of with chefs. And we've created an equitable business model where they earn equity in their business, their owners. And we provide them with all the support necessary to be successful. Finance, accounting, payroll, you know, construction management, facilities management, social media, marketing, branding, events, sales, like all of that is in our infrastructure. And they go out and they create. And the thing with artists of any type is when your passion gets suppressed, your creativity gets suppressed, you know, you don't, it can be it can be paralyzing. And I think that we really understood that. And we've got a great group of people that kind of stay in their lane and have allowed us to grow to the place we are today. So. Love it. You also answered a question that I didn't even ask because I was curious how you're attracting, you know, some of these amazing chefs you've talked about the, was it the winner of season 17 of Top Shell? Yeah, Joe final one. Yeah. So they're all really good friends. They do lots of events together. It was two Joe's, Joe Flam in Chicago, Joe Sapso out of LA and Kerry out of Denver. We're the top three. So cool. And so what I think I'm also hearing from you is that from a business perspective, you've created a value proposition that is unique and different than other, what do you call it, restaurateurs or groups or whatever the right terminology is. And that becomes your hope for some of these chefs to want to come partner with you. Yeah, and we've never really had an interest. I've never personally had an interest in owning 100% of a restaurant, right? I mean, I have an interest in, you know, the activism that I was brought up with from, you know, having a mother that was a nun and a father that was a political activist from Puerto Rico, essentially an immigrant. And so, you know, the activism piece extends to the community, but it also is very present within our company. And, you know, we employ a disproportionate amount of people from disadvantaged communities, whether they're single moms or, you know, or immigrants or whatever, you know. So we take a lot of pride in creating stability, stable incomes and getting people into the credit system so that they can buy cars and homes and, you know, really investing in our people's growth. And, you know, we've got people that have been with us for 14, 15 years that kids are going off the college now, first generation. And, you know, that's what that's what we're most proud of. I'm a former recruiter as well. I miss the IT bubble. And in Colorado, you know, when I was in some of the companies I was in and we did some affirmative action reporting, at the time, I'm going back at least 10 years, our census data showed we're a pretty white community. And it was always interesting to folks in my HR world of where do, where do diverse hires come from when the population is not so? Right. You talked about a passion for activism and translating that into employees, long standing partners in your businesses. I'm curious, how do you do that? Yeah, it's a good question because Denver is really white. But, you know, the surrounding towns aren't as white, right? Aurora is a wildly diverse city, which, you know, I think has done an amazing job welcoming people from all over the world. And by the way, it's a super interesting food scene. I eat there regularly in that town and pop around all the little restaurants that, you know, people are opening up on young entrepreneurs are opening up, and sometimes not young, sometimes out of necessity, you know, people we've got, you know, every time I get in a new where I meet somebody from Senegal or Russia or Nigeria or Kenya or something, and they were like a doctor, an engineer or something like that. And their credentials didn't transfer over. So, you know, instead of having to go back to school for a decade, they open up a restaurant or they would like to. Uber is the lowest hanging fruit for them to make money. But, you know, they don't necessarily, because they don't have credit, they don't have access to our capital that, you know, somebody in America would have. And these are real problems that we have in Denver that we need to address, right? You know, how the hell do we let a man who who saved people's lives and hospitals and, you know, and just because his credentials didn't transfer over here, it doesn't mean he's not a brilliant person and he's got a family, he wants to take care of his family, he wants to have some of his culture recognized restaurants are a great way to do that. We can't figure out a way to give these guys access to capital so they can do that. And that's where the infrastructure that I talked about in our company comes in that I'm, you know, you had talked about not being political before. I am very political and I really feel like, you know, we're pushing very hard on the city and the state to say, hey, listen, you know, our business model works for the greater good of the people and we can create an infrastructure and incubate immigrant entrepreneurs and single moms and things like that. And really, that's what we should be doing downtown on the 60th Street Mall, because every panel I sit on or every panel I listen to, they talk about, you know, the same subjects over and over again, what comes first, businesses or residents, what comes, you know, and it's just like, look, the bottom line is, you know, the neighborhoods in Denver are too mature. There's no reason to leave them unless you give me one. And the only way to give me a reason to leave it is if you have a cultural center that I can't get in my neighborhood with great food and art and music and something that I'm going to be proud of and want to take people to. And we have a great opportunity in Colorado to do that in our capital city and we're blowing it. So I'm cautious with this question, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Because you're involved in local politics, to the extent that you are, without letting the cat out of the bag or anything that is confidential, what are some of the things that you're seeing our governments do that you think are in the best interest of our residents? Let me make sure I'm understanding your question. You want to know what some of the positive things government is doing? Yes. For its residents? Okay. I think there's several. I think the state has done a good job in particular, Governor Polis's team and his administration, because they listen to their residents quite a bit. You know, they're accessible. I think that that's probably a rarity in politics in America. And I think that he's an interesting guy. He's socially progressive. I think he's fiscally pretty moderate. And I think he's got a whole bunch of libertarian in him. And I think his words, not mine, when they ask him about the vice presidential run, he said I'm bald, I'm gay, and I'm Jewish. They probably don't want me to be vice president right now. But it's too bad, because I think he'd make a great president, actually, because I think he is thoughtful. And I think he really understands all the different segments of the population. And if he doesn't, he is a good listener and seeks to find the truth. And so I think that they handled COVID really well in Colorado, comparatively, to other parts of the country. They didn't go extreme one way or the other. You know, I didn't agree with everything. But I mean, in my opinion, I think they did a really, really good job. I think the infrastructure in the state of Colorado is good. I think they've attracted businesses to Colorado that have created meaningful jobs. Colorado, historically, had been very boomer bust as a state with the economy. And I think we have a much more stable economy today than we've had in the past. You know, so, you know, but there's, you know, there's other problems too. I mean, they put, well, let me continue, they put Colorado on the map everywhere I go internationally. And I travel a lot. People now know Colorado and they know Denver. Even 10 years ago, that wasn't the case. So I think it's a desirable place to come and visit the sea. And I think it's got a little bit of a unicorn reputation. So I think all of that is good. And it's a nice place to live. The city, I think, is a different story. I think they've struggled with their leadership in recent times. And I think the current guy today is a good guy. And I think he's a really smart guy. I think he's got a really smart team around him. But I think he's got an incomplete team. I don't even think they've filled all that maybe they have filled all their roles. But I know they got off to a rocky start just in terms of staffing and whatnot, you know, the city departments struggle. You know, and I think they've got a lot of good intentions, but they're also battling with a city council that, you know, has some people on it. There's some incredible people in city council, by the way, but there's also some people in city council that I shouldn't say that they're not incredible. I think everybody on city council is an incredible person. I think there are some special interests that get in the way of, you know, us seeing the potential of what city council could be here. And there's a lack of listening, which happens in all lines of business, including government, which was hurting the city quite a bit. In particular, it's small businesses. But the city, you know, I think has invested, you know, pretty heavily in infrastructure. And I think Visit Denver has done a really good job with conventions. I think that's been a big boon to the economy here. And it's created a lot of jobs. I think the gentleman who runs that Richard Sharf is a caring person. And, you know, but you know, the city is, you know, the city's in trouble, I think right now today. I think it really needs to look at itself in the mirror and say, Hey, listen, you know, who do we want to be? And are we really representing the people of Colorado? And I don't think that's true, you know, and there's just so much apathy in voting. You know, you don't just people just don't get out and vote. You know, if you're not what I've learned in business is that if you're not paying attention to your local politics, you know, you're really, you know, going to be in for a rude awakening. And we've seen a lot of that in Denver. And, you know, so that's that's kind of my opinion on the politics. Yeah, appreciate going there. Educate some folks for those that are not active or even aware of how to learn about local politics. Where do you suggest they go look? Well, I don't think most people want to pay attention to the news these days just because there's a lot of BS in it, as we know. But I would say get active in your community. I would say that's a great start because, you know, these are supposed to be public servants. And, you know, you got to hold them accountable to being that. And I think that the more active you are as a citizen, the more your voice will be heard. And other people will follow you, you know, encourage those around you to be active in whatever the events of the days are, you know, so go to the cultural events, go to the the city sponsored events, meet people, you know, understand what their thought processes and what their platforms are. You know, and by the way, you know, what a boring world if we all have to agree with one another, right? That's not what I'm saying, right? You know, we should disagree and we should be able to have spirited conversations, but we should have better balance in our government where everybody's being, you know, represented. And we need to listen to one another. And, you know, I liken it to sort of like what I learned in restaurants. And I used to want things on our menus that I liked, right? And there's a lot of things on all of our menus that I like, but not everything, but it's not about me, right? It's about what the guest wants. And a lot of people like that, you know, and it's the same thing in life. You know, there's a lot of issues that you might feel really strongly about. But others might not, or others might have a different opinion, and their citizens too, and you represent them too. And so sometimes you got to put your ego aside, and I think you've got to, you know, make decisions, you know, that take everybody's opinion into account. All right, so we're getting close to where the end of our time. Let me ask a follow-up question on that. And maybe a little bit of context. So I work as an executive coach. That's what I do primarily day to day. I work with a lot of companies. And what I experience is an inability or a lacking or not wanting to disagree. And so what we have to see is the people at the top of the food chain make statements, make decisions, ask for debate or input. And that lower level staff say, yes. So there's a lot of agreement without discussion or debate. And what I think is being lost is, how do we disagree civilly? And even if you don't take up my side of this argument, that I don't hold it against you personally. So in essence, how do we disagree to disagree? Yeah, there's, I think there's a lot of, there's a lot to talk about with that statement. Because part of it, you know, the first answer is engagement, right? A lot of folks at lower levels, have plenty of opinions. And they just don't engage, you know, or they have things that they want and they demand and they get them and they don't use them. You know, an example of that was like during COVID, you know, people wanted mental health services in our company. So we provided 12 hours per employee a year of mental health services, which is, you know, 700 employees. That's a lot, right? And I think in the last four years, we've had like 30 people use it, even though people were screaming and kicking and they wanted it and this and that, you know, it's the same thing with benefits. You know, we need benefits. We need all this stuff. Great. Here's your benefits. You can't get anybody to sign up for it. You know, it's like, so I think there's a lot of, I think this is a lot of unhealthy chatter that goes on on social media and in these Reddit's and things like that, where there's a lot of misinformation. And so and then, you know, combine that with, you know, really kind of stupid laws that don't allow you to train your work for you. Workforce development is a big key, you know, in the state of Colorado. Well, you know, you can't afford to train anybody in the lower level jobs in Colorado, because it's just too expensive. So there's no mechanism in place to help, no grant money, no, you know, to put like learning management systems together for small businesses, things like that that would be, I think, really helpful. And I think that's where you get like engagement, and then you can get more spirited debate when people are talking about things that they're educated in, because right now there's a lot of throwing stones in America and, you know, specifically in Denver as well, with, you know, when people have very limited information, you know. All right, last question for you. How in your company are you encouraging the spirited debate? You know, interestingly enough, I, you know, I'm very active. I connect with my leaders all the way down to the store level pretty frequently. So my directors, I meet with weekly, and on a call, and then individually, either weekly or biweekly in person, depending on who it is. And then my general managers, just at the restaurants, you know, I had lunch with a general manager at one of the burger spot at the at the steakhouse yesterday, and then for dinner, I took one of the general managers out to dinner from Bellevue Tavenburger. And, you know, we just spend a couple hours together, you know, time spent, man. It's about spending time, and it's about getting to know somebody. And I think, you know, relationships are really, really, really important. I worry about this zoom culture, because how do you really establish deep, meaningful relationships where people are comfortable having spirited conversations? Because if you're going to have a spirited conversation, you know, and you don't have a deep relationship with somebody or a good relationship with somebody, you're going to get a, that's when people get offended and they dig their heels in, you know, there's no like, nobody pays attention to intent, because nobody really knows what intent is, you know, if you don't have a deep personal relationship. So I think those are the biggest things. Love it. So being available, FaceTime, open up the conversation, spending time with people. It's wonderful. All right. Any parting thoughts before we close out? I know. Check out the restaurants. See what you think. Love it. Love it. All right. So in the show notes, we'll have some contact information. We'll put some links to the restaurants. Thank you, Juan, the very first guest on the Denver edition. And as I've been thinking about this, if we're in the game long enough and we get to number 100, I'd love to have you back as 101. All right. Thank you very much. Bye.
