Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Brian Solari. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Brian, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you come up with the idea for your business?

I had taken some business courses specifically with the WISE group and the first step to bringing an idea to a business is to survey to find out if your product has demand. So when I was working in restaurants i would often ask and also hear people ask for a secondary location for dessert or after dinner drinks once they left our establishment. People were looking for a casual spot to finish their evening and dessert was most often the first thing that they said they were looking for. So I knew that there was demand for the Carmella’s concept. I decided to expand upon the Italian cafe, which has desserts and coffee and well as wine and beer and liquor. I expanded the bar area and bar menu to make a bar/cafe feel.

Brian, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I grew up in an Italian family that was food centric. I had relatives that owned food business like Italian ice, pizza, and other italian food related businesses and they were busy and doing very well. That was exciting to me that I could make good food a business and make a good living if it was done right.

I’ve done a few things in my life, but always had my foot in the food business. I enjoyed the camaraderie and the meeting new people. My personality is to push things in any industry and try something new. I liked the idea of offering people a setting that they were unfamiliar with but would appreciate.

Too be honest, there was a bit of a learning between myself and the customers. People were confused when they first came as we were different than what they were accustomed to. But we also, as a business, had to learn what it was that people were really looking for. We continued to expand the menu items that people were buying and eliminate the items that did not sell well. We tried a lot of things and there were some surprises as to what they did and did not want. But we also worked hard on recipes and various sizes to find the best scenario for our customer as well as our kitchen and labor costs. The biggest lesson I would take from this is, as a business person, not to be rigid. There is the old adage that the customer is always right. There are probably many ways to interpret that saying. But the way I interpret it is by supplying the customers the products they consistently ask for in the way they are asking for them and removing the items they don’t show any interest in. At the day’s end, I am a business person and have to be that first when running a business. I never want to be right, I want to sell a product.

In working directly with the customer and listening to the customer, we have created a well respected and admired brand.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

When I first opened Carmella’s my wife was eight months pregnant with our second child. He didn’t know who I was for at least the first six months of his life, as I was never home. When we opened we were almost 20k in debt and had no idea how we were going to pay the next months bills. And that continued on and off for about three years for various reason.

I remember about 5 days into our opening, I was standing in the place behind the counter all by myself- no other staff and no customers. The stress got so bad that i leaned over to pick up a napkin off the floor and when I did I almost threw up. The only thing that stopped me was that a group of four walked through the door.

There were ups and downs for the next few years, but I worked hard and put in a lot of hours and thought about the business when I wasn’t working. I decided to never believe that the business wouldn’t make it. I would make sure that it survived. I think that the most fundamental building block of making a business work is believing that it can work. You have to believe that it will work and that it can be done or you will question yourself at every decision, which takes your attention off of the important things, which involves growing the business.

Any advice for managing a team?

As a business owner, there my be no more important job than managing your team. The employees are the ones that run the operations that are vital to sales and success.

The first step is being committed to building a culture of respect and responsibility. Good people and good employees want to work in businesses that respect them as people and that the staff is held accountable to their production. This is still an ongoing development in Carmella’s, but that’s because I take this aspect very seriously. It’s easy to spot people that aren’t buying into the culture, so we have a mantra of hire well, train well, fire fast. One bad seed will drag down quality staff.

I pay my staff well, but also have high expectations not only in production, but in ethics and respect.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.carmellasdessertbar.com
• Instagram: @carmellasdessertbar
• Facebook: facebook.com/carmellasdessertbar