American Entrepreneur – Jack Carlisle, Serial Entrepreneur

 

About Jack Carlisle

 

Interview Transcript of: American Entrepreneur – Jack Carlisle, Serial Entrepreneur

Alan
Welcome back. I’m here today with Jack Carlisle. Jack is a serial entrepreneur and has been starting businesses for the last 22 years. Jack, welcome to today’s show.

Jack
Thanks for having me.

Alan
You know, Jack, when I am when I look at what you’re doing, being a serial entrepreneur, seems like it’s just ingrained in your blood. So what? Let’s walk through the history, give me some history of how you got to where you are today and some of the companies that you work with and started and.

Jack
You know, I just kind of interesting where I ended up today is not where I had planned on 22 years ago, when I was a child, I always wanted to be a pilot, I wanted to be involved in aviation, somehow got a job work, really hard wax in washing airplanes for flight time, kind of worked my way up. Along the way, we started a few opened up a big tire store, which is really fun. And they opened up with my three brothers. Same time I continued my flying, I ended up opening up a flight school as well.

Alan
At the same time we were running the store.

Jack
And then obviously that got to be a little too much. We just went ahead and we had an offer on the tire store. So we ended up selling that and I went to full time with the flight school. Kind of working my way up in aviation. Same time I was had a custom tractor business sold real estate insurance, set tile, then I start a little bit of a construction company as well.

Alan
So Jack, when you got involved with businesses, was it? Was it following a passion? Or was it trying to fill a need of?

Jack
You know, at first it was following a passion. It really was. I was really passionate about flying at the time. And I always thought that’s where I would be the happiest? Yeah, it’s kind of interesting. I ended up working for somebody as a corporate pilot. And decided I wanted to get back into the into owning my own business. And at that time, I completely changed gears and started looking into the food industry. particular restaurant, I always loved to cook my mother was scratch cooker from hardcore scratch cooker, you know, learned a lot from her. And so, you know, that kind of evolved into the point where we decided we want to open a restaurant and we actually started catering to start out with

Alan
what year is this?.

Jack
So this was this was 2008. Okay, okay, so the dreaded 2000 802 1008.

Alan
So we were just really the banking crisis. And everything was no one knew where things were going back then.

Jack
Oh, yeah. The interesting story about that is we we were signing the lease for our building, and we were signing the documents for our loan, the day that why cobia bank decided they were done. Wow. And unfortunately, at that time, everything that we had worked on, wouldn’t go through because no banks were looking at that time. So we had to get creative. And that’s when we started started catering we had gathered up my kids and my wife and I says, hey, you know, we don’t we don’t have any, we don’t have any work. So what do you guys feel about spending the summer catering? So I drugged them around the county fairs for all summer long, and we cook pizzas as a family. So I had my 12 year old running the cash register. My wife was doing dough along with my 14 year old daughter and my 13 year old son was topping the pizzas and I was cooking them. So yeah,

Alan
Yeah, I think you represent the typical America. Where in this country, there’s a certain segment of capitalism that allows us the freedom to kind of start businesses and follow our passions and our dreams. And this case, you brought your family along with it.

Jack
Yeah, it was a great experience. You know, our kids kind of hated it at the time, but they look back on it with pretty good fondness.

Alan
It was a good summer. So So now today, your you’ve moved from the catering business and just starting pizza place or what.

Jack
Yeah so you know, the catering business that we were running was a was a seasonal thing. Okay. And so then I started okay, I get better get myself, you know, a real job. So I actually had, it was, I don’t know how many resumes I had. I kind of figured it was close to 40 to 50. resumes out anywhere from stocking shelves at Lowe’s to flying the Goodyear blimp. and nothing was coming through we can, can get it.

Alan
Say Jack, I’m gonna hold that thought for that we need to take a quick break. And we’ll be right back after these messages I’m visiting today with Jack Carlyle Jack is been starting businesses for the past 22 years. And we’re talking about the the economy where we’re at today. And also, after the break, we’ll get into what Jack ended up doing right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back. I’m here today with Jack Carlisle. He’s a serial entrepreneurs when starting businesses for the past 22 years. And Jack before the break, we’re talking about, you know, you know how you transition from your catering business and to the to your next venture and what exactly was that venture?

Jack
So we ended up you know, we found that it was easier to to find an investor than it was a job, that point. So we started to go ahead and open up a restaurant. We thought we were ready for that. Okay, so.

Alan
When you’re getting ready to open up a restaurant, walk through the process, because for listeners, a lot of may be thinking I hate my job right? Now I I want to do something else with my life. And with that learning curve, what steps did you take to get your business up and running?

Jack
So the first thing we did is we obviously tried to come up with a concept I was looking for, as a pilot, I ate out three to three meals a day, I knew what I was looking for when I went to a restaurant, and I wasn’t finding it. And so I was like, I want something that’s fresh, I want something that’s local, and I want something at the time we were making pizzas and wood fired ovens. And so I thought it took that concept. And basically, we we build it around those premises, you know, something that’s fresh, often people can come in and know exactly what they’re eating.

Alan
Now, when you when you did that, were you How did you choose your location.

Jack
The location basically chose ourselves the reason I say that is we didn’t we were we were out of money. At this time, we didn’t really have a whole lot of choices. We knew we’re gonna have to open it up on a shoestring budget. And I had found a restaurant that was currently struggling and they needed to get out of it. And therefore I was able to pick it up for extremely reasonable cost. It was definitely discounted.

Alan
Okay, then. So you had your location? Did you have to remodel for equipment or anything?

Unknown Speaker
We had to get really creative with that as well. I didn’t have a ton of money to start with. wood fired oven runs about $26,000 Just for the oven. So it was me my wife, my two kids and my nephew, we went and did all the work ourselves. We spent about one month to go ahead and get that wrapped up and got it opened up here.

Alan
I think you represent like I said, the mainstream of America’s people are out there wanting to get into business for themselves and and they find out that it’s not easy, is it?

Unknown Speaker
It’s not it’s it’s not for the faint of heart for sure.

Alan
And how did you How’d your story Yes, you were on a shoestring ledger completely broke. You found someone to give me some money know what happened.

Unknown Speaker
So we we got it opened up. And you know, to our surprise, we thought we were gonna have a game Buster, great business. And it didn’t happen that way. It was slow. It was hard. We fought for every customer that I had. And we fought hard to keep everyone that we that came in. We slowly build it. We started out with 30 seats. We currently now have 95 seats and weekends. We have a two hour wait now. So cash flows coming in now. And we actually started out the other thing we had to do. We had to start it out as a family. It was me my wife, my two kids and you have a two hour wait. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, on Friday nights. Yeah, that’s saying something for free. We’re happy about that. Yeah. You know, we’ve got with the products that we were using. We knew that that system would work with the fresh food and knowing exactly what’s been done. served, we make everything from scratch.

Alan
So, you know, there’s a key ingredient to it and also knowing what your customers want. Exactly. So Jack, we need to take, take a quick break. And I want to after after we get back, I might come back and talk about what was the transition of going from feast or famine to the two hour wait. We’ll be right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back, I’m here today with Jack Carlisle. Jack and I have been talking about the businesses they’ve been starting over the past 22 years. Recently, he started pizza restaurant in which you would face your family to a two hour wait. And if so Jack was getting there. What what exactly happened? Where you went from a feast or famine in the business to you know, getting it finding your customers, or did they find you?

Jack
And that’s an interesting, you know, customers actually had to find us, okay. And it’s not hard. It’s really actually kind of hard to find our restaurant. Like I said, I didn’t have any money for advertising. We, we use Facebook a lot. And it was all word of mouth. It basically was word of mouth. I remember doing one day we did we sold $65 in the whole entire day. And at that point, we were like, Okay, what are we doing wrong here? And there wasn’t really anything that we were doing wrong. It’s just it takes a long time to build that client.

Alan
How long did that take?

Jack
It took me four years now. So you know in? Well, it’s a good tipping point was three years.

Alan
About three years to start a crossover? Yeah. Okay. You didn’t really have to change anything. It just the the the word caught on and you had a regular.

Jack
We just kept building, we ended up having a 40% increase every year. And we just kept building on that.

Alan
And how many? How many employees are you up to?

Jack
So we’re running about 30 employees right now? Okay. And that’s quite a bit from the original six.

Alan
Jack was what’s the name of the restaurant?

Jack
It’s called Jax,

Alan
Jax okay, very creative. Now, you started off this business model with your family involved? Obviously, it is you grew it, it was prohibitive to to just stay with that. But what time did you put your first employees in?

Jack
So it was actually almost nine min not? Sorry? Nine months into it? Okay. Yeah. And that was kind of an interesting experience to bring in our first nonfamily employee. It was kind of monumental for us.

Alan
So Jack, someone comes to you today and says, Jack, you’re an entrepreneur been doing this for a long time and like your business model, that pizza restaurant, give me some advice of what should I be focused on?

Jack
Should I be focused on? You know? Probably? Man, that’s a tough question. Because there’s a lot of things but for us, it was actually sheer determination. Okay. Quite frankly, we didn’t have any other choice. We that was, we either had to make it work, or completely, you know, it would have been completely devastating. At that point. If we couldn’t have made it work.

Alan
Are there things are the mistakes that you made along the way? Oh, for sure. And what are some of those? What’s your number one area that you would if you had to do it over again, this is what I would have done differently?

Jack
You know, I, I, that’s, that’s another tough question. Because the things that the bad mistakes that I made, actually turned us into what we are now. Okay, and so I

Alan
That’s why I bring that up. Because it’s like, it’s like, no one is perfect as they start businesses, and everyone makes mistakes, but then they learn they say, Yeah, this, you know, I may have done this too quick. I may have, you know, I had to modify my menu or is there any of that that you adjusted as he went through?

Jack
You know, it was a total evolution from from from the very beginning, we actually started out as more of a cafe style where people come in order at account counter. We’re now currently a full service restaurant.

Alan
Okay, so you did evolve from we lose.

Jack
A lot of evolution. going on, and we had to make the evolution happen to be able to survive, we actually would hit a point where it didn’t seem like we were growing. Yeah. And at that point, we had to do something different to. And so how did you reach.

Alan
Out and get the word of mouth out?

Jack
Quite honestly, we, I worked Facebook really hard. Okay.

Alan
It’s kind of it kind of sounds a success story.

Jack
Because it was free. You know, I could spend an hour a day and I did a lot of unique things people weren’t doing on social media. And, and the other thing was, we had a good product, and people are excited about it.

Alan
Now, I gotta ask you, this is a tough question. I could ask it, you know, 2008 King, and tough economy, there’s all sorts of there was a change in this society in terms of entitlements, number of entitlements, why not just pack it up and say, you know, what, I’ll take the welfare check, or the free benefits.

Jack
Hey, you know, that’s, that’s a that’s kind of dear to my heart, because we had to make that decision. We were, we were getting we were getting close to actually happen. Completely do foreclosure before I opened the restaurant. And I had to make the choice of do I go back on what I promised I was going to do, and I honestly, I could have collected, I could have taken out foreclosure, I could have collected a welfare check. And we were probably hours away from doing that. And then we made a decision. Do we want that mentality to do we want to have that mentality, and we want to push that mentality on to our children? And we decided not to so we rolled up our sleeves and went to work.

Alan
Yeah, I’ll say is I listen to this story, there are millions and millions America, writing new shoes, it’s a tough world out there. Unemployment benefits are, you know, just saying employment rates high, a lot of people looking for work, but but you work through this, you work through it, and and you stuck with it through sheer determination. So if, when you look at him to the future, and you see the road that you want, what do you see for the next 20 years or so?

Jack
Um, you know, I’m really excited about the next 20 years, we’ve had some just the opportunities. Like I say, I wasn’t planning on being in the food industry. Yeah, I got into it, and I absolutely loved it. And I, when I got doing the restaurant, I thought the restaurants were going to be my future. Yeah. And, and, but other opportunities have presented themselves to me, and I’m finding out that I’m going to take those other opportunities and, and see where those take me as well. And so we’ve been it’s been it’s been an interesting ride.

Alan
You’ve been able to build on your your reputation and legacy.

Jack
Yeah, and without those experiences that I had at the restaurant, I couldn’t be at the place that I am today.

Alan
Well, I think I think a lot of it too, is it you know, every one of us again until the story in the end, but but, you know, when I listen to your story, it was focused on sheer determination of yourself through a jack we’re running short on time is someone to find Jack’s today. How would they go about that?

Jack
Um, you know, Jack seven.com or look us up on Facebook and Jack Solomon,

Alan
Jack seven. Hey, Jack Carlisle today. Thanks for being with me here on America. James. Thanks, Andy. All right. We’ll be right back after these messages.