EP 34: Kevin Garry

Transcript

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Welcome to Hospitality On The Rise, the podcast about the people shaping the hospitality industry and their journeys. I'm your host, Alice Cheng, founder and CEO of Culinary Agents, hospitality's go-to hiring platform. And I'm here to give you your dose of virtual mentorship.

Here, we'll be sharing the stories, lessons learned, and advice from hospitality leaders who've carved out their own path to success. After all, this industry is where many get their start and go on to do incredible things.

Whether you're a pro, starting out, or just love the hustle, this podcast highlights what makes hospitality extraordinary, the people.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

I'm so excited to have Kevin Garry here with us today. Kevin is the Managing Partner and Owner of L’Artusi, b’artusi, Via Porta, and L’Artusi Supper Club here in New York City. Some of my favorite long time places to sit quietly and have a pasta tasting to myself. Kevin, welcome.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY 

I love hearing that. Thank you. Thank you for having me. And you've been such a huge help with Culinary Agents over the years for us and I know everyone else in the industry, so I'm thrilled to be chatting with you. Thank you for having me.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Yeah, and thank you for saying that. I think, you know, I love what I do, and I love my team, and I love the industry. So this can just be one giant love fest. But let's focus on how you got here. So how did it all begin?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

So my uncle–upstate New York, where I grew up outside of Albany–he is a chef and owned two restaurants. I think I was maybe 14 years old, and I got a call one day that he needed someone to wash dishes. So I went in and I started washing dishes as a 14 year old and just liked earning my own money, not having to ask my folks for 20 bucks to go see a movie. And I just kind of fell in love with the fun of it, the culture, the characters. And I just kind of really enjoyed working. I was the youngest person in that kitchen by far. I think I technically was probably too young to be working around knives and things. But I just kind of picked it up. 

Over high school and summers back from college and things, working for my uncle, I worked my way up to being a line cook, was a waiter, did a lot of catering things. So it got to the point where he would call me in the morning and I would be either a cook or a front of house server at either of his restaurants. Every day was completely different based off what he needed. And I just felt valued. I felt like I was an important part of his restaurant world as a young kid. And I just kind of loved that empowerment. It was fun and it taught me a ton.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

That was the, back then, that was the on-demand, right? Like who called out? Just call Kevin. Kevin will come in and fill it in.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, yeah. The running joke was he always would say to someone, “Can you work?” And I was like, God, I feel like I say that now all the time too.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Well, so at the time, because this industry is one of the largest employer, if not the largest employer, first employer for young people. At the time were you like, “This is just so much fun, this is great,” but it's not something that you saw yourself doing in the future, or were you already hooked?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

I mean, I was hooked but didn't know it. I definitely had the desire to go to college and get my degree and kind of start my quote unquote “real job.” And I followed that path. I went to Boston College, and I was a marketing major and graduated. And my plan was to get a job, a quote unquote “normal job,” and put a suit on and have nine-to-five hours. And I graduated about four months before September 11th. There were no jobs to be had for someone that just graduated college. 

And as my father told me, if you know how to be a waiter or a bartender, you can get employment in any country and any economic situation in the world. And I fell back to being a waiter right after college when I was living in Boston. And it was great, did that for a couple of years. I was making money, saw a different restaurant and kind of a restaurant in a bigger city and how those are run. It was a great time of my life, 21, 22, making plenty of money in cash and spending most of it out with friends afterwards. Didn't save much of it.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, well, I mean great advice and very true about the universal language of getting a job.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Hospitality. Yeah. Yeah.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, like a side hustle is like hospitality, right? And you can may not speak the actual language, but, you know, the way to make certain drinks are the same in any country you go to.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Exactly, exactly.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

They may muddle the ingredients a little differently, but all the common denominator. Great. So you're working in the industry. At what point were you like… did you ever say, “Well, I want to have my own thing one day” or did you just see yourself enjoying it more and more and trying to figure out how you could stay in the industry in different ways?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

So that's a great question. I don't know if there was like one moment where I kind of realized that, but there was one fantastic moment. I eventually moved to New York City after I had graduated for a couple of years, moved to New York. Believe it or not, I'm from Albany, two and a half hours away, and I had literally never set foot in New York City. So a buddy of mine moved down to New York, we found an apartment. I spent the summer trying to get my “real job” and couldn't find anything. I was like, “My father gave me good advice. Let me get a waiter job.” 

And I didn't know anything about New York City dining. And I did a little research. This is early internet, so Google existed. And the name that kept popping up was Danny Meyer, who I had not heard of. And I applied to all his restaurants and get hired at Gramercy Tavern as a waiter. And I still remember walking into that restaurant for the very first time for an interview. And within five seconds, I felt something different. It was the first place, first restaurant I ever walked into where I was like, “Oh, everyone's here because this is their career. They're not here because it's their side hustle or their job they're doing before they get their real life job.” And it was so apparent from the feeling of that restaurant and the folks that interviewed me, who I still am friends with today or doing great things in this industry.

That was kind of my moment where I was like, “Oh wow, maybe this can be a career for me that is not ‘Oh you just work in restaurants.’” You know? I was working at the best restaurant in the city and has had a wonderful run. And that was the eye-opening moment where I said to myself,
“Okay, like”– You know, I always think of that Venn diagram of life, happiness is something you're good at with something you can make money at with something you like. And, you know, the money might not have been there at that time, but I liked it, and I was realizing that I was pretty good at it. And that was the first moment where I was like, “Okay, this is what I'm gonna pursue for my career.”

HOST: ALICE CHENG

I love that. And I'm finding, obviously, a common denominator with leaders and also my personal network, of course, because we've also spoken with Chef Mike Anthony on the pod…

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

That’s awesome.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

…as well as most recently I was chatting with Liz Murray and she too, that was her moment, walking into the dining room for Gramercy. And I have done that walk from the service entrance into the dining room, and there is something magical about there. I think I'm going to have to go get a drink at the bar tonight. 

So you're there. That's such an important thing also that I'll emphasize real quick is the employer that you choose, right? Doing a little bit of research, even back then when you didn't have that many resources, now there's no excuse. You can find information. You can get a feel. And a lot of job seekers do their due diligence, if you will. But working with and for the right employer can sometimes really make or break at least that experience at that time and could change your perspective in many different ways. I’m just highlighting that as people who might be listening that are kind of thinking about where they want to work, what they want to do, what's their next step.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, it's super important. And I think one of the best pieces of advice for anyone trying to get into this industry is try to work for someone that might be similar to your style or what you perceive your style to be and just learn from them. It's one of the most important things I did in my career, was work for Danny and the team there at Gramercy Tavern.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, a bunch of great people. And so you were there for a while and you kind of grew. 

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, about five years.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

You had a couple of different positions. You had a couple of different positions.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, I started out as a waiter and was doing that for probably, I don't know, six, eight months. And I got called down to the office by the general manager at the time, Kevin Mahan, who I have most everything in my career to owe. And I thought I was maybe going to be in trouble. I had no idea what the conversation was going to be about. And they offered me a management position. And I was… My jaw hit the ground because I thought it was a joke, to be honest with you. I didn't know that they had thought I was doing better than the other waiters. And I was shocked. And it was the moment in my life where I was like, “Oh my God, I'm going to be helping run one of the best restaurants in the world.” And Kevin took a chance on me. I literally thought there was probably 10 other people that were more qualified than I was. But whatever, you know.

He still has never told me exactly why he picked me. I'll need to ask him again. But yeah, that was my moment where I put a suit on and I was running a business. It was, you know, from there, it was just learning, learning, learning. And it was amazing.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

What would you say was your biggest learning curve going from server to management at the time?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY 

The hardest thing was there were, particularly at Granary Tavern, they have, especially at the time, there were people that have worked there forever. And I have a memory of one of the captains there who had been there since day one. He had been working there 20 years by the time I even showed up. What I realized pretty quickly is that I'm not gonna manage people like that. They looked at me and said– my first attempt to manage them, he said to me, “I don't even know your name yet.”

So I said, okay. So I realized that the veterans, my job was to just help them, support them on the floor. The best waiters in the world get weeded every single night. And if I was there kind of helping, supporting–not coaching or managing, but just helping them do their job well, that's how I got their respect. And then over time, as there was natural turnover, I realized that there were people that were hired, servers and bartenders that only knew me as Kevin the Manager. So I could be a manager to them and I could manage and direct them. And then the ones that knew me as the new-hired waiter that happened to be promoted to manager, I handled it very differently. I gave them a little bit more ability, a little more space. And again, it was more support and help as opposed to direct and manage. 

And I still give that advice to my managers today that got promoted from within, because being promoted from within and being a coworker, someone that you might be going out for a drink with afterwards, and now all of sudden you're wearing different clothes and have a title, you have to think about that a little bit differently. And the fact that I went through that personally, I think has helped me coach the folks on my team that have been promoted from within. Those first couple months is really hard for any manager that is on that path.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, I think that's similar in any industry. Actually, I remember back in the day when I was at IBM, we had a similar situation. And some people gave that individual a hard time sometimes, but great advice. 

So at what point were you realizing that it was time for another challenge?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

So after I became assistant beverage director working under Juliette Pope, who was for my money, the best beverage professional going, and I had gained experience as a floor manager, I gained experience as a beverage professional. And I just felt that I had gotten my kind of MBA in hospitality working at Gramercy Tavern. I mean, everything that restaurant stood for was about how do we make it better for the guests, better for the employees. And that was the number one goal. And that has proven to stand the test of time because that restaurant is still doing great. And I had thought that I was ready to become a general manager. Kevin, my old mentor-boss, wasn't going anywhere. And I had looked within Union Square Hospitality Group to see if there was any general manager openings within USHG. 

And I kind of came to the conclusion that knowing at the time that I might want to do this on my own at some point, I was really interested in seeing a different way to succeed. And I was concerned that if I stayed within USHG, I wouldn't be getting all that much different kind of… I wouldn't be seeing things through a different lens. It would be the Danny Meyer playbook, which I knew would be successful and I knew would be probably a very comfortable place for me to be. But I wanted to kind of push myself out of my comfort zone and see success through someone else's eyes. ‘Cause I was still trying to gather all the little tidbits I learned from Danny and the Gramercy crew I had, and I was looking for tidbits from a different perspective. 

So Kevin was a wonderful mentor, is a wonderful mentor, and had really helped me kind of look. One of the lessons I learned from him at the time was he wasn't afraid to lose me. He wasn't afraid to go find a job for me that would be great for my career, which by definition of that would make his life harder because he needed to find another manager. And just that selflessness spoke to me, and he helped me find my first GM job. He had recently bought an apartment on 14th Street and the original Dell'anima was right down the street. A little tiny Italian restaurant, fresh pasta in the West Village. 

HOST: ALICE CHENG

The best.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, it's awesome. That chef's counter was like the best place to sit in the city. And he had become a regular there and friendly with the owners and the folks that work there. And they let him know that they were opening a second restaurant called L'Artusi, and they were looking for GMs. So he put me in touch, and I met with the managing partner, August Cardona, who now, fast forward 17 years, is my business partner. We interviewed in a construction site of L'Artusi, and it turned out, at the end of the interview, turns out we were from the same hometown in Albany. He went to a rival high school. We played basketball against each other in the sixth grade, hadn't remembered it.

And I was hired to be the opening GM of a L'Artusi in November of 2008, right before the last economic crash. And I think I was hired three weeks in advance with no one else hired, no managers, no nothing. And was just literally thrown in the deep end without any swimmies. And I had to figure out how to swim. And I absolutely loved it. I just did my Danny Meyer playbook. I was trying to do my best impersonation of Danny and Juliette and Kevin. And just trying to do everything we can to make sure the employees have a wonderful experience, take care of the guests as best we can. The thing I learned the most and the thing I'm most proud of is I hired that whole front of house team. And in that first year–and it was a rough first year. You know, as I said, the economy was not doing so well. We were a brand new restaurant. 

HOST: ALICE CHENG

And this is before Culinary Agents! For the record.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

We were posting on Craigslist next to “Yeah, I'm looking for a couch and a manager.” Yeah, it was crazy. But in that first year, not a single front of house employee left by choice. And that was a moment where I was so proud of that. Certainly we asked some people to not be on the team, it didn't work out, but there was no one that left by choice. And every opening you hear–you probably know the stats better than me–that 30% of your team's gonna fall away in a couple of months, and everyone stayed. So that was kind of the thing that was like, all right, whatever you're doing is working. So it kind of just gave me that confidence that whatever playbook I thought I was following, I should continue to follow it. It was validation for my style of management.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, I love it. I remember the early days and you know, because it was prior to Culinary Agents, a lot of my time actually that I spent at the chef's counter with Chef Whitney and Andrew, and you know, that time as well as all the time they spent at L’Artusi and some of your other establishments. We must have been like ships passing in the wind because I feel like I didn't actually meet you til a couple of years later. But yeah, it was so inspirational.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah. Yeah. We hear from so many people that were, you know, because we've been open over the 17 years in this fall. And so many people–

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Oh my God. Congrats!

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Thank you. So many people that, you know, “Oh, I went on the first date with my wife there!” or “I used to sit at the bar and get a bowl of pasta and a glass of wine.” Like, I just love hearing those stories. It's just the best.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Yeah. And it's still like one of the hardest tables to get. So kudos to you and the team. 

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Thank you.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

It's incredible. So you did that, but then quickly you kind of took over director of operations for a couple of the properties under the group.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY 

Yes, so we were kind of in growth mode at the time. You know, Gabe Thompson and his wife Katherine were our executive chef, pastry chef, partners. Joe Campanale was a partner, kind of our wine guy. And we expanded a little bit. We opened up L’Apicio, which was in East Village. That was one of the best lessons in restaurants I've ever had. You know, L'Artusi was open on a shoestring budget. We didn't know what we were doing. We took over an existing restaurant with everything bad about it and just said, “We don't have any money to make it nicer. Let's just fly with this.” And L’Apicio was a great landlord deal. You know, free rent, money for a build out. We got custom kitchen designers and custom furniture and did everything. 

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Beautiful.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

And it failed miserably. It had a nice couple of year run, but it didn't last. But it was my style of service. It was Joe's wine. It was Gabe's food. And it just didn't work. And it was a great lesson to fail early in my career, and that's the craziness of our industry, right? Like Daniel Boulud had DBGB around the corner, and that went out of business too. So like, you can be really good at what you do, and sometimes restaurants just don't work. And it was early in my career, to have that failure was so valuable because it, I say yes to so few things now about growth and expansion, because I know that you can do all the things that have made it successful in one property and it just won't work someplace else. That's kind of that magic romanticism of our industry that is just really weird.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, and I was so sad when that– I mean, again, I'm not even kidding, I was such a big fan of this, of the group. My friends and I would go, you know, basically hopping around to the different restaurants in the group. And I remember you guys had that beautiful PDR, the private dining room in the middle that had the encapsulation you could see out. I mean, it was beautiful. 

Anyway. But I mean, that's great advice, right? Lessons learned. Sometimes things work out, sometimes they don't, regardless of how much money you have for a build out. 

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, you can't force it.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, yeah. And you know, that that kind of is a little telling because I feel like there was a time before b’artusi was open and Via Porta where there was no kind of a lot of expansion, right? It was focused on L’Artusi for a little bit.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, we had no plans ever to expand. L’Artusi is a beast on its own and needed all of our attention. But I had… my trajectory was a little bit different, because after about five or six years with this group, I actually left and took a different job. So I had a five year gap where I wasn't with the group. I got recruited to go work at Shake Shack. And so I left. And then when I came back, six years later, it was just L’Artusi. And coming back as the managing partner right before the pandemic, I always tell people my joke is I'm the idiot that put his life savings into buying a restaurant group three months before a global pandemic. So I was a little stressed, but it did work out. But yeah, I had remained in touch with all those guys and was rooting for them when I was working at Shake Shack and still went to L’Artusi all the time because I needed that tagliatelle bolognese.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Seriously. And yeah, and I didn't want to jump over that. I saw that you did go take another opportunity for a little bit and in a kind of different, still in hospitality, obviously, Shake Shack, and at a really kind of informative time of the company as well. How was that?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

So getting back to what we talked about earlier, I was starting to… I learned from Danny and the team at Gramercy Tavern, kind of that MBA in hospitality. And when I left to go work for L’Artusi and August, my former boss, current partner, I was really looking to learn the business side of full dining because I got the hospitality at Gramercy Tavern, and I wanted to learn how to run a business, specifically a restaurant.

I really learned that amazingly well in those five or six years at L’Artusi as the GM and eventually the director of ops. And about five or six years in, the fast casual world was starting to kind of be a thing. Chipotle was probably the first one. Shake Shack was starting to grow. And Randy Garutti, who is now the former CEO of Shake Shack, was a buddy of mine from back in the day. He would take me out for breakfast and try to pitch me to come work for this burger place. “It's so exciting, and it's going all these places.” I just didn't want to go flip burgers. I kind of liked my suits and my Barolo and all that. 

But after a couple of breakfast meetings, I kind of perceived that the industry, at that time, was de-emphasizing full service, kind of fine dining, and the fast casual world was beginning to gain some traction. With my goal of always learning our industry through different lenses, different sets of eyes, I said, “Geez, maybe I should give this a shot.” I was comfortable with the fact that I knew the culture was a Danny Meyer culture. I knew a lot of people that worked there. But I was comfortable at L'Artusi. I liked my job. I was pretty good at it. Stuff was going really well. Again, I got a little comfortable, I think. And I think I needed a little kick in the ass for a new challenge. 

I eventually said yes, and I got hired to be an area director for New York City. So I was running almost all the properties in New York City, and it was fascinating, absolutely fascinating to work there. Pre-IPO, post-IPO, I think we had, I don't know, 40 or 50 restaurants when I started. When I left, there was probably 250 or 300 all around the world.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Wow.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

I don't know if I can say that it was a hospitality job because my touch with the guests was just not much. The guests were there for 10 minutes. They were in and out. It wasn't a three-hour tasting menu with wine pairings and a cheese presentation. So it was really, my role was kind of a behind the scenes role. And it was almost like managing an assembly line of food. It wasn't necessarily a restaurant. It was really data driven. It was the first time that I ever worked in a place where the majority of the company wasn't in operations. There was a marketing department, there was a finance department and accounting department, you know, all the support systems that sat in an office and just fed us data as operators to make us better. And I had always worked for mom and pops where everyone's just in operations, right? And you probably don't have time to go digging into a computer. 

And it really informed me in a way that kind of like, I would say the first couple of years of my career was all about creative. Green markets and chefs and mixologists and sommeliers. And then this is the first time that I was interested in, “Oh I can talk to a CFO of a big company or a CEO and get their perspective.” We had a purchaser, which was a foreign concept to me in a single unit restaurant. And I learned so much from her about how to leverage your buying power to get better service and better pricing.

It was the best five or six years of my career in terms of learning the back end of restaurants and how little changes here or there can affect operations to make operations smoother, to make the business more profitable. And it was just an amazing experience. And I think I wouldn't be where I am today if I didn't go through that experience. I highly recommend that everyone in full service at some point works for a fast casual because you will just see things completely differently. 

And in hindsight, I'm glad I started at super fine dining and then went down to fast casual, because all the values of fine dining when applied to fast casual have almost a bigger outsized impact when you do it in a fast casual setting. And I think that was part of success for us there, was that I was able to go from full service to kind of fast casual. And then coming out of it, going from fast casual back to full service, I've now taken a lot from what I learned at Shake Shack and applied it to L’Artusi.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, I love that we talk about the jobs or stepping stones to your career, and whatever you decide, whatever path you decide to take or opportunity, get what you need and what you can out of it and bring it to your next experience or to your next thing. That's another beautiful thing about this industry is that, yes, there's, I’ll say higher paced movement, like people jump around a little bit more, but now people are moving with a little bit more intention, or they're not moving. And I think those are trends that continue to point to ongoing professionalism and development of the businesses and people of this industry.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, I agree 100%.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah. And so now you're back. 

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

I'm back.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Now you're back better than ever. You checked all the boxes of things that you needed to know before you took over. And did you come in, like, ideas ablaze on like growth and expansion?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Yeah, I did. I think I had a list of a hundred things within like a week. And my North Star with all that was none of the changes that we make can be seen or noticed by the guest. There was nothing I wanted to do differently in terms of the type of hospitality, the quality of the food, the physical space. We were fired on all cylinders. The restaurant was doing well. But because I had that perspective of everything I learned at Shake Shack, I came in, I literally had a hundred things. And I applied all those, and it just made the business so much stronger. 

A couple examples. I mentioned the purchaser I worked with at Shake Shack and understanding your own leverage and buying power. I met with all of our vendors and I just said, “Hey, we have a (at the time) 14 year track record of paying our bills on time. We're buying a lot of product. We need better pricing or we're gonna move our business.” They all jumped for us, and we got better service, we got better pricing. We didn't change the quality of any of the ingredients that we bought. What was on the plate and in your glass was the exact same thing. We just applied some basic business practices to getting it for a little bit less money, and we improved our food costs by 4% with all those changes, which is a pretty significant bump.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Huge.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

The other thing that we did, which was one of the luckiest or best things we did was, L’Artusi was never open for lunch. We were open dinner only and brunch on Sundays. So we were only open eight services a week. And I was on the team at Shake Shack that learned about and launched delivery. We met with Zach, the COO, and I went out to San Fran. We met with the Grubhubs and the Postmates and DoorDash and all that, and I kind of learned that world. And I was one of the [people] on the team that helped implement it at Shake Shack. I understood everything about delivery. 

So when I got back to L’Artusi, like I said, we weren't open for lunch, but I walked in the first day, and we still have 25 people clocked in, prepping and working and getting ready for dinner. And you know, in the way I was trained at Shake Shack, it's “labor efficiency, labor efficiency.” And I was like, “Wow, we're generating no revenue right now, but we have 25 people clocked in.” So I said, “Why don't we try lunch delivery? Even if we get five or six orders a day, it's a couple of sales that will help with something.” And like I said, we have a team there. So we set up everything for delivery, got all the photos, went live with it. I think we went live for like two weeks, maybe. 

And then the pandemic hit and we all closed. And what we were able to do is literally just change the hours of operation on the DoorDash app, and we were open for dinner service. And we heard horror stories about other full service restaurants that obviously also pivoted delivery, but they were trying to set up their systems from scratch. They didn't understand the throttles, and like, the delivery guys told us that Carbone did it, and they had like a line around the corner, and, like, the police showed up because there were so many people, because they got so many orders and they didn't know how to turn it off. And we had already figured all that stuff out. 

HOST: ALICE CHENG

So let's keep coming.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Like within two days we were firing all cylinders, and the kitchen–it was so eerie–the kitchen felt busier than the busiest Saturday night we ever had. And there was not a single soul in the restaurant except for us. And we were blasting music and anyone that wanted to work, because the front door is a pretty far walk from the kitchen. So we had this relay system because we didn't want the couriers in the restaurant because it was, like, middle of COVID. 

And it taught us a couple of things. First, brought us as a team together, because that was a really scary time in New York and in our industry. But we understood the power of delivery, and the food to our surprise, was really good at home. We thought that pasta would never travel well, but Chef Joe figured out if he oversauced it a little bit, it travels a little bit better. Couple of our dishes are better on delivery. Like the chicken steams in the box, and steak gets extra juicy. So it was like a pleasant surprise, and coming out of that, delivery is a huge part of our business now. 

We have our own ghost kitchen. b’artusi, as you mentioned, is a bar. But the whole reason that business exists is because we use that kitchen for our L’Artusi delivery because we can't do it out of our flagship. It's too busy and the kitchen too small. So it was just a great learning experience. You know, I said a million times during the pandemic, like we just got to get good at hitting a curve ball. Like stuff's going to happen to us that we can't control and we just, but we still have to just figure it out. And that was obviously a really stressful and terrible time, but from our team, it really got us good at understanding that you have to adjust, and adjusting and changing doesn't mean your restaurant’s any worse, right? It has to evolve.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, I love that. You know, before we get to quick-fire, I'll ask you what's next.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

So we just started thinking about actually expanding a little bit. Yeah, and we're trying to figure out the right way to do it. We feel great about the businesses that we have. We've proven that brands off of the L’Artusi flagship seem to work pretty well. b’artusi and Via Porta are great businesses. It's got a great corner on West 10th and Hudson; that's probably my favorite corner in all the West Village. We also, about a year and a half ago, opened up a L’Artusi Supper Club, which is our second private dining room. We have one at the flagship L’Artusi that fits 14 people, but we get so many requests for larger groups. So we actually took the old I Sodi space and have a business there called L’Artusi Supper Club. 

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Yeah, nice.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY 

So that's essentially a private dining room that fits 30 people, which is one of the bigger private rooms in the city. We can do cocktail parties for 45. So all those things have led to us feeling really good about our brand, right? One of the things I struggle with, and I don't think I'll ever be able to have clear eyes on this, is what is the perception of L'Artusi as a brand to the greater world, right? Because I'm so close to it. I live and breathe it. It's my baby. Like, I know that people love us and we're popular, but I like… You never really know how much, right? But opening up these other businesses and seeing how many people want to be part of it has really gotten us to say, “Geez, we probably should look at opening a couple more of  L'Artusis.” 

So we're in the process of figuring out what that looks like and where it's going to be and how we're going to run them. But like I said, I'm so scared of failure. We've had restaurants that have gone out of business. So I don't want to take a step back, ever. Anything we want to do, we just want to make sure is as close to a short success as it possibly can be.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

I love it. Well, if you're looking for ideas, I hear Midtown East area has a lot of openings, I'm just saying. No, but it certainly sounds like you've equipped yourself and you have the right attitude for survival and being flexible. So I don't think you… I think a healthy level of paranoia and drive is great. But at this point in your career and your track record, I think you can ease up on yourself a little bit. That's the outside. That's my outside looking in and working with you for so many years.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Well, you'll be the first one to know because I'm going to need to get an ad posted.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

Absolutely. I mean, we know like 12 to 18 months before something's opening. Anyway, on that note–which we're very grateful for–quick-fire. All right. What advice would you tell your younger self?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Ooh! Don't worry so much. When you can't control things in life, don't worry about it. It just leads to stress and anxiety. I'm not like a religious person, but I believe in things happen for a reason. Just be a little bit more confident that you're a good person, that things are gonna work out, you're gonna land on your feet. I think I was trying to control things too much in my path as opposed to just letting things happen naturally. And I think early in my career, I was a little too eager to progress when I hadn't really gotten actually the experience that I needed. So staying in those first jobs longer than maybe I thought I needed to was something I would advise young people in the industry.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

What's your advice for someone struggling in the industry?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

This industry is not for everyone. So it's okay. Like if this isn't the lifestyle that you want, if it's–you know, especially as I get older, my everything hurts–being on your feet all day long. And it's okay. Like not every industry is for every person. And I think the quicker you realize that and make a shift, it's all right. Don't force anything. The best jobs I ever had younger in my life were the ones that told me, want to know what? I don't want to do this. That was some valuable lessons from early internships. So it's okay if this industry is not for you. It doesn't mean you're a failure. It just means that you're better suited for something else.

HOST: ALICE CHENG

What's your advice for fellow hospitality leaders?

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

Be present, be available, be calm, be yourself every day. The thing I hate the worst about hospitality leaders is when they have ups and downs of their own personal emotions, because you have to be approachable from an employee and a guest perspective. I worked with a manager one time early in my career who was a wonderful manager when he was in a good mood, and when he was in a bad mood, nobody wanted to approach him. So on the shifts he was in a bad mood, the guests suffered because the staff was afraid to say, “Hey, can you help me with this?” “Hey, I need that,” because he was unapproachable. So that taught me that I have to be the same every day so that people feel like they can approach me so that I can help them. If I'm giving off vibes that I don't want to be bothered, then our guests and our business are going to suffer.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

I love it. On that note, thank you so much, Kevin, for taking time to share your career path and advice. 

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY 

Thank you.

HOST: ALICE CHENg

I look forward to having some delicious pasta at your restaurants.

GUEST: KEVIN GARRY

I really appreciate it and thank you for all your help over the years finding us awesome talent.

HOST: ALICE CHENG 

Thank you.

HOST: ALICE CHENG
Remember, success looks different for everyone in hospitality. No two paths are the same. If you have a leader or a topic you want to hear about, email [email protected].

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