- 4 months ago
Welcome to Beyond the Billions! Join Forbes deputy editor Giacomo Tognini as he sits down with senior editor Chase Peterson-Withorn to go inside the world of the richest restaurateur in America, Raising Cane’s founder and owner, Todd Graves. Chase shares his story of the day he spent with Graves where he got a firsthand look at the billionaire’s life, wealth, and strategy for achieving massive scale by sticking to the extreme discipline of a simple menu.
Then they dive into the cutthroat fast food industry and reveal the obsessive corporate culture and tight private control shared by the most successful entrepreneurs. Find out the common traits among billionaires from Jersey Mike’s to Panda Express, and learn why valuations for these chains are so huge right now.
00:00 This Week In Billionaires Recap
01:29 Chasing A Billionaire
03:30 How Raising Cane’s Crushes The Competition
05:54 Inside A Raising Cane’s Kitchen
07:07 The $11 Million Picasso and Elvis Presley's Piano
10:46 The Unchanging Menu: Simplicity And Scale
17:34 The Common Thread Between Fast Food Billionaires
To watch the full Rasing Cane’s Documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wu7d4DyzalI&t=63s
To read more about Raising Cane’s: https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2025/09/24/how-the-raising-canes-founder-built-a-22-billion-chicken-finger-empire-thats-snoop-doggs-favorite-fast-food-chain/
To read more about Meta’s deal with Coreweave https://www.forbes.com/sites/kirkogunrinde/2025/09/30/coreweave-strikes-142-billion-deal-with-meta-to-boost-ai-capability/:
To read more about video game juggernaut EA: https://www.forbes.com/sites/martinacastellanos/2025/09/29/videogame-juggernaut-electronic-arts-gets-acquired-for-55-billion/
To read more about : http://forbes.com/sites/giacomotognini/2025/09/29/tanking-covid-19-vaccine-sales-are-crushing-biotech-billionaire-fortunes/
Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1
Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:
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More From Forbes: http://forbes.com
Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.
Then they dive into the cutthroat fast food industry and reveal the obsessive corporate culture and tight private control shared by the most successful entrepreneurs. Find out the common traits among billionaires from Jersey Mike’s to Panda Express, and learn why valuations for these chains are so huge right now.
00:00 This Week In Billionaires Recap
01:29 Chasing A Billionaire
03:30 How Raising Cane’s Crushes The Competition
05:54 Inside A Raising Cane’s Kitchen
07:07 The $11 Million Picasso and Elvis Presley's Piano
10:46 The Unchanging Menu: Simplicity And Scale
17:34 The Common Thread Between Fast Food Billionaires
To watch the full Rasing Cane’s Documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wu7d4DyzalI&t=63s
To read more about Raising Cane’s: https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2025/09/24/how-the-raising-canes-founder-built-a-22-billion-chicken-finger-empire-thats-snoop-doggs-favorite-fast-food-chain/
To read more about Meta’s deal with Coreweave https://www.forbes.com/sites/kirkogunrinde/2025/09/30/coreweave-strikes-142-billion-deal-with-meta-to-boost-ai-capability/:
To read more about video game juggernaut EA: https://www.forbes.com/sites/martinacastellanos/2025/09/29/videogame-juggernaut-electronic-arts-gets-acquired-for-55-billion/
To read more about : http://forbes.com/sites/giacomotognini/2025/09/29/tanking-covid-19-vaccine-sales-are-crushing-biotech-billionaire-fortunes/
Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1
Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:
https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript
Stay Connected
Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes
More From Forbes: http://forbes.com
Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00This week in Billionaires, plunging sales of COVID-19 vaccines have dealt a heavy blow to
00:04biotech firms Moderna and BioNTech, shaving billions of dollars from their founders and
00:09investors' fortunes. The two companies counted eight billionaires worth $116 billion in 2021,
00:15but now they only have five, worth just $28.8 billion. Both firms relied on their COVID shots
00:22for the vast majority of their revenue in 2024, and they both expect those sales to decline
00:27by at least 20% this year, amid more restrictive policies from RFK Jr. and the FDA and CDC.
00:35Video game maker Electronic Arts announced a $55 billion buyout from the Saudi public investment
00:41fund, private equity firm Silver Lake, and Jared Kushner's private equity firm Affinity Partners.
00:46Kushner, who recently became a billionaire, played a key role in the deal, which will be the largest
00:50leveraged buyout in history. The Saudi sovereign wealth fund already owns about 10% of Electronic
00:55Arts, and is also the largest investor in Kushner's Affinity, having backed him with $2 billion.
01:01Cloud computing firm Coreweave clinched a staggering $14.2 billion deal with Meta,
01:07providing the tech giant with access to computing power until 2031 to train its next-generation AI
01:13models. Coreweave's stock jumped 12% on the news, boosting the net worths of its billionaire
01:18co-founders and investors, including CEO Michael Intrader. Coreweave's share price has more than
01:24tripled since its IPO in March, minting at least five new billionaires. Welcome to Beyond the Billions.
01:30I'm Giacomo Tugnini, a deputy editor here at Forbes, and joining me today is Chase Peterson-Withorn,
01:35a senior editor at Forbes who's seen his fair share of coverage of billionaires, especially in the quick
01:40service and fast food industry, and is 11 years here. Chase, great to have you. And I'm going to start
01:46off with a bit of a taboo question. What's your favorite fast food? Well, thanks for having me.
01:53It's hard to say. I think I'm known for, you know, loving fast food, I would say. So it's hard to pick,
02:01but right now, it has to be Raising Cane's right now because, you know, today is the day that my cover
02:06story came out on Raising Cane's, so it's fresh on the mind. Yeah, it's a fantastic story, which we'll dig
02:14into today. And I had an inkling that you were going to go with that, so maybe we'll circle back
02:19later to get your, you know, like unvarnished opinion. But yeah, you recently interviewed
02:24Todd Graves, the founder of Raising Cane's. And I remember hearing about the story like two years
02:31ago when, you know, sort of first made it big, and you've been trying to get this interview for
02:35a long time. So how did that process go? Like how come it took so long?
02:40Yeah, that's a great question. You know how this goes sometimes. Scheduling billionaires can be a bit
02:46of a nightmare for a lot of different reasons. Todd is somebody who is always on the go. He spends
02:52like half of his time away from home going to Raising Cane's stores, hanging out with, you know,
02:57celebrities, doing fundraisers, going to the Super Bowl, you know, where he's throwing big Super Bowl
03:01parties for all these celebrities that back his chicken finger company. So between all that, I
03:06think it was difficult to sort of pin down a time where he could actually, you know, sit down with
03:10us, shoot a video, show us around, let us meet the dog behind Raising Cane's and all that. So it was,
03:16it definitely was a couple years, I would say, in the making and many months of, you know, moving
03:21dates around. But it was worth the wait. So how was it going down there? He seems like such a
03:25character, you know, obviously when, when you sort of first heard of him, he was already pretty big,
03:31but now it's the business has gotten even bigger. Just break down sort of the numbers a little bit
03:37and how it was to meet him in person. How, how was your first impression of him?
03:41Yeah. So Todd, I guess we'll start with Raising Cane's. It is one of the biggest fast food chains
03:47in America. They did $5.1 billion in revenue last year, just about a billion dollars in EBITDA,
03:53basically profit. And it is one of the fastest growing chains in America. They're adding like
04:00125 stores or so a year. They're all company owned. So it's harder to grow faster. And they do
04:07something like $6.6 million in sales per restaurant, which is, I mean, they crush the
04:14competition. It's basically Chick-fil-A is at 7.5 million, Raising Cane is at 6.6. And then there's
04:20a couple other chains that are maybe in like the four or three range, but almost everybody else is
04:24like at or below $2 million per store. So lines are always wrapped around the building, you know,
04:29very popular chain. So meeting Todd, the man behind it all, he's definitely one of those billionaires
04:37who's a larger than life presence. He's definitely a billionaire who is just very inspirational,
04:44you know, and just has that charisma or, you know, leadership quality that just, you know,
04:50makes people inspired to go off and do things. And, you know, there are a lot of billionaires that
04:54I've met who are like that. There are a lot of billionaires I've met who are not like that, you know,
04:58at all. And Todd Graves was definitely like that. So he's the chicken finger guy. He's happy to be the
05:04chicken finger guy. He's out there promoting the brand all the time. But he's also very involved in
05:08the details of his business all the time. So, you know, he knows what's going on and he pays very
05:13close attention to their marketing campaigns. He's reviewing the kids meal toys. He's reviewing the
05:18decor that goes on all of the walls of all the restaurants. So, you know, he's worth $22 billion
05:23now. He's as rich as Rupert Murdoch, Jerry Jones, you know, I think he was 46th on the Forbes for 100.
05:29So there aren't 50 people in America, you know, who are richer than this guy. And he's still,
05:33you know, traveling the country, you know, going to his stores and visiting the people who are
05:38working for him and checking in with customers and then even like reviewing the kids meal toys.
05:42So just a really interesting guy. And this was your first sort of on-camera interview with the
05:47billionaire, right? So how, how was that experience for you? Yeah, it's different. You know, I mean,
05:52you know, shot stuff before, but this is the first time that I've done my, you know, you know,
05:57you know, usually we go meet up with these people, get a couple hours of their time if we're lucky,
06:01sometimes more if we're really lucky. And usually you're trying to get their whole life story and
06:05you're trying to press them on all of these very detailed questions of, you know, what year was
06:09this and how many months later was it this and, you know, all of that stuff. And it's different,
06:14you know, when you're on camera where you sort of, you're part of the interview. And so my reactions
06:19were important also to be paying attention to and just trying to make sure we were steering the
06:23conversation to just all be interesting stuff, you know? Yeah, sounds amazing. And we actually have a
06:30clip here to show you. You can see orders come in, everything comes from the freshly grilled toast
06:36all the way down through chicken and fries, that they make it and they get it out the door.
06:41Because you have this system going is, you know exactly what orders are coming in. So you've cooked
06:45to order. If it's busy, you cook a little ahead. If it's slow, then you pull it back. But you can see
06:50all this when you're cooking. If you're a restaurant guy, this is heaven. It's not multiple lines going to see
06:54all this. You've got nothing under a heat lamp. Everything is just simple and fresh and right out the door.
07:00It looks like you were having a great time in that experience. But I'm also curious to ask you, as you
07:05mentioned, Todd Graves is worth $22 billion, the richest restaurateur in America, right? Was there anything
07:12that you saw when you were there? And I know you have a few things in mind, which is why I wanted to ask you,
07:17that sort of, you know, I guess showed you that wealth that he's built up, right? Like things like, oh, wow,
07:23that's such like a billionaire thing or asset, Trinka to have there.
07:27Yeah, he definitely lives like a billionaire. You know, he's, has a very nice house in Baton Rouge.
07:35He has a very nice guest house. You know, we got to sort of set up in his guest house. And, you know,
07:39while we were there, there was some debate about what art, you know, he could display behind him.
07:46Like I said, he's a details guy, right? So what pieces of art that he owns, you know, could he have on
07:50the mantle behind him for our, you know, sit down interview that was going to be recorded. And,
07:54uh, there was debate about whether his Picasso painting, you know, was allowed to be in the
07:59background and all of that. There's some debate about it. And as we were setting up, you know,
08:03his detail, uh, obsession, I guess, flows down to all the people who work for him. And they're also
08:08very into the details too. Great to work with, very into the details. And, um, and so, you know,
08:14it ended up push come to shove. The Picasso was not going to be in the, in the photo. And then all
08:20of, uh, they wanted to, you know, take the Picasso out of the guest house, take it back to the main
08:25house. And there was some debate among the staffers as to whose job it was going to be to carry this
08:30Picasso painting across the, across the street. And basically they were doing nose goes, uh, you know,
08:35because nobody particularly wanted to be the one responsible for this $11 million painting, but
08:40somebody ended up doing it and it was fine. But, you know, it was stuff like that, you know,
08:44where he was super into the details. And then, so then, you know, we're hanging out at his guest
08:47house and, uh, you know, the piano in the corner is Elvis Presley's piano, you know, and he's just
08:53a big collector of memorabilia. And he was telling me about how he owns, you know, dinosaur fossils.
08:58And he has a pumpkin guy that grew the world's biggest pumpkin or something like that for him.
09:02Uh, and, uh, Indiana Jones's jacket. And, you know, he was wearing a very nice watch and,
09:08you know, very nice outfit. So he, you know, he was, uh, in a lot of ways, like a very approachable
09:13down to earth, you know, just entrepreneur, entrepreneur of a guy, you know, like, but,
09:19uh, but there definitely were the trappings of, uh, of wealth there. If you sort of knew what to look
09:24for. Yeah. I wouldn't want to know what the, sort of the insurance costs of carrying that Picasso
09:28across the street would be. Uh, and then you also visited his tree house, right? Which is another
09:32kind of crazy thing he has. Yeah. And so then, you know, he takes us to see his tree house.
09:38He spent something like $400,000 on this tree house, which is like, you know, what a typical
09:42American would spend on an actual home, actual home. And, uh, and it was really cool, you know,
09:47and it was, it had a bedroom and had a full bathroom up, up in this a hundred foot live
09:51oak tree. I didn't even know you could have a bathroom up there. Uh, so it was just like,
09:54uh, it was a tree home, I would say. Uh, and it was the ultimate billionaire's, uh, you know,
10:00play plays. And I think he had built it originally just because he was a fan of the show
10:03tree house masters and they built it for him on the show. Uh, and it was for, you know, his,
10:07his children. Uh, and now he sort of hangs out with celebrities there when they're in town. So
10:11he's telling us about, you know, having Shaquille O'Neal up there. And then Jack ended up building
10:15his own tree house after that. He had Snoop Dogg up there and, you know, all these, all these
10:19celebrities. So, uh, it was, it was definitely a surreal experience.
10:25That's amazing. But that's sort of take a step back, I guess, on how he built the business.
10:29And another interesting thing I think in your story is that, you know, typically as these chains
10:35get bigger and bigger, the locations start to change, the menu starts to change, maybe get bigger,
10:41but that's not really the case at all with, uh, with, with Todd and, and Raising Cane. So
10:46can you speak a little bit more about sort of the backstory and then how he's still had this very,
10:52you know, consistent approach, I guess, to the business?
10:54Yeah. So, um, Raising Cane started as a chicken finger only restaurant. And that was, you know,
11:04back in 1996. And today it is still a chicken finger only restaurant. The menu is still the
11:09same. He serves basically five things. He serves chicken fingers. He serves crinkle cut fries.
11:14He serves coleslaw, Texas toast, and one sauce called cane sauce. And that's it. And that's never
11:20changed. And the last time he even added anything to his menu was lemonade in 2007. So he gets, he,
11:25I asked him how many times do you think you've been, you know, somebody's pitched you on, Hey,
11:29you need to add a spicy tender. Hey, you should do sliders. Hey, you should do this. Hey, you should
11:33do that. And, uh, he said, he thought more than a hundred thousand times, you know, it's been suggested
11:39to him. And, uh, and he said no every single time. Um, so, you know, he's just very disciplined in
11:46the way he runs his business. And he, he thinks that, you know, deviating even slightly will make
11:50it slower for customers to get their orders or decide what to order and it will make them worse
11:55at what they do. And so he basically said, you know, I know who I am. I'm the guy who does chicken
12:00fingers. And my goal is to just do that and do that only and do it better than anybody else.
12:04And, uh, he found a way to achieve great scale and great success, uh, and keep growing without ever
12:12growing the menu. And so, you know, the drawback there of course, is that it's a very limited menu.
12:16And if you're not in the mood for chicken fingers, you're not going to Todd grapes. He's not getting
12:20your dollar. Uh, you know, but the upside is his costs are, you know, lower than others. His menu is
12:26super simple. You know, his supply chain is super simple. And by focusing on just a few things, uh,
12:33you know, they basically execute on it just as well as anybody in the fast food industry, because
12:38they're just so laser focused on the one thing. Right. And you visited the original store in
12:43Baton Rouge as well, right? How was that? And sort of, I know he kept all of the sort of initial
12:48things he put in there, right? Like the mural, but how was that experience for you? You know,
12:54yeah, it was really interesting because it was definitely different than any canes that I've ever
12:58been in. It's, you know, it's a small little, uh, you know, store a block from Louisiana State University.
13:05And it's still, you know, the wood paneled walls and the booths that he had put in and, you know,
13:10all the stuff from 1996, uh, you know, whereas a typical canes now is a, you know, brand new
13:14location with a big drive through and all this stuff. Um, so that was really interesting. And,
13:19you know, Todd's just, he's the kind of guy who just keeps records of everything. He keeps old photos.
13:24He keeps, you know, and so, you know, he was, he didn't, he hasn't renovated the store at all. So,
13:30you know, you can see where he's carved his name in 1996, you know, into the booth and where
13:35he put in the plumbing himself to save money because they didn't have money to, you know,
13:38start this business. They, you know, it's a whole other story, the wild story about how he even
13:43started this business. But by the time, you know, he was opening the store, he didn't have any money.
13:47So he was doing the plumbing himself. He was putting in the menu board himself, you know,
13:50and then they were manning the registers and the friars themselves. Um, so it was just really
13:54interesting to go through and see. And, you know, there's little sort of gimmicks that are in every
13:58raising canes. Now there's a disco ball on the ceiling of every raising canes. Uh, there's a portrait of
14:03Elvis on the wall of every raising canes. And it all stems from the fact that he just thought a disco
14:07ball would be cool. And they had a skylight. So they put one in, in 1996, he just thought Elvis
14:11was cool. You know, he has Elvis's piano, uh, you know, so he just, they just put a portrait of Elvis
14:16up on the wall. They just put a picture of his dog up on the wall. And, uh, and now it's sort of,
14:21they just carried that through to, you know, to every store. And so you'll see,
14:24you know, um, you'll see the remnants or, you know, whatever of, of, of all that stuff in every store,
14:30but you'll see the original stuff was definitely cool. And, you know, he talked a lot about how
14:35there's an authenticity there where it's, it wasn't just like, they had some focus group that
14:38said people love dogs. So we should do a dog. He just had a dog that just, you know, that just came
14:42out to the store every day when he was building it. And his friend said, you should name it after
14:46your dog. And so he named it after his dog and then the dog becomes the mascot. And then, you know,
14:50you're off to the races, right? They just, they had a skylight. So they thought, let's put in a,
14:54let's put in a disco ball. So they just did, you know? And so, uh, it was just really interesting to see,
14:58I guess, sort of the origin story of, of all that and how it all just kind of came from like a
15:02college age kid, just doing what he thought would be cool for, you know, one little restaurant.
15:06Yeah. He seems to be a guy who really sort of built on his instincts, right? So I guess when you
15:11were there eating with him, did you feel any pressure to, to give a review one way or the
15:16other? I mean, I know you've, you'd been to Raising Cane's before, but you know, within that sort of
15:19context there with him. Uh, I don't think so. I mean, I, it's never hard to eat a chicken finger.
15:24You know, there are worse things to be doing for work than eating a chicken finger, but it was cool
15:29doing it, you know, across the table from the guy who invented it was, was definitely really
15:34interesting. And, uh, and I will say that, you know, he's obsessive about the food being fresh,
15:40the food being like perfectly presentable. You know what I mean? They won't, they don't serve,
15:44they don't have heated lamps. They don't put anything in a warming cabinet. If it's like a few
15:48minutes old, they get rid of it, you know? And they're very mindful about, you know, if you notice,
15:51if you, if you walk into a Raising Cane's, um, not during peak hours, you know, when they're maybe
15:57not just, you know, cause again, they're only doing five menu items so they can, when it's the
16:00lunch rush, I think they're just frying chicken nonstop, you know? And so there's always, it's
16:05always, you know, being served, but if you go in the off hours, they'll actually yell when you walk
16:09in the door, they'll say, we've got one in the, you know, coming in, we've got two coming in and the
16:13cook in the back hears that, and then starts making the chicken for you right then so that nothing ever
16:18sits out and they don't have to waste anything. And, uh, because the menu is so simple and he's
16:22explaining this to me, um, they know what you're going to order, give or take, because your options
16:27are basically, do you want three chicken fingers, four chicken fingers, five chicken fingers, six
16:31chicken fingers, right? Do you want, uh, you know, and then you can trade the sides out, but there's
16:36only three sides, right? So do you want toast fries or coleslaw? Do you want one of each? Do you want
16:39two of one or one of two, you know, whatever. So it's pretty easy for them to throw four or five
16:44chicken fingers in the fryer, you know, because they know you're going to order somewhere between
16:48three and six. Uh, so it's really interesting to see that. And I will say that that he calls it
16:53the mothership, the first restaurant. Um, it was definitely, I would say it was the freshest
16:57Raising Cane's I've had, but I mean, it's pretty, pretty fresh everywhere, but you can see that they
17:00took a lot of pride, uh, in running the first one and the one that's right down the road from his house.
17:05Uh, they definitely put a lot of extra effort into making sure that it was as fresh as possible.
17:10Yeah. It's sort of fascinating to hear from you sort of how it was to see him in action,
17:13but obviously, you know, in your 11 plus years here, you've covered all kinds of different
17:18billionaires across different industries, but owning in sort of on, you know, restaurants and
17:24fast food. And for many years, you've also covered the Cathy family behind Chick-fil-A.
17:29You earlier this year wrote a story about Steve Ells, the founder of Chipotle becoming a billionaire.
17:34Do you see any sort of common traits between Graves and these other entrepreneurs who've taken sort of a
17:39pretty simple, you know, food concept into, you know, a billion dollar plus fortune?
17:46Yeah, I think so. I think that the billionaires who, you know, the restaurant industry is famously one
17:51of the most difficult industries to go in and fast food is super competitive. Fast food has
17:55razor thin margins. You know, I mean, it's, it's definitely a very cutthroat, you know, business.
18:01I think that the ones who have risen to the top and are billionaires, I think they tend to be pretty
18:05obsessive about the food, you know, and, and they all have a corporate culture that
18:11they definitely are very keen to protect and nurture. And, you know, Todd talked about culture
18:17all the time, you know, and I don't think it's just corporate speak. I do think that,
18:23you know, they, they try to make it a fun atmosphere. They try to, you know, be very involved
18:28in their communities. They've given $165 million, you know, plus, you know, to all these communities
18:33that they've been in. And I think he's very serious about that. The other thing I would say is
18:39he's very similar in some ways to Panda Express, who I wrote about a few years ago, you know,
18:45as just being a stubbornly privately held fast food chain that owns its own stores. You know,
18:51a lot of, you know, Subway, for example, you know, franchises their stores like crazy, right?
18:56McDonald's franchises their stores like crazy. So, you know, Todd Graves of Raising Cane's and Panda
19:03Express, the Cheung family are examples of sort of the opposite where they own the company themselves
19:10and they own the stores themselves so that they can keep that very tight control over every aspect of,
19:18you know, the experience when you go in there, they're making sure that you're not getting,
19:22you know, nobody's skimping on quality of the materials. Nobody is not updating the stores or
19:28not keeping the stores clean or, you know, not honoring some promotions, you know, across the
19:33country or something like that. You know, Todd is just obsessive about all of those little details
19:38and making sure that everything is perfect. And I think some of the others are like that. The
19:42Cathy's are definitely like that. You know, I mean, they run, they have a little bit of a different
19:45model at Chick-fil-A, but they run that business very, very closely and they're very serious about,
19:49you know, the standards. And I think that, you know, Panda is like that. And I think Todd Graves is
19:54definitely an extreme example of, you know, somebody who wants to make sure that every,
19:59for something, for a business that's so simple, it's, you know, he's involved in every little
20:05aspect and everything you do when you're in a Raising Cane's has been thought out and thought
20:09out and thought out. Everywhere you look and what you see, everything is, you know, very, very detailed.
20:14Yeah. It's super interesting. I mean, I have covered sort of only one, I guess, food entrepreneur,
20:19which is Dick Portillo of the Chicago based, you know, sort of hot dog and Italian beef standard chain.
20:24And he, before he sold it out, you know, sold out 11 years ago, he was kept talking about how,
20:28you know, the culture was really important, owning all the stores. I just briefly want to ask you
20:34what, you know, we've seen so many deals in the past year in this space, right? Jersey Mike was
20:39acquired last year, early this year, Dave's Hot Chicken. Do you see any sort of, you know, from a,
20:44from a, you know, financial standpoint, right? Because obviously we're financial reporters,
20:49any shifts in trends in terms of big acquisitions. Obviously it sounds like Todd is not interested in
20:54selling, but do you see sort of any, any, Subway I think was last year too, sort of any changes in
21:00in valuations or how the market is moving that way? Yeah, it's definitely, there's definitely a lot
21:07of private equity interest in these fast food concepts and the valuations are huge. You know,
21:12I mean, Subway was sold for, you know, 9 billion plus, and that was a troubled, you know, franchise
21:17heavy, you know, business. You know, I think Jersey Mike's was maybe over $8 billion, maybe including
21:22debt, but you know, big, big numbers. And, and, you know, Todd could certainly sell canes for
21:29tens of billions of dollars. You know what I mean? It's very, you know, fast growing,
21:32very successful chain. He does not seem interested in it whatsoever. He's been doubling down on this
21:39forever. You know, I mean, his, he had a co-founder and his co-founder sold out after they opened their
21:44second location. And at that time, I think it was a no brainer for Todd. It was, of course,
21:49I'm going to stick to this, you know, and then he kept reinvesting and reinvesting and reinvesting.
21:54And so I think he's just, this is what he does. I think this is who he is. And it's interesting
21:58actually that you brought up Portillo's because, you know, Dick Portillo talked very openly with you
22:03about how much he regretted selling his business. Yeah. And I think that, yeah. And I think that,
22:08you know, Todd is of that type where if he didn't run raising hands, what would he do? You know,
22:15you know, uh, he would probably want to go try started, you know, run a chicken figure business.
22:19So he's already doing that. So, you know, why would he ever sell? Uh, and so, and I wonder too,
22:24you know, how much some of these guys see, you know, Dick Portillo and people like that who,
22:27uh, you know, end up regretting it later on and just decide that they're, they're not going to sell.
22:32So I would be, you never know, you know what I mean? Peter Cancroft of Jersey Mike's,
22:36you know, ran that business for a long time. It was his baby and he ended up selling it.
22:40So you can never say never. And the valuations are so high right now. And, you know, you can get so
22:44much money, uh, you know, for selling these businesses that it's, you know, it can be tough.
22:48And it depends on your succession plan too. Right. And who's going to take over and all of that.
22:53Um, but you know, so you never know, sometimes they'll surprise you and they'll sell,
22:56but I'd be pretty surprised if you saw, you know, the Cathy family of Chick-fil-A sell. I'd be pretty
23:00surprised if you saw the churns of Panda Express sell. And I'd be pretty shocked if you saw Todd
23:04Graves selling Raising Cane's at least any, anytime soon. Yeah. Super, super interesting.
23:10And obviously I encourage everyone to read Chase's fantastic story before I let you go. I'm going to,
23:14I'm going to have another stab with the question asked you at this top and I'm going to make it a
23:18bit more, a bit narrower this time to not give you Raising Cane's as an option. What's your,
23:22what's your go-to chicken sandwich? Oh, you know, you can't go wrong eating a fried chicken
23:29sandwich in my opinion. Uh, I think that I will say I've never had the Raising Cane's chicken
23:35sandwich that he does do a sandwich, but it's just three tenders on a bun. So it's basically just,
23:41you can debate the semantics there. Yeah. I don't know if it really counts, but technically he does
23:45have the sandwich, but I think, you know, the gold standard is, it's gotta be Chick-fil-A. Uh,
23:50I mean, you can look at the numbers too behind it. I mean, they're the most successful
23:54fried chicken, you know, chain. They're the most successful per store, uh, you know,
23:58fried chicken chain. I mean, it's a jug or not. And, uh, Cane's is just, you know,
24:02right up there with them. They're sort of one and two in that industry, but I mean, you know,
24:06I think Chick-fil-A is probably the gold standard. It's been so much fun chatting with you about this,
24:10Chase, more fun than some of the other work we sometimes have to do here, but yeah,
24:13thanks so much for joining me. Yeah. Thanks so much. To read Chase's story and the other stories
24:18that we mentioned in today's episode, you can find them in the interview notes.
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