We were lucky to catch up with Sandy Levine recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Sandy, thanks for joining us today. Folks often look at a successful business and imagine it was an overnight success, but from what we’ve seen this is often far from the truth. We’d love to hear your scaling up story – walk us through how you grew over time – what were some of the big things you had to do to grow and what was that scaling up journey like?

The main thing we’ve done over the years to scale up is a) we never paid ourselves nearly as much as we could have. Putting profits back into the business helped us save funds for future endeavors. In most cases, after 2-4 years of profitability, we’d have paid down the loans and saved enough for a down payment on another loan (for a new concept). We also never rushed into anything. For the first 2 years after opening any of our now 5 concepts, we wouldn’t even entertain the thought of expanding. Once we both had a hearty chunk of savings, and our other place(s) were operating smoothly at high levels without much day-to-day assistance by ownership, we’d begin looking for new spaces to expand to. We were open and up front with landlords and agents about not being very motivated buyers, and were patient enough to wait for the right deal (we try to keep occupancy costs below 5% of gross sales to begin leases/mortgages).

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I started in the restaurant industry as an 11-year-old dishwasher on Saturdays at my grandparents’ deli. I worked my way through most stations and served throughout high school, college, and after college, while I tried to decide which career path to take. Eventually I realized that this is the industry for me, and never looked back.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I think the golden rule is something that I was naive to take as gospel. I always wanted to do and learn more when I was coming up. I think early on in my ownership role, I pushed some staff members who I had a lot of respect for to pursue management positions. After a few of them quit shortly after being promoted, I realized that not everyone is the same, and some folks just want to stay in the job they have. Since, I’ve found that assumptions are often wrong, and the only way to know what people are thinking is to have open, honest communication with them.

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

At our first bar, we had a regular who was a chef. I reached out to him when we were considering leasing what ended up becoming our first restaurant space. He sent me a list of several chefs, and my wife and I visited each chef’s restaurant. The choice was glaringly obvious, and for the last 10+ years since I first ate his food, I still stand by the opinion that his food is the best in our city.