Lance Glinn:
... ICE House Podcast. Today's guest is Jon Taffer, entrepreneur, author and the host of Bar Rescue.
Jon, thanks so much for joining us Inside the ICE House. Happy to have you here.
Jon Taffer:
Good to be here.
Lance Glinn:
So Jon, first off, congratulations on hitting season 10 of Bar Rescue. That's a huge milestone-
Jon Taffer:
Thank you.
Lance Glinn:
... for a TV series, let alone one working in real bars with real stakes at hand. When you look back just at the early days of Bar Rescue when this was still a fresh idea trying to find its footing, did you have any sense that you'd still be doing this 10 seasons and I think you said 15 years later?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah, no. I thought I'd do a pilot and go home. Then I thought one season and go home. I'll never forget, I was talking to my production company at the end of the first season. I said to them, "So, the biggest challenge was pilot the first season, it's easier to get the second season, right?" They said, "No, statistically it's even harder."
But every year, it's shocking that it just continues to go on. And these past three years, the first time I've ever had a multiple year contract. Because normally in TV, it's year by year.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
Let's see how you do.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And then if you do well, we'll give you another year. But 15 years, man, I can't believe it.
Lance Glinn:
Are there any bars ... And I know we were talking before we pressed record, I'm a fan. The one that I always go back to that really sticks with me, Nevada Brew Works is one that always sticks with me. I don't know why, maybe because it was-
Jon Taffer:
Because of the family dynamic?
Lance Glinn:
... the time of COVID. The family dynamic, too. They were going through so much.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
No only with the bar, but with the health of their children, everything. It just sort of sticks with me as someone who has a young child myself. Are there any bars just over the years that really stick with you? Ones that stand out for good or bad, because there have been a lot of I'm sure bad ones that stand out.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
At least in the beginning, before you got there. Are there any ones that really stick to you?
Jon Taffer:
It's more the people than the bars. So yeah, there's a Havana episode. It was a Black gentleman and his son and his son had heart surgery at three-years-old, only had a 20% chance to live. I don't know if you saw that episode.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
The dad always had a cigar. I love this family, his father was in ... But the father didn't know how the son felt, the son didn't know and the family dynamic was terrible. That one means a lot to me.
And there was another one you might remember, Characters.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Which became MoonRunners.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Remember the children were crying and the family? Any time I can fix a family like that, that feels really good.
Lance Glinn:
And we're going to talk a little bit more as we go later in the podcast about really managing those dynamics of trying to rescue this bar while also trying to be an emotional support in a way, too.
One thing that's always really fascinated me as someone whose watched the show back to the first few seasons is how it's evolved. Not just stylistically, the show, but in the problems that bars are facing. So as you step into season 10, when you think about the evolution from that first pilot to now, what would you say has been the biggest shift really in the bars you're walking into, or maybe even into your own approach in rescuing them?
Jon Taffer:
I think there's been two major shifts, it's hard to pick one. Obviously, the marketplace has changed.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
The pandemic changed everything. Inflation changed everything. Escalated costs obviously impact businesses. The lack of being able to find employees has impacted us. I call all that marketplace influence.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But consumer influence has really changed us as well. I always felt that Starbucks was the minor league of bars.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
When you're 18, 19-years-old, you're in college or whatever, you go to Starbucks.
Lance Glinn:
Sure, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
You sit and have not a cocktail, but you're in a social coffee environment.
Lance Glinn:
Coffee, whatever it might be, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
But during the pandemic, that disappeared. So now, we have a Gen Z that didn't have that social interaction during college and those years of 21 to 24-years-old.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
I think it's affected the industry.
I also think that social media has had a serious impact on what I would call relevancy. If you posted a picture of yourself looking awful today, people would say, "Good photo, buddy, looking good."
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
You get this fake BS relevancy all the time from social media. So people want relevancy, they go to businesses that make them feel relevant. They order food that makes them feel relevant, drinks that make them feel relevant. The brands they choose are based on relevancy. So legacy brands don't mean as much as they used to. It's so much about what are you doing for me today.
Lance Glinn:
It's like that instant gratification.
Jon Taffer:
It is instant grat ...
Lance Glinn:
People want that instant gratification.
Jon Taffer:
It also affects the way you deal with employees. I got to give you a lot of pat on the backs because you're used to getting that out there every day.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So the way you manage employees has changed as well.
Lance Glinn:
And so, we talked a little bit before about the emotional support or the emotion that comes through in each episode with all of these different families that you meet, all these different people that you interact with. So obviously, the show is titled Bar Rescue, but you are rescuing, over the season, things far beyond the physical buildings that these bars are in.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
Like I said, you're rescuing these people and sometimes their lives. You connect with these owners personally and in some instances, and again I'd mentioned Nevada Brew Works before, you're helping rescue their overall well-being.
Jon Taffer:
Yes.
Lance Glinn:
How do you navigate the line between being this business expert and dealing with the bar, but also being an emotional anchor for these people who sometimes don't just need bar help?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. I look at a business as every failing business has a failing owner. And for many of these people, even if I built them the Taj Mahal, if I don't change what they do, they're going to fail. So it starts with them and it ends with them. It's a challenge.
Why are they failing? Why do they walk past that filth? Why do their employees disrespect them? People look at the bar and they say, "The bar is failing. The bar is dirty, that's why you're failing." No. I say, "You let the bar be dirty-"
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
... "that's why you're failing." So everything is on the owner to me.
So I almost walk past the bar and go right to them. Why are you allowing this? Why are you disappointing your wife this way? Why are you disappointing your children this way? Your house is on the line, man. You've blown your parents retirement. So that's the challenging part is if I can't change their behavior, I can't help them. Fortunately, I have a skill or some kind of a talent that allows me to communicate with people and I can change their lives and that's what's exciting to me.
Lance Glinn:
And I feel like, I can think of or you just mentioned, people are failing their spouses, they're failing their children.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
They're about to lose their house, they've blown their parents' retirement. I feel like that's such a common theme among so many episodes and I always think to myself when I'm watching these episodes. I'm like, "Do these people not get it or have they not even watched the show before to see themselves in maybe past episodes that have happened?" You know what I'm saying?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
They probably relate to previous bars and previous owners that you've helped. These previous owners, they may have been severely in debt and keep trying to hemorrhage money, and the owner that you're about to speak to might be going through the same thing. So I'm always taken aback back. I'm like, "Wow. Do you not watch the show? Do you not see that these people that Jon already spoke to and helped, they're going through the same exact things that you're going through right now? Do you not look in the mirror?" Are you surprised that these people don't just say-
Jon Taffer:
They don't see it. That's the problem, they don't see it. And sometimes, their ego is what blinds them.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But ego with an empty wallet makes no sense to me.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
I don't think you can have ego with an empty wallet.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. What is the ... Because it's not something you see interview, that's not true. You sometimes see it in the back to bar episodes that you do where you'll bring people back and you'll see, and you'll give an update on what their bar is doing. You can always look it up online, look at a specific bar, see how that bar is doing. But what is your level of interaction, if any, once the episode's is over, once the bar has been rescued, so to speak?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
What is your level of communication, besides those back to the bar episodes, of these owners that you've helped before?
Jon Taffer:
I leave it up to them. It's their business, it's their world. I'm not going to reach out to them, I'm not going to harass them or follow. But if they reach out to me, I'm always responsive.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
About 20, 25% of them have become friends.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
Which I'm very proud of.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
So if I was a bar owner, Bar Rescue would be a must watch, as I just said, because whether it's menu engineering, layout, operations, training, there are a ton of lessons. Have you ever had encounters where you're at a bar just yourself, not trying to rescue it, just enjoying a drink, where an owner who maybe wasn't rescued, you've never met before, comes to you and says thank you essentially? "Watching your show taught me X, Y and Z."
Jon Taffer:
Every day.
Lance Glinn:
Every day?
Jon Taffer:
Literally every day. I get emails all the time from people. I just the other day got an email from an dentist.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
Who told me he watches Bar Rescue and he's implemented programs-
Lance Glinn:
Really?
Jon Taffer:
... in his dental practice.
Lance Glinn:
Really?
Jon Taffer:
And I can't tell you how rewarding it is to get those emails. I'm making a show, I'm making a living, but I'm actually impacting people's lives. It's a wonderful feeling to be able to do that. So many reality shows are destructive.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
Rather than constructive. And I always wanted to do a constructive one.
Lance Glinn:
Did you always, when you go back to that first pilot episode, did you always have in mind that you wanted the show not only to just be a story of you rescuing these bars that are on the brink of failure? Did you want there to be an educational component?
Jon Taffer:
Yes.
Lance Glinn:
That educational impact to it?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. When we started the show, my deal with the network would be it would have to be authentic. There's no scripting, there's no pre-doing, which we've stuck to every day. And that I wanted real failures. I didn't want easy jobs.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
I wanted them to really challenge me. And then that I didn't want it to be a T&A show.
Lance Glinn:
Got it.
Jon Taffer:
I didn't want it to be all just tension.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
I wanted to tell a story of the small business owner and struggle. People call it a business transformation show, to me it's a human transformation show.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. No, for sure. And like we've been talking about already, there is that emotional side to it more than just rescuing the physical building, or the beer wells or the different alcohol that's behind the bar. There is that human side to it.
Jon Taffer:
I'll tell you something interesting. When I get that hug at the end of the episode, our microphones are on our chest so you can't hear it because we're covering them up. The things they say to me during those hugs are incredible. "Jon, you saved my life."
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
"Jon, my kids are talking to me again."
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
"Jon, I see hope." How about this one? "Jon, my wife slept in our bed last night-"
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
... "for the first time in months."
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
When you hear that, the reward of knowing that I made a real difference for this family. So those hugs are the most meaningful thing to me. And what's interesting is the ones that fight me the hardest give me the biggest hug in the end.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So it makes me even more aggressive next week.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. It's more than just a show.
Jon Taffer:
It is.
Lance Glinn:
Clearly, more than just a show.
Jon Taffer:
It's a passion for me.
Lance Glinn:
So after 10 seasons, and this is true with any reality show, any transformational type of show thing, so it's not just Bar Rescue. But after 10 seasons, there are strong opinions out there about what happens once the cameras are cut. What happens, how it's filmed, how owners behavior. Is some of this for dramatization? And that comes with any show. What are some of the I guess biggest misconceptions that you've heard over the past 10 years when it comes to Bar Rescue?
Jon Taffer:
Oh, and these things infuriate me. People say it's fake. But anybody who says it's fake has never been there because it isn't, and I tell you on my mother's grave.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
There's not a word that's scripted. I've never been to these bars before, I've never met these people before. That really infuriates me and I've worked so hard to keep it authentic. So that really gets me.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. Now-
Jon Taffer:
Let me tell you how Bar Rescue works.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
Because I think you'll enjoy this.
Lance Glinn:
I certainly would.
Jon Taffer:
I shoot in four days.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
So day one, I show up at about 6:00 at night. I literally get a one-minute briefing. "Jon and George are ready to kill each other. George already lost his house, Jon's going to."
Lance Glinn:
Although I will say, one of the funniest things I always find is you sitting in the car with your experts watching the bars. You obviously have all those cameras in there watching them do what they do without you in the building. You obviously have and your experts are always reacting to all these wild things and I'm reacting the same way because I'm like, "Oh, my God."
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
How are these people doing this?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
But anyway, apologies.
Jon Taffer:
So after that 60-second briefing, I go in and do recon. Whatever happens, they're nice, I'm nice. If they're not nice, I'm not nice.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
Whatever happens happens. At the end of recon, what you don't know is I put everybody in vans in the parking lot and I design the bar that night.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
I'm given a demographic and psychographic report. I look at my horizontals, my verticals, my design. I design the bar that night.
Day two you see stress test and training. What you don't see is I'm finishing up the design. By the end of the second day, everything has to be ordered. Equipment, furniture, paint, everything. All the kitchen equipment, the bar equipment. Logos to the sign makers, everything has to be done by the second day.
After stress test, we start remodeling at midnight. We remodel the night of day two, all day day three and the morning of day four. So we do remodel it in 36 hours. And on day four, I reveal it.
Lance Glinn:
So are you using then ... I think we've even seen it in episodes, too. But to do these trainings while obviously it's being remodeled because the people aren't doing training-
Jon Taffer:
That's why we do it at another location.
Lance Glinn:
You do it at another location.
Jon Taffer:
Right.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, I think that's just so interesting. That I'm sure is probably another misconception that you hear all the time, that it takes more than the four days that we see. But I find that so incredible, the sheer amount of people that must be working behind-the-scenes to make that happen in the, what is four days, 96 hours or so.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
It must be incredible. Specifically, the bar remodeling because you're remaking the inside of an entire building.
Jon Taffer:
And programming POS systems.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And putting in technology, as well as stainless steel equipment and cooking equipment. Sometimes we have to increase voltage to 220 to handle equipment. Lighting packages, flooring, all that, and we do it in 36 hours. I'm very proud of it.
Lance Glinn:
That's incredible, that's incredible. So some bar owners, you just talked about it, some of them are nice from the start during recon, some are not nice. Some bar owners very clearly resist you from the start. They, like we talked about earlier, they are blind to their own problems. Others, more open, understanding, realizing that their route that they're currently going on is not one that they can sustain longterm.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
How often can you predict early on whose going to take your advice and whose going to potentially fall back into old habits when you leave?
Jon Taffer:
I know it when I'm walking out.
Lance Glinn:
I was going to ask, is it instantaneous?
Jon Taffer:
I completely know it because again, every failing business has a failing owner.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
If I turned him, I turn the business. So I know that it's all about that individual, that he or her that's running the operation. When it works, their posture changes.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
Their facial expression changes.
Lance Glinn:
The mannerisms start to change, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
They have enthusiasm, you can see it in their face. They bought in.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
They're committed. You see it and it's an amazingly rewarding thing when you actually see that physical change happen in people.
I use it, BMS, broken man syndrome. Very often, these guys are broken. They've been hurt. Look at the pandemic, inflation.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Even all these external factors beating the heck out of them for years. It's wonderful to see that posture change and them to be excited again.
Lance Glinn:
How hard was that season, the pandemic season?
Jon Taffer:
Oh, brutal.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Brutal. I didn't want to stop because I felt we had to keep going. So everybody was masked, of course.
Lance Glinn:
Of course.
Jon Taffer:
We did COVID tests twice a day.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Nobody was allowed within six feet of me because if I get sick, the whole show goes down.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
My camera guys got sick, everybody else seemed to get sick except for me and it was very, very difficult, but people really needed us then.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And the industry needed a voice during that as well so we kept going.
Lance Glinn:
And we talked a little bit about it earlier-
Jon Taffer:
Added about 40% to our budget-
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
... just to be able to function in that environment, yeah.
Lance Glinn:
Just to be able to deal with, yeah, like you said, all the testing-
Jon Taffer:
We were in a bubble basically.
Lance Glinn:
... and all the bubbling that has to be done. Do you look at the industry as a whole as, okay, there was a before pandemic and then there's an after pandemic?
Jon Taffer:
I think to some degree yes. Post-pandemic, just the whole economic structure of our industry, the challenges that we're facing, the overall cost structure. And I think the inflationary impact had a massive ... Inflation justified price increases.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
Some operators went too far. They saw the consumer understanding price increase as an opportunity to take it to the sky.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
And I think that's hurt our industry to some degree in a value proposition, those operators that pushed it too far.
Lance Glinn:
So I want to quickly go back to that question on owners that you can tell will implement the changes that you make to those who will go back to their old ways. But off of that, how often do you and your team, when you're going through I guess the application process, let's call it. When you're going through that process of figuring out what bars are going to be on the show, how often do you and your team encounter bars that want to be on the show mainly for publicity? Because the show's a huge hit and when a bar has essentially your backing or your presence there, I'm assuming and we've seen towards the episodes they say, "Oh, over the next three months, this bar has done X, Y and Z." So your presence obviously matters for that specific bar's success. How often do you run into instances where a bar just wants to be on the show to have you there for the publicity, rather than to actually take your advice?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. First of all, I have no involvement in casting. I let the network because I don't want to know anything until I get there.
Lance Glinn:
Sure, sure.
Jon Taffer:
So that's how I keep it real. So I'm not involved in that process. I can tell you this. They do do that.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So for example, maybe they're not losing money, they just want a free remodel.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Or the promotion exposure. So we want to see tax returns, I want to see houses on the line. I want to see that these people are in trouble.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Because it's their stakes. It's the fact that that house is on the line that hopefully incentivizes them to do better and it keeps the show real.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So we work really, really hard at qualifying that. That hasn't happened to us in a number of years.
You know what else has happened over the years. We've done rescues where the bar was in default on their lease. So we come in, we remodel the bar. As soon as we're done, the landlord evicts them and rents the brand new remodeled bar at a higher price. So we learned that lesson early on. So now, if you're in default on your lease, we make the landlord do an extension-
Lance Glinn:
Interesting.
Jon Taffer:
... before we come in and do the remodel.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So there's a number of these kinds of things that, if we don't do our homework, can work against us.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, that's something I wouldn't even think about.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. Neither did I until it happened.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, and I was going to ask. To that point, what is the level of communication? Because obviously, you're working with the bars, you're working with the owners, but so many of these bars and owners, they're not the owners of the land.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
They're not the owners of the property. What is the level of communication like in the process with the landlords, the people that do own the land?
Jon Taffer:
So the landlord has to approve it.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
Obviously, in some cases we're remodeling their building.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
So they certainly need to approve that. And then of course, the owner has to approve it and agree to the terms of it. Again, a lot of prequalification to keep it real.
And then what happens is owners are not allowed to say we're coming. They're not sure if I'm coming.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
They think I might be coming.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
And then I play a lot of tricks to keep it real. For example, I'll hang some extra lights.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And then we'll go up to the owner, if they're all acting on good behavior because they think I'm coming, we'll go in and say, "Sorry, guys, he chose another bar." They'll pull a couple of lights down.
Lance Glinn:
Oh.
Jon Taffer:
The bottles come out, everybody starts drinking.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
It becomes natural and then I walk in.
Lance Glinn:
And then you come in. Oh, no.
Jon Taffer:
So sometimes, I got to fake them out to keep it real.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Then if they leak that I'm coming, that I might be coming, a bar that has three customers in it suddenly has 100 customers in it.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And that's not real either.
Lance Glinn:
No.
Jon Taffer:
So we make them keep it secret and I try to keep it as real as possible.
Lance Glinn:
Wow. Yeah, and that makes a ton of sense. Because again, to that point of watching them on the hidden cameras, you'd think that if they knew you were potentially on your way, whether that was-
Jon Taffer:
The bar would be packed.
Lance Glinn:
... that night, or maybe a night later that week, they would be on their best behavior.
Jon Taffer:
That's right.
Lance Glinn:
They would understand that, "Hey, I don't want to embarrass myself in front of Jon Taffer." But yet, time and time again, we do see errors being made and people acting in the wrong way, so to speak, at bars.
Jon Taffer:
I got to make it real.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, absolutely.
Jon Taffer:
And sometimes, I got to work at it to make that happen.
Lance Glinn:
So I want to pivot to just the health of the hospitality and bar industry as a whole.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
So staying home has never been more accessible. Food and drinks, I can get them delivered easily. Entertainment-
Jon Taffer:
Whatever you want.
Lance Glinn:
... I can do so much from my couch. I don't even need to necessarily go to the movies anymore, so to speak. The hospitality industry is obviously an industry's that's never going to go away, but people's budgets, we've talked about too, they're tightening as well. How much of a threat is the, I guess for lack of a better term, this stay-at-home economy to bars?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah, it's a serious threat. It's affected lunch, major, major metropolitan areas. Now people have to start coming back to work again and companies are calling it.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
But for a long period, lunch disappeared from places like New York City.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Lunch business was gone, everybody stayed home.
Also, from a leisure standpoint it's changed. The restaurant industry, we're sitting here at the stock market, so I think this is a good conversation to have. For many, many years, restaurant companies were evaluated on growth. How many units did they open? How fast are they growing? Well now, they're rated on earnings. Well, when they were focused on growth, they opened a lot of stores that were marginal stores.
Lance Glinn:
True.
Jon Taffer:
Maybe they shouldn't have opened because they were focused on growth. Well now, they own all these lousy stores.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Now they're told, "You got to show us earnings," and they got to dump these lousy stores. So in a way, some of it is the industry's fault and the market's fault for causing a focus on growth rather than earnings.
And then the consumer of course has changed. Prices are higher, people are seeking value. GLP medications are impacting the restaurant industry as well. Drinking trends are a little lower now than they used to be. But I've seen that before, I think that pendulum swings back and forth. It's a very challenging time for us.
Lance Glinn:
Is there always, you said you've seen it before, is there always that volatility that comes with the industry? You might have the upticks, you might have the downticks. Obviously, the pandemic was a different time.
Jon Taffer:
Anomaly, yeah.
Lance Glinn:
It was one that was an anomaly. But just in general, you've seen those upticks and those downticks, the tailwinds and headwinds-
Jon Taffer:
Over the years, yeah.
Lance Glinn:
... over the course of your years?
Jon Taffer:
Also, I always get a kick out of the difference between the media and the world. I remember years ago when articles were, "Don't eat red meat, don't eat red meat, don't eat red meat." Everybody said, "Don't eat ..." Red meat sales in the restaurant industry went up 6% that year.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
So what we read and what people do are not always the same things.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. Do you see a greater impact with big cities, we're sitting here in New York City, take LA, take Vegas, compared to more of those small towns, those local bars, or are you seeing it reverse? What sort of segment is getting hit harder in your opinion?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. I think the urban markets I think are getting hit more harder. I think there's more competitive environment, the costs are higher. I have friends that have owned restaurants in this city, one of them just closed his second restaurant profitable.
Lance Glinn:
Why?
Jon Taffer:
He said to me, "I'm sick of it, Jon. The only people that are making money in New York in the restaurant business are the landlords." So it's very challenging here.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah. So now more than ever, I'd also argue, we talked a little bit about changing demographics. People want value plus excitement.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
That can mean things like more interactive cocktails, experience-driven menus, that special type of energy from bars that they frequent. They want more than just, "Hey, let's go get a drink."
Jon Taffer:
They want connectivity.
Lance Glinn:
Exactly. So with that said, are bars now expected to go just beyond serving good drinks and food?
Jon Taffer:
I think so. I think that the environment is much more important today, we call 360 environments. Look at local dive bars. They tend to be a little dark.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
A little cozy. They tend to be a little older.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
A little traditional, a little historic, if you will. Authenticity.
Lance Glinn:
The people running them may have been doing it for a lot longer.
Jon Taffer:
And the same guys behind the bar every day.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
When you go there, the same customers are there every day. So I think that that type of a bar has its place in our society.
The second public building ever built in America was a bar.
Lance Glinn:
Really?
Jon Taffer:
The first was a church.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
And they were called public houses then. And there were no government buildings, there were no town halls. All business, marriages, everything happened in these pubs back then. And they used to build them with these little walls, they called them snugs. So a priest could sit next to the drunk-
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
... at two separate tables with a wall between them.
Lance Glinn:
There you go.
Jon Taffer:
Because it was for everybody.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And the first distiller in America was George Washington.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
So bars go back to the beginning of America, they're the fabric of our nation, but it's those local bars that are the fabric of our nation.
Lance Glinn:
So you would say that the expectations, they really have fundamentally changed?
Jon Taffer:
Oh, sure. And I think things like Food Network and my show have helped elevate that expectation. People know what a great cocktail should look like today, they know what great garnishes should be.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
I know what a great plate should look like.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So I think this has been good. It's raised the expectation of the consumer, which puts a little pressure on us and I think that's good.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, we know now. Or we knew before because of the taste, but we now know now that a warm beer is certainly how a beer should go.
Jon Taffer:
That's correct. And how much head it should have, how the glass should look.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, for sure.
Jon Taffer:
Absolutely.
Lance Glinn:
For sure. So I want to also now change the conversation to AI and it's a topic that always finds its way into our conversations regardless of the industry because it's something that's disrupting every single industry that we talk about. Whether that's hospitality, whether that's trucking, logistics, tech, software sales, whatever it might be, it's impacting everything. There's a lot of talk about AI transforming things from scheduling, to guest personalization, so on and so forth.
From your vantage point, so far as we sit here in 2026, how real is AI's impact on bars and hospitality right now? Is it just hype or is it already reshaping the industry?
Jon Taffer:
Well, I own my Taffer's Tavern, our chain. I have made the decision that I don't put AI between me and the customer.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
I don't want the customer dealing with technology. I like connectivity, I like that eye-to-eye contact. We work very hard on hiring employees that are connective. But we use AI technology in the back of the house like crazy.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
We can use it for identifying sites. It has a real estate play for us. It'll assess psychographics, demographics, income levels, preferences, all of that stuff. And then of course, back of the house efficiencies, labor efficiencies, order processing, ordering inventory levels, par levels. All of that eliminates maybe 80, 90 hours a week of management functions.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
So now, rather than my manager working on inventory, he's out front talking to customers. And that, to me, is the most exciting part of AI. I don't use it to put between me and the customer, I use it to put my people in front of the customers more.
Lance Glinn:
Sure. And I'd think that bars that embrace AI could have access to more data, like you were just talking about, than ever before. That could be customer behavior, spending trends, peak hours, menu performance, obviously much more, some of the things you mentioned as well. But it's one thing to obviously have access to that data, but a whole nother thing to really know how to use it.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
Right.
Jon Taffer:
And robotics.
Lance Glinn:
And robotics as well, yeah.
Jon Taffer:
For example, we're discussing now importing a robotic coffee system and it's got arms.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Not dispensers, and it makes it, foams it.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
And it makes an unbelievable latte with your picture on it.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
On the foam in about 45 seconds. It can make hundreds and hundreds a day. It never gets sick.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, that's right. It'll always be ready to work.
Jon Taffer:
It doesn't ask for raises.
Lance Glinn:
It'll always be ready to work.
Jon Taffer:
So robotics are a huge impact. Robotic bar tenders we're going to see coming very, very soon.
Lance Glinn:
Wow. So with robotics, with AI, with all this new technology, how do you think bar owners, especially some who have maybe been doing the same things the same ways for a whole bunch of years, how should they integrate this technology and this data into what they do? Because again, it's so beneficial if used right and it would be a shame if it's not.
Jon Taffer:
Destructive if it's not. It can be incredibly destructive if it's put in the wrong place. I fear that of my industry. I fear that AI will take too much of the position and brands will lose identity and it'll all be which terminal you choose to do business with. So that worries me very much about AI.
To me, my industry needs to focus on revenue.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
Not only expenses. Robotics provides savings of expenses, they provide consistency, opportunities, things like that.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But they don't drive revenue. And if I don't drive revenue, I'm going to fail. I say to every restaurant operator, every small business operator in America, "You don't have expenses problems. Your rent isn't too high, your marketing isn't too high, your revenues are too low." Revenue solves everything.
So I think my industry, sure, robotics is great, AI is great, but you better focus on revenue and traffic because those are the things that are going to save us.
Lance Glinn:
I want to move the conversation and now, word of mouth used to be exactly that. People talking face-to-face saying, "Hey, I just went to X, Y and Z bar, I went to X, Y and Z restaurant, you should go and try it." And that's so much of how people got new customers, that's so much of how people got traffic in the door and got people to become frequent customers, not just one-time customers. Now, it's really social media. It's TikTok, it's Instagram.
Jon Taffer:
Yes.
Lance Glinn:
It's X, among obviously all the other platforms. Facebook, too. Do you think the bar industry truly understands and is harnessing the power of social media or is it still playing catch up?
Jon Taffer:
No, I think it's still playing catch up and I'm not sure anybody's figured out the magic formula. I think that we're all struggling. Yeah, we get some engagement. Does that engagement turn into traffic? So many restaurants invest so much into social media, but does it really make them a dollar? Does it really draw those kind of customers? I'm not sure I've seen any industry master it yet.
Lance Glinn:
Is there something though to being photogenic? You look on TikTok where these short clips or Instagram where these photos that pop up and you can scroll, is there something to having a product, regardless of how good or bad it tastes or whether you're eating it or drinking it, is there something to having something that's photogenic? That visually makes someone say, "Wow, I really want to go try that."
Jon Taffer:
Yeah, I'm going to take that a step further. I don't believe that restaurants are in the business of selling food or beverages.
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
We're in the reaction business. You see the plate of food that the cook is cooking in the kitchen is not a product, it's a vehicle. The product is what happens when it hits the table. One of two things happens, either you react to it or you don't. The first bite, either you react to it or you don't. I'm a nutcase. I will stand in the back of my restaurant watching every plate hit the table. If people don't react to it like I just did, I will redesign it until they do.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
When you take that first bite, if I don't see you look at the person you're with-
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
... I will redesign that recipe until you do. I don't play music, I play reactions, I achieve it through music.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
I don't play video, I play reactions, I achieve it. The restaurant business is a reaction business. People seeking relevancy today, when you react positively, you got your relevancy.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
So he or she in the restaurant business who creates the best reaction wins. Operators don't get that. They seem to think the product is the food and the beverage, it's not. It's the connectivity, it's the reaction. And when I create reactions, I own you.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, yeah. No, I must say, look, I'm a big fan of the show. I have been really since the beginning. And just talking to you today has really opened up my eyes to a lot more than just what I've learned from the show. But I've always been curious, you're originally from New York, now correct me if I'm wrong, but you're out there in Vegas and on the West Coast. What originally got you into the bar industry? What originally piqued your interest on, "I want to get into hospitality, I want to get those reactions?"
Jon Taffer:
It's funny. I was going to University of Denver. I was studying political science and cultural anthropology. And I went to bartending school to get a job in a bar.
Lance Glinn:
Okay. Just on the side, just a college job?
Jon Taffer:
While I was in college, absolutely. And I just fell in love with it. And I decided that back then, I didn't want to go into politics. I'm very glad about that decision, especially these days.
Lance Glinn:
Did we almost get Jon Taffer, attorney-at-law?
Jon Taffer:
But cultural anthropology is the study of our behavior on the study of primate. It's helped me in the bar business because I'm a student of human behavior. I've read books and I study human behavior all the time, and I think that's an important part of catering to what your primal instincts and desires are is understanding them.
So I started in that way, fell in love with the business and wound up running the Troubadour in Hollywood, California, and Barney's Beanery, and a couple famous places. And one thing led to another, one day I was giving a speech in Las Vegas. And I had invented Sunday Ticket and I've done a bunch of things in my life. Well, I'm giving a speech in Las Vegas at a convention and somebody comes up to me and he says, "Jon, you should be on TV."
So I went right home that night, I wrote up something called On the Rocks. And it was a cross between Kitchen Nightmares and Mission Impossible, so they would drop me in and I'd have my files.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And I would pick my experts-
Lance Glinn:
Okay.
Jon Taffer:
... and all that kind of stuff. And I had created Bubba Gump Shrimp Company for Paramount working with them many, many years ago as a consultant. So I called my friends at Paramount. I said, "Hey, can you put some TV people in the room? I want to come pitch an idea."
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
"You tell me if I think I'm crazy." So they put the head of TV and all these people in the room. I go to the Paramount Studios, I drive through the iconic gates and all of that.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
And I sit in a room and they say it to me, and I'll say it to you cleaner than they said it to me. They said to me, "Jon, you will never be on television."
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
"You're too old, you're not good-looking enough, it'll never happen."
Lance Glinn:
Wow. Talk about being blunt.
Jon Taffer:
They were very blunt with me because they thought they were friends so they were being straight with me.
Lance Glinn:
Sure, sure, sure.
Jon Taffer:
And they told me what they felt.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
But I went and shot my own scissor reel after that, sent it to four production companies, got four out of four offers, was on TV less than a year later. And what network am I in? Paramount.
Lance Glinn:
Paramount.
Jon Taffer:
Paramount. So you never know. So there's a great lesson in this. Only you can say no to you.
Lance Glinn:
Wow. And that was going to be my next question. How did Bar Rescue get started?
Jon Taffer:
That's how it happened.
Lance Glinn:
Wow. So interesting.
Jon Taffer:
That was 16 years ago.
Lance Glinn:
Wow. And now, here you are-
Jon Taffer:
Yeah.
Lance Glinn:
... with season 10 on the horizon. So Jon, I do want to throw some quick hitting questions your way.
Jon Taffer:
Okay.
Lance Glinn:
It's a little bit of a rapid fire. So first and foremost, your favorite cocktail to order when you're off the clock is?
Jon Taffer:
A brown butter old-fashioned.
Lance Glinn:
Brown butter old-fashioned. Which do you prefer more, having been from New York original, now on the West Coast, East Coast nightlife or West Coast nightlife?
Jon Taffer:
East Coast.
Lance Glinn:
East Coast? Even being in Vegas for as long as you have?
Jon Taffer:
Yeah. Well, Vegas is very unique.
Lance Glinn:
Sure, sure.
Jon Taffer:
Obviously, Vegas nightlife.
Lance Glinn:
Being on the West Coast for as long as you have.
Jon Taffer:
Yeah, people come to Vegas, you drink more.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
You do everything more in Vegas.
Lance Glinn:
Sure, sure.
Jon Taffer:
This is more normal here.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But East Coast nightlife is pretty powerful. If you compare New York to LA, the amount of bars and nightclubs and stuff in LA are many, many less than New York.
Lance Glinn:
Wow.
Jon Taffer:
And it's not quite the scene that it is here.
Lance Glinn:
What's the better bartending trait to have, speed or personality?
Jon Taffer:
Personality.
Lance Glinn:
Personality?
Jon Taffer:
That can get you past speed.
Lance Glinn:
Got it.
Jon Taffer:
If you got a big enough smile, I'll wait those extra 30 seconds. You're such a good guy, he doesn't have to hurry for me.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah, you'll have the conversation as they're making.
Jon Taffer:
That's right.
Lance Glinn:
What is your preferred atmosphere, that local dive bar or a cocktail lounge?
Jon Taffer:
I think I would go more for the cocktail lounge. A few years ago, I might have said the dive bar. But I've gotten so cocktail proficient these days that I like that cocktail environment.
Lance Glinn:
Finally, what's worse for you, the sticky floors and bar top or warm beers?
Jon Taffer:
Sticky floor and bar top because that stickiness is bacteria. It's disgust.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
And it can make you sick. The warm beer is just going to disappoint you, but it's not going to get you sick.
Lance Glinn:
Absolutely. So we spent the first part of our conversation talking about Bar Rescue and season 10, so I want to start and wrap up on that. You've built a massive fan base over the seasons, it feels like a fan base that really knows you. What are you personally most excited for fans to see in this 10th season?
Jon Taffer:
It's interesting. I think that fans ... First of all, I am who I am, so I don't change my behavior to cater to fans.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But I read what people say, of course. They like when I scream and yell, but they liked when I'm warm and when I'm connective. This is a fascinating season. I scream and yell as much as I ever have.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
But this is a really emotional season. You're going to see me tear up a couple of times. These are families in trouble. Think about it. They went through the pandemic, then they went through the inflation aspect.
Lance Glinn:
Yeah.
Jon Taffer:
It's been a rough number of years.
Lance Glinn:
Sure.
Jon Taffer:
They're in debt, they're behind on payroll taxes and they're really in a terrible situation. So the opportunity to help that family, to really create a powerful change in their lives, save their children, protect their home, that's very powerful to me. This season is full of that emotion. I can't wait until you see it.
Lance Glinn:
So when the final credits roll on that final episode of the season, what do you hope viewers really walk away feeling or thinking about? The bars, the owners, even the industry itself. What do you hope viewers leave that final season with? Or leave this 10th season and that final episode with?
Jon Taffer:
I hope they leave looking at their own personal lives and saying, "Look at the obstacles these people had and they turned it around. I can turn around mine, too." If my show could help inspire people to overcome the challenges in their lives, to make their businesses perform better, communicate with their family better, I think those little things mean more to me than any bar I could ever rescue.
Lance Glinn:
Well, Jon, it's been a pleasure having this conversation. Thank you so much for joining us Inside the ICE House.
Jon Taffer:
I've got to tell you, I do a lot of these. You are very well-prepared and I enjoyed this.
Lance Glinn:
Thank you. Well, look, as a fan, again, I appreciate talking to you. Thank you so much.
Jon Taffer:
My pleasure.
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