It’s Not You—It’s Your Hospitality

We break down why great restaurants are built on more than food costs, labor costs, and checklists. True restaurant success starts with culture, leadership, team development, accountability, and guest experience. From reducing employee turnover to developing Gen Z team members, this conversation explores what separates managers from true leaders and why the best restaurant teams are created throug...

How do successful restaurant groups scale without losing quality, culture, or accountability? In this podcast, we break down how to create restaurant training systems that scale—especially when you’re growing from one location to multiple restaurants, managing more GMs, opening new concepts, and trying to maintain the guest experience that made you successful in the first place. You’ll hear a real...

What does it take to build a world-class restaurant team? Well...in this video, award-winning chef Philip Tessier shares why the future of hospitality isn't just about creating great food, it's about developing great people. Chef Tessier discusses leadership, ownership mentality, innovation, Michelin-star standards, training systems, guest experience, and why the best restaurant cultures...

Most restaurants don’t fail because of bad food, they fail because of bad leadership, weak training, and inconsistent hospitality. So in this exclusive interview, Restauranteur and Top Chef judge Janet Zuccarini sits down with Preston Lee to break down the secrets to leadership, hospitality, and training systems that helped her build one of the most respected restaurant groups. From opening her ve...

Restaurant culture is broken… and nobody wants to talk about it. In this server training I break down the detrimental mindset that is destroying hospitality and restaurant culture and instead show how to thrive in the industry. In this powerful training, we dive deep into what real hospitality actually means and why the best servers, bartenders, managers, and restaurant leaders don’t operate from...

In this podcast, I break down the 8 biggest restaurant leadership problems I’ve seen after working with over 350 restaurants worldwide and evaluating more than 1,000 restaurant operations, from small mom-and-pop shops to multi-million dollar hospitality groups.  And here’s the truth: the problems are always the same. The only difference is scale. If you’re a restaurant owner, operator, or manager,...

For this in depth restaurant management training...Preston sits down with rising restaurant leader Camille, to break down the real-world management training that transforms restaurant managers into true leaders. After leaving her photography business, Cammy started as a hostess in 2021 and quickly climbed the ranks into restaurant leadership. Now managing the floor at a busy Southern California Me...

If you think restaurant marketing is just posting pretty food photos… you’re already losing. In this in depth interview, I sit down with Coffee Dose founder Jeni Castro, one of the most disruptive and effective marketers in the coffee and hospitality space, to break down what actually drives sales, brand loyalty, and real growth. From building a cult-like following with “Anti-B*tch Serum”… to crea...

Restaurant Manager Training: Step-by-Step to Higher Profits Struggling with inconsistent staff performance, poor hospitality, or missed revenue opportunities? In this in-depth restaurant manager training, I sat down with a general manager and we broke down the real reasons his team isn’t executing and I showed him a step-by-step system to fix it. This isn’t theory. This is what actually works insi...

Are your hosts secretly hurting your restaurant’s growth? Most restaurant owners massively underestimate the power of the host role and it’s costing them sales, guest retention, and long-term success. In this podcast, Preston Lee talks why your host (or cashier in QSR) is actually one of the most important positions in your entire operation and how failing to properly define, hire, and train this...

Most restaurants don’t have a sales problem, they have a people development problem. When you break down inconsistent service, weak guest retention, bad reviews, and high turnover, it almost always comes back to the same root issue: underdeveloped training, weak leadership, and broken systems.  In this video, we break down a complete restaurant training and onboarding system designed to fix that a...

If you think your managers are a cost, you’re already losing money. After working with over 300 restaurants worldwide, I’ve seen the same mistake again and again: owners try to fix training, systems, or hospitality first… but nothing truly changes until leadership is fixed. Leadership is the foundation. If it’s weak, everything else breaks. In this video, I break down how an $80,000 manager can ei...

How do you turn $12 into a $100 million restaurant empire? In this video, I break down the incredible true story behind Carlo Distefano and the rise of the San Carlo Restaurant Group, one of the most successful luxury restaurant brands in the UK, with locations in London, Manchester, Dubai, and soon Miami.  If you’ve ever wondered how to start a restaurant, scale a restaurant business, or build a...

Running a restaurant has NEVER been harder.  Since 2020, the cost of operating a restaurant has increased by 35%… while margins were already razor thin. At the same time, competition is rising, staff expectations are changing, and consistency is harder than ever to maintain.  So how do the top 10% of restaurants still win?  In this video, I break down the real problem holding restaurants back and...

Most restaurants fail. The average independent restaurant lasts less than 5 years. Profit margins sit around 3-5%, staff turnover can exceed 75%, and the industry is notorious for destroying even the most passionate owners. So how did St. Elmo Steak House survive 123 years... and become one of the highest-grossing independent restaurants in America? Located in Indianapolis, this legendary steakhou...

Grab the popcorn, because in this podcast I break down one of the greatest restaurant growth stories ever: How Portillo's went from a tiny hot dog trailer funded with just $1,100 to a $700M+ public restaurant empire. I recently spent $1,200 on a company dinner… and it made me realize something powerful: Someone else once took roughly the same amount of money and built a national brand using s...

Why is it so hard to train Gen Z in restaurants? Why do so many restaurant owners, managers, and leaders feel like Gen Z employees don’t care, won’t commit, and walk out at the first sign of accountability? Well, in this powerful podcast I explain exactly why training Gen Z feels broken, what’s actually happening beneath the surface, and how you can systematize your training, hiring, and accountab...

People are paying $350 just for a reservation at Carbone in New York. Not for food. Not for wine. Just to get in the door. And yes, there are reservation brokers whose entire business is reselling tables at nearly impossible to get restaurants. So the real question is… 👉 Why does Carbone have that kind of demand? Is it the food? The celebrities? The hype? In this podcast, I break down exactly how...

Most restaurants don’t fail overnight. They die slowly. And the two biggest silent killers I see over and over again are: 👉 Inconsistent hospitality 👉 Little to no 'real' upselling So that's why in this podcast, I break down why hospitality and upselling are not “soft skills”, but how they are revenue systems. If you want higher check averages, stronger guest retention, and a more...

I’ve talked to over 1,000 restaurant owners in the last two years. We’ve worked with 300+ restaurants (and we’re closing in on 400). From single location mom and pop shops doing $250k a year to multi-unit hospitality groups doing hundreds of millions and even billion-dollar global brands. And here’s the crazy part… 👉 They all have the same problem. The problems don’t change. They just get bigger,...

Whether you work in a restaurant, a private club, or any service business, your real job isn’t just to do tasks it’s to make people feel valued. In this presentation, I explain why hospitality is really about the small moments, not just grand gestures, how “micro-dosing hospitality” creates massive loyalty, and why a guest-first or member-first mindset changes everything. When people feel seen, re...

When guests search “restaurants near me,” they’re not choosing the best restaurant, they’re choosing the one with the most reviews and the highest rating.  That's why in this podcast, I break down why Google reviews are one of the biggest profit levers in the restaurant industry and how most restaurant owners are leaving massive money on the table by ignoring them. With food costs, labor cost...

After creating training systems for over 300 restaurants and spending more than 10 years building restaurant training programs for groups and corporations, I’ve seen exactly where restaurant training breaks down, and why so many teams struggle to perform consistently.  In this live training, I break down the two biggest reasons restaurant training fails: underdeveloped training that creates chaos...

Hospitality is not a soft skill or a “nice to have”, it is the most profitable marketing strategy successful restaurants use!   After working with and studying top-performing restaurant owners, one thing is clear: the most successful restaurants build their brand, culture, and long-term growth around hospitality, not social media ads or gimmicky marketing.  Hospitality starts with the owner’s mind...

Most restaurants don’t fail because of bad food, they fail because of missed details. Hospitality is NOT one big moment, but a series of small, often-overlooked details that either elevate or quietly destroy the guest experience. From dirty or creased menus, sticky booths, and slow touch points to transactional service that lacks care...these small mistakes create friction that guests feel, even i...