Inside the AI Shift Happening in Independent Restaurants

Unknown Speaker (0:00): Hey, everybody. I gotta tell you. We're gonna talk about BUILT. BUILT Hospitality. Millions of people use BUILT every day.

Unknown Speaker (0:07): That's right. Every day to earn awards on housing and in their neighborhood. But now now it extends to your restroom. That's where Built Hospitality comes in. Built Hospitality shapes how guests are recognized and taken care of.

Unknown Speaker (0:21): Built's restaurant facing platform is designed specifically for dining operators to drive loyalty with their guests. It combines reservations, guest preferences, VIP management, and payments all into one platform alongside an agentic concierge. That's right. An AI concierge that thoughtfully designs and executes experiences around your guest tastes using the latest and greatest in AI technology. When a guest walks in, your team already knows what they like without digging through notes.

Unknown Speaker (0:56): Built Hospitality works across the entire guest journey. That's right. The entire guest journey from delivering a complimentary course at the right moment, just the right moment, sending a personalized offer that brings them coming back again and again and again. That's right. That's what Built Hospitality is doing.

Unknown Speaker (1:14): It is allowing you to communicate with your guests and keep them coming back over and over. Make every guest feel like a regular every time, not just their first time every time They're a regular. Built Hospitality is available now for restaurant groups everywhere. Learn more at builtdining.com backslash hangout. That's builtdining.com backslash hangout, and check out what Built Hospitality is gonna do for you and your restaurant.

Unknown Speaker (1:47): Live from the DIRECTV studio in New York City, it's hangout podcast with the restaurant guy and the finance guy. And joining us today in studio is mister Sterling Douglas, the CEO of Shouty. And when he's on the podcast

Unknown Speaker (2:09): with us, he's the technology guy.

Unknown Speaker (2:12): That's right. We've got the restaurant guy, the finance guy, and the technology guy. And, Jimbo, this is a special occasion. Did you know why?

Unknown Speaker (2:19): Why is that?

Unknown Speaker (2:20): Because mister Sterling Douglas is is wearing his special. I think it's a seven, eight timer. What is it?

Jimmy Frischling (2:26): It it is the most. We've never had Never. We've never had a guest as often as as as Sterling. And by the way, and by the way, you mentioned the technology guy. A theme of this episode may very well may may very well be, but wait, there's more.

Jimmy Frischling (2:41): So let's well, let's go.

Unknown Speaker (2:43): What what does that mean?

Jimmy Frischling (2:44): Well, let's dive into it.

Unknown Speaker (2:45): It's a teaser.

Jimmy Frischling (2:45): First of all, I that's a teaser. Thank you. First of all, I had the privilege

Unknown Speaker (2:49): A lot

Unknown Speaker (2:49): of tea 17 times? There's no way he's been on 17.

Jimmy Frischling (2:53): 16 podcast. He did. He once did when we were out at our when we were at an NRA grilling one, not the, in Chicago, he was our guest host and like banged out. He's been the most frequent guest, but I think 17 times. I think he racked up a lot.

Jimmy Frischling (3:08): A lot. A lot of cost us

Unknown Speaker (3:10): to to have a guest 17.

Jimmy Frischling (3:11): You know what? You know what? We we we can pay him more, but we can never pay him enough. We can never pay him enough. Never pay him enough.

Jimmy Frischling (3:18): Okay. Listen. First of all, I I have the privilege of welcoming everyone more formally to Hospitality Hangout, Hospitality Focus podcast. As everyone knows, my name is Jimmy Frischling, otherwise known as the finance guy, and I'm here with my partner, my brother, another mother, mister Michael Schatzberg, aka Shatzy, aka the restaurant guy. But I'm gonna continue.

Unknown Speaker (3:38): Oh, there's

Jimmy Frischling (3:38): more. There's more. Because not only do we have, Sterling back, I will say boldly, I believe he is one of the most forward thinking technologists or restaurant technology focused persons that we know and we've had on the podcast. He's And not only been on the podcast before, as you just said, about 17

Unknown Speaker (3:58): Not about Jimmy. I've been I I have right now, Julie has confirmed. This is, I think, Jimmy Yeah. I'm not sure, but I think this is This is breaking news coming to you live from the hangout. Sterling Douglas 17 times on the hangout.

Unknown Speaker (4:16): That is breaking news, Jimmy. You know, Jimmy, we're always breaking news.

Jimmy Frischling (4:19): We special have gift from strong at the end of the show. What do we It's better than turtle It's better

Unknown Speaker (4:23): What do we

Unknown Speaker (4:23): got for? It's better than turtle wax. That's also a teaser. Stick with me.

Unknown Speaker (4:26): Oh.

Unknown Speaker (4:27): Alright. Turtle wax.

Unknown Speaker (4:28): I haven't heard that a lot.

Unknown Speaker (4:29): But Sterling's been on the show so many times. He has his own locker. He's the only person we've ever given a locker to in in the studio. In the studio.

Unknown Speaker (4:35): But here's cigars and whiskey? But here's one thing

Jimmy Frischling (4:39): in terms of the category of but wait. There's more. I believe we're either gonna have to retire the technology guy or add the AI guy because we've never had a person that has been so forward thinking and leaning into it as Sterling. And we're gonna and we're gonna dive into that too. Yet another teaser, a trifecta.

Unknown Speaker (4:58): I feel like when we launched the podcast, Jimmy

Unknown Speaker (5:00): Yes.

Unknown Speaker (5:01): It was all about technology. There really wasn't AI. Like, nobody said AI. There was no dot AI. There was no AI URL.

Unknown Speaker (5:07): Not like you know what mean?

Unknown Speaker (5:08): And I'll tell you this. Mhmm. I actually think one of the secrets one of the see what part of the secret sauces of Challi's platform Yes. And how AI, again, embedded it is, is it you actually don't need to talk about AI. Mhmm.

Unknown Speaker (5:19): You know what mean? In fact, I think one of the best AI solutions Yes. For restaurants Yes. You're not gonna have the acronym. Not even have the initials AI.

Unknown Speaker (5:26): What are gonna have? It's just gonna be there. It's just there. We're and that's what we're gonna talk about.

Unknown Speaker (5:30): It's just there.

Unknown Speaker (5:30): It's just

Unknown Speaker (5:31): there. It's a thing. You don't have to say

Unknown Speaker (5:32): it.

Unknown Speaker (5:32): Because you say I to a restaurant, they're like, oh my god. AI. I'll tell you. No. It works.

Jimmy Frischling (5:37): You don't even know where the magic comes from because it's embedded.

Unknown Speaker (5:40): There's a lot

Unknown Speaker (5:41): to do. Well, listen.

Unknown Speaker (5:42): Mister Sterling Doug, it's great to have you back on

Unknown Speaker (5:44): the show.

Unknown Speaker (5:45): For those who may be new to the show, I know that's fine. Hard to believe there are new listeners, you know, after this many years. But, give us a quick background on yourself and the elevator pitch on Chowly and how everything has changed since 2015. You launched Chowly. 2015.

Unknown Speaker (6:04): That's a quick, man. If I carry the two pie

Unknown Speaker (6:07): Julie will give it to you.

Unknown Speaker (6:08): Wait for the data team to get you that.

Unknown Speaker (6:10): Jimmy, that's, that's, like, at least at least ten, eleven years.

Unknown Speaker (6:13): Ten, eleven years.

Unknown Speaker (6:13): Ten, eleven years ago. Right?

Unknown Speaker (6:15): Depending on the month. Yeah. Ten or eleven. What's 314. Right.

Unknown Speaker (6:18): So carry right. Okay.

Unknown Speaker (6:19): So tell us a little bit about let's let's go cat let ladies and gentlemen, here he is, mister Sterling Douglas. Welcome to the show.

Unknown Speaker (6:27): Tell us a little

Unknown Speaker (6:28): about yourself and Charlie. What's us what's changed?

Sterling Douglas (6:31): Thanks for having me, guys. Love the upgrades to the studio. Yes. For the locker This is upgrade. Swing board.

Unknown Speaker (6:36): I mean, this

Unknown Speaker (6:37): is great.

Unknown Speaker (6:37): Thing look

Unknown Speaker (6:38): like if this is an upgrade.

Unknown Speaker (6:39): Yeah. Yeah.

Sterling Douglas (6:41): Yeah. No. Thanks for having me. It's good to give you guys a quick update here. I mean, on the Challi side, you know, everybody knows us for the third party marketplace integrations, you know, that's how we started back in 2015 as Shazi said.

Sterling Douglas (6:53): But really that gave us a good foundation to really expand the platform. Right? So now we have a product, the Challi platform, It's and not just the integrations in the marketplaces. It's your full marketing website. It's your email marketing.

Sterling Douglas (7:04): It's your Google Ads, Google Business Profile. We do surveys. Everything you need to power outside of the four walls of your restaurant. And that's really what,

Unknown Speaker (7:13): you know, we've been driving over the Wait. Wait.

Unknown Speaker (7:15): Wait. What does it mean powering everything outside the four walls?

Sterling Douglas (7:19): So when you think of off premise, a lot of people think of off premise orders. Right? Pickup, delivery, curbside orders. But the way that we think about it is off premise interactions. So anytime someone's interacting with your restaurant in a digital way, whether it's a Google business profile, they visit your website, they see an email, these are all touch points and interactions they have with your restaurant that are occurring outside the four walls.

Unknown Speaker (7:39): Hey everybody, I gotta tell you. We're gonna talk about BUILT. BUILT Hospitality. Millions of people use BUILT every day. That's right, every day to earn rewards on housing and in their neighborhood.

Unknown Speaker (7:51): But now, now it extends to your restaurant. That's where Built Hospitality comes in. Built Hospitality shapes how guests are recognized and taken care of. Built's restaurant facing platform is designed specifically for dining operators to drive loyalty with their guests. It combines reservations, guest preferences, VIP management, and payments all into one platform alongside an agentic concierge.

Unknown Speaker (8:19): That's right. An AI concierge that thoughtfully designs and executes experiences around your guests' tastes, using the latest and greatest in AI technology. When a guest walks in, your team already knows what they like without digging through notes. Built hospitality works across the entire guest journey. That's right.

Unknown Speaker (8:40): The entire guest journey from delivering a complimentary course at the right moment, just the right moment, sending a personalized offer that brings them coming back again and again and again. That's right. That's what Built Hospitality is doing. It is allowing you to communicate with your guests and keep them coming back over and over. Make every guest feel like a regular every time, not just their first time, every time.

Unknown Speaker (9:03): They're a regular. Built Hospitality is available now for restaurant groups everywhere. Learn more at builtdining.com backslash hangout. That's builtdining.com backslash Hangout, and check out what Built Hospitality is gonna do for you and your restaurant.

Unknown Speaker (9:22): I like that. We're gonna start off.

Unknown Speaker (9:24): I'm I'm speechless. We're gonna start out speech.

Unknown Speaker (9:27): I want

Unknown Speaker (9:27): that that that's a shock. That's

Unknown Speaker (9:28): that shock. Wow.

Sterling Douglas (9:30): Do I win do I do I win something for that?

Unknown Speaker (9:32): 100%.

Unknown Speaker (9:32): 100%

Jimmy Frischling (9:33): like like any good baseball game, the pitcher's gotta start warming up a little bit. I wanna start with before we go deep, deep, deep, deep, wanna start with the last time you were on the show, we were talking about Challi's acquisition of our good friends and partners at Targetable.

Unknown Speaker (9:51): Yeah.

Jimmy Frischling (9:51): And and that was great fun and we talked about that and now let's fast forward and you've gone and launched first of all your own podcast appropriately named

Unknown Speaker (10:02): Oh, thank you.

Jimmy Frischling (10:02): AI Studio audience is very pleased with that. AI for restaurants. In case anyone's wondering, we at the at the Hospitada Hangout, we embrace and support other podcasters. Like, we're we're we're gonna promote AI for restaurants with your cohost, our friend Aaron Newton from Thanks. Yeah.

Jimmy Frischling (10:18): Fantastic platform. Sure. Yeah. Have to ask, given you're running a company that's just emerged as the platform, the suite, and we're gonna talk about that too, for 17,000 restaurants.

Unknown Speaker (10:31): We have, like, forty five minutes, Jimmy.

Jimmy Frischling (10:33): Why don't we talk about 70,000 restaurants. You're running the company. What made you say, you know what? I also need to be behind the microphone every single week.

Unknown Speaker (10:41): Jealousy. He sees us.

Unknown Speaker (10:44): He sees us. I see what you have. I want the studio. You

Unknown Speaker (10:47): know? Yes.

Unknown Speaker (10:47): I want

Unknown Speaker (10:48): when I can't. Jealous. Yes. No. Look.

Sterling Douglas (10:50): I think that look. We I've been at this ten years. I got to see

Unknown Speaker (10:53): press conference. I thought was eleven.

Unknown Speaker (10:55): Okay. Eleven. Eleven. 10:11.

Unknown Speaker (10:56): I can't decide what that was experience or makes me feel older. Yeah. Like, I I haven't quite figured out that balance.

Unknown Speaker (11:01): Six, seven.

Sterling Douglas (11:02): No. But I mean, like, I've gotten to see the restaurant the restaurant industry be hit with waves of technology. Like, remember when third party marketplaces came, there was tablet hell, the big move from cloud to cloud point of sales, the tech explosion from COVID. Right? And each time, like, restaurants have this, you know, this perspective or this, you know, this this thing that, they don't embrace technology.

Sterling Douglas (11:23): They don't adopt technology quick enough. And I saw that with HWave. And one of the things that I've seen a lot differently with AI is that they're not running from it. Every restaurant tour that I'm talking to is craving it and embracing it and trying to do it more. And Aaron is someone who I've been talking with about AI for about a year and a half.

Sterling Douglas (11:41): We would trade notes, challenge each other, we we're really competitive. And so every time we'd walk away from a phone call, I'd be like, shit. You know, Aaron knows this thing and that's so cool and I'm behind. And he would feel the exact same way. Then he started doing this boot camp and he's got like this wait list and it kinda blew up.

Sterling Douglas (11:56): He's got c level executives from Taco Bell trying to get into it. And so we just thought this was a really good way for us to kind of extend that reach and help restaurants that want to embrace and want to adopt AI to to be able to do that and get those optimizations. So we talk about, you know, we use it every day. Right? We work with restaurants that use it every day.

Sterling Douglas (12:17): So we talk about the restaurant use cases. We talk about easy, getting started tips. We talk about super advanced stuff, and we talk about how to lead a company through a transition. Right? Because

Unknown Speaker (12:26): not looking me? Why It's almost like you're talking to Jimmy, like I'm not even in the room.

Unknown Speaker (12:30): Well Did

Unknown Speaker (12:31): you notice

Sterling Douglas (12:31): that? I mean, he dressed up.

Unknown Speaker (12:33): I I dressed up.

Unknown Speaker (12:33): You you look like me. Could be a hot day. I was wearing my summer outfit, Jimmy.

Jimmy Frischling (12:39): By the way, when I walked in, said to Sterling, you know, we we we try to dress better at Brandon than wearing V neck t shirts. And then he and then at first, he was like embarrassed, and then he went, wait a second. I went,

Unknown Speaker (12:48): did you see me yesterday? I was in a blazer. I look gorgeous.

Unknown Speaker (12:52): Yeah. That was yesterday. We didn't record the pod yesterday. You

Unknown Speaker (12:54): Well, no. I did a pod yesterday. Didn't I do a pod yesterday?

Unknown Speaker (12:56): You did a pod yesterday.

Unknown Speaker (12:57): Did. Did. Did you dress up for yesterday that

Unknown Speaker (12:59): you did? Okay. Then you start to you listen. You got Greg Creed's accent and his pedigree. I'll dress up for you too.

Sterling Douglas (13:06): Alright. I'll start working on it.

Unknown Speaker (13:07): Julie, I don't know what you're doing, but you're going in, you're going out, you're popping in, you're popping out. You're confusing the pants.

Jimmy Frischling (13:11): I just wanna say regarding Sterling and Aaron's podcast. Okay. I think it's awesome, first of all. I'm not gonna say it's better or worse than ours. You know what?

Jimmy Frischling (13:19): There's room at the table. There's room for podcasting.

Unknown Speaker (13:22): There's 3,000,000 podcasts. I mean, there's no no room for it. Room.

Jimmy Frischling (13:26): It's but I do feel you've made AI accessible and and it's uniquely focused for our industry. And I think to that, will tell you, I think a lot of folks should be grateful. I know I am. You know, with ten years plus at Challi and and the journey you just shared, it daunted me that you're actually a KG veteran of this industry, which I don't know what it says about me and Chet because gonna say we are old as dirt. Uh-huh.

Unknown Speaker (13:51): Well, when did we meet Sterling? It was it was always 2019.

Unknown Speaker (13:54): I think it was earlier

Unknown Speaker (13:56): than that.

Unknown Speaker (13:56): That's actually earlier.

Unknown Speaker (13:57): '8. Sorry. It was 17. 17? 17.

Unknown Speaker (13:59): 17. Sorry.

Unknown Speaker (13:59): So how old were you in 2017? Me? Oh, no. Me. Just ask you.

Unknown Speaker (14:03): How old you were? I mean, me. Just ask how old

Unknown Speaker (14:05): were you in 2017. 2017, I would have been

Unknown Speaker (14:08): 21.

Unknown Speaker (14:09): 25 Julie Julie, do some math there, please.

Sterling Douglas (14:11): I was gonna ask the data team to do crank out the numbers there. 25, 26 years old.

Unknown Speaker (14:15): We met Sterling when was 25. We flew to Chicago to

Jimmy Frischling (14:17): Yes, see were actually and note we were Sterling shared that we were the only investor that actually flew out to meet not just him and Justin and and and Tom and and some of the the key c suite executives but actually met the team and then we and then we broke bread we broke bread together.

Unknown Speaker (14:38): Said A peninsula. It's lovely. What? Peninsula Hotel? Mhmm.

Unknown Speaker (14:41): Jeez. Who's paying for that?

Unknown Speaker (14:43): I we did.

Unknown Speaker (14:43): You guys

Unknown Speaker (14:44): Jesus, Jimmy.

Jimmy Frischling (14:45): Yeah. Was coming out of Peninsula? I was coming out of my banker days. I was thinking that's how you do it. I didn't realize he would have been happy.

Unknown Speaker (14:51): Sterling would have been happy at, like, with hot dogs, like, like, the tilos. Or tilos would have been like, yeah.

Unknown Speaker (14:55): He would

Sterling Douglas (14:55): have been thrilled. Italian beef, though, not hot dogs.

Jimmy Frischling (14:57): Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Italian beef. Here's what I wanna dive into because this, I think, is a big thing that's going on and and kind of the the journey and the evolution of our industry.

Jimmy Frischling (15:06): One of the things I find unique right now is you guys have built truly a suite, and I would argue for the SMBs and and even beyond. But certainly, you are a best in suite. And we've talked about that. You've got the POS integration. You talk about the online ordering, dynamic pricing, email marketing, websites, Google products, and now AI woven into it.

Jimmy Frischling (15:27): How does AI change the game in terms of having all this data and all these these verticals under a single roof as opposed to trying to stitch it together, you know, from different point solutions. And I know some of the point solution guys get mad at me when I say this, but I'm sorry not

Unknown Speaker (15:45): ever gets

Jimmy Frischling (15:46): Sorry not sorry. I think I think best and sweet is really important for operators, but can you expand upon that and how AI is changing the game?

Sterling Douglas (15:54): Yeah. I think that there's a couple points there. So one you've got like this is the data advantage. Right? When when as a as a suite or as a, you know, someone who's multi product, when you can feed data between two different systems, they just get better.

Sterling Douglas (16:06): So when you're ordering, your point of sale, your marketing, your pricing data all talk to each other, right, that is always going to be able to, you know, each product makes the next one a little bit better. Mhmm. And then when you throw AI into it, AI then can find the patterns, make the recommendations. So for us, right, AI can see a menu item is trending on delivery. It can trigger a targeted email campaign.

Sterling Douglas (16:25): It can measure it, then it can suggest a Google ad. The Google ad's gonna give it even richer keyword data. You can feed that back into the website. Now we can increase the organic Google search, and now we can drive more traffic to the website. And all of that can happen without the operator

Unknown Speaker (16:37): looking automatically. Correct. No one's doing anything. No one's touching anything.

Unknown Speaker (16:41): Someone is. It's with Claude.

Unknown Speaker (16:43): You know? But I'm saying, like, this is all set up. Right. So you go and operate your restaurant. Just take care of guests.

Unknown Speaker (16:49): Do them making sure the food's great, making sure your guests are happy, doing all the things you need to do because that's what people are. And all this stuff is happening behind the scenes automatically now. Right. I love it. It's really unbelievable.

Unknown Speaker (17:00): I mean, let's talk about SMBs. Right?

Unknown Speaker (17:02): Mhmm.

Unknown Speaker (17:03): Jimmy, what does SMB stand for?

Jimmy Frischling (17:05): Small and medium sized businesses.

Unknown Speaker (17:08): And that that is that what it stands

Unknown Speaker (17:09): for? I

Unknown Speaker (17:10): What do

Sterling Douglas (17:10): like to call them? To call them independent operators,

Unknown Speaker (17:12): not SMBs.

Jimmy Frischling (17:13): Well, it's it's hard for SMB to stand for independent operators. I call that IO, independent operators.

Unknown Speaker (17:19): Is that IO?

Unknown Speaker (17:20): But we don't like, you say IO, and people are gonna go a whole different direction.

Unknown Speaker (17:23): Why we think

Unknown Speaker (17:23): they call

Unknown Speaker (17:23): it like Apple. Right?

Jimmy Frischling (17:24): I agree. Think I think IO is better than

Sterling Douglas (17:26): I've never talked to an independent operator and heard them call themselves an SMB or, like, I am an SMB.

Unknown Speaker (17:32): Like, Jimmy, I'm an SMB. I'm an owner. Didn't you say I'm an SME?

Unknown Speaker (17:36): I think I called you a son of a

Unknown Speaker (17:37): I was gonna say, think it was an SOB.

Unknown Speaker (17:39): Oh, SOB. SOB. Well, I knew there was something you called me. I thought okay.

Jimmy Frischling (17:42): So nothing new. I wanna say, I think I think I just I'll take this as a this is a real moment for me. I'm I think I'm done with SMBs.

Unknown Speaker (17:48): Really? I think I'm done using that SOB.

Jimmy Frischling (17:50): I'm I'm with you? Absolutely. All day long and twice on Sundays. But I think I'm going. I'm that's it.

Jimmy Frischling (17:56): I I'm dropping it. SMB out. Independent operators in.

Unknown Speaker (18:00): Alright. So

Unknown Speaker (18:01): we can't use SMB. So the the the the single unit operator it's not single unit because you can have 10 you could be an S. Right? You can

Unknown Speaker (18:09): be an independent operator in

Unknown Speaker (18:10): multiple locations. It's it's not a big chain. Not enterprise. Okay? Anything other than enterprise.

Unknown Speaker (18:15): Okay? Yeah. Anything under what what would you care? Is that under 50?

Sterling Douglas (18:18): I it's it's the math changes a a ton.

Unknown Speaker (18:21): Like, Lettuce Entertain you, you get,

Sterling Douglas (18:22): like, over a 120 restaurants. They're in they're they're in One to 10 units. That's that's where

Unknown Speaker (18:26): we Really?

Sterling Douglas (18:26): We have some that are 15. We have some that are singles. I mean, we're like, Challi has enterprise customers too. We have 500 location groups and

Unknown Speaker (18:33): and all Does Lettuce Entertain you, do you consider that enterprise?

Unknown Speaker (18:36): Yeah. I would consider that.

Unknown Speaker (18:37): Yeah. That's Even though they have so many single unit

Unknown Speaker (18:39): Yeah. The multi concept. You see? But I mean, like, it's a group. Right?

Unknown Speaker (18:42): You see, you got your a cup. You got your b cup. You got your c d You got d cup. What's the d? What's the d?

Unknown Speaker (18:48): That's the biggest.

Unknown Speaker (18:48): You can't go write the D.

Unknown Speaker (18:50): Can't write

Unknown Speaker (18:50): the D.

Unknown Speaker (18:50): Hey, B.

Unknown Speaker (18:51): C. So, okay. So let's just get into this, right? Yeah. Giving a three location operator tools that used to be only available to chains, That's what's happening now.

Unknown Speaker (19:02): Right now, what you're doing right now is you're letting like, it used to be back in the day, McDonald's had an advantage over everybody. I use McDonald's because that's a chain everybody knows. It's been around for a long time, and it's really you know, it was always the grill in the room. Right?

Unknown Speaker (19:16): I prefer McDowell's, by the way.

Unknown Speaker (19:18): McDowell's is good for McDowell's. See McDowell's that was an SMB. There was only one McDonald's McDonald's. There's a lot of McDonald's. I think they're like 20011 that whatever it is a lot of McDonald's, right?

Unknown Speaker (19:28): So now with A I and in particular your platform, we call it the Challi platform, Jimmy, right? The Challi platform.

Unknown Speaker (19:37): I think Stones went with the platform. Challi platform. Challi platform.

Unknown Speaker (19:41): Oh, we're just calling it.

Unknown Speaker (19:42): No, no, no. Don't throw

Unknown Speaker (19:43): it in. It's Challi platform. So with the Charlie platform Yeah. An operator with five, ten units Mhmm. One unit can literally now play in the game Sure.

Unknown Speaker (19:54): Like their McDonald's.

Sterling Douglas (19:56): Yeah. I actually think they can move faster.

Unknown Speaker (19:58): Move faster? Yeah. I know. Because McDonald's moves slow.

Unknown Speaker (20:02): Yeah. That's a huge organization.

Unknown Speaker (20:03): Mean wanted to sell enterprise. When I first met, you were like, we're gonna sell enterprise. And selling enterprise is cool because you're like, oh, I'm in McDonald's. You know? But selling McDonald's from a technology standpoint, I mean, that could be two years.

Sterling Douglas (20:14): It was they're completely different businesses. I think that the SMB, the independent operators, that part of the space is a completely different it's a completely different customer than the enterprise groups. It's a different sales motion obviously, but it's also a different product. It's a different support model. It's a different implementation model.

Sterling Douglas (20:32): They need different things. Everything is so different you end up running two different businesses, which is what we were doing for a while. And a lot

Unknown Speaker (20:38): of times you're dealing with decision maker. Yeah. Where if you're dealing

Unknown Speaker (20:41): with these enterprise, you're not. You got go through procurement, you have

Unknown Speaker (20:45): have a you got to

Sterling Douglas (20:46): get everybody rowing in the same direction.

Unknown Speaker (20:48): So you're dealing with a lot of time it's decision maker or it's like, you know, an email or a conversation away from the decision maker. So you're selling somebody who is either making the decision or they're like one level away, right?

Unknown Speaker (20:58): Yeah, yeah.

Unknown Speaker (20:59): So tell us the advantages of Challi and there's the Challi platform. I loved I just love saying that. Shouty platform. It sounds really cool. What is it that now that that I can get?

Unknown Speaker (21:12): So give me the advantages.

Sterling Douglas (21:14): Yeah. I I mean, I think that the the biggest advantage, the simplest one, is just making the website, you know, optimized for GEO.

Unknown Speaker (21:21): This is basically how Woah. Woah. Don't just throw GEO out there and not mention that. Okay. Because I grew up and Jimmy grew up, it was SEO.

Unknown Speaker (21:29): Right, Jimmy?

Unknown Speaker (21:29): That's right.

Unknown Speaker (21:29): Yes.

Unknown Speaker (21:30): Right? Yes. Engine optimization. Yes. Now, SEO is I'm not gonna say meaningless, it's just changed.

Unknown Speaker (21:37): It's GEO. It's popped Can you share what GEO stands for?

Sterling Douglas (21:40): Yeah. Generative engine optimization. So very similar

Unknown Speaker (21:43): Did write that down?

Sterling Douglas (21:44): Got it. Very similar to to SEO. SEO is more for kind of like the the traditional Google search, whereas geo is gonna be more focused on like if you're searching for something on chat GBT or within Claude or even some of the Gemini

Unknown Speaker (21:56): Like Gemini and CoalPilot means all geo net.

Sterling Douglas (21:59): Yeah. So they're so they're kind of the, you know, these AI agents and the LLMs look for slightly different things. You know, they look for these things called citations and it's a little bit different. So your site needs to be both. Right?

Sterling Douglas (22:08): SEO is not done. SEO is No, not dead. It's still like that's still king. That's still how your websites get found. But the fastest growing one is geo.

Sterling Douglas (22:17): Right? Like if you look at the restaurant website traffic in 2024, point 3% of all restaurant website traffic was referred to by AI, almost exclusively ChatGPT.

Unknown Speaker (22:26): Oh, what is it now? 2025,

Sterling Douglas (22:28): it was 2.5%. So it went from point three

Unknown Speaker (22:31): to 2.5% day on April, whatever date

Sterling Douglas (22:34): it is. In 2026, I think it's gonna get close to 10% by the end of the year. It's the fastest growing. I think it's going to be the second most common way that diners discover restaurants by the end of this year. It is growing that fast.

Unknown Speaker (22:48): Now will Shally help with my GEO? That's exactly what we we do. Oh. Yeah. So you're saying that to be in the game of GEO, which is where the puck is going Yep.

Unknown Speaker (22:59): I gotta have Chowly.

Sterling Douglas (23:00): Yeah. You got your site has to be ready for GEO. And the thing about GEO is that

Unknown Speaker (23:04): That is the website.

Sterling Douglas (23:05): The restaurant, the brand's website. Marketing website. Like, that is it's like, our view is that your marketing website's sole purpose is to drive traffic and convert orders or convert reservations if you're full service.

Unknown Speaker (23:14): So if I don't have GEO when I search for anything, I'm just gonna get lost.

Sterling Douglas (23:19): I think that right now you probably wouldn't notice the biggest difference but every day, every month that goes by is that gets is that increases. It's learning. Yeah. As that increases, you'll start to feel it more and more. But we have restaurants where like here's the thing I love about Google.

Sterling Douglas (23:34): When you site type in a question, the AI search results is the first thing you show. It's before ads. Yes. And so we've had sites and customers where we come in, we change their website, we cut it over and within days you ask for, you know, where are the best tacos in, you know, Bedford, Massachusetts or wherever, and you'll actually see that site in that answer.

Unknown Speaker (23:54): In that answer.

Sterling Douglas (23:54): Because in that particular area, there's just nobody with any type of, you know, GEO setup on their site.

Jimmy Frischling (23:59): I wanna I wanna dive into that a little further, please. AI is clearly a massive, massive topic right now, not just in our industry.

Sterling Douglas (24:08): Deserves almost a whole podcast.

Jimmy Frischling (24:10): Almost deserves a whole podcast. They should do that. And look. Some restaurants, and we've been in this industry a long time, we know they're still, believe it or not, still using fax machines. Some they're ordering.

Jimmy Frischling (24:21): Yeah. Tell us, you've you've commented on the growth of GEO.

Unknown Speaker (24:27): Jimmy, do you know what that is? I do know what

Jimmy Frischling (24:30): that is. It's like Hal. It's like Hal 2,000. But tell us where are operators on the adoption curve today? You talked about how fast Yeah.

Jimmy Frischling (24:39): AI is moving. Where are operators in terms of their adoption?

Sterling Douglas (24:44): I think this is the fastest these operators, these restaurants have ever adopted technology. And I'm specifically talking about the independent operators. Right? Like, we like, there's a single location. Right?

Sterling Douglas (24:54): This is a single shingle, you know, family owned. I was talking to him yesterday.

Unknown Speaker (24:58): Say that 10 times fast.

Sterling Douglas (25:00): Single shingle. Yeah. Right. They they they literally they they asked us for a webhook URL to send data to them. And that's like it's a very strange request to get from, you know, an independent operator, like, you know, the enterprise groups ask for that all the time.

Sterling Douglas (25:14): And, but he had built his own custom reporting dashboard and he wanted to get some of our data into that so that he could, you know, monitor it and and do all that. So he didn't even really know what a webhook was because he asked him a couple questions but we figured it out. Now he has the data and now he's got his custom reporting. That's a single location unit. We had a three location unit who was feeding their food distributor contracts into, I think it was ChatGPT and found out they had all these rebates and all these, you know, free software things that they had never knew they had access to.

Sterling Douglas (25:43): And so you see these smaller groups are actually adopting it really fast. The enterprises are too. Shake Shack, Project Catalyst. Right?

Unknown Speaker (25:51): Right. They they just launched that.

Sterling Douglas (25:52): Right? But I mean, that's a full tech stack rebuild. That's new point of sale. That's gonna take time for them to really start enabling those AI use cases. Once it turns, you know, it's an ocean liner.

Sterling Douglas (26:03): But the s the SMB groups, these independent operators, they're moving fast, and that is their advantage.

Unknown Speaker (26:08): It's really unbelievable. So do you think it's because the operators are just like they're younger now, they're growing up in this technology, of the AI, they see it happening. So they're in their, let's say, late 20s, early 30s. These guys are franchise operators and they're like, this is just in their DNA, or is it the older operator that's like the kids are their kids are showing them, Hey, dad, you know, you gotta see this. You know, you're getting ripped off, man.

Unknown Speaker (26:35): You gotta feed it into Claude or Chad. Like, how are these operators even knowing this kind of stuff? Because like you said, operators are always an incredibly slow to adopt technology. We're always in the kitchen, in the restaurant, touching tables. We're thinking about everything.

Unknown Speaker (26:49): The last thing we're thinking about is a new point of sale system. It was just the last thing we're thinking about. Right? And now you're telling me that operators are, like, feeding information contracts into into, like, these LLMMs? LLMs.

Unknown Speaker (27:03): Yeah. LLMs. Right? And getting information they never knew. So are the distributors getting mad?

Sterling Douglas (27:09): I can't I mean, like, I'm not I don't get mad when our when our restaurants are using AI to do stuff. I usually, like, reach out and, like, show me what you're tell me what you're doing so I can help you build. Like, I I love learning this. How can I position Challi to be able to get you what you need? Because, you know, I just believe that seeing what they're gonna build with it is the most interesting.

Unknown Speaker (27:27): So if I have the Challi platform Mhmm. I could do is there a AI kind of element to where I could ask questions to it and then the Challi platform because it's aggregating 17,000 restaurants and all of their questions are now being aggregated to get your platform smarter?

Sterling Douglas (27:46): Yeah. To an extent, we don't necessarily use all of the, like, chats or questions or sessions that are coming in, but we we've already kind of through our data know the established patterns. Right? We know that, you know, if you're in Manhattan, like that's a very unique playbook on the digital marketing side, that's not gonna work for someone who's been in Billings, Montana. Someone who's in Billings, Montana is gonna have a very different playbook.

Sterling Douglas (28:06): So whether it's someone who has a big email list will have one. Someone who already has a lot of regulars is gonna have a different loyalty program. And so it's more about establishing the patterns and building the principles that help basically fuel these agents to give the customers the right answers and to do the right automations to help get them more orders.

Unknown Speaker (28:24): Can I use chat? Can I use Challi platform, like, for myself? Not if I don't have a restaurant just to use it because it's cool?

Sterling Douglas (28:31): No. But you can, you know, talk to me on on our podcast, and

Unknown Speaker (28:34): we can Oh, hang Hang on. Alright. Listen. Jimbo. Yes.

Unknown Speaker (28:38): We got a lot more to get to.

Unknown Speaker (28:39): Yes.

Unknown Speaker (28:39): We gotta take a quick break because we got a lot more action here. We got Hot or Not. We got the quick fire. You're not gonna want to miss it. And then we got a special segment that Jimmy just created today for Sterling that he doesn't even know about yet.

Unknown Speaker (28:52): That's and we're using AI right now. While you're sitting here AI, the Challi platform is creating a segment for Jimmy. That's how smart it is. Don't go away. Be right back with Sterling Douglas from Challi.

Unknown Speaker (29:09): Stay with us. We are back and we are back with a little hot or not. The AI edition, Jimmy. This is the hottest segment of all podcasts in the entire world. Jimmy was just ranked by, Podcast, Times as the number one most excited, segment ever.

Unknown Speaker (29:30): I love that magazine. News and Podcast Times.

Unknown Speaker (29:32): I love it.

Unknown Speaker (29:33): Yeah. Okay. Because it's a new magazine that just came out. Everyone's loving it. Joe Rogan, eat your heart out.

Unknown Speaker (29:37): Yeah. Yeah. Alright. You ready? Sterling, you've been on 17 times, so I think you know how to play this.

Unknown Speaker (29:41): So, sorry. Don't think too hard. Here we go. Alright. Hot or not.

Unknown Speaker (29:43): Chat GPT. Is that hot? Not. Woah. Jimmy.

Unknown Speaker (29:48): Wow. Jimmy almost fell off.

Unknown Speaker (29:49): I'm sick. Big authority. Big. Clawed.

Sterling Douglas (29:51): Yeah. Clawed hot. Super hot.

Unknown Speaker (29:53): Woah. The hottest.

Unknown Speaker (29:53): Jimmy. Jimmy? Are you listening to this?

Unknown Speaker (29:55): I'm

Unknown Speaker (29:55): listening. What what what am I hard at a hard at a at smelling with a hard with

Unknown Speaker (30:00): a hard of listening

Unknown Speaker (30:01): ai menu generators that hot or not ai menu generator

Unknown Speaker (30:06): no not not ai menu

Unknown Speaker (30:08): hiring tools yes Yes. AI generated photos.

Sterling Douglas (30:14): Not generated photos. Edited photos. Enhanced photos. Photos. Yeah.

Sterling Douglas (30:19): Enhanced.

Unknown Speaker (30:20): Jimmy? Jimmy, we we got I mean, you got I mean, you heard that. What do you wanna say? What do you wanna

Unknown Speaker (30:24): And then there was a lot of conviction there Yeah. In his hot or not, and then he kinda changed the game to all of a sudden, yes. I didn't know where I don't I don't know where that's I

Sterling Douglas (30:33): was not doing you know, for a guy who's probably played this game 10 times

Unknown Speaker (30:36): with you

Unknown Speaker (30:36): guys, I did not follow the rule as well.

Unknown Speaker (30:37): Yeah. No.

Jimmy Frischling (30:38): Maybe maybe I'll ask because I think chat was the OG. Yeah. And often we talk about the second mover and, so maybe you could comment a little bit because you gave chat GPT a, knot a with some conviction, and you gave Claude a hot.

Unknown Speaker (30:57): No. Jimmy, it was super hot.

Jimmy Frischling (31:00): Super sorry. Scolding hot. Scolding hot. Maybe for our listeners, you can comment a little bit just about that.

Sterling Douglas (31:07): What What happened? I I think What happened? ChatGPT, to me, is it they if they haven't already won, they will win the consumer part of AI. I think that Anthropic and Claude will win the business side. Interesting.

Sterling Douglas (31:21): I think that the the models, the tools that they they build above it, I think Claude code is is the the single greatest piece of software that's ever been built in my lifetime. Like that that is what I'm talking about. So, but it's super common. A lot of people I've seen this a ton start with ChatGPT. It's much more approachable.

Sterling Douglas (31:37): Everybody uses it. But then as they wanna start doing more, might hit a ceiling and then they'll move to, you know, clawed desktop, you know, or clawed dot a I and then they'll if they keep going on kind of their evolution, they'll get into clawed code. My goal at Challi is that every single person on our team will start every task with Claude code. And Claude code will either do the task or help them do the task. And I even want to expand that to our board.

Sterling Douglas (32:02): Is one of my goals that I want every single one of our board members to commit code to the Challi platform through Claude code and that is something that we want to try to work towards. Can I I want to

Jimmy Frischling (32:13): add something here because I I just because you want to? Well as you were describing Claude and you talked earlier about Challi, I'm gonna say something you tell me this is a bridge or a leap too far. I think my observation is Claude is democratizing specifically engineers, computer programmers. There's an element of the democratizing the programming skills to allow those who have not necessarily been trained extensively in development to now feel that they could approach it. Yes.

Jimmy Frischling (32:44): The democratization of.

Unknown Speaker (32:45): Yeah.

Jimmy Frischling (32:46): And when you talked earlier about and Shats, you commented about how Challi helps the independent operators see I left off the independent operators bringing them a suite and a platform of services, I think that that used to be exclusive to the largest enterprises. You mentioned McDonald's. I see the democratization of the tech stack for the benefit of the independents. Is that a parallel that that that you could say has some merit to it, or is did did did I take a leap and you're like, no. Go back in

Unknown Speaker (33:14): your process.

Unknown Speaker (33:14): Can I just add one thing before you get I'd like to democratize democratization, Jimmy? What do think about democratizing See,

Unknown Speaker (33:20): think I made I think I made a thoughtful point, and then you just You used

Unknown Speaker (33:23): democratization, like, nine times in that question.

Unknown Speaker (33:25): He was trying to show off that he knows how to pronounce it.

Unknown Speaker (33:27): It was, like, unbelievable.

Unknown Speaker (33:28): Had a look. I I had a you what I just did? I claudered it.

Unknown Speaker (33:30): There you go. I had

Unknown Speaker (33:31): a claudered democratization. Is is my spelling it?

Unknown Speaker (33:34): I I Is there merit to what I just said?

Sterling Douglas (33:36): Yeah. I think a 100%. I think that, I don't think it's a commoditization. I think that it's a shift in

Unknown Speaker (33:43): Did you

Unknown Speaker (33:43): just say commoditization?

Unknown Speaker (33:44): Yeah. I'm trying to keep

Unknown Speaker (33:45): up with guy. I'm trying

Unknown Speaker (33:47): to keep Jesus. I I think So

Unknown Speaker (33:49): I gotta go look up some words now.

Sterling Douglas (33:51): I think what it does is it helps the SMEs, subject matter experts. I think that as if you are a subject matter

Unknown Speaker (33:57): Hey, Jimmy, you never called me a SME. You said subject matter, I'm a SMEEZE?

Unknown Speaker (34:01): Yeah. I I I think that I think that

Sterling Douglas (34:04): it empowers and enables them. So like our graphic designer used to only do the graphic design. Right? She would she would do the design so she wouldn't be able to understand how to how it fits into the code, she wouldn't be able to understand how the deployments work, she wouldn't understand why it took so long for things to go back and forth, and now she can literally make a change in Claude code and have it go through the entire life cycle. So now that graphic designer who is the subject matter expert for the site to make sure that everything is looking nice, to make sure that's following good UX practices, now is empowered to do the entire cycle for that website and she can own so much more.

Sterling Douglas (34:40): So I think that it really empowers the subject matter expert and I think it's the same thing for restaurateurs. If you give them the power to quickly get at their data instead of them having to go through two managers and this request and try to combine things from these three dashboards, all of a sudden, they can actually make those decisions because they know their best business better than anybody else. And so I think there's gonna be a big shift of power and that the ones who are truly subject matter experts are not going to be held back by a lot of these stage gates that may have previously held them back.

Unknown Speaker (35:08): If we do this right, Chase

Unknown Speaker (35:09): I lost him on you.

Jimmy Frischling (35:10): This right. If we I'm just I'm not kidding. If we do this right, that that was the money shot of this episode.

Unknown Speaker (35:16): It was.

Jimmy Frischling (35:16): Right there. Right there. That was that was what operators need to take away from this podcast was what it's early to share.

Unknown Speaker (35:22): I'm still on the democratization of the Commoditization. Commoditization. By the way, Claude said SMB and SME are the same thing. It says small, medium medium sized enterprise or small, medium sized business or also subject matter expert or server message block.

Unknown Speaker (35:45): That last bit that last and that that last bit will not make

Unknown Speaker (35:49): that was brought to my claw. Yes.

Unknown Speaker (35:51): That that will not be one of you.

Unknown Speaker (35:52): Alright. Let's jump into a little, a little quick fire. Okay, Sterling. After 17 times in the episode, I think you know how we play the quick fire. Yep.

Unknown Speaker (36:00): And this is a fast moving, very fast moving. We don't have a lot of times, but to get to it really quick, Five lightning round questions. Jimmy, don't hold this up. Let's go. Let's do it fast.

Unknown Speaker (36:09): Okay? Last yesterday, Jimmy, you held it up.

Unknown Speaker (36:12): You really did. Apologize.

Unknown Speaker (36:13): That's okay. Alright. What is your favorite show to binge watch right now? What is Sterling Douglas binge watching? I have a three year old.

Unknown Speaker (36:23): I don't have a chance to watch TV at all. By the way,

Unknown Speaker (36:26): am I holding up?

Unknown Speaker (36:26): Oh, here goes Jimmy.

Unknown Speaker (36:28): Jimmy's like,

Unknown Speaker (36:28): I have a nine year old.

Sterling Douglas (36:29): I thought this was I thought this was rapid fire. Only show I think I've watched in like the last year and a half was that four episode Dinosaurs on Netflix, where they used AI generated dinosaurs, but then had it like Planet Earth style. I watched it with my nephew, who loves dinosaurs

Unknown Speaker (36:48): and is and is six years old. That's God. That's the last show. You and Jimmy are so behind. Punty.

Sterling Douglas (36:54): Is Yellowstone still? I'm I'm halfway through it.

Unknown Speaker (36:57): No. I mean, look. I mean, Yellowstone would be

Unknown Speaker (37:00): a hell of

Unknown Speaker (37:00): a lot better than a dinosaur thing on Netflix. You say I'm watching.

Jimmy Frischling (37:03): I believe I believe it's pronounced the Flintstones. Yeah. Flintstones. I don't believe I

Unknown Speaker (37:08): think I would

Unknown Speaker (37:09): rather him said the Flintstones. I love bluey.

Unknown Speaker (37:11): I'm watching a lot

Jimmy Frischling (37:12): of bluey. Look at that. I told you. I told you bluey.

Unknown Speaker (37:15): Still watching bluey. His daughter's nine. Is that?

Unknown Speaker (37:18): Yeah, that's okay.

Unknown Speaker (37:19): It is.

Unknown Speaker (37:19): Yeah,

Unknown Speaker (37:20): he should still be watching Bluey.

Unknown Speaker (37:21): He's on the He's on the tail end.

Unknown Speaker (37:24): I have somebody coming in on the on the who's talking. Hey everybody. I gotta tell you we're going to talk about built build hospitality. Millions of people use BUILT every day. That's right.

Unknown Speaker (37:34): Every day to earn rewards on housing and in their neighborhood. But now now it extends to your restaurant. That's where BUILT Hospitality comes in. BUILT Hospitality shapes how guests are recognized and taken care of. Built's restaurant facing platform is designed specifically for dining operators to drive loyalty with their guests.

Unknown Speaker (37:54): It combines reservations, guest preferences, VIP management, and payments all into one do the to that. When a guest walks in, We're your team already knows what they like without digging through notes. Built Hospitality works across the entire guest journey. That's right. The entire guest journey from delivering a complimentary course at the right moment, just the right moment, sending a personalized offer that brings them coming back again and again and again.

Unknown Speaker (38:38): That's right. That's what built hospitality is doing. It is allowing you to communicate with your guests and keep them coming back over and over. Make every guest feel like a regular every time, not just their first time, every time. They're a regular.

Unknown Speaker (38:52): Built Hospitality is available now for restaurant groups everywhere. Learn more at builtdining.com backslash hangout. That's builtdining.com backslash hangout, and check out what Built hospitality is gonna do for you and your restaurant. Why are you why are you whispering, Julie? Is there like somebody napping in your house?

Jimmy Frischling (39:13): Bluey's excellent. If you want eight minutes of just joy, each thirty minutes has eight three, eight minute segments to eight minute mini shows, eight minutes of joy.

Unknown Speaker (39:23): Yeah. It's Bluey.

Unknown Speaker (39:24): We're we are we're not doing great on rapid fire.

Unknown Speaker (39:26): Yes. Yes.

Unknown Speaker (39:27): Sorry. This is generally how the quick fire usually goes. Yes. Alright. Netflix or Hulu or none of the above?

Unknown Speaker (39:32): Netflix. You're a Netflix guy. Yeah. Okay. And what's your favorite Netflix show?

Unknown Speaker (39:36): Is it going back to dinosaurs?

Unknown Speaker (39:38): Well, Blue

Unknown Speaker (39:39): Like, Seinfeld is on Netflix.

Unknown Speaker (39:40): Blue is on Disney plus. What's on Netflix? Patrol. You know, that one's on that one's on Netflix. I watch that

Unknown Speaker (39:46): a lot. So are there no adult shows that you watch anymore?

Sterling Douglas (39:49): Like I said, the dinosaurs one, that's, like, the closest thing.

Unknown Speaker (39:52): Oh, good lord. What's going on in that house? Jimmy. Right now, Spotify, who are listening to? I told you we should have multiple choice, Julie.

Sterling Douglas (40:05): Yeah. Mean, first on Spotify, what am I listening to? There's, you know, there's this great podcast that I listen to right after I'm done listening to the hospitality hangout called AI for restaurants. But then, you know, after that, man. Yeah.

Sterling Douglas (40:19): You know, Young Gravy? I don't know. I've been listening to him a lot recently.

Unknown Speaker (40:22): Like I think we have to go with, multiple choice for now on, Julie. You know? Am I right? You know?

Unknown Speaker (40:29): I could pull out my phone and tell you, but we'll go with Young Gravy. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (40:32): I get to I I'm loving Olivia Dean right now. Jimmy's like, who the hell is that? Yeah. You look great. You put

Jimmy Frischling (40:41): that on our episode's kibosh. Alright. This episode's kibosh now. We had we're not licensed to play this.

Unknown Speaker (40:47): I am. That's a good song, though.

Unknown Speaker (40:49): This is, like, a good vibes. Right? I'm digging so you never heard of the Libby Dean? I have. This is good.

Unknown Speaker (40:55): No. He doesn't like it. I can tell.

Jimmy Frischling (40:57): I believe it's pronounced Jimmy Dean.

Unknown Speaker (40:59): That's yeah. That's just

Unknown Speaker (41:00): Jimmy Jimmy knows the sauce.

Unknown Speaker (41:02): I believe His man immediately goes so or hotel loyalty? Who where are you? Are you a airline guy, a loyal or a hotel guy, or both?

Sterling Douglas (41:10): Hotel because airline whoever wherever I live, whoever has, a hub there, I have to, like, I have hide it.

Unknown Speaker (41:16): What's your hotel loyalty go to? Is it Hyatt?

Unknown Speaker (41:19): I'm I'm a Hyatt guy right now. Hyatt? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (41:21): I'm a Hyatt guy. What's your favorite? Like, what's your Hyatt go to brand? Like, don't they have a whole bunch of brands now?

Unknown Speaker (41:27): They have a ton. Either, like, Autograph, like I mean, Park Hyatt's are really nice when Oh, Autograph is Marriott. Oh, is Autograph Marriott?

Unknown Speaker (41:34): Unbound is their is their, like, their boutique. Okay.

Sterling Douglas (41:37): Yeah. You know a lot more about it than I do.

Unknown Speaker (41:39): Because you used to travel a lot. I think you travel anymore. No I don't remember when Sterling was always on the road.

Unknown Speaker (41:44): He's a road warrior focused.

Unknown Speaker (41:46): He is

Unknown Speaker (41:46): platform and the kid platform kid.

Unknown Speaker (41:49): It's the Charlie platform and the kid. Challi plat everyone loves the Challi platform and, yes, and the kit. Alright. What's your Uber rating right now, mister Sterling Douglas?

Unknown Speaker (42:00): Oh, alright. Hold on. Let's let's see. Let's see how we're doing here. I've had Uber since it first came I got I'm not sure if they launched

Jimmy Frischling (42:06): in ahead of both of us, Shazzy. I know I'm ahead of you. Think Shazzy's gonna bad.

Unknown Speaker (42:10): But being ahead of me is really hard. Yeah.

Sterling Douglas (42:12): I'm a 494.

Unknown Speaker (42:15): And he is. 494. I'm a 487, and Chad's 494. That's That's

Unknown Speaker (42:19): damn good.

Unknown Speaker (42:20): Damn good.

Unknown Speaker (42:21): Did you show that to the audience?

Unknown Speaker (42:22): No. No. No.

Unknown Speaker (42:23): No. I take some minutes if that's really true.

Sterling Douglas (42:25): No. No. It's definitely exaggerated. It's actually, a 3.8, so I I said, I didn't make up something.

Jimmy Frischling (42:31): Wait. What am I, Jimmy? You're a four seven something. I think I'm high four seven.

Unknown Speaker (42:35): I feel like once you go below, like, a four five, they throw you off the platform.

Unknown Speaker (42:39): You don't get picked up that very fast.

Unknown Speaker (42:40): No. I don't think they come and get you. They're like just don't even

Unknown Speaker (42:43): circle around you? You just see the

Unknown Speaker (42:45): guy and the thing just go anyway. Okay. This is really serious. You're a Chicago guy. Mhmm.

Unknown Speaker (42:51): But now you're, like, in Denver or something. That's right. Right? Yeah. How do think of bagel?

Unknown Speaker (42:55): And did you change since, like, a Chicago did you change your how you think of bagel?

Sterling Douglas (43:00): First of all, the best place to get bagels is New York City. Right. That's, you know, that's no contest. I rarely got bagels in Chicago because once you have them in New York, you don't really that's all you think about, and you just know you're gonna be disappointed. Like, I either I either do, like, the classic kind of, like, loc style one, or I'll do, like, sausage, egg, and cheese.

Unknown Speaker (43:20): Okay. And what kind of bagel? You're doing everything bagel?

Sterling Douglas (43:22): Yeah. Usually, you switch it off between a plain and an everything bagel just depending on, you know, I'm feeling.

Unknown Speaker (43:26): We interviewed we had a whole bagel boss series. Right, Jimmy? Yeah. And and you know what came up? Salt bagel making a big comeback.

Unknown Speaker (43:34): Really? That's what we heard. Okay. And what do you think about that? You like salt bagels?

Sterling Douglas (43:38): I I don't know if I've had one. I'll have to try one.

Unknown Speaker (43:40): I wonder is salt the same thing as, like, the yellow part of the egg. We were told, like, at at one point in when when Jimmy and I were growing up Yeah. That you shouldn't eat the yellow part because it's cholesterol. Jimmy? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (43:51): Weren't we told it's so good for the

Unknown Speaker (43:53): emerge that was the emergence of the of the egg white egg

Unknown Speaker (43:57): white egg white. You gotta eat it. I feel like salt was the same thing. Don't eat salt. White salt.

Unknown Speaker (44:01): You're putting salt on. There's plenty of salt.

Unknown Speaker (44:03): Good for you. It helps you stay high as an electrolyte.

Unknown Speaker (44:07): We were told there was a whole

Unknown Speaker (44:08): bunch of salt. Can't be bad

Unknown Speaker (44:10): for you. Electrolytes It was the

Unknown Speaker (44:11): circle of life. We were told that that salt was good, then salt was bad. Right? Somebody just walked in.

Unknown Speaker (44:18): Salt is good.

Unknown Speaker (44:18): It's a

Unknown Speaker (44:18): circle of

Unknown Speaker (44:19): life. That

Sterling Douglas (44:20): was your, photography and cinematography crew.

Unknown Speaker (44:22): Oh, great. The cinematography crew is here. Alright. Listen. If you were to challenge Jimmy Rai to classic Space Invaders, are you a Space Invaders guy?

Sterling Douglas (44:31): I know what it is.

Unknown Speaker (44:32): But we have Julie, like, he he doesn't even know what it is.

Unknown Speaker (44:35): He's No. Like I said I know what

Unknown Speaker (44:36): it is. I suppose he's never played it before.

Unknown Speaker (44:37): I've I've played it.

Unknown Speaker (44:38): Jimmy's never played a video game.

Unknown Speaker (44:40): I don't think Jimmy Jimmy, did

Unknown Speaker (44:41): you ever play when you were younger, did you I mean, you have three brothers. You're in the middle.

Jimmy Frischling (44:45): Yes. Right? We had Atari. So I And that's what?

Unknown Speaker (44:48): You didn't go to a Nintendo?

Unknown Speaker (44:49): We then we went to Carl didn't get you something like a computer for Hanukkah? No. In college, and I bought a used Intellivision. You're out. Yes.

Unknown Speaker (44:58): And then that was it for me. Intellivision based.

Unknown Speaker (45:00): What was

Unknown Speaker (45:00): I Unbelievable. Did you know what Intellivision is?

Unknown Speaker (45:02): Scott Scott Galloway

Unknown Speaker (45:03): Intellivision. And I

Unknown Speaker (45:04): Intellivision. No. That one Mattel.

Jimmy Frischling (45:05): It was Mattel. Scott Galloway and I are on the same page. We're the kind of the no video game camera. Ever? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (45:11): I'm a no video game.

Unknown Speaker (45:12): So you went from Atari, didn't play video games.

Jimmy Frischling (45:15): After after after Atari, it was all just go plays playing sports and go and hang out with friends. Video games are not part of my Tell me.

Unknown Speaker (45:22): So when do you think that you ended the video game and went into sports? I'm gonna dip somewhere here. For me, it was high school. Wait a minute. So you got Atari.

Unknown Speaker (45:31): You had to be in, like

Jimmy Frischling (45:33): Middle school. Like, night even, like, like, late grammar school.

Unknown Speaker (45:36): And you're like, you know what? I'm not really good at this, but I'm really good at sports.

Jimmy Frischling (45:39): No. The games just weren't that interesting. The joystick. I think brother Teddy once I beat him in at Torrey football and threw the joystick. One of the joysticks broke, and my dad was like, you broke it.

Unknown Speaker (45:49): That's it. That's the end

Unknown Speaker (45:49): of that.

Unknown Speaker (45:50): That's end of the game. Alright, now go find something else to do.

Unknown Speaker (45:53): So could you play space invaders?

Unknown Speaker (45:56): You know

Unknown Speaker (45:56): what that is? Go. Go. Go. And the little Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (45:58): Yeah. I can play it. Yeah. You could.

Unknown Speaker (46:00): Yeah. Yeah. But, I mean Most people don't realize that MC Hammer's, you know, can't touch this, the dance Yeah. All started with space invaders.

Unknown Speaker (46:06): It was?

Unknown Speaker (46:07): Well, I I read that.

Sterling Douglas (46:09): So that's very believable. I wrote it down. I wrote it said it with confidence. I believe it.

Unknown Speaker (46:13): I wrote it down and then I read it, so it's true. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (46:16): I wrote it down. I agree.

Unknown Speaker (46:18): I agree. This is Jimmy Suck. By the way, I just saw MC Hammer's on a commercial. Yes. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (46:25): What is that for? Is that

Unknown Speaker (46:26): a He looks he looks good.

Unknown Speaker (46:27): Guy covers it? What is Allstate? What is it? Looks good.

Unknown Speaker (46:30): Not is. He

Unknown Speaker (46:30): looks good. Someone grabs sandwiches. Can't take this. Right? It's why do the insurance companies make the funniest commercials?

Unknown Speaker (46:37): What who started that?

Sterling Douglas (46:38): Because insurance Either they're gonna talk about insurance?

Unknown Speaker (46:41): Nobody. I but but it's like now every, like it's like it's like GEICO, Allstate, and then it's like, what's the one with the, Limu? Liberty Mutual. Li right? It's like all of them.

Unknown Speaker (46:52): LiMu. Yeah.

Jimmy Frischling (46:54): It's right. And they're all really funny. Don't shame them. We might need one of their Shame it?

Unknown Speaker (46:58): No. I'm not. We want the insurance comp we want the insurance companies. They're the they're the best

Sterling Douglas (47:03): commercial Specifically, the marketing too.

Unknown Speaker (47:06): Yes. They feel like the beer com like, remember when Bud Light was the best commercials? Yes. Remember the what was the dog?

Unknown Speaker (47:11): Spuds McKenzie. Spuds. Spuds. Spuds. McKenzie.

Unknown Speaker (47:14): But but they had the best commercials. How did the insurance companies, the most boring business, you know, took over advertising?

Jimmy Frischling (47:21): They hired the folks from the beer companies. Aflac.

Unknown Speaker (47:24): Right. Right. So so really, is it Aflac that started being funny on commercials? Because that was insurance. Right?

Unknown Speaker (47:30): Aflac?

Unknown Speaker (47:32): Yeah. That's pretty early.

Unknown Speaker (47:34): Yeah. But wouldn't it be if if right now, it's been going on for years. Wouldn't you be like, who's doing those commercials? If you were a bud, wouldn't you get that person back? Am I wrong?

Jimmy Frischling (47:43): Bring back the guy that created what's up. Right. Right. That was Budweiser. Wasn't it?

Unknown Speaker (47:47): Budweiser.

Sterling Douglas (47:47): What the? What the? Right? There's like nothing more nineties than referencing that That

Unknown Speaker (47:53): was a great commercial.

Unknown Speaker (47:54): Yeah. I gotta be honest here. Alright. Wait a minute. Is it so the Space Invaders was really just a terrible, terrible question.

Sterling Douglas (47:59): I I think I invited to choose which one I'd be. I always and I think if you

Unknown Speaker (48:03): go back at at

Sterling Douglas (48:04): at the 17 episodes, I always

Unknown Speaker (48:05): So let me start that again. Okay? If you were to let's say here's how we always did. If you were to challenge Jimmy or I Yeah. Like, let's go how we always Yes.

Unknown Speaker (48:14): I forgot how

Jimmy Frischling (48:15): we always do it. To a game of Space Invaders.

Unknown Speaker (48:17): No. No. I I know. I I I know what you're trying to do. You know what you're trying to If

Unknown Speaker (48:21): you were

Unknown Speaker (48:21): to challenge Shotzi.

Unknown Speaker (48:22): That's he wouldn't even wait for the question.

Unknown Speaker (48:24): He would if you were to challenge it, Shotzi,

Unknown Speaker (48:27): like, get in there. Like, that's

Unknown Speaker (48:28): Space But if Invaders, I actually will change my answer, and I think I've got a better shot at beating Jimmy. I agree. You seem like you'd be really good at Space Invaders, and I'm not particularly good at it.

Unknown Speaker (48:36): You know, when I was younger, I would, but now I have a panic attack, and I have to, like, like, take.

Unknown Speaker (48:39): You think I'm just moving too fast?

Jimmy Frischling (48:41): I need, like, my Xanax. It's like, oh my god. I need Xanax. Yeah. Would definitely chance I'd have to beat Chatzi is his he's he'd lose interest.

Sterling Douglas (48:50): Yeah. His interest? Very quickly. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker (48:52): Yeah. I definitely yes. I would definitely yeah. You know, my attention span is not what he

Unknown Speaker (48:56): used to be, Jimmy. Yes. It is. And I don't know when it used

Unknown Speaker (48:58): to be whatever it was supposed to be. I don't recall it ever being very good.

Jimmy Frischling (49:02): Alright. We gotta get Sterling has got AI pod AI for restaurant podcast to produce. He's got 17,000 plus restaurants, independent operators to to help. So we're gonna get him back to work. First, I wanna thank him, so much for joining us, not just on the podcast, not just for your, seventeenth or now eighteenth appearance.

Jimmy Frischling (49:19): I guess this is number 18, but for coming to the studio. Yeah. In person. And doing this in person, that is a treat. We appreciate you.

Jimmy Frischling (49:26): By the way, my daughter actually thinks Sterling is Thor. And I have to say for

Sterling Douglas (49:32): all Couldn't go the whole episode without mentioning that.

Jimmy Frischling (49:34): I have to mention that because I have to say for all the things my daughter said about friends of mine, I don't think there's been a better compliment, than than Sterling being like, she met Sterling, and she was like, that's Thor. So there you go.

Sterling Douglas (49:44): By the way, my locker is low on whiskey.

Unknown Speaker (49:46): Low on whiskey. We we we got that here.

Unknown Speaker (49:48): Do you check baggage, or do you carry on?

Unknown Speaker (49:51): I think that's too strong because I'm I'm Because if you check Oh

Unknown Speaker (49:54): oh, if you wanted to bring on.

Unknown Speaker (49:55): I got a great here. Yeah. I got a great bottle. Have to check.

Unknown Speaker (49:59): If you

Unknown Speaker (49:59): I have to check for a great bottle.

Unknown Speaker (50:01): Are they ever getting I I heard in England they got rid of the the liquid rules. That's something they're gonna get rid of? I mean, is that liquid thing gonna be, like, forever? Like, you can't bring? You know what?

Unknown Speaker (50:09): After the episode, we'll put that into check.

Unknown Speaker (50:10): So they will still checking.

Unknown Speaker (50:12): I feel like with I feel like God. Well, I thought that was a generic consumer question.

Unknown Speaker (50:15): Oh, okay. That's more consumer question.

Unknown Speaker (50:17): Yes. Have you when was the last time you you you traveled and they took something, you know, when you went through and they said, hey. This deodorant's, like, you know, over, what is it, three and a half ounces? I feel like they don't look anymore. I think they're looking.

Unknown Speaker (50:27): They're still looking? I think they're still looking.

Unknown Speaker (50:29): But I know for a fact that my deodorant we and talked about it yesterday, my deodorant, I look for I I just bought a thing of that Native deodorant, and it it was over four ounces.

Jimmy Frischling (50:39): I guess they they were already filled on deodorant, didn't need yours, they let you slide.

Unknown Speaker (50:42): Is it so you believe that

Unknown Speaker (50:44): they they have an inventory that they're gonna take it all.

Unknown Speaker (50:46): What do we need here? We need shampoo.

Unknown Speaker (50:48): We need soap.

Jimmy Frischling (50:49): We need body lotion. I need some moisturizer. Still taking it all? I think they're still taking oh, you know what? I don't know.

Jimmy Frischling (50:53): But I'm gonna wrap up the show. If anyone wants to get in touch with Sterling directly

Unknown Speaker (50:57): You're so busy?

Jimmy Frischling (50:58): No. Not I'm I'm here with you guys. Paul will get Sterling back to work. Busy. Anyone wants to get in touch with Sterling directly, you can email the podcast team at podcast@brandednyc.com.

Jimmy Frischling (51:08): And, Chad sorry. Sterling, how do they find AI for restaurants? Restaurants? What's the URL of yourrestaurants.ai

Sterling Douglas (51:14): and then you can learn more about challie@challie.com.

Jimmy Frischling (51:16): Boom boom. Close this out, my friend.

Unknown Speaker (51:19): I it. I love it. Alright listen, if you want to see One of the best looking founders CEOs in technology, not Jimmy, not in America in the entire week. Probably the hair on this guy is stunning.

Jimmy Frischling (51:33): You've seen all sorts of you chat of Sterling's hair.

Unknown Speaker (51:36): Go to YouTube at hospitality hangout and check out Sterling's hair and and comment if you think it looks perfect. And if you haven't subscribed but you listen, subscribe to the podcast. And I don't know how you do that, but somebody does. Anyway, cheers, everybody. Cheers, everyone.

Unknown Speaker (51:51): You.