When restaurant owners are struggling, they’re often quick to blame external factors like the economy, lazy employees, or changing customer habits.

But here’s the truth - if other restaurants are thriving under the same conditions, the problem isn’t the economy…

It’s your business.

In this episode of The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast, we deliver a reality check for independent and multi-location restaurant owners who are working 80-hour weeks - yet still not seeing results.

We break down the myth that effort equals success and show you how focusing on the wrong things can quietly kill your business. You’ll also learn the hidden profit leaks that bleed your margins daily.

Tune in to discover:

✅How to identify why your restaurant's profitability is lagging

✅Simple, zero-cost upselling strategies that can boost sales by 10-20%

✅How to fix a broken hiring process and retain staff beyond 90 days

✅The value of after-action employee reviews - and how to do them

✅Why a victor mindset (not more hours) is key to long-term restaurant success

✅How to measure performance and build real systems in your restaurant business

Whether you’re running a single-location restaurant or trying to grow multiple units, this episode reveals the small issues that compound over time and destroy profits.

Key Points

00:01:00 Your Business Isn't That Good
00:03:00 Victim vs Victor Mentality
00:06:00 Results vs Effort
00:08:40 Death by a Thousand Cuts
00:12:40 The Impact Of Upselling
00:18:00 Zero-Cost Revenue Growth
00:22:00 Hiring Metrics
00:27:00 After-Action Employee Reviews
00:30:20 Profit Knowledge Gap
00:34:00 Root Cause Analysis

If you're ready to improve your restaurant team culture, increase profits, and stop letting your business run you - this episode will show you how to grow a restaurant with clarity, strategy, and systems.

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👉Get your multi-unit playbook here → https://hs.ownershifttraining.com/optin-mupb

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✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

Is Your Restaurant Manager Destroying Your Business? Get The Manager Hiring Toolkit Here→ https://hs.ownershifttraining.com/managerhiringtoolkit

Think hiring a restaurant manager will free up your time and boost profits?

Think again.

Many restaurant owners watch sales tank, staff turnover explode, and food costs spiral out of control - often within months - because they made one fatal management mistake.

In this episode of Restaurant Growth Accelerator, I share my personal story of opening a second location, hiring a manager, and watching my once-successful business collapse.

You’ll hear exactly how promoting the wrong person - without proper restaurant management training - led to burnout, lost staff, and more.

Tune in to discover:

✅The critical difference between worker skills vs. management skills most owners overlook

✅Why promoting your best worker can create your worst manager

✅How to hire restaurant managers who WILL do the job (not just those who CAN do it)

✅A proven 6 to 8-month restaurant manager training program that builds real leadership skills

✅The anonymous employee survey system that reveals hidden management problems before they explode

You’ll learn how to set management expectations, run performance evaluations, and build a restaurant management system that works in any multi-location or independent restaurant.

Key Points

00:00:20 Manager Disaster Story
00:01:40 Second Location Opening Chaos
00:04:00 Manager Demands Raise
00:07:40 Worker Skills vs Manager Skills
00:11:00 Burger Production Math Example
00:14:20 Setting Management Expectations
00:18:40 Anonymous Employee Surveys
00:23:40 Hiring "Will Do" vs "Can Do"
00:31:00 Systemizing Soft Skills Training

Whether you’re hiring your first manager or trying to fix a failing one, this episode gives you restaurant leadership skills you need to prevent burnout, reduce staff turnover, and create a business that runs without you.

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✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

If your restaurant’s bank account is in the red while your staff just cashed their paychecks, you’re not alone… and it can be fixed.

In this episode, you’ll learn why so many restaurant owners end up the lowest-paid person in their own business. And more importantly, exactly how to fix it without taking on another soul-crushing merchant cash advance.

We bust the dangerous myth that simply boosting sales will solve your problems - and show why reducing your restaurant prime cost by just 10% can put far more money in your pocket than increasing sales by the same amount.

Tune in to discover:

✅The exact restaurant break-even analysis Andrew used to save his business when he couldn’t pay rent

✅Unique labor cost control strategies that prevent scheduling mistakes and increase restaurant profitability

✅The simple portion control test that exposed a cook using twice the protein everyone else did

✅The “perfect salad” visual control trick to keep your team consistent without slowing service.

✅How to run a restaurant expense audit that asks, “Is this making me money?” - and cuts the waste that’s bleeding your cash flow.

Key Points

00:00:00 Opening Reality Check
00:02:20 Business vs Charity
00:03:40 Breaking Even Analysis
00:07:20 Labor Productivity Planning
00:10:00 Prime Cost Calculations
00:14:40 Cashflow vs Profit
00:17:00 Merchant Cash Advances
00:21:00 Menu Pricing Strategy
00:25:00 Tracking What Matters
00:27:40 Portion Control Testing
00:31:20 Visual Control Methods
00:35:00 Expense Audit Process

Stop being the last person to get paid in your own restaurant. Apply these proven restaurant cost control strategies and finally flip the script on who’s really making money in your business.

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✅Tools For Restaurant Owners✅

Thinking of opening another restaurant? Avoid costly mistakes with my free guide:
👉https://hs.ownershifttraining.com/optin-mupb

-

✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

Every restaurant owner knows that sinking feeling when their phone explodes with problems before they’ve even had their morning coffee...

But what if those daily fires are actually a roadmap to the real issues killing your restaurant operations?

In this episode, you’ll uncover a powerful, systematic framework to identify the root causes of your restaurant’s challenges - so you can solve the problems permanently.

Instead of endlessly managing symptoms - like staff calling out, customer complaints, or product quality issues - you’ll learn how to focus on restaurant leadership strategies that fix the core problem, making multiple headaches vanish at once.

We’ll break down why so many restaurant staffing issues are actually training failures in disguise, and how dialing in your processes will transform your bottom line.

This episode also tackles delegation for restaurant owners who feel like they’re answering every silly question, every single shift.

We share the “seven magic words” that train your team to think independently and build stronger problem-solving skills - a crucial move for multi-unit restaurant owners who want more free time.

Key moments:

00:02:20 The Walk-In Whiteboard Strategy
00:04:00 Finding Problem Commonalities
00:08:00 The Root Cause Question
00:09:40 Symptoms vs Problems
00:13:00 The Engagement Mind Trick
00:17:20 Delegation Without Leadership Teams
00:21:00 The Seven-Word Solution
00:26:40 Implementation Over Planning

If you’re ready to stop feeling like a part-time firefighter and finally build a restaurant that runs itself, this episode delivers the restaurant growth framework used by top operators to create freedom and profitability.

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✅Tools For Restaurant Owners✅

Claim your FREE Restaurant Weekly Financial Tracker to uncover thousands in hidden profits and optimize your costs (in less time than it takes to finish your morning coffee): https://ghl.ownershifttraining.com/weekly-tracker-lp

-

✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

Is your restaurant always short-staffed? Are you constantly stuck covering shifts? And does it feel like it’s impossible to hire reliable restaurant employees?

Today we’re sharing restaurant hiring strategies that actually work - so you can break the cycle of constant turnover.

In this episode of the Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast, you’ll learn how to build a restaurant hiring funnel, master restaurant recruiting tips, and transform your staffing process so you never feel short-staffed again.

If running your restaurant feels like an endless nightmare - constant no-shows, people quitting after two weeks, scrambling to fill shifts - it’s time for a better approach.

The real problem isn’t “nobody wants to work anymore” - it’s that you don’t know how to find, hire, and retain A players for restaurants who will stay long-term.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

✅ Why most restaurant owners struggle to hire the right restaurant staff

✅ How to write a restaurant job ad that attracts top talent

✅ Why your Indeed campaigns might fail -and how to fix them

✅ How to interview restaurant employees effectively (beyond just gut feelings)

✅ Tips to reduce restaurant turnover and retain great employees


Key Points

00:01:00 Short-staffing nightmare
00:03:20 Always be recruiting
00:06:40 Indeed isn't broken
00:08:40 Job ad transformation
00:12:00 Wage market reality
00:16:00 Interviewing misconceptions
00:19:00 Bias in hiring
00:22:00 Open-ended questions
00:27:20 Hiring playbook system
00:32:00 Employee heat maps
00:36:00 Learning from departures

Ready to stop being the one who always has to cover shifts? Listen now to transform your hiring process and build a team that actually stays.

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✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

Most restaurant owners buy themselves an 80-hour-a-week job earning $50,000 per year, thinking they own a real business - but in truth, they’ve just created another stressful job.

I was recently a guest on The Restaurant Technology Podcast (see links below), hosted by Jeremy Julian.

During the episode, I shared my journey and biggest tips for restaurant owners who want to be more profitable while working fewer hours.

You’ll discover my ‘Restaurant Freedom Formula’ - a proven three-step system that helps restaurant owners achieve 15–20% profit margins while working normal hours.

In this episode, you’ll learn exactly how to break free from survival mode and transform your restaurant operations:

✅ Cut prime costs to 55% (most restaurant owners are stuck at 70–80%)

✅ Reinvest those savings into smart restaurant marketing strategies

✅ Build the systems and team that let you step back from daily operations

We also dive into why restaurant owners get trapped in survival mode twice a year, the specific interview questions that reliably predict successful restaurant employees...

And how to plan for your restaurant’s seasonal labor shifts to avoid costly hiring disasters.

Whether you’re running a single unit or expanding to multi-unit restaurant ownership, these frameworks can help you stop working in your restaurant and finally start working on it.

Key Moments:

00:01:20 First Restaurant Reality Check
00:03:20 Dad’s House on the Line
00:11:00 Prime Cost Fundamentals
00:16:40 Three-Step Freedom Formula
00:22:20 Reference Checks
00:24:00 Past Behavior Interview Questions
00:35:00 Business Seasons
00:38:20 Seasonal Hiring Secret

If you’re tired of being the highest-paid employee in your own business - and ready to scale your restaurant profitably - this episode is for you.

Listen now and discover the exact frameworks to transform from a burned-out operator into a true restaurant entrepreneur.

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Connect with Jeremy Julian of The Restaurant Technology Guys:

https://restauranttechnologyguys.com/
https://www.youtube.com/@RestaurantTechGuys
https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-restaurant-technology-guys/

-

✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

One of the biggest mistakes restaurant owners make is assuming that hiring an "experienced" manager will magically fix their problems.

Without a solid restaurant manager training system, clear expectations, and accountability, even experienced managers fail.

In this episode of the Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast, Andrew Scott and Nathan Voulgaris break down the real reasons why so many restaurant managers underperform - and more importantly, how you as a restaurant owner, can fix it.

You'll learn how a lack of structured management training, poor hiring practices, and missing systems lead to costly mistakes.

Discover how to implement proven restaurant management systems that help you build strong leadership, increase restaurant profitability, and create a scalable business that doesn’t require you to micromanage every decision.

Key Takeaways You’ll Learn:

Why most restaurant leadership fails from day one

How to hire managers who will actually do the job

How to create a restaurant management training program that works

Why you must set clear accountability standards

The critical difference between coaching and hand-holding your team

The ripped bonus check story that completely reshaped leadership philosophy

Why restaurant manager initiative can’t be trained… but must be identified

Key Moments:

00:02:40 Three root causes of poor management
00:05:00 Why common sense no longer exists
00:07:00 Setting clear expectations
00:15:20 Hiring the right management personality
00:19:40 Can do versus will do
00:24:20 Coaching through management roadblocks
00:30:00 The ripped bonus check lesson
00:33:20 Why initiative cannot be trained
00:35:40 The broken debit machine initiative story

If you’re ready to stop doing your managers' jobs for them, this episode gives you the exact systems, coaching frameworks, and hiring strategies you need to finally build a self-sufficient management team - while you focus on growing your restaurant business.

-

Thinking of opening another restaurant? Avoid costly mistakes with my free guide:
👉https://hs.ownershifttraining.com/optin-mupb

-

✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/

Customer complaints and bad reviews in your restaurant can be massive opportunities to increase profits, boost customer retention, and dominate your local search results.

In this episode of The Restaurant Growth Accelerator, we unpack the restaurant reputation management strategies that turn negative customer reviews into lifelong loyalty and recurring revenue.

Discover the exact psychology behind why guests complain (spoiler: it’s not about free stuff) and learn our three-step review response system that turns 1-star reviews into 5-star advocates.

Beyond damage control, we break down the review generation tactics that fuel consistent five-star feedback (on autopilot).

From QR code restaurant review prompts to smart server incentive programs that generate 25+ new Google reviews per week, you’ll get field-tested tools to boost restaurant reviews while building customer trust.

You’ll also learn:

👉The “Free Cookie Compliance Trick” that gets your team asking for reviews (without constant reminders)

👉How to measure and increase lifetime customer value in restaurants

👉Why a smart, timely reply to a bad review can be your best restaurant marketing strategy

Key Points

00:06:00 - Goodwill Bank Theory
00:11:00 - Complaint Transformation
00:17:20 - Lifetime Customer Value
00:24:00 - Getting Positive Reviews
00:27:40 - Compliance Tactics
00:31:20 - Review Marketing

Stop letting bad reviews kill your business - turn them into your most powerful marketing tool.

Listen now to master the art of handling customer complaints in restaurants and unlock the full power of review-based marketing.

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✅Tools For Restaurant Owners✅

Claim your FREE Restaurant Weekly Financial Tracker to uncover thousands in hidden profits and optimize your costs (in less time than it takes to finish your morning coffee): https://ghl.ownershifttraining.com/weekly-tracker-lp

-

✅About Us✅

The Restaurant Growth Accelerator Podcast is hosted by Andrew Scott - founder of OwnerShift Training.

Andrew Scott successfully scaled his restaurant business to 4 locations while working a handful of hours each week. He’s since helped over 1,000 restaurant owners increase their sales, profits, and free time - and he’d love to help you too.

✅For Restaurant Owners✅

Interested in growing your restaurant business while working less? Book your free assessment call:
👉 Restaurant Assessment Call

✅Connect With Us✅

https://www.facebook.com/groups/multiunitempirebuilders/
https://www.instagram.com/andrewrichardscott
https://ownershifttraining.com/