Pizza Expo Podcast Episode 10- Christian Patriarca
[00:00:00.000] - Rev and Eric
All right. We are back with Who's at Pizza Expo. We're in the Marqii booth. We're here with Christian. Christian, how do you pronounce your last name? I don't want to butcher it.
[00:00:08.220] - Christian
Patriarca
[00:00:09.700] - Rev and Eric
Patriarca. With Slice 420. Colorado Springs. One location. Another one on the way, right?
[00:00:13.900] - Christian
Yes, sir.
[00:00:14.440] - Rev and Eric
So how close are you on that one?
[00:00:15.660] - Christian
Probably about a month away.
[00:00:16.980] - Rev and Eric
Yeah? Awesome. So you run one. What's it look like going into the second one? Are the systems in place? Are you prepared for that?
[00:00:25.230] - Christian
It's pretty scary man.
[00:00:26.010] - Rev and Eric
Is it?
[00:00:26.850] - Christian
Very scary. It's nerve racking, honestly, because right now it's hard enough to get a staff. Everybody's talking about that. That's the new topic. Nobody can staff up. We're doing pretty good now, but it's hard to staff up another store. I already have 20 employees. It's crazy how I think I'm going to get another 20 or 25, but slowly, but surely it's coming around. I think that putting a few things in place, offering salaries, offering benefits, just offering what the company can offer to people to make sure they feel valued and stick around.
[00:00:58.320] - Rev and Eric
One of the things...
[00:01:02.650] - Rev and Eric
Let's stay on that subject. For sure there's a labor crunch happening out there. People are having...what's working for you? Like what's getting people to want to come work for you and stay working for you?
[00:01:11.670] - Christian
I think one of the things being able to be side by side with a team and work with them hands on instead of just being somebody that says something in the dark and this is it. Always being there when there's a complaint, but never being there for anything that's good. So teaching the team correctly, being side by side with them on Friday and Saturday nights and raising up those leaders so they can really see my vision and I can really pour into them. And then I know I'm going to have to split up my time in both places.
[00:01:37.570] - Christian
So it's really coming down to the character of what, I'm looking for the character. They can be a great pizza man, but the character and the integrity and the attitude needs to be better than you making a good pizza, because if you have the love and passion for food and want to learn how to make pizza, I've just had an epiphany that I have to become a teacher. I didn't think I had the time to really say, hey, I got to teach you this craft because I realize how long it took me to evolve into a good pizza maker.
[00:02:01.630] - Christian
So it was like, how am I going to teach somebody? I need to be here with you. But having a process of a streamlined, where somebody's opening the dough, ones stretching, ones putting it on the board and putting it in the oven. Creating that assembly line doesn't mean that that person has to take the dough, open the dough, sauce it. So I'm limiting the steps of one pizza maker into two or three over a busy streamline, and it's helping because I can develop them into a great pizza maker.
[00:02:28.030] - Christian
But right now, just do this great. You do this great. And you do this great. And then we'll keep working on the rest until it's all there. So that's how I kind of been putting this together in the busy times with new people.
[00:02:41.020] - Rev and Eric
You can hire for skill or I'm sorry, you can hire for personality, you can teach a skill.
[00:02:45.100] - Rev and Eric
I want to give a shout out to you, there are a handful, probably of social media accounts that I just absolutely love. And yours is one of them. And I love it for a couple of reasons. One, you're very positive and you've got a great message. I love the story and love why you do what you do. But the biggest thing I love about your pizza shop and what you do is, you're constantly like you're shouting out your employees. And this is this guy, that's this guy, this guy kicks butt. But because you know what? They love it. And what does it cost you to do that? Nothing.
[00:03:11.850] - Christian
It's 100% nothing. And it means so much.
[00:03:14.620] - Rev and Eric
But it means everything.
[00:03:15.160] - Christian
It's so valuable.
[00:03:16.240] - Rev and Eric
Yeah.
[00:03:16.510] - Christian
It really is, because I remember when somebody would tell me good job, that made me go the extra length because somebody said, "hey, good job". So I try to do that often and all the time. Even if they're not doing the greatest job, I'd rather say, "hey, man, listen, you're doing a great job, here let me show you how in some areas you got to improve because I want you to be the best that you can be." So it's always, from my perspective, because of my working.
[00:03:38.470] - Christian
I've been working in the trenches. I'm a worker, I didn't grow up in the business, like my family handed me down the restaurant. I got out there. I kicked butt myself, I worked hard. I have the people behind me to root me on. But I did it because I love the restaurant business. I love making pizza. I love the rush. I love working with people.
[00:03:56.670] - Christian
I have a conviction. Every single day I wake up out of bed at six o'clock in the morning, I go to bed at midnight, seven days a week. I say it's because I love what I do and I have a conviction. I feel convicted to my family. I feel convicted to the people that I work with, I have a conviction going to work.
[00:04:11.620] - Rev and Eric
Yeah, I have to tell you, one of my favorite moments of COVID and doing Instagram lives was, I would kind of dig deep on people and find a little funny thing here or there. And I called him, I said, we're doing this Instagram live and I said, I have to ask you a question, he's like "what", I said I looked at you're wife's Instagram or Facebook page and I said, there's a picture y'all at the beach and Mama looks really good and there's a picture of him and I said, you were sucking your gut in, weren't you? And he's like, "yeah."
[00:04:39.840] - Christian
Absolutely.
[00:04:41.120] - Rev and Eric
And you can tell and I cracked up laughing and he's like...
[00:04:44.780] - Christian
He was spot on.
[00:04:46.650] - Rev and Eric
I knew it because I'm like...
[00:04:48.490] - Christian
He must know from experience, though. I'm not going to say it man, how did you know that.
[00:04:51.693] - Rev and Eric
You can't make fun of the pizza pouch!
[00:04:51.990] - Rev and Eric
Totally. It was, it would just make me laugh because I saw the picture and I know you well enough to know that if I gave you a hard time about it, you're going to be like, yeah you're right.
[00:04:59.320] - Christian
I'm trying to work on it with, like, this gentleman. Dude, you've came a long way, man. You look awesome man. Congratulations.
[00:05:04.480] - Rev and Eric
Thank you, thank you. I've put on a few from the last couple of days but
[00:05:06.280] - Christian
That's okay. You'll get it back down when you go home.
[00:05:07.990] - Rev and Eric
We don't want to keep your forever. Quick question. What have you seen new today? Anything over the last couple of days that you've seen here?
[00:05:13.360] - Christian
Yeah, you.
[00:05:14.100] - Rev and Eric
Thank you.
[00:05:15.280] - Rev and Eric
I have the same answer.
[00:05:16.680] - Christian
Yes. I definitely saw some new faces that I've been meaning to connect with. And one of the things that this has definitely been a slowed down Expo, right? It's a little slowed down. We don't see the Italian Tier and Caputo here and a lot of northeasterners I don't see here, but I've definitely seen a lot of good friends, which has made it so worth it because we've missed, I've missed my Todd Honey, I've missed Daren from...I've missed Jeanie from Grande. So I've missed people. And now we've reconnected.
[00:05:42.540] - Christian
It was a lot more intimate. Definitely this year because it wasn't a rat race of 20,000 people either. So even though we're missing some people, it was definitely a better way to connect this year. So I'm definitely grateful that I made it out here. Everybody's given 100 who is here and everybody's really excited who's here because they're seeing people they haven't seen. So there's a lot of good emotion here this year.
[00:06:01.900] - Rev and Eric
Yeah. Well, I guess to wrap up, thank you for being a Perfect Crust customer.
[00:06:05.590] - Christian
Thank you guys.
[00:06:05.590] - Rev and Eric
We appreciate that.
[00:06:06.930] - Christian
Absolutely.
[00:06:07.411] - Rev and Eric
Great to finally meet you
[00:06:07.420] - Rev and Eric
And you just keep pouring into people man
[00:06:10.050] - Christian
Absolutely.
[00:06:10.660] - Rev and Eric
Because I love it because, you know, we talked about this a lot personally. You pour into people and then it comes back ten fold.
[00:06:15.370] - Christian
Definitely. So two things before we get off. Okay. One thing is that I use Perfect Pizza Crust Liner. I'm saying this earlier, but it's not really to say, hey, let's put you guys on a pedestal but you guys earned it. I use you guys because my pizza is not as greasy and it stays crispier because I've seen it with my own eyes. Period.
[00:06:33.000] - Christian
You, I've been following you because you're always on Instagram. You're always pushing out good content. You're always being positive. I didn't even know you, but I know you're awesome before I even met you because I've been following you. So thank you guys for this opportunity.
[00:06:43.450] - Rev and Eric
I'll send you the check, so thank you.
[00:06:45.440] - Rev and Eric
Good to see you
[00:06:46.920] - Rev and Eric
And also, if you're watching this, you're hearing this, go check out what they're doing on socials. They're great storytellers. And part of social media is storytelling and part of it is community and you got both of them in the bag.
[00:06:55.920] - Christian
We're trying our hardest and we keep wanting to improve that. Thank you for that.
[00:06:59.130] - Rev and Eric
Pleasure. Thank you, Chris.
[00:06:59.610] - Christian
Thank you sir. Appreciate you guys, thank you so much.
