Announcing My next Writing Project

Dear readers,

At long last, I have decided what my next writing project will be. I have toyed with writing a novel as I believe I have several very interesting story lines percolating in my head. However, after spending some time at a recent business conference and some self-reflection with the aid of my personal coach, I have decided my next writing project will be a follow-up to my book Restaurant Management, the Myth, the Math, the Magic.

My first book was written for the independent restaurateurs in mind. It was designed as a guide, mentally, spiritually, and mathematically, to take a first-time restaurant operator through the necessary steps required to becoming successful. As is well reported, independent restaurants fail at it alarmingly high rate. My first book was dedicated to helping those who dreamed of opening a restaurant to beat the odds. There are lots of useful nuggets of restaurant wisdom in that first book, most importantly, the math portion that teaches operator how to price a restaurant menu for profit.

My next book will be dedicated to restaurant growth. As we all know in business, if you're not growing, you're dying. No business ever gets the luxury of staying in one place. There is no, "I got this restaurant running exactly the way I wanted to, so now I can relax, sit back, and harvest my rewards." (By the way, that will be one of the myths in my next book on restaurant growth!) The manuscript I'm writing now will be the next in the series of my restaurant books. I will guide restaurant operators into the next phase of business development, which is managing growth.

I will continue to use my weekly post in this space to talk about business, ethics, economics, and life. My next post will discuss the famous pilgrimage of Mansa Musa in 1324 and how that relates to the reparation debates in several States in the US. That article has been delayed because something very peculiar just occurred in the Northern State of Minnesota. Spring has arrived, and with it the tedious, albeit necessary cleanup of our yards. After, what seems like an eternity this past winter, the snow receded and revealed the sorry state of my poor yard. So, this weekend has been dedicated to the backbreaking work of raking, tilling the garden, multiple trips to the compost site, and the spreading of fresh mulch. I have also found myself pinched between a very fruitful business conference last week in Detroit and my annual trip to the National Restaurant Association show in Chicago this week. These external blips in my annual calendar have robbed me of the time I usually dedicate to writing my weekly column.

I'm excited to begin the next book, in what looks to be developing into a complete series of books, chronicling my 45 years in the restaurant industry. If one thought there were's pitfalls associated with opening a single restaurant, there are entire chasms to cross in building a restaurant company. I look forward to getting back in my writing space and sharing my restaurant growth experience.

Thank you to all my readers for supporting my work and following me on this journey.