- 6 hours ago
Smokey John’s has been serving barbecue in Dallas, Texas, since 1976, but it was losing money. Then, a devastating fire destroyed the entire restaurant in 2017. So, brothers Brent and Juan Reaves had to rebuild it from scratch. Their bet paid off. Today, Smokey John’s makes nearly $4 million in annual revenue and goes through roughly 2,000 pounds of brisket each week. The brothers explain what it takes to keep a 50-year-old barbecue business alive while continuing their father’s legacy.
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00:01Barbecue is the hardest restaurant business
00:04because your main item takes about 14 to 16 hours to cook.
00:10You're watching something that's just sitting over the fire.
00:14It's just the craziest business.
00:16That's why we probably have more alcoholics in our industry,
00:19because you just get time to drink.
00:24This is why people fly to Texas to get barbecues.
00:28That's like an old-school rap video right there.
00:30You know what I'm talking about?
00:31I'm Brent Reeves.
00:32And I'm Juan Reeves.
00:33And we're the co-owners of Smokey John's Barbecue.
00:35We're brothers.
00:37And we're brothers.
00:39How many times have we found out?
00:40Hundreds.
00:41About 50,000, yeah.
00:44We've been a family-owned and operated business for 50 years.
00:49Our dad opened up in August of 1976.
00:52We took over in 2013.
00:54And in 2017, we watched our father's business go up in smoke.
01:00I pull up and the fire chief is there.
01:03He was like,
01:03and that Smokey John's is burning up right now.
01:06I'm like, bro, that's our business.
01:10I thought, you know, if we persevere, there's pathway here for us.
01:14We can't not come back.
01:18The year we opened after the fire was a record year.
01:21Our annual revenue is just a little short of $4 million.
01:25Dad's philosophy for barbecue is make it good.
01:28Make it good.
01:30Our dad had a vision for this place.
01:32And I think we both have always wanted to make sure that we fulfill that vision.
01:37How do we make dad's name continue on beyond his life?
01:51Our father...
01:52Sounds like you're about to start praying.
01:54Who art in heaven.
01:56He is in heaven, hopefully.
01:58What?
02:00Our dad was a serial entrepreneur.
02:02He was in every type of business from construction, real estate, roofing, insurance.
02:09In order to thank you for the business that you gave him,
02:11he would smoke a turkey or smoke a ham and just say,
02:15hey, thank you for your business, right?
02:17He started getting more calls for hams and turkeys than he did for roofing and insurance.
02:21You need a restaurant.
02:24He's like...
02:25You probably do.
02:26That's fine.
02:26I probably do need a restaurant.
02:29So he opened up in August of 1976.
02:36I don't think we have a secret to perfectly barbecue meat.
02:39Just buy high quality meat.
02:41High quality meat is way more forgiving.
02:43He's the meat guy.
02:45He handles the meat.
02:46You can tell we're brothers.
02:47He's been doing this since I was born.
02:52We go through about 2,000 pounds of brisket a week.
02:55Probably about 300 pounds of ribs.
02:57About 200 pounds of catfish a week as well, too.
03:00So we get our brisket from Colorado.
03:04When I tell you this bad boy has so much marbling, it's so delicious.
03:10Historically, brisket was a throwaway piece of meat.
03:12So in order to get a good cook, that's too much fat and it's too dense to render.
03:17If you just season the outside of it, that seasoning is just going to slide off.
03:20So he's going to cut that down like to about a quarter inch.
03:23So it smooths out and then that heat in the pit, the smoke just rolls over it smoothly.
03:32Our dad, I think his brisket, I think he was getting it for about 54 cents a pound back in
03:38the day.
03:41The barbecue craze hasn't hit like it has now.
03:45Protein prices are starting to make you be like a seafood restaurant where you have market prices at this point.
03:50We spend easily six to eight thousand dollars a week on protein.
03:58How would you describe your father's philosophy when it came to barbecue and running the business?
04:05Dad is a creative guy.
04:07He is not a details.
04:08He was never a details guy.
04:12Old school parents never tell you kind of what's going on with the business.
04:16You don't know what's happening.
04:18After our mom passed is the first time we actually saw the books.
04:22We were dying.
04:23We were losing a ton of money.
04:26We were losing about nine to ten thousand a month.
04:30So we took over and bought the business.
04:33We thought that we needed to really enhance the experience.
04:36We started to go through TripAdvisor, Yelp and start hearing what the customers were thinking.
04:41We started adding things to the menu like mac and cheese.
04:44Our parents thought it was crazy to add because they thought that was so expensive.
04:48Our goal was if we could at least do fifty thousand dollars a month,
04:54we thought that we could keep the business going.
04:56And now we do over two hundred thousand dollars a month.
04:58So we're much further than that fifty thousand dollar dream and goal.
05:04Our annual revenue is just a little short of four million dollars.
05:09Our four main revenue streams are the restaurant, the catering, concessions and our consumer product.
05:16Twenty-three percent of our revenue comes from the state fair in Texas.
05:20We spent about fifty thousand dollars to get the fair set up.
05:22We've got labor, equipment, product, fees.
05:27But it's a sizable investment.
05:29That's a tough thing in restaurant business. Cash is coming fast.
05:33You think you have it until you pay the bills.
05:38So this smoker was not cheap at all.
05:41This is a big investment.
05:42It was over thirty-five thousand dollars.
05:44This is the first time we've had a new smoker ever in the restaurant.
05:49This wood's been burning overnight.
05:51So this is hickory.
05:53It's a flavor profile that our dad liked and started with.
05:56It gives you a longer burn so you don't go through the wood quite as much.
06:01Where are we going?
06:02Let's go 275.
06:05During the fire this whole place was completely gone.
06:08And where the smoker is now is the other smoker sitting there and that was it.
06:15It's time to talk about the fire.
06:17Well that's a rough one.
06:20How did you find out that it happened?
06:23Wow.
06:27So I pull up and the fire chief is there.
06:29And the guy was like man you can't come in here.
06:33It's a major fire.
06:34I said bro is it Smokey John's?
06:37He was like yeah man that Smokey John's is burning up right now.
06:42I'm like bro that's our business.
06:45None of the customers were hurt. None of the team members were hurt.
06:47We did have a lot of customers that were still sitting down eating.
06:51But didn't want to leave.
06:52While the fire was burning.
06:53The food may be good but this is your life.
06:56Yeah this is your life.
06:56Yeah.
06:59When I drove up and I kind of saw all the fire trucks just pouring all the water.
07:06It just really I was numb.
07:08It didn't really it just didn't seem real.
07:11It just it just didn't seem real.
07:12When he was telling me I didn't even believe I didn't believe it happened.
07:14I didn't believe that this was accurate.
07:16I thought it was probably not that bad.
07:19It was that bad.
07:23Our bank that we banked with for 30 years really was very cool about loaning us on any money to
07:31rebuild.
07:31They weren't cool about it.
07:33No they were cool like.
07:34Oh you mean they were.
07:35They weren't warm.
07:36They weren't like oh my goodness you've been long time customers.
07:39How can we help you.
07:41It was like I don't know.
07:43After a fire now the insurance company gets involved of course.
07:47Little did we know how grossly uninsured we were.
07:52Right.
07:53Because we were still operating off of our parents old insurance company.
07:57We had no idea.
07:58We never set that up.
07:59We were only covered for $53,000 for a 3,000 square foot restaurant.
08:05That just was like.
08:06That was devastating.
08:07Oh my God.
08:09The saving grace was that our parents had the foresight to get business interruption insurance.
08:15It covered the cost of our payroll.
08:17It covered the cost of any rent that we would have to have.
08:21We were down for about 16 months but we were able to keep the majority of our staff on the
08:25payroll.
08:27We used the fire to take a little retreat almost.
08:31To rebrand, to refocus and to really decide who we were going to be coming back.
08:35It was like 16 months later we opened the doors.
08:38And it was like.
08:38And folks just started.
08:40We were like.
08:40I don't even think we were prepared that much food to handle all those people that were going.
08:44No.
08:44We were inundated.
08:45With business.
08:46It was amazing.
08:47It was cool.
08:48It was awesome.
08:50Dad being able to see the place reopened.
08:52It was cool for us because.
08:53He was very proud.
08:55Very, very proud.
08:57Our dad got to see us reopen in January of 2019.
09:02Nine months later he passed away.
09:09Here in Texas, if you're on the top 50 barbecue places then you are like one of the gods.
09:16Most of your most popular places in Texas are not run by black owned businesses.
09:21I don't think black barbecue restaurants get the credit for what they've done over the years.
09:32Typically black owned barbecue restaurants are usually embedded in the community.
09:42Our goal is to really build our name back up to draw more people because our regulars can't afford to
09:50eat here three or four times a month like they have in the past.
09:52We're a smaller place.
09:53We have been around a long time.
09:55We really are a community business.
09:58We try to absorb as much as we can on the pricing but we couldn't just absorb all that increase
10:05because at that point we were losing money.
10:09There are some places where the barbecue is a little cheaper.
10:13And it should be.
10:14But it should be.
10:17Some people suck.
10:18I mean everybody is not good.
10:19Geez Louise.
10:21One of my shortcomings is the truth.
10:23Well you don't have to always offer it.
10:26Father we want to thank you for this time that we've taken to lift your name up and to give
10:32praise and thanks to you Lord for the privilege of prayer.
10:35Thank you Lord for just this opportunity to be able to serve your people.
10:38Thank you for this amazing team that you've blessed us to be around.
10:42How do we make dad's name continue on beyond his life?
10:50So we do it in the food.
10:51We do it in how we connect with our team.
10:54If our team members are doing well and if they're thriving we're good.
10:58Come on girl let's go.
11:00She's been on it.
11:01Food.
11:02Family.
11:03That's what we're about.
11:08They called us pretty funny because he's pretty and I'm funny and together that makes us pretty funny.
11:15He made all of that up.
11:17No I didn't.
11:18He said it all the time.
11:19They said it.
11:20They were typing it.
11:21They said it because you said it.
11:22They said it because you said it.
11:23I said it because they said it.
11:25They did not.
11:26You said that.
11:27They said it.
11:27You should be called pretty funny.
11:29And so then people started saying y'all are pretty funny.
11:32That's because they would say why did they call y'all pretty funny and I'd say well because
11:35he's pretty and I'm funny.
11:36They are asking a question.
11:38And together that makes us pretty funny.
11:39Yes.
11:40Yes.
11:40Yes.
11:40They've, you know, you're going for a recomendation for us.
11:40The way that people still knew us pretty much.
11:40We need you.
11:40You, for sure.
11:40Yes.
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