Brianna Parisian on Tiny Experiments, Servant Leadership, and Managing Thrive Social’s Entertainment District in Downtown Chandler

Anthony Codispoti (00:01)
Welcome to another edition of the inspired stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. My name is Anthony Codispode and today’s guest is Briana Parijan, the chief operating officer at Thrive Social Company. Based in Chandler, Arizona, they focus on building communities one neighborhood at a time. They specialize in reviving historic downtown areas.

developing new restaurant concepts and creating vibrant community spaces. Brianna oversees daily operations and coordinates multiple departments across hospitality, restaurant development and community initiatives. She draws from experience in various operations and management roles at Liquid Sunshine projects, Barrett Financial Group, Sheridan Grand and others. Now, before we get into all that good stuff,

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the COO of Thrive Social, Brianna Parishan. Thanks for making the time to share your story today.

Brianna Parisian (02:01)
Absolutely, thanks for having me.

Anthony Codispoti (02:04)
So Brianna, you worked in a variety of different sectors from hospitality to financial operations. As you look back on your career before Thrive Social, can you pick out a formidable stop for you and talk through a lesson, a powerful lesson that you learned there?

Brianna Parisian (02:23)
Definitely. I would say it’s taking the opinion of others, taking like a worldly opinion, if you will, and trying to base my life and my career trajectory off of that. So I’ve always been in the hospitality industry. My first job was when I was 15 at a local cafe as a breakfast server, as a mom and pop shop. And every morning I would ride my bike there, do my shift, ride my bike home. And I loved it. I love engaging with people, building connections, different things like that.

as I realized like, okay, like I think the hospitality industry is for me. I started to branch out. I got into leadership at a local pizza place. And then I started working at Marriott International. I got a lot of flack for lack of a better word from friends, family saying, wow, you, you you work a lot. You work all these holidays. You do all these things. You need a better work life balance. And so I tried to make a switch and I got a job at a local brokerage called Barrett Financial.

And as I’m working there, I put in two years and I kept my job at Borrow’s and my job at Marriott in the meantime. I was like, this isn’t for me. Being behind a computer is not what I enjoy doing. I enjoy connections and building guest relationships and you can’t do that when you work in an office. ⁓ And so I am such a, I mean, I would talk to a wall if you put me in front of a wall. So our industry is great.

Anthony Codispoti (03:37)
You’re real people person.

So not just a people person, a wall person, you’re a talking person. Yeah. Okay.

Brianna Parisian (03:47)
Exactly. Yeah.

And so at that point, I was like, you know, I need to figure out what I’d like to do. ⁓ I hit a glass ceiling at the company I was at. It was either, ⁓ you know, sacrifice a couple of my personal values to continue to grow, or maybe find a different trajectory in the hospitality industry. ⁓ And so I reached out to the CEO of Thrive Social. At the time, it was Liquid Sunshine Projects.

I was like, hey, can I meet you for career advice? It seems like you really love your work-life balance. It seems like you love what you do. And you’re in the hospitality industry, and I’d love to just kind of chat with you. And at that point, he was like, I’ve always admired you. I thought you’ve done a great job. I want to build a place for you in my company. And I’ve always wanted you to work for me. And he offered me a job, and I started with him. And here I am a couple of years later.

Anthony Codispoti (04:40)
fun stuff. So let’s ⁓ go back a step here. When you were at Barrett Financial, you talk about the glass ceiling. And if you were going to stay there, it would have meant compromising some of your principles. Can you say more about that?

Brianna Parisian (04:55)
Yeah, so I didn’t love the company culture. was very, you scratch my back, I scratch yours. I, you know, when I worked at Borrow’s and I was there for eight, nine years, and that’s actually the company I was referring to at the glass ceiling. That’s where I would have to stop and work Sundays. And you know, Sundays is a non-negotiable for me. And I worked Sunday as seven out of the eight years I was there. And I was at the point where I was like, okay, like I really need Sundays off.

⁓ And there was no wiggle room to be like, okay, like, yeah, you can have Sundays off and work six days. Because I was like, I’ll work six days out of seven days. You know, just Sundays are a day that I need off. And that was kind of capped out. Yeah. And so there was no way like this is this is the schedule. There’s no changes. And I’m like, you know, as much as I love this company, and I respect, you know, the leaders in that company, that’s a non negotiable for me. And

Anthony Codispoti (05:37)
and they weren’t having it.

Brianna Parisian (05:51)
Barrett, I got a carrot dangled in front of me for a COO position actually. And I did all this leg work and then I met with the owner and he was like, no, we’re going to go in a different direction. Sorry that they led you on. And I was like, you know, I’m not loving it. Like here’s this corporate world that everyone thinks I need to get into. And I don’t love the carrot dangling. And I don’t love the you scratch my back, I scratch yours. I’m in good with this person so I get this promotion.

And then, Barrow’s, just wasn’t willing to sacrifice my Sundays. And so that’s, you know, I was in a rock and a hard place. I was really frustrated. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my career. I felt like I had made all these strides and progressed and given up Marriott. ⁓ I took a promotion at Barrow’s. wore a promotion at Marriott. And I felt like I’d given that up. And I was feeling really down and low. luckily for me, the first person I met with, ⁓ you know, happened to be a great mentor. So.

Anthony Codispoti (06:48)
And tell me that person’s name again. Brad. Brad. And so did you and Brad know each other from before? It sounds like he was admiring you from afar. What was the connection up to that?

Brianna Parisian (06:50)
He’s our CEO.

So I sold him coupon books when I was, geez, probably 10 or 11. And I wouldn’t leave this guy alone. I’m like, I know he owns a car wash. He doesn’t care if this book has a car wash coupon in it. I’m going to make my sales pitch great. And he wound up buying a couple of coupon books from me. yeah, I babysat his kids. And I never really interacted with him outside the coupon books. But he was like, you stood out to me. And then I developed a training program at Borrow’s. And his wife was like, like,

Anthony Codispoti (07:06)
Ha

Brianna Parisian (07:30)
Are you happy at Barrow’s? And I’m like, yeah, thank you. I don’t want to work in the bar industry. And for a couple of years before I decided to meet with him, the little seeds were dropped. Like, are you happy at your current job? I’m like, yes, thank you so much. And never thought much about it. And genuinely just wanted to meet with him to get career advice. And then he offered me a job, which I was not expecting. And ever since then, I’ve been working for him.

Anthony Codispoti (07:52)
And that was the first person you went and sat down with.

Brianna Parisian (07:55)
Yeah, you know, and I had milled it over because I had a couple great mentors in college and I’m really close with my, he was my DECA advisor in high school and we still talk. ⁓ But I was like, I want someone with real life, not an educational mentor, but like a general real life person that I look up to. And I texted him to get some advice and here we are.

Anthony Codispoti (08:18)
And so explain to us, layman’s terms, what does Thrive Social do?

Brianna Parisian (08:22)
Yeah, so, ⁓ jeez, we don’t do the same thing ever. Like, I cannot consistently tell you a day where I’ve had the same day or the same task. Ideally, what Thrive Social is, it’s the management company that manages all of Brad’s bars and restaurants. We also have a car wash. We’re building out our 501c3 charity. Our goal as a company is to create a creative environment for our team to thrive and creatively problem solve stuff.

as well as drive community engagement. So if we have a guest, all of our bars are within a walking distance. So you can throw a rock from one door to another door, which makes my life so easy on the weekends. ⁓ But our goal is like, if you’re leaving the pub, how do we get you to engage with Downtown Chambers more? And it doesn’t have to be going to one of our other bars. We have great local restaurants, Santan Brewing Company we have a great relationship with. There’s great retailers.

how do we refer people to stay down in downtown Chandler and make it a focal point.

Anthony Codispoti (09:24)
So it goes beyond just ⁓ promoting and supporting your own businesses, but to really look at this as like a larger community.

Brianna Parisian (09:32)
Yeah, for lack of a better word, how do we make downtown Chandler an entertainment district? How do we drive the economy to get more revenue down here?

Anthony Codispoti (09:40)
And so how do you think about that?

Brianna Parisian (09:42)
We think about it in a couple different ways. ⁓ Guest service is one of our biggest pushes as Thrive Social. And that doesn’t mean just in our store. So we have a guest service manager who does a phenomenal job and she’ll walk people, say you’re leaving Murphy’s. You don’t know what your next step is. You’re kind of barred out. Well, like, why don’t we walk you somewhere that has a great activation? So burst of butterflies. I sit with the owner on the downtown Chandler Community Partnership Board and we’ll walk people over there and be like, yeah, go paint something. You know, this is a great opportunity.

Our neighbor, she has a retail shop. Hey, have you tried this retail shop? We’ll walk them over there, introduce them to the owner and create great community engagement within all of downtown Chandler and not just within the bars.

Anthony Codispoti (10:23)
When you say walk them over, actually sort of like a guided chaperone, like you’re walking with them. Here, let me show you where to go next.

Brianna Parisian (10:31)
Sure will.

Yeah, and we’ll have a full conversation. Hey, what are you in town for? Are you local? Where are you from? What brought you to downtown Chandler? What was the pull for you to come down here? And then in that time, they’re like, you know, this is so great. No one’s ever like taken the time to be like, no, like it’s over there. And you point. Absolutely not. Like take the next step and walk someone to somewhere. If someone asks us for directions, sure, like let’s walk you there. It can get confusing. You see a group.

that someone’s taking a picture, offer to step in, any of our employees offer to step in, take a picture, move on.

Anthony Codispoti (11:05)
So what you’re describing sounds amazing on paper, but how does it work in practicality? Because I don’t know, is it a server or a hostess or a bartender that is now taking away from the job that they were just doing to now spend several minutes to walk down and then come back? It seems like operationally that would create some challenges for you.

Brianna Parisian (11:32)
Yeah, and that’s a phenomenal question. So our in-store team, their goal is to always build engagement and add value. So they’re the people where if I’m walking through and I have a tray of beers and I notice a table is taking a selfie, that’s registered in my mind. I drop off my beers on my way back to the kitchen to go run food. I’m gonna stop and say, hey, can I take a picture of you guys? That takes maybe 30 seconds out of my day, but that builds a guest relationship that not a lot of places build. And that sticks in the guest’s brain.

That’s what our in-store team does. Our in-store team doesn’t traditionally walk people places unless we have a lull in business or say we have someone who has some type of disability or some type of restriction where like we need to go hold the door or we want to show them where the handicap ramp is. That’s something where we’re absolutely fine with our team taking 60 seconds out of their shift to walk someone out. Outside of that, we have our Thrive Social Executive team. So our Chief Operating Officer, Sarah.

Myself, our guest service manager, and then we have two guest service associates who are the people who do all the intermingling and walking people throughout and different things like that.

Anthony Codispoti (12:36)
Okay, so tell us about the different concepts under the Thrive Social Brand.

Brianna Parisian (12:41)
Absolutely. So we have Murphy’s Law, which is an Irish pub, Rebel and Rogue, which is a social hall. Think about it like not your average college bar, but your dad’s average college bar. So the idea was to make it a throwback to before technology was a thing and people actually engaged and talked to each other. Went and got a drink at a bar, threw darts and just had a great time. Black Sheep Wine Bar, which is the spin on it is not your average wine bar. We don’t like to do anything average at all.

And so instead of, know, we have wine tastings and these are the notes. It’s fun. If you don’t like wine, that’s fine. We have a great cocktailist. We have great food. Just come be you. We don’t care who you are. We accept everyone. And then Lola’s Liquors, which is an upscale cocktail lounge.

Anthony Codispoti (13:26)
Okay. And so the way you were talking, it sounds like ⁓ perhaps a big portion of the population that you’re serving are from out of town. They’re there for tourists or business reasons. Yes.

Brianna Parisian (13:39)
For the people that I try and engage with, yes, because I sit on the board of the Downtown Chandler Community Partnership. And that’s something that as Thrive Social, we as an executive team want to build that. Our in-store team builds phenomenal regulars though, and talk to a lot of locals.

Anthony Codispoti (13:56)
Okay. So do the other businesses in downtown Chandler operate similarly? Like are they walking people over to your businesses as well?

Brianna Parisian (14:06)
I ⁓ haven’t seen it late night. ⁓ I think there’s a difference in daytime business and nighttime business. So the daytime is when you can really engage with people and take the time to like build conversations and relationships. And that’s when retail is open. So that’s the great time to walk people over or my GM from Black Sheep and I were actually just walking to a storage unit and we saw guests with a Black Sheep bag.

in ⁓ Boutique on Boston, which is one of our neighboring retail stores. And know, my GM, Carrie was like, hey, I’m glad to see you checked it out. Like, you’re going to love it. You know, and that’s the type of camaraderie, if you will, that we like to build. I would like to think that retailers are like, hey, if you want a great place for a beer, right next door is Rebel and Rogue. ⁓ And sometimes, you know, we get feedback from guests like, hey, we referred to you. But to be honest with you, my day to day, it’s

I have way too many things going on to actually slow down and see if we get referrals from local businesses too.

Anthony Codispoti (15:09)
Sure, but you guys are leading by example and hoping that others will follow.

Brianna Parisian (15:14)
Yeah, and I wouldn’t even say that we do it with the intention of hoping we receive it back. Our intention is just to provide guests with a once in a lifetime experience that you don’t normally get at a restaurant.

Anthony Codispoti (15:27)
So you guys are over the top with the hospitality, walking people down. Obviously, there are lots of restaurant groups in the country where they own multiple bar and restaurant concepts. What you’ve just described there about walking people to something else nearby that they might find interesting, I think is a big differentiator. Any other things that set Thrive Social apart from other restaurant groups in the country?

Brianna Parisian (15:52)
I mean, I would personally say it’s our drive for the guest service. ⁓ Working at Marriott really gave me the trajectory of like, I love making guest experiences. So anything that we can do to make a guest experience means a lot. I don’t know a ton of restaurant groups that have a designated guest service department with a guest service manager.

I’m assuming that most restaurant groups probably has like a manager that’s dedicated to that on a shift and that’s part of their pre shift. But having like a designated guest service department has made a world of difference for us. It’s a clear standard of what we want our guest service to be. It’s an extra three people plus myself who are in the stores making that experience. And then we do the sampling, we do different things. So like if we have a seasonal cocktail.

We’ll go around to different guests and be like, hey, like this is our seasonal cocktail. What do you think about it? Or hey, you know, these are a couple things we’re trying out for the menu. We’d love for you to vote on it and engage guests and get different feedback.

Anthony Codispoti (16:55)
Now, Brianna, your title is COO. Am I correct? Because I thought I heard you reference somebody else as the chief operating officer. ⁓

Brianna Parisian (17:03)
⁓ CEO, Brad Ingerfield, he’s

the owner, he’s the chief executive officer.

Anthony Codispoti (17:07)
Okay,

I misheard then. ⁓ Okay, so you started out executive operations manager, director of operations, and now today the COO. ⁓

Brianna Parisian (17:18)
I actually started out as an executive assistant and then grew into the operations role shortly after. At the time, Brad had a business partner and he was like, you know, she needs an assistant. And I was like, I’ll be your assistant. I don’t care. And within like two or three months, he’s like, you know what? I dig it back. I think I need you to be the operations manager. And then it just kind of grew from there.

Anthony Codispoti (17:21)
Okay.

Which one of those transitions was the most challenging for you?

Brianna Parisian (17:46)
I would say operations manager to director of operations. ⁓ That’s when I really got my legs under me and grew my own wings, if you will. I think a struggle that I’ve always had is, you know, and I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s a struggle because respecting authority is important. ⁓ But if there’s an authority figure, it’s, you know, I’m respecting what their wishes are.

And challenging authority has always been kind of a harder thing for me, even if I disagree with their leadership style. So Brad’s initial business partner, the culture wasn’t where it is now. And the team didn’t really respect her. It wasn’t a great relationship. And so here I am, her assistant, or even when I moved into the operations manager role, everyone saw me through a lens that they see her. And I wasn’t really.

to like ever able to like come out on my own and connect with my team or do things and be like, hey, no, like let’s creatively problem solve. What do you think we should do? Cause that’s not how she ran the company. And so that transition was really, really hard because not only do you have to earn the respect to your staff, but like you have to show them that it’s okay to mess up. I mean, nine times out of 10, I probably mess up, you know? And it’s, we’re okay with you problem solving and it not being the right solution.

⁓ The issue comes in where if we’re doing the same solution 10 times after we’ve established it’s not the right solution, that’s where it’s like, ooh, okay. Or if we do something unethical that we know isn’t the right solution, that’s where we start to get the gray area and it’s like, okay, well, how do we solve that? I think we’re doing it maliciously. What’s our next step?

Anthony Codispoti (19:30)
And so part of the culture that needed to evolve was there was a lack of respect for this one partner, it was not a good kind of two way relationship with the rest of the team. But also it sounds like there was this ⁓ cloud of don’t mess up is if you mess up, like we’re going to come down on you pretty hard. And so I’m going to guess you can’t really change that one, the first part of the culture until maybe that partner is no longer

active in the organization, but that second part of letting people know that it’s okay to make mistakes, let’s not make the same mistake over and over again, and let’s not make ⁓ unethical choices. But how did you go about from a practical standpoint, letting people know it was okay to make honest mistakes?

Brianna Parisian (20:21)
Yeah, so as soon as the partner was out of the picture, ⁓ I remember pretty vividly one of the managers making like, it was a, I wouldn’t even say it’s a pretty big mess up, but they made a mess up with the drawer and they were afraid to tell me about it and they hid it. And you know, in reviewing our financials at the end of the week, I was like, hey, what’s going on here? And you can just see the look of fear on her face. And she lied to me, like just a bold face lie. And I was like, hey,

you know, I’m not saying that you’re lying, but I can tell you’re not telling me the truth. Like numbers don’t lie. And it’s okay if you messed up and you don’t know how to do something, that’s fine. I’m willing to help you. I would love to show you how to do it. Just tell me you messed up. I don’t think it was malicious, but we need to be able to communicate openly for us to be successful as a company. And then from there, it started, well, hey, I have a question. I’m like, okay, what’s your question? You know, can I do this?

Well, I don’t know. Can you? Like, we’re entrusting you to be the general manager. Why wouldn’t you think you can do that? well, I don’t know. I always had to ask. Like, you had to ask permission to post a schedule? Why? What do you think? You know, what are the pros and what are the cons to this? What’s our labor percentage? Why do you need a higher labor percentage? Walk me through your thought process. Okay, that makes sense. Why don’t we move forward then? You know, instead of just a blatant yes, no, my way or the highway, it’s

Well, let’s talk about it. Like you have the ability to ⁓ creatively problem solve. Absolutely call me. me day or night if you have a question, but let’s creatively problem solve.

Anthony Codispoti (21:55)
I love this because you know, I talk a lot with my guests about the culture and the company. And I think for so many people listening that are running their own businesses or you know, in a position of leadership, like how do we change the culture for like, you know, we put a plaque on the wall, you choose a motto, slogan, whatever. But I think, you know, the story that you just shared there shows that really the best path there is just living.

what you want the culture of the company to be, right? You want it to be more collaborative. You want there to be that open, honest ⁓ conversation to happen on a daily basis. And so when you’re confronted with a big mess up, a big mistake, and the person is initially trying to sweep it under the rug, ⁓ you could come down hard, you could bring the sledgehammer, but that’s not

going to foster the kind of culture that you ultimately want to develop. Did you have that in mind going in or was this just sort of your personality and it just kind of unfolded that way?

Brianna Parisian (23:04)
Yeah, I mean, it’s definitely something that I’ve always been. You know, coming from eight years of leadership in a restaurant before I started this job, that’s how I’ve always been. Like, it’s okay to mess up, but we’re gonna correct it and we’re gonna move forward and then we don’t wanna see that same mess up again. Now, if the problem is presented at a different light and you try your best to solve the problems with the tools I’ve given you, great. If you blatantly are just like, meh, now we have the issue. And that’s, I…

how I’ve always been. Now the interesting part is my boss and I have the same philosophy just with different variations. So when he talks he’s like no you know creatively problem-solved there should be no like there’s no authority we don’t have authoritative relationships and I’m like hey I hear you like and that’s valid right however you give a bunch of 21 year olds the we don’t have

authority and there’s no authoritative relationships and be creative well now you have a dirty bar and stuff like that so we’ve had some really great conversations with I hear you and I respect that and that’s exactly my thought process but we can’t use that type of verbiage so we’ll have high level conversations if you will where we’re on the same page and then we execute it a little differently like hey here’s your guys’s framework now let’s be creative within the framework

And so I think it was really validating to already have that mindset and then have a boss that has that same mindset. ⁓ And I didn’t have to change my personality or the way that I work at all. It just ebbed and flowed. And I have a really good relationship with my leadership team, at least I think so. I would hope that they would say the same thing. Where we joke around, I I probably know more about their personal life than some of my pretty good friends’ personal life.

They come in here and my office is a safe space. You can say anything you want in this office as long as that door is shut and your team can’t hear it. Your team’s driving you crazy, that’s fine. You guys drive me crazy too. Like this is the safe space to talk about it. Now I don’t ever want to hear you talking about your team in the store, but if someone’s frustrating you, you can come talk about it in the office and I can turn off my manager brain and you can just vent. If it’s a problem we need to solve, manager brain can stay on and we can address it.

If you and your boyfriend, you and your girlfriend, you and your wife got into a fight and you need to come vent my office, great. I probably won’t remember in 30 minutes anyway, but this is a safe space for you guys. And I think that was a helpful tool of like, okay, like manage your brain on or manage your brain off. Are we venting? Do we need to problem solve? What’s going on there? And that’s what really created the open and honest communication that I think a lot of upper management and store level management lack.

Anthony Codispoti (25:44)
That’s really interesting. It makes me think of I’m gonna I’m gonna forget who I heard this from. But in terms of like a spousal relationship, I’m married, understanding going into the conversation, do you want helped? Do you want to be heard? Or do you want to hug? And I don’t know, maybe the hug comes into the plan there in your office, or maybe that’s off limits. But it sounds similar. Like, hey, are you just coming in here because you need to be heard? Like you need to vent? Okay. Or is this something that

where you’re asking for my help to resolve it. Is that kind of how you think about it? okay, which path or do I, which mind track do I need to be on?

Brianna Parisian (26:23)
Absolutely. we like, we don’t ever want someone to change to fit in a box. like I, hugs, not my thing. No, thank you. Please don’t touch me. And like my team knows that and it’s something we joke about, right? ⁓ But we have a manager who is a little bit more on the emotional side and like, okay, Bri, like I’m gonna cry. Like if you want to turn around, I’m gonna cry. And I’m like, okay, I’ll go get you a glass of water. Like, you know, but we want everyone to be vulnerable.

⁓ And no one should ever have to change their personality to fit on our leadership team. That’s what makes us so great at engaging with different individuals is every single one of us has a different personality. Every single one of us has a different strength. And the way that I manage our Black Sheep GM is not how I manage our Murphy’s GM. They’re two very separate individuals who need very different instructions or very different support or different things like

Anthony Codispoti (27:17)
So I hear a lot of talk about the culture that you are instilling with the folks that you interact with on a regular basis, a lot of the GMs, a lot of your, you know, leadership team. When you think about kind of your frontline people working in the bars, restaurants, the know, the front of house back of house, how do you guys approach in a very competitive labor market, ⁓ both recruiting, hiring,

and retention. How do you hold on to good folks?

Brianna Parisian (27:48)
Yeah, so we show our team that they’re valued. And again, I would hope our team would be like, you know what? Yes, I am valued. So for example, one of our shift leads at Rebel, and I’m going to preface that I believe in making sure that our managers feel enabled in the store. So if I walk in, I’m going to say hi to all of our servers. But if I notice something wrong, I’m going to talk to the manager. Hey, when I walked in, I noticed three tables are dirty. That’s a really poor example for when people walk in. First impressions mean a lot.

Can you please connect with the server and make sure that we’re taking the time to bust the tables before we do our side work? You know, different things like that. Because I want our managers to feel empowered. I never want them to feel like they’re undercut. ⁓ But you know, we’ll banter. Like, I think that there is a line that needs to be drawn between the hourly team members and the executive leadership team to where, like, I don’t want to engage in your personal life. I don’t think that’s appropriate. And I think it gets messy that way. ⁓

And I think that shift leads and managers should engage in their team’s personal life in the sense of like how I have an open door policy. If you have a teammate that’s having a hard time, they should be able to go talk to you in the office. You can be like, do you need help problem solving? You know, are you just trying to get it out? What do you need for your shift? I also run our HR department. So if someone needs to talk to me, they email our HR email and they can set up a meeting. But in my day to day, I don’t think it’s appropriate because there’s so much intermingling.

in restaurants that I don’t want to be involved in a drama level. With that being said, you you walk in, you talk to your team and you know, one of our shift leads, Bre, I’m the employee of the month. And I was like, my gosh, that would be great if we had an employee of the month, you know, we just we don’t have that. ⁓ you know, bantering and like making sure people like I hear you and I see you like we don’t even do that. ⁓ So for Christmas, I got her a plaque that said, you know, her name.

Anthony Codispoti (29:17)
Yeah.

Brianna Parisian (29:41)
And then an employee that has worked every month ⁓ as a joke because we don’t have an employee of the month. you know, different things like heavier things. One of our servers at Murphy’s, mom passed away and she wanted to work her shift. She did not want to go home. I’m like, you sure? Like, I’ll work your shift. I have no problem working in the store. And she’s like, no, like I want to stay. I want to get my mind off it. We sent her flowers the next day. ⁓ Two of our team members just had a baby and

we are paying her out full three weeks of sick pay. Not a lot of companies are gonna do that. We sent her flowers. ⁓ Personally, I sent her money and was like, hey, like door dash some food on me. One of our store managers had a baby and I ⁓ were paying him his full paternity leave, which again, a lot of companies don’t do. I went over and I met his baby. I brought his girlfriend food, sent her money to go get a massage, different things like that. So like we try and be as actively involved.

supporting our staff from an appropriate level.

Anthony Codispoti (30:45)
That’s really cool. And so I’ve heard you talk about the CEO, you’re the COO, you also run HR. And I know, and I know, I know every company is sort of different in their structure. Is there a CFO as well? Or are some of those duties kind of split between you and the CEO?

Brianna Parisian (30:50)
Right now, right now!

It would be me and the CEO. the only, we have a chief culinary officer who runs our backer house. He is phenomenal. His creations are phenomenal. His team’s phenomenal. We have our chief marketing officer, Sarah, myself, and then Brad. So those are all of our high level, like, executive positions. And then HR, accounting, pretty much all of our financials outside of what Brad does on a day-to-day basis fall over to me. So I do all of our…

like AP, AR accounts, and then at the end of the year, gather all of our tax information, send it over to our accountant, and he takes it from there.

Anthony Codispoti (31:40)
That’s all the hats, Brianna.

Brianna Parisian (31:41)
Yeah,

Brad likes to call it talent stacking.

Anthony Codispoti (31:46)
Well, when you give it an official powerful name like that, then it sounds like an honor that’s been bestowed upon you rather than, I don’t know, overworking. How does it feel though in real life?

Brianna Parisian (31:57)
No, he’s great. Just like we show appreciation to our team. You know, we were in a meeting one time and I was like, hey, can I take the weekend off? I’m going to go watch my brother’s soccer game. I’m trying to figure out my flights. And like as we’re sitting there, he bought me a flight and he’s like, yeah, here’s your flight. Like, have fun watching his game. So he shows his appreciation. I went to Ireland this last year and you know, he like sends me a message. He’s like, hey,

throw you a bonus just so you have some more spending money. Enjoy Ireland. Thanks for all you do. So, yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (32:26)
It’s cool. those

little isolated incidents, those kind of one offs, they can have such a powerful impact on what you feel in your heart, right? Like it was nice to have the flight paid for. It was nice to have the bonus to have, you know, extra spending money to have a little bit of fun. But I’m going to guess like a big maybe the biggest part of it is just how it made you feel inside, how it made you feel valued and treasured.

Brianna Parisian (32:54)
No, absolutely. And that’s something that I’ve always done, you know, even at 16, ⁓ texting my counter staff like, hey, what do we want for coffee? It’s on me. And this is the first time I’ve been in a leadership role where I have a budget to do things through the company, which is great. ⁓ And it doesn’t mean we use it every month. It doesn’t mean, you know, I still don’t go out of my way to do things myself, but the fact that he values team members from such a high level and he empowers us as managers to be able to go do things for.

Our staff, just, it makes me able to bless them tenfold. Because the budget that I have in my personal finances to do things for our team, I also have a budget and a professional finance to do things. And that just means that instead of reaching five people that month, we got to reach 10 people that month.

Anthony Codispoti (33:39)
Nice. ⁓ And so you guys are about to open DOS DS. When is when does this take place?

Brianna Parisian (33:45)
So we might be pivoting it to a different concept. So the fun part about Brad, the fun part for Brad is he is, is he is one of most creative people that I’ve ever met. The fun part for me is I get to problem solve as we go. The also stressful part is, okay, great, I problem solved this one concept. Oh, we changed our mind, we’re going over here.

Anthony Codispoti (33:47)
Okay. Okay.

The fun part for Brad. Brad gets to be very creative.

Brianna Parisian (34:12)
⁓ So it sounds like our fifth concept is going to be a different concept. It’s going to be a cocktail lounge, ⁓ which I think will fit the space that we have for it a little bit better and hopefully Dostoe’s comes in a couple years.

Anthony Codispoti (34:26)
Okay, I was gonna ask what is sort of the cadence for you guys opening up new locations?

Brianna Parisian (34:31)
I think it depends, know, it’s Brad and I both send each other ideas back like, I’m like, Hey, what about this idea? Hey, what about this concept? And then we’ll like put it on the back table. And we’ll see when we get a space like what’s going to fit this space best, what’s gonna, you know, how can we take an existing business and expand it into that space? What can we do to creatively problem solve if there’s only so many liquor licenses? So how do we creatively problem solve this? For example, when we open Lola’s ⁓

It’s field restaurant concepts is the official business for Murphy’s and then it has two separate DBAs. So that’s how we creatively problem solve. They’re the same business, just two separate DBAs with two separate fronts. And then there’s a ghost kitchen in what was so.

Anthony Codispoti (35:12)
What problem did that solve?

Brianna Parisian (35:14)
So that solved getting a liquor license for Lola’s. Liquor licenses are very, very hard to come by. And so instead of having to find a liquor license, we did the same business and we just did two separate DBAs under the same business license and same liquor license and they’re attached, but a guest wouldn’t know it’s attached. So there is a trap door, if you will, that opens to the hallway of Murphy’s. And so it’s the exact same business, just two separate designs.

Anthony Codispoti (35:39)
Okay, clever. And you’ve mentioned the 5013C a couple of times. Tell me more about that.

Brianna Parisian (35:45)
So Good Neighbors is our way to give back to the community. ⁓ And Brad’s wife, Christy, is one of the most generous people I’ve ever met. And I think this is one of her power projects, something that she’s really passionate about. And Brad’s like, you know what? That’s a great way to tie our restaurants back into giving back to the community, because we will write checks, we’ll do fundraisers for the firefighters or local law enforcement associations. We’re huge on supporting military and first responders.

Our Chandler first responders are phenomenal. We’re on a first name basis with Chandler Fire and Chandler PD, just being open late night. you know, God forbid you’re in a bad situation, having first responders that you’re close with is always a great thing to have in your pocket. And so we give back in all the different ways that we can. Brad’s constantly like, hey, like you don’t even have to ask me, you go donate to whoever you need to donate through the businesses.

And so Good Neighbors is our way to do different type of fundraisers and events and then just donate directly to a charity, a different charity or a different foundation.

Anthony Codispoti (36:47)
Give me an example of one of these fundraising events.

Brianna Parisian (36:50)
Sure, so we did the bagpipers. So the fire department has bagpipers for fallen firefighters, first responders, different things like that. And we had a fundraising night where they came in and the bagpipers bartended. And in order to truly do donations, bagpipers can’t really bartend, firefighters are back there and they’re fun to look at and they’re fun to engage with. But my store manager and I worked the event and then all the tips went to them.

people were donating all night to them. did a part of the proceeds to them and then we just wrote them the check and they got it.

Anthony Codispoti (37:25)
That’s fun. so are most

of the donations come through in the form of a check or cash, as opposed to, I don’t know, here’s blankets or something else that you might need.

Brianna Parisian (37:35)
Yep, we write checks or we’ll do gift cards for people to raffle. ⁓ We did the Chandler Law Enforcement Association. We helped one of their fundraisers back in April. We donated a couple like high-end bottles of whiskey that’s allocated and you can’t get in stores. ⁓ So we pulled our allocations, donated those, wrote them a check, did percentage of sales, and we allowed them to host there.

Anthony Codispoti (37:58)
Well, that’s fun. As you guys think about, you, are sort of sending ideas back and forth, new concepts. Do you ever think about opening up something outside of Chandler, or is it important to you to stay in the city?

Brianna Parisian (38:13)
You know, we’ve talked about opening stuff outside of Chandler. ⁓ I think I was just elected to sit on the DCCP board ⁓ in our landlord is incredible. And so I’m sitting on the board on his behalf to make sure that his interests are represented. And then we’re going in a good direction. And I think right now, since that big change just happened, we would probably focus most of our efforts in Chandler, at least for the next three or four years, and then maybe branch out outside of

Anthony Codispoti (38:43)
Is it hard to find space? I don’t know if I’ve ever been to, I mean, I’ve been to Phoenix before. And so I’m going to guess I haven’t been to that suburb. is it pretty dense or are there building opportunities there?

Brianna Parisian (38:57)
It’s hard to find the right space. ⁓ So for example, excuse me. ⁓ It’s hard to find the right space. So you want to be smart where you put your lease. ⁓ Arizona Avenue is a major street that separates downtown Chandler. Not a lot of people like to cross Arizona Avenue. So it’s not a great business venture, even though there’s two spots open across Arizona Avenue to put a bar over there.

People always want to bar hop on the side with the most activities. It also is hard to find a reasonable space. If someone wants to charge you $45 a square foot, you have to kind of crunch the numbers, see what your margins are going to be like, and make a good business decision. And I will say that that’s one thing that I admire about Brad is we’ll take the time to be like, is this a financially good decision before pulling the trigger on a new concept and having it fail.

⁓ I think it’s important to make sure you think through those type of things and I have so many friends in the industry and just watching different industries and concepts either go under or not do as well and people are not motivated. I appreciate that we take the time to think that through before we jump both feet in.

Anthony Codispoti (40:11)
Are you noticing trends here as we record this in early 2026 of what seems to be working in the space and what isn’t?

Brianna Parisian (40:21)
Definitely, in downtown Chandler specifically, I would say more bar-driven concepts are working, but I do think that a few more restaurants are needed. And so how do you find the happy medium where you have a successful business, but you’re contributing to the economy and you’re contributing to an area well? Because anyone can throw a bar in there. Now a profitable…

Profitable bar that’s iffy, but anyone can just like up and throw a bar somewhere But how do you make it where it contributes to a society and an entertainment district? Well, and I think in the current economy Where a lot of people are failing is they’re not adding value and they’re not adding Not only are they not adding value to their business, but they’re not adding value to The district that you’re in and that’s where we tend to see a downtick ⁓

And I tell our team all the time, know, thrive social, our companies, that’s our business. Whatever else is happening in downtown Chandler, it is not our business. It doesn’t matter. So we’ll have guests come in and say different things about neighboring bars. And we’re just like, hey, like, sorry you had that experience. We hope we can save your image of downtown Chandler. ⁓ Because when people think they’re like, ⁓ downtown Gilbert’s the place to go. Well, how do you change that? All the bars in downtown Chandler should be working together to change that narrative.

because that’s how we get more revenue and more foot traffic down here. ⁓ And I think a lot of bars miss that mindset and they’re like, well, I’m just trying to make the money right here and right now. Well, long-term, you need to think about the economy’s turning down. People are careful about where they’re spending their money. How do you stand out as a bar, as a district to get people to come down and spend their money here?

Anthony Codispoti (42:07)
It’s interesting that you say that a well run bar, the right concept on the right way, ⁓ seems to be working better than, you know, a restaurant, typical restaurant concept. You know, one of the things that I’ve seen, I read a lot that ⁓ overall alcohol consumption is down. ⁓ What are you guys noticing? Is that playing out for you in your business or not so much?

Brianna Parisian (42:36)
⁓ Yes and no. So I’ll switch to, I’ve been talking as you know, daytime COO, now switch to nighttime COO. And I think this is another disconnect, right? Like I’m down here on the weekends till three, four in the morning, New Year’s Eve, I was here till 5 a.m. ⁓ Down here to support my in-store team. Sometimes I jump in and bartend. I’m here to do our end of year, end of month inventory. ⁓ And so you get to see the people come out of the Uber with the shooters and

you engage with people who are like, yeah, it’s way cheaper to pregame at home and then nurse a beer all night. And so that registers something in my mind. Well, how do I, because yes, we do see that alcohol sales are down. How do I get people after seven o’clock to spend money? And if they’re not spending on liquor, what do I do to get them to spend money? So that’s where we’re like, okay, let’s, how do we push food sales? One, it’s safer to be eating while you drink. So how do we make this a safe environment for everyone?

And two, if people aren’t spending money on liquor, how do we get them to engage on food? Do we want run specials? Does our team greet everyone with, can we start you with a basket of fries? Do we sample fries? Do I go in and send out fries to tables or send out tumblers or send out something on our late night menu to tables and then guests see it go by and like, hey, that’s a great idea. I should eat something. ⁓ So that’s just another way that we’re like creatively problem solved.

Anthony Codispoti (43:55)
Hmm.

That’s interesting. You talk about you see, you know, routinely people jump out of Ubers and they’re throwing back when you say a shooter, get me up to speed. You talk about like a little airplane bottle.

Brianna Parisian (44:11)
Yeah, and you know what, it’s hysterical because like, we’ll have, you New Year’s Eve, I watched someone hop out of a party bus, and you know, two Coors bottles, or not bottles, cans, stuck them in their pockets. And I’m like, hello. And you know, I radio over and I’m like, I tell our security manager, I’m like, hey, I don’t know if Murphy’s heard me go up front, that guy has something in his pocket. And you know, Steve goes over, he’s like, hey, man, hate to be that person. But like, do you have beer in your pocket? The guy’s like,

Yeah, and like takes it out of his pocket, go throws it in the trash. And Steve’s like, okay, like if you go in there and you behave, I’ll buy you a beer later. You know, so the guy goes and behaves and you know, he winds up ordering like three or four beers and Steve’s like, all right, like frosty shot on me and goes and gives him a frosty shot. So how do you like stop that from happening? I don’t know. You know, you just in the moment you problem solve and you go from there.

Anthony Codispoti (45:06)
I really liked that approach. Initially, I would have thought no, come down on that guy. He’s you know, he’s coming in here, smuggled beers in, he’s not going to buy anything here. But what a great approach, right? You could have made that guy an enemy, you could have made him you know, you could have really come down on and made an example out of him. You made a positive example there. It’s like, hey, put the beers away, go in, order some beers, have some fun. And then I’m going to take care of you with a drink later. What a cool approach.

Brianna Parisian (45:33)
Yeah, and that’s our big thing is be proactive, right? Because we stopped him before he got in the bar, we protected our liquor license, we protected us as a company, our team, and guess what? You’re getting a free drink if you behave yourself. I mean, you know, when people drink, they just become funny human beings. And so my favorite thing is telling full grown men like, if we behave, your drink’s on me later, you know? And it’s just, it’s fun to engage and banter back and

Anthony Codispoti (45:59)
So we talked earlier about how, you know, earlier on friends and family were giving you a hard time earlier on in your career about not finding sort of like that good work life balance. And I hear you like you’ve got this huge responsibility and you know, your daytime CEO role, but it’s not like five o’clock comes and you’re just punching out every night and heading home. You’re talking about, you know, being there in the entertainment district till

the wee hours of the morning sometimes. Do you feel like you’ve found any kind of balance or are you just like all in this is my life all the time every day?

Brianna Parisian (46:36)
You know what, surprisingly, I have found a really good balance. And I will attribute that to who my boss is as a person and how generous he is with me taking time off. I’ve been out of the country. Let’s say I’ve been to six countries in the last two years. I’m like, my best friend needs me to go wash her kids in Washington. Like they have a family emergency. I need to go. And he’s like, of course, go. ⁓

lets me take time off for family vacations, going to see my brother. I’ve probably accumulated like 60 to 70 PTO days last year and he has not once skipped a paycheck or tried to like barrel down on it because while I’m gone, I’m still working. ⁓ You know, I’m in Ireland in a pub drinking a Guinness finishing our payroll. And, but that’s something that…

Excites me like I don’t mind working on vacation all my managers know that they can call me when they need me We have a really self-sufficient team now the first year and a half of me working here I didn’t take any time off It took a while to build a team and build a culture where you can step away and do things But now that I’ve built that he’s go like have fun in your 20s I want you to be happy you happy makes a successful business you not happy does not make a successful business so in season, I mean all work 70 80 hours and

not even bad an eye because come summer, you know, I’m taking three days off a week or I’m taking a week off to go see my brother doing different things, working remote. And I have that flexibility. And so, you know, working your tail off during season doesn’t seem so bad.

Anthony Codispoti (48:15)
I wonder how many people listening are now thinking, boy, I wish I could drink a Guinness when I run payroll.

Brianna Parisian (48:23)
Yeah, so it’s funny, know, because I never in my life would I’ve ever thought that I would be in a position where I can take my phone somewhere and be accessible to run five companies in a different country. Never did I ever think I would get there. And I think my family’s kind of realized like, wow, like, you know, she might be answering an email on Christmas morning or taking a phone call on Christmas Eve, but

she’s here, she’s off site, able to manage a problem and she’s not missing out on family activities. Or, you know, last night during my Bible study, I had to take a phone call and it was what, two minutes? And so I step outside, take the phone call, come back in, everything’s dealt with, the team’s like, okay, like I feel good, I know I can solve this problem. And we go from there, so.

Anthony Codispoti (49:14)
You know, Brianna, in my experience, a lot of growth can come from overcoming challenges. I’d like to explore a big challenge that you’ve overcome in your life, whether it’s personal or professional, how you got through that and what you learned.

Brianna Parisian (49:30)
Yeah, definitely. I would say a pretty big challenge, and I would even say it was with this current company ⁓ at the start of my growth, was balancing this career and my faith. ⁓ I’m a born-again Christian, and my faith is a huge part of my life. And I hope that when people have an interaction with me and they leave that interaction, they walk away thinking like,

wow, like if I was with another company that wouldn’t have been handled that way. I wonder why Brianna handled it that way. And that sparked something for people to be like, what’s different about her? What’s different about how our company is led? ⁓ But this is the first time I’ve ever worked in a bar industry. And so jumping feet first into a bar industry, because when I have a job, it’s not like you get 50 % of my time or like you can have 100 % when I’m there, but when I’m not there, don’t talk to me, it’s

You get 100 % and I’m going to make this run smooth and I’m not going to step away until it’s running smooth. Especially since I have a personal connection with my boss. This is a very personal job. If people are stealing or not giving good service or anything like that, take that very personally. This is impacting two people that I admire very much. And so the balance of diving in full frontal and

You know, being exposed to the things of the bar industry that I’d never been exposed to. ⁓ Being around like cursing more drugs, alcohol consumption, ⁓ crazy drama between different bars and downtown Chandler and different things like that. mean, like, whoa, like I’m A, uncomfortable. B, how do I manage all these people? C, how do I still be a faithful Christian and be in this environment?

and kind of figuring that out was a huge challenge. And there was a lot of spiritual warfare that went into it. And I can’t even say that it’s something I don’t battle with. If I’m immersed, St. Patrick’s Day week, I am down here seven days a week, 24 hours a day. I get a hotel room, I sleep for two hours and I come right back. Because we throw a festival. And so it’s just a lot to be around. And everyone’s like, take a shot with me. And I’m like, no, thank you.

Can I buy Coke off you? Probably a bad person asked that, you know? ⁓ And so I would say that’s definitely the biggest challenge.

Anthony Codispoti (52:05)
So do not drink alcohol at all.

Brianna Parisian (52:08)
I do, I socially drink. ⁓ definitely, I don’t drink to get drunk ⁓ and I don’t succumb to peer pressure, which when we threw our first manager Christmas party, I gotta tell you, I’ve never seen the boys more annoyed than when I refused to take shots after shots with them and they’re like, Bri, come on. And I’m like, no.

Anthony Codispoti (52:31)
good. So yeah, what what does that feel like inside of you? Like, I want to understand that conflict a little bit more. Is it? Do you feel conflicted because there are behaviors going on around you that you would not engage in? And so it just feels uncomfortable to be around it? Or is there something deeper where like, you almost feel like you want to try to correct some of that behavior?

Brianna Parisian (52:56)
No, I don’t think I want to try and correct it. I mean, there are times where, you know, one of the store managers tells me about his dating life and I look at him and I’m like, maybe let’s take a break and try and find a girlfriend, you know? ⁓ But I would say it’s more of, you know, here I am and I want to engage and I want my staff to feel comfortable around me, but I have nothing to contribute to this conversation. You’re telling me how you just went and slept with 10 people in a week.

I have nothing to contribute to that conversation. You’re telling me how you got blackout drunk, lost your phone, lost your keys, this is why I’m late, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. I have nothing to contribute to that conversation. I don’t even have a good way to help you solve that problem, so I’d stop getting blackout drunk. And so that’s the hard part. And then I’d say like, know, man of droughtings, I’ve let loose a little bit more over the course of the last two years and I’ve…

you know, casually started to drink with only my management team, just to kind of give them the win of like, yes, Bree’s having a drink with us. But it’s the never ending, like, please take a shot, please take a shot, please take a shot. And it’s just like, you know, you can only say no so many times and like they’re never going to get why. Like I don’t want to be drunk. I don’t like the feeling. I, you know, that’s just not something that like vibes with me. Meanwhile, you know, homeboy over here is five shots deep and he’s like not understanding why I don’t want to take a shot.

And that’s where the conflict is like, well, I’m not going to sit here and preach to you. Like, you know why I’m not taking a shot. I know why I’m not taking a shot. I don’t like the feeling of being drunk. ⁓ And then you get the comments of like, you know, we had an incident where a security guard, I caught him drinking at a local bar before a shift. And so we fired him. And, you know, I was pretty frustrated at the situation because we had put a lot of effort into the security guard. And one of the managers was like, well, not everyone’s like,

perfect Christian princess and I was like, hey now, like, was that a kind statement? And he’s like, no, but like, you know, not everyone lives up to your expectations. And I was like, when have you ever lived up to my expectations? Like, come on, let’s be so for real. And he’s like, okay, yeah, you’re right. And I’m like, now my expectation is for you as a company, like our expectation is you don’t, like you come in, if I breathalyze you, you blow a 0.0000. That’s in our handbook, that’s a policy. That’s not a life expectation that I have for someone that’s common sense.

And he’s like, okay, yeah, you’re right. But that was when he first became a manager. And I knew that I had to teach him to be in a leadership role. He was in the military. He’s been a bartender, security guard his whole life. And a lot of bars in Arizona don’t follow a liquor license. So he came from a bar that I’m not gonna name, that it’s like they’re taking shots and they’re not really carrying. And I’m like, yeah, we don’t do that here. And he’s like, okay, heard. But then…

to him, he was like, well, I don’t understand, like everyone does it. And I’m like, if everyone jumped off a bridge, would you like, come on now, it has nothing to do with the fact that I’m a Christian, it’s the fact that we have policies in place, right? And I’m like, now the fact that I’m a Christian, do I have a standard of ethics and morals that I live by? Absolutely. But I could say the same for just anyone, like you don’t have to be a Christian to be ethical, right? ⁓ And so that in and of itself was a learning curve for him and for me, cause like managing.

people who are like, well, it’s fine to drink, like it’s fine to do this. And it’s like, it’s not, it’s actually not. And kind of teaching them that without putting my faith too much in it and like getting them to like remove the faith aspect and be like, no, like these are actually policies that like are the law and that’s why she’s enforcing them. But it’s also opened up great conversations, you know, he was like, ⁓ I went on a date with this girl and she said she’s a Christian, she must be no fun. And I was like, hey, I’m fun. And he’s like, yeah, you’re right, okay. So.

Anthony Codispoti (56:42)
Do you ever have or have you ever had an employee come to you and want their exploring spiritually? They want to have like a conversation about your faith and understand it better.

Brianna Parisian (56:56)
⁓ I have at borrows. I have not at this job. Again, I try and keep like a separate, like my personal life away from our hourly like store employees just to ensure, cause I do run our HR department. I don’t want any conflict of interest. So I don’t want someone to be like, I can’t talk to Bri about this because X, Y, and Z or, you know, we have ⁓ a variety of different staff members, ⁓ you know? And so I don’t want someone to be like,

You know, my girlfriend and I are having a, like one of our AGMs, you know, I don’t want her to be able, or I don’t want her to not come to me and be like, my girlfriend and I are having a rough time. You know, I think it’s gonna affect me with guests today. Can I do admin stuff? Do you mind working the floor for me? Because she knows I’m a Christian and I don’t want her to have like an awkward where she’s like, I don’t wanna talk to Bri about this. And so I don’t talk about it with my hourly team. Store managers, yes. ⁓

But at borrows all the time. Yeah, I had several different counter girls ask me questions. ⁓ Here again, I want to make sure that my team feels comfortable to talk to me. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (58:00)
Yeah, you want a little separation.

⁓ Shifting gears a bit. ⁓ How about recommending a book or a podcast, maybe another resource that’s been really helpful for you, either in your personal or professional development.

Brianna Parisian (58:16)
Yeah, so Brad and I both just read the book Tiny Experiments. ⁓ And so in theory, instead of like trying to a big problem, trying to find a long solution for it, you do tiny experiments to see if they work before you implement them. So for example, our seating at Revel and Rogue, we were trying to reconfigure and instead of spending $100,000 to redo the inside with different seating, why don’t I do a tiny experiment, rearrange here, move the dart boards, put this here and let’s see how that works.

⁓ And so that’s been great with us problem solving and instead of making a knee-jerk decision to, okay, let’s just go to construction. Like, no, like let’s do a tiny experiment and see how it works first.

Anthony Codispoti (58:56)
Can give me another example? Because I love this concept that you’re talking about.

Brianna Parisian (59:00)
Yeah, absolutely. ⁓ our guest service department was a tiny experiment. ⁓ Emily, who’s our guest service manager, she started as a server. I hired her on our executive team as my executive assistant. So she did both. When we opened our fourth bar, I promoted her to a store manager. So then she was on our executive team as an assistant, and then she had a store manager. And a tiny experiment was I was telling Brad, know, like, I’m just one person and as much as I want to add value,

we should add value by adding a guest service department. And so like we had talked about that, then we slowly had Emily start to do things in the store guest service wise as a tiny experiment to see if it would be profitable, if it was a good idea before full sending another salary employee. And it turned out our little experiment did well. And so we hired her. And then after that, we were like, okay, well, like, let’s see if we hired hourly people under her, what that would do. And so we kind of did a little experiment. It worked well. So we hired two people.

Anthony Codispoti (1:00:00)
So in that particular experiment, how were you judging the results? What were the metrics that you were looking at?

Brianna Parisian (1:00:07)
Totally. So we have a log, if you will, that our guest service team fills out. So they’ll go and they’ll say, I spent $12.70 our cost for four drinks to go sample to X amount of tables. On these tables, here are their ticket numbers, here’s our ROI because five people bought them. So this is the money we made, this is the money we spent. And so that’s a good way for Brad to see the numbers. For me, it was the engagement in the stores. When I walk in,

Do I see them engaging? Do I see people laughing? Do I see them walking from late night one concept to another concept? Another tiny experiment was ⁓ there was a shift lead that I was like, know, he’s not ready to be an AGM yet, but he’s really, really good with our security team. You started as a security guard. Let’s try him out as a security manager. Let’s see if he can retain people in the bar. So like you have a bachelor at party at one bar. Let’s see if he can retain people and walk them over to our other bars. And so.

And that’s just me seeing it and then people running in like, your security manager was great. know, we were at one bar. We were walking through the breezeway. And it’s just a security. It’s not branded. And there was a guy talking to us and he was like, hey, like, glad to see you guys. Can I walk you over? And he walks them into another bar. Just like different things like that that we see from guest feedback, different things like that. I’m down here all the time. So my eyes.

Anthony Codispoti (1:01:33)
Yeah, the first ⁓ tiny experiment that you were talking about changing the seating around, what did you learn from that?

Brianna Parisian (1:01:41)
Feng Shui, and I don’t typically use that word. So ⁓ I hope that Sarah catches that when she sees this, because it was a very Sarah word of me. ⁓ But it allowed for people to, so it allowed us to max my seats. We added 10 more seats by moving around the seating, and then it created a better Feng Shui so people could walk down and then walk back and not have like all these traffic blocks and you can’t get the seats, and then you have the dart boards in the back.

It created your eye to draw back and for you to come in versus like this awkward hard stop of seats then dartboards this way.

Anthony Codispoti (1:02:19)
Brianna, we’ve talked about a lot of different hats that you wear. I’m curious what you think is your superpower.

Brianna Parisian (1:02:27)
Ooh, I honestly would love, I would really like to say managing a team. ⁓ I think it is a different skill set to manage people the way that they need to be managed and still have such an eclectic creative CEO where his vision for how the culture and his businesses are run are met while meeting all your managers needs and helping them in their weaknesses.

Anthony Codispoti (1:02:54)
What’s your favorite thing to do outside of

Brianna Parisian (1:03:00)
Good question. I love spending time with my dog and with my community, like grabbing dinner. I love, love, love finding different restaurants to check out, see their food, different drinks, you how they style their restaurants, what their leadership teams are doing, and just turn off my brain and have a guest experience instead of giving one.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:21)
Hmm. That stuff. Brianna, I’ve just got one more question for you today. But before we get there, I want to do three quick things. First of all, anybody who wants to get in touch with Brianna or the brand, their website is actually kind of fun. Why don’t you go ahead and tell people what the domain name is?

Brianna Parisian (1:03:40)
Yep, so our website is thrive social company.com. But if you were to email us, it’s Brianna B R I a n a at thrive th r i ve dot social.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:53)
And that’s the fun part, I think, is that you guys have, they call them top level domain names. That’s very unusual. It’s not a .com or a .net or .org. It’s .social. And that is a legit ⁓ top level domain. So write Brianna with two Ns at thrive.social. Any other contact info that we want to provide?

Brianna Parisian (1:04:14)
Yes, if you’re looking for any type of marketing connection or brand specific identity questions, Sarah with an H at thrive.social.

Anthony Codispoti (1:04:23)
Sarah with an H at thrive.social. And we’ll have links to all that in the show notes, folks. Also as a reminder for listeners, if you want to get more hospitality employees access to therapists, doctors, and prescription meds that, paradoxical as it seems, actually increases your company’s net profits, reach out to us at addbackbenefits.com. And finally, if you’ll take just a moment to leave us a comment or a review on your favorite podcast app, you’ll hold a special place in my heart forever. Thank you.

So last question for you, Brianna. A year from now, you and I reconnect, and you are celebrating something big. What’s that one specific thing that you hope to be celebrating a year from today?

Brianna Parisian (1:05:04)
Well, I sure hope it’s the opening of our fifth bar.

Anthony Codispoti (1:05:08)
Say more about it. What will that feel like when you get to that point?

Brianna Parisian (1:05:12)
you know, the feeling of relief after endless hours of permitting and designing and construction and hiring and training and, you know, just, it’s like it’s a weight lifted off your shoulder mixed with utter excitement of like, hey, this worked, we did it.

Anthony Codispoti (1:05:33)
Love it. Brianna Parisian from Thrive Social. want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate you.

Brianna Parisian (1:05:43)
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. was such an honor to be on your show.

Anthony Codispoti (1:05:47)
Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us today.