June 25, 2026

The Hot Dog Isn’t Why People Come

The core of a successful service-based business is hospitality.

That’s a duh statement. Or is it?

You probably woke up this morning thinking about what your company should be doing with AI adoption, what same-store sales look like today, whether you increased frequency or average order value, whether that TikTok post got favored by the algorithm… that’s me on most mornings as well. But not today.

I had an amazing experience in Waldorf, Maryland, of all places, at a Southern Maryland Blue Crabs game. You gotta understand the background for me to be able to tell this story.

I’m on my annual two-week "Be Kind Journey" road trip by myself, this year visiting 13 different baseball teams in 15 days. Of course, I’ve reached out to every team in advance to see if they’re interested in creating content together. Every single one of them has responded, and every single one of them is interested. I am five days into the journey, and it’s been amazing.

Responses have had varying degrees of excitement and timing. For the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs, their response was: “Just show up and ask for our owner. We’ll figure out the rest when you get here.”

That is kind of not my vibe.

As a former event planner, business owner, content creator, and father, I’ve learned the power of setting expectations.

But hey, sometimes a firm “yes” and “we got this” is all you need.

I was expecting to shake some hands, eat some food, maybe participate in an in-game promotion. All the standard stuff that I really enjoy and that helps accentuate the fan experience in my content.

What I got was so much more.

I got an intense reminder that the core of a hospitality-based business is loving being in service.

I met Byron Sackett, the chief operating officer and one of the owners of the team. He’s an incredible entrepreneur. He’s been in the business of service his whole career.

I was asked to find him in his office, where he greeted me, walked me around the stadium, and then welcomed me into their VIP club, where he brought out nine of his favorite dishes!

We had an amazing conversation about the value of caring for people.

“You can get a baked potato anywhere, but you’ll pay twice the amount for it at a great restaurant with great service than you would at a grocery store.”

He is right, and I think we’d all agree.

There’s always a lot of talk in our industry about how to get our team to care about our guests the same way we do, and Byron has an amazing way of explaining it.

He says to his team, “The hot dog is perceived value. It is the caring, concern, and service that is the reason people come.”

When you realize it’s you, not the food, you approach things differently.

Man, he is so right.

And this isn’t a new thought for any of us. Maybe it’s just repackaged in a new light, or maybe it’s just a healthy reminder of what makes our industry special.

It’s not what’s on the plate.

It’s the person who made it, the person who brought it to you, and the person who cleans up after you.

So while we all sit down at our desks today and try to figure out how to better analyze our performance marketing, how to increase retention, or how to better optimize our rewards program, I’ll keep one thing in mind:

It’s the human touch and the service that do the heavy lifting.