Restaurant Technology Podcast

About Restaurant Technology Podcast

Restaurant Technology is a weekly business news series hosted by Cali BBQ Media Founder Shawn Walchef. Keep up to date on the latest stories, insights, and thought leadership in the modern restaurant technology landscape. restauranttechnology.substack.com (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast)

Publisher

Cali BBQ Media

Category

business · technology

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

26 Feb 2025

Latest episode

15 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

55 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   15 Oct 2026

   Why Great Food Isn’t Enough To Save Your Restaurant In 2027

   The traditional restaurant model is dead. The question for operators is this: Are you building a restaurant of the past, or a restaurant of the future? At Cali BBQ, we have failed (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com/p/we-opened-3-ghost-kitchens-they-failed). We’ve tested things that broke, launched ideas that flopped, and lived through every industry shift over the last two decades. But we’re still here, scaling and profitable, because we stopped acting like a traditional restaurant. If you want your restaurant to thrive in 2026 and beyond, you have to master three pillars: Content creates attention. AI improves operations. Product creates loyalty. Here is the playbook. This newsletter edition is presented by Cerboni (http://www.cerboni.com) — bookkeeping and financial services from people who actually know restaurants. Learn more at cerboni.com (http://carbon.com). 1. Your Restaurant Needs Content The first thing every next generation restaurant needs is content. At Cali BBQ, we built a media company on top of our restaurant company because we believe so much in storytelling. If you are not making content, you have to start now. Not when you have more time. Right now. Go into your kitchen and film someone making a recipe. Talk about why you opened your restaurant and show more of the people behind the business. Content today means video, especially short-form video. Record it once and distribute it everywhere. Put it on YouTube, LinkedIn, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and wherever your customers spend time. You have to get comfortable telling your story. No one is coming just because you opened your doors. That is the hard truth restaurant owners need to hear. Customers need to be invited in and they need to know why they should visit. Great storytelling from owners and restaurant staff can create that reason. 2. Adopt Artificial Intelligence The second thing every next generation restaurant needs is an artificial intelligence strategy. The question is not whether AI is coming to restaurants because it is already here. The real question is how AI fits into your tech stack and how it helps you run a more profitable, sustainable, and impactful business. At my restaurant and media business we use ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and more every day. Those AI engines have become important apps in our tech stack. We also use Toast and its AI tools (https://pos.toasttab.com/products/toast-iq-grow?srsltid=AU7gw4Ul7ZM93sBxaHkeFr325HtVjRaFjZOd9q9bN_qpxu4whE17KCCh) to get deeper insights into the business, as well as ClearCogs (https://www.clearcogs.com) to help with inventory, and Meez (https://www.getmeez.com/) for recipe costing. Artificial intelligence is changing how restaurant teams operate and one of the best examples at Cali BBQ happened on Father’s Day. We use a company called Palona (https://palona.ai). Palona used my voice from our YouTube videos to create an AI phone agent called Shawn AI (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com/p/i-let-ai-answer-the-phones-on-our). This Shawn AI now answers our restaurant phone. On Father’s Day, it answered 150 phone calls. No one on our restaurant team had to stop what they were doing during service to pick up the phone. That helped us generate our biggest single sales day ever: $26,000 in sales, an 18% increase from the year before. (https://www.adweek.com/media/calibbq-18-sales-lift-ai-agents-for-fathers-day/) This was a clear example of AI solving a real restaurant problem and helping create a measurable result. And it is why we need to keep talking about artificial intelligence in practical terms. 3. Have a Killer Product The third thing is the one we do not talk about enough: You need a great product. When we first opened in 2008, we were a breakfast concept. We served great breakfast, but then we added a dinner menu that was all over the place. We were also a sports bar. Because of this confusion, the menu had too many things going on. We were trying to be too many things to too many people. But, eventually, we focused. We became Cali Comfort BBQ, and now we are Cali BBQ. Slow smoked barbecue became the thing we were known for. Finding that focus changed the business. You cannot be everything to everyone and the more you focus on the product and remove distractions, the stronger your restaurant becomes. Last year I went on a trip to Istanbul, where I visited restaurants that have lasted for generations. One of the biggest lessons was how focused those businesses were. Whether they were focused on döner or baklava, they had one thing that was their focus and they did it exceptionally well. If you are going to open a restaurant, make sure you have a phenomenal product. Whatever your thing is, do that thing better than anyone else. *** The restaurants of the future will not survive by accident. They will learn to tell better stories. They will build around technology like AI. And they will focus on products people genuinely love. That is the model we are trying to build at Cali BBQ (http://calibbq.media). Content creates attention. AI improves operations. Product creates loyalty. If you are a restaurant owner, I want to hear from you. Let’s connect in the comments or by DM. Shawn P. Walchef (https://substack.com/profile/4716285-shawn-p-walchef) Hospitality Finance Experts Cerboni (https://cerboniservices.com) provides financial clarity for people who run restaurants, with expert bookkeeping, tax, and CFO services. They are a paid sponsor of this newsletter edition. Send us a message and we are happy to put you in touch. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit restauranttechnology.substack.com (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

2. 

   11 Oct 2026

   I Talked to Danny Meyer About Changing Your Grip and Building for Essentiality

   It took me nine years of prep and nearly 1,500 interviews before I got a chance to sit down and talk with the legendary restaurateur Danny Meyer (https://www.instagram.com/dhmeyer/?hl=en). You have to work everyday to reach your dreams. Here’s my story about how this one became reality: In 2017, we launched our first podcast Behind the Smoke from a small office across the street from Cali BBQ (http://calibbq.media) in Spring Valley, California. We had a few mics, a basic camera setup, and a whiteboard filled with the leaders I dreamed of interviewing. Right at the top of the whiteboard was written “Danny Meyer”, the founder of Union Square Hospitality Group (https://www.ushg.com). I had first read his book Setting the Table back in 2008 when opening my restaurant. The lessons I learned from it were ingrained in me. In 2019, as we were beginning to grow Cali BBQ Media (http://betheshow.media), I pulled that book off the shelf to re-read it yet again. On page 104, right next to a passage about building an “aura of authenticity” at Gramercy Tavern, I wrote a note in pen: Behind the Smoke w/ Danny Meyer. I knew I wanted to interview him, but I also knew I wasn’t ready yet. Earning that seat was going to take time, consistency, and relentless preparation. By 2026, the dream became reality. I watched the sun rise over the San Francisco Bay as we drove into the city. Walking into Bourbon Steak in Union Square (https://www.bourbonsteaksf.com) alongside my Cali BBQ Media team, who were running cameras, audio, and producing behind-the-scenes content, we prepared to film an episode of the Restaurant Influencers (https://www.entrepreneur.com/video/series/restaurant-influencers-interviews) podcast and a separate Q&A for the print Entrepreneur Magazine. Seeing our crew set up in that room was a testament to what happens when you build a team that shares the vision and executes at the highest level. In times like this I think of the people who’ve been with us during the journey that led to this interview. Partners like Toast (https://toast.partner-experience.com/r/R-6PXU-NGUQ) and PepsiCo (https://entm.ag/RIPepsico) who believe in us and the multiplying power of storytelling and hospitality. Those companies and the people within them understand deeply the importance of building a culture that matters. Danny often says culture is an aspiration, not a destination. During our conversation, I asked him how he defines it. “Culture is ‘the way we do things around here,’” he told me. “You can have a culture with no intention, but you can’t have a great culture without intention.” He calls it an aspiration because you never truly arrive. There will never be a moment where the culture is completely “fixed,” and that’s okay, as long as the intention is to keep moving forward. As founders try to scale that culture, Danny shared a crucial metaphor about knowing when to let go: changing your grip. When you learn to play tennis, you’re taught a basic grip to get started. But if you want to get better, if you want more velocity and topspin, a coach will tell you to change your grip. At first, it feels uncomfortable to make the shift. “That is the exact same thing we have to learn as leaders,” Danny explained. “The way we have always led might have been good enough to get us here, but as you scale the business, you absolutely need to change your grip. Sometimes you have to loosen your grip and let other people hold the racquet.” In his book, Danny tackles the realities of scaling and facing the fear of failure head-on. A few years after Setting the Table celebrated never closing a restaurant, he had to close his beloved Tabla in New York. Instead of hiding from that reckoning, he openly shared what he learned. Having closed Cali BBQ locations (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com/p/we-opened-3-ghost-kitchens-they-failed) myself and chosen to document those hard choices publicly, I know how rare that honesty is among founders. Real leadership like that which flows from Danny Meyer is about having the courage to keep moving forward. “Especially in a hard economy, what we are all selling is hope,” he said. “In tough times, hospitality is the answer to what could possibly go right...” He pointed to the very last chapter of What Could Possibly Go Right? (https://www.ushg.com/what-could-possibly-go-right), the concept of essentiality. “Can we create businesses that genuinely make people’s lives better?” he asked. Collecting Dots to Connect Dots Danny talks about ABCD: Always Be Collecting Dots so you can Always Be Connecting Dots. One of the most meaningful dots in this 18-year story belongs to the late Mike Mills, the legendary pitmaster and founder of 17th Street BBQ. Back in 2018 in Texas, Mike and his daughter Amy sat down with me for an interview on Behind the Smoke. During our conversation, Mike and Amy spoke with admiration about their relationship with Danny Meyer (https://youtu.be/uP3uKEpAb2w?t=2512), reflecting on how Danny brought authentic barbecue to New York City through the Big Apple Barbecue Block Party and what he meant to the entire hospitality industry. Sitting across from Danny at Bourbon Steak eight years later, I played that clip of Mike talking about him. Watching Danny react to hearing Mike’s voice again, 6 years after he died, brought a rush of emotion into the room. It was a raw, beautiful reminder of how interconnected our industry truly is. That emotional momentum carried straight into page 186 of Danny’s new book, What Could Possibly Go Right? (https://www.ushg.com/what-could-possibly-go-right). In 1984, Danny saw Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George on Broadway. One song stayed with him for four decades: “Finishing the Hat.” That song is about an artist creating something on a canvas that used to be blank. When Danny reopened Union Square Cafe in 2016, he read those lyrics to his team on night two. To Danny, that’s opening a restaurant: imagining a place, building it, and letting people create memories in a room that used to be empty. I had marked page 186 in my copy with one word: GIFT. On Monday morning of interview week, I texted my friend Nick Osnaya at Left Coast Printing Pros. I was interviewing a dream guest, so could he make me a custom hat by Wednesday at noon? Five letters, one question: WCPGR? (What Could Possibly Go Right?, the name of Danny Meyer’s book (https://www.ushg.com/what-could-possibly-go-right).) Wednesday afternoon, the hats arrived, and I boarded my flight for the interview. After playing the Mike Mills clip, I read Danny that passage from page 186 and handed him the custom hat. He put it on. We both had tears in our eyes. “God bless you,” he said. “I will cherish that.” Then he signed my book: “Thank you for your passion for hospitality & culture.” My conversation with Danny Meyer started with his book that I read in 2008. It wove through my interview with Mike Mills in 2018. It grew into a note in the margins when we launched a media company. And it culminated in sitting across from Danny in 2026. That is an 18-year timeline of collecting dots before they ever connected. You have to build relationships when there’s no immediate opportunity. You have to empower a media team to capture the journey. You have to record, publish, learn, and repeat. You have to ask for what you want. So tell me: What’s on your whiteboard? This newsletter edition is sponsored by Cerboni Accounting and Financial Services. (https://cerboniservices.com) To learn more about how Cerboni Services helps restaurant operators build year-round financial roadmaps, visit cerboniservices.com (https://cerboniservices.com). This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit restauranttechnology.substack.com (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

3. 

   23 Sept 2026

   5 Lessons I Learned From Interviewing the Top CEOs in Hospitality

   Running a restaurant will consume you if you get trapped in the daily firefight. Between broken ice machines, labor shortages, food cost spikes, guest complaints, and vendor delays, it is easy to spend 100% of your energy just trying to make it to last call. At Cali BBQ, we’ve been grinding on the restaurant side for 18 years. On the media side, we’ve been at it for almost a decade. And for the first 5 years of running Cali BBQ Media (http://betheshow.media), we made zero dollars. It wasn’t until we figured out how to build real digital hospitality and monetize media that we started securing major brand partnerships with companies like Toast (https://toast.betheshow.media), Pepsi, Restaurant365, Uber, Google, and Ring. The top leaders in hospitality do not just survive the day. They play the long game. Restaurant owners cannot afford to think like traditional restaurant owners anymore; we have to operate like media companies, technology adopters, and community builders. Here are five hard-earned lessons from sitting down with the CEOs, founders, and operators shaping the future of our industry. 1. Dream Big (And Stay Grounded on the Floor) If you want to access the top minds in your industry, you have to be willing to pitch a vision that sounds ridiculous to average thinkers. When Cali BBQ switched point-of-sale systems from Aloha to Toast in 2020, I told Will Eppard, Toast’s sales director in San Diego at the time, that I was going to interview the cofounders of Toast. He laughed. Because at the time, it sounded absurd. We were a local BBQ joint running a media experiment that hadn’t generated a dime in profit. Two years later, after interviewing then-CEO Chris Comparato, I was invited to speak on a customer panel in front of 1,300 Toasters at their sales kickoff. Right after that keynote, I sat down with co-founder Aman Narang (now CEO) to record an episode of Restaurant Influencers. That moment started with a massive goal and years of small, daily actions. What stood out from Aman was the mindset behind the tech: the best technology leaders obsess over their customers’ problems. Toast was built by founders sitting inside restaurants, watching ticket bottlenecks in real time, and writing code to solve operational pain points. Dream as big as possible, but stay obsessively close to the operator. 2. Play the Long Game (Relationships Compound) The high-value interview, the strategic partnership, or the major brand deal almost never happens on the first ask. It often doesn’t happen on the second or third ask either. Sometimes it takes 25 touchpoints across multiple years. When we went heavy into ghost kitchens during the pandemic, we took major risks. Through that entire buildout, I told the team at CloudKitchens that eventually I was going to sit down with Travis Kalanick, co-founder of Uber and founder of CloudKitchens, to talk about why a barbecue brand was building a media company. Eventually, it happened. Travis didn’t just grant the sit-down, he turned the tables and interviewed me in front of his entire CloudKitchens all-hands team. That door opened because we stayed consistent when there was no instant payout. In media, tech, and restaurants, trust compounds over time. Keep showing up, keep getting better, and play the long game. 3. Real Leaders Want to Share the Struggle One of the biggest misconceptions in business is that top-level CEOs are completely unreachable. Some are guarded, but the most impactful leaders actually want to share their origin stories, their struggles, and what they’re building. That was my experience with Jordan Boesch, co-founder and CEO of 7shifts (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordan-boesch/). We originally reached out because our restaurant needed to upgrade from legacy scheduling software like HotSchedules to a modern, cloud-based workflow. That initial operational reach-out turned into Jordan appearing on Digital Hospitality, Rising Tides Live, and Restaurant Influencers (https://www.entrepreneur.com/growing-a-business/he-founded-a-creative-employee-management-tool-in-a-quiznos/477136) published by (https://www.entrepreneur.com/growing-a-business/he-founded-a-creative-employee-management-tool-in-a-quiznos/477136)Entrepreneur Magazine (https://www.entrepreneur.com/growing-a-business/he-founded-a-creative-employee-management-tool-in-a-quiznos/477136). We’ve reconnected in person multiple times at the National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago. What makes Jordan stand out is his openness. He regularly talks about product missteps, hard customer feedback, and the relentless work required to scale software. Great leaders are always seeking raw feedback from operators in the trenches to build better products. 4. Earn Visibility Before You Need It Nobody starts on the keynote stage. Everyone starts small, makes embarrassing mistakes, and figures out the playbook on the fly. Look at Troy Hooper (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jtroyhooper/). Before building Kiwi Restaurant Group and scaling Pepper Lunch across North America as CEO of Hot Palette America (and now Strategic Advisor to the Board), he was showing up daily on Clubhouse during the pandemic. He was giving away advice for free, testing ideas, and building relationships on LinkedIn and Instagram before the massive expansion deal was ever on the table. Now he hosts his own show The Pineapple Perspective and shows up weekly on (https://content.calibbq.media/rising-tides-live-2025-successes-and-challenges-goals-for-2026/)Rising Tides Live (https://content.calibbq.media/rising-tides-live-2025-successes-and-challenges-goals-for-2026/). Modern leadership is not granted by a title on a business card, it is earned by showing up consistently before anyone gives you a platform. Be visible, be useful, and build in public long before the crowd arrives. 5. Build Your Own Media Engine The single biggest lesson from interviewing world-class hospitality leaders is simple: Great leaders create their own media. They stop waiting for local newspapers, food critics, or trade magazines to tell their story. They build the digital infrastructure themselves. If you do not control your narrative, third-party delivery apps, review sites, and algorithms will control it for you. Omnichannel content (short-form video, podcasts, LinkedIn updates, YouTube series) is how you build trust at scale. Media is how prospective franchisees understand your vision. It is how top-tier talent discovers your culture before applying. It is how vendors, investors, and guests connect with your brand before ever stepping through the front door. The difference between good operators and industry-defining leaders is not that leaders have secret answers. It is that they are better at asking hard questions, telling honest stories, and staying visible long enough for scale to find them. That is how a single barbecue restaurant in San Diego (http://calibbq.media) transformed into a media company. That is how cold DMs turned into key partnerships, and how those partnerships turned into brand revenue. If you’re an operator navigating tech shifts, bad leases, or figuring out how to build your brand online, reach out on DM @Shawnpwalchef. Stay curious. Get involved. Ask for help. -Shawn This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit restauranttechnology.substack.com (https://restauranttechnology.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1)

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

2 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 13 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

25

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

0

Contact Restaurant Technology Podcast

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.