Danny Bendas on Helping Restaurant Operators Thrive and How Synergy Helps Them Scale

Anthony Codispoti (00:00)
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. As you listen today, let one idea shape what you do next. My name is Anthony Cotaspodi and today’s guest is Daniel Bendis, managing partner at Synergy restaurant consultants, a firm that helps restaurants and hospitality groups sharpen their concepts, menus and operations.

Synergy’s mission is simple, elevate food, beverage, and hospitality around the world through hands-on practical advice. The team offers new concept creation, menu innovation, kitchen design, supply chain support, and leadership training, all backed by more than three decades of real-world results. Since joining Synergy in 1989, Danny has guided over 225 clients

from national chains like Dunkin’ Donuts to family-owned eateries, generating proven gains in revenue and guest satisfaction. Earlier in his career, he helped open Houlihan’s Old Place locations as well as other Gilbert-Obertson brands. He led the kitchen at the American Restaurant and served as director of operations for Hallmark Cards Restaurant, subsidiary, American Food Service Enterprises.

before becoming vice president of food and beverage at NANCO Enterprises, operator of Elephant Bar Restaurants and Jeremiah’s Steakhouses. He also hosts the Restaurant Roadmap podcast, which we’re gonna hear more about too. But before we get into all his good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, Ad Back Benefits Agency. Listen, if you run a business, you are likely stuck in the cycle of rising insurance premiums. You’re paying more, but your team is getting less.

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Danny Bendas (02:45)
Hey, excited to be here. I think this is going to be a fun hour or so. So looking forward to it.

Anthony Codispoti (02:49)
Agreed. ⁓

First of all, did I get your last name corrected? get the inflection on it. Give me the correct pronunciation.

Danny Bendas (02:55)
Yeah, appendix. It’s like D-I-S. Yeah, very simple. You got it.

Anthony Codispoti (02:59)
Bendis.

Great. Okay, so Danny, let’s start at the beginning. What first drew you into the restaurant world?

Danny Bendas (03:06)
You know, I was 14 years old and I had an older brother who’s always been sort of a mentor. He was working at a college cafeteria near my home outside of the Allentown, Pennsylvania. He was moving on to go work for a country club with a chef as an apprentice. And so I basically took his job. So I became a cook’s helper, you know, dishwasher, like who hasn’t started as a dishwasher in the restaurant business, right? Or a busboy or whatever.

Yeah, that was my first entry. I liked it. I always figured this was going to be my career ultimately going forward. From there, I worked as a cook at a restaurant nearby and then went to the Culinary Institute of America because I didn’t want to go to college to do two more years of liberal arts. I wanted to get right into my career. So the CIA was a great experience.

I was very happy and proud to be the first class to attend the culinary Institute at the Hyde Park campus. They had just moved from New Haven, Connecticut to Hyde Park. And so the rest, as they say, is history. I’ve been in this business ever since. I’ve only had one job outside the industry my entire career. I hope that beds together at the first new dormitory at the culinary when I was attending school there. So to gain a little lecturing.

So that’s how we’re all starting.

Anthony Codispoti (04:30)
So from that first entry level job, you were hooked. What was it that you loved from the beginning so much about the industry?

Danny Bendas (04:37)
you know, I think just hands on, think being able to help people, ⁓ you know, serving people, you know, I think as we’ll talk about, as we get into other topics, you know, staying in tune to the guests, giving back to the guests. And, you know, there’s a guy when I was working at the restaurant that I worked for at the time, I was like 19 years old, a gentleman who was the president of the N. ⁓

National Restaurant Association, he made a comment, said, if you take care of your guests, you never have to worry about how much is in your cash register. And I always kind of took that to heart because, know, if you give great service, great food, fair value, you know, generally speaking, you’re going to be successful. So that was quite an interesting learning lesson and that ability to help people in a restaurant business is fun. You know, we had a, we have a lot of time having fun.

⁓ Which if you’re not having fun, that’s not working what you’re doing, right?

Anthony Codispoti (05:39)
Tell us about one of your mentors, somebody that had a big impact on you coming up through the industry.

Danny Bendas (05:44)
Yeah, I was, as I thought about that question, there are two actually, ⁓ well three, my mom and dad, they great roots, great parents, best parents anybody could have. But when I was at the culinary, I met a chef, one of my instructors, and we used to, I used to assist him as he taught cooking classes, you know, off campus to make some extra money. And then I was working after graduation back home.

And one day I got a phone call from him and he offered me a job in Kansas City for to be a unit chef at the original Hulahans Old Place on the on the Country Club Plaza. And I flew out and interviewed. I took the job and over the years he was a true mentor. He helped me get a lot of jobs and get involved in a lot of really interesting businesses where I learned a tremendous amount about the business. And so.

The other one who actually became a really great experience and a mentor ⁓ through that experience was a gentleman named Joseph Platton. Now, you know, I’m going back a long ways, but for those that have been in the industry for a number of years, Gerald was the restaurant icon of New York City in the 50s and the 60s. He created the Four Seasons Restaurant in Midtown Manhattan. He created the Forum of the Twelve Caesars.

He was a president of an organization called Restaurant Associates back in the day. He also created all of the food service at the World Trade Center as it was being built prior to the unfortunate incidents of 9-11. And so Windows on the World was his creation. The Big Kitchen, which was in the lower level of one of the towers, was a major subway hub and I think something like

of a million people went through that subway help every day in and out of Manhattan to go to work. And he was hired by Mr. Donald Hall, who was the president of Hallmark Cards in Kansas City. And, you know, when I say we were a restaurant affiliate of Hallmark Cards, American Food Service Enterprises was founded. In those days, American cuisine was pretty much non-existent. You know, it was French, it was Italian.

Most of my school experiences had to do more with European cuisines versus American. So Joe conceived of a concept called the Heartland Market, which was an all American. ⁓ If you think about each season or usually today, this was sort of a miniature version of that where we had various retail stores, food service entities, and they all produce product to support each other. So we had a retail bakery, we had a

We kitchen, we had a deli, we had a wine store, we had an equipment shop, and we had a restaurant called the Crystal Pavilion. Joe was the, he conceptualized all of these things. And we only focused on American-made products, which were really in the infancy at the time. So mean, everything, if you wanted far-riles, European, if you wanted mustards or jams, generally they were European. And this was the upbringing or the upstart of

you know, American made products and we were sort of on the ground floor of that. And we’re talking circa 1977 ish, 78. So we were, you know, Joe’s a very far ahead of his time, right? So yeah. And being a Kansas city, we’re virtually in the middle of the country, you know, the Heartland Market. So, and that’s where I met my business partner, Dean, and we got to know each other and that was the beginnings, ultimately.

Anthony Codispoti (09:18)
You were right there at the epicenter of it.

Okay, so let’s talk about that. How did Synergy come into play and how did you become a part of it?

Danny Bendas (09:42)
Yeah, Dean ⁓ and I worked together in Kansas City, as I said, I was head of operations. He was head of retail merchandising and I ultimately left and I went to work in Santa Barbara, California for a restaurant group. operated Elephant Bar restaurants at the time, a small chain and Jeremiah steak houses. Ultimately, Dean left.

And he went to work for El Torito restaurants in Southern California. So I was in Santa Barbara. He was in basically the New Court Beach area. We stayed in touch and over time, you know, El Torito was purchased by a brand called the WR Grace Company. WR Grace in those days, they just bought restaurant brands and they probably had 15 restaurant brands back in the day. And so through all of those

purchases and consolidations, know, Dean’s job basically got outsourced or downsized. And so he ended up forming Synergy to help manufacturers promote their product within restaurant chains. And he was, you he was doing well. He was busy and I was in Santa Barbara. I just had my first ⁓ child and you know, I wanted to move on, you know, and so he…

and I got together one day and we decided that he was busy enough for me to come and join him. That was in 1990, April 15th. I always remember that because it was tax day, right? And I know my daughter had just been born. So that was, we’re in our 35th or over 35 years now. you know, it’s been a great experience. As I said, you know, I love to teach. It’s way of us to teach and get back to the end.

Anthony Codispoti (11:14)
day.

Yeah, say more about that, your love of teaching. ⁓ Was there any thoughts to actually become a teacher rather than stay in the restaurant space?

Danny Bendas (11:35)
Okay.

Yeah,

yeah, there are always times when I thought that I could be a really good teacher because I loved showing people, telling people, you know, I think I’m a pretty logical thinking person. So the ability to help people grow and succeed. And, know, just a quick sidebar there, Anthony, one of my jobs with Gilbert Robinson restaurants was at a restaurant called the Plaza 3 ⁓ right next door to the original Hooligans. And that was the flagship of the company, sort of a

continental cuisine restaurant back in the day. And I had one of the best crews and the best restaurant experience in my life there because the guys really wanted to learn. know, three of the guys that worked with me ended up going on to culinary schools. I’m assuming they’re still in the business. I haven’t kept up, I’m not sure, but that desire to teach. And you know, I taught some part-time classes at the community colleges in the area.

But know, teaching doesn’t pay that well, which is unfortunate in today’s world. So consulting is a way of teaching and giving back and helping people get better, solving problems for them, helping them survive, helping them grow, just helping them through leadership skills and, you know, becoming better restaurateurs and operating better brands. So I can teach, I can make money and I can have fun and I can kind of travel around and see the world. it all works out really good. Exactly.

Anthony Codispoti (13:02)
You check all the boxes.

Danny Bendas (13:04)
Yeah, okay.

Anthony Codispoti (13:04)
Yeah. And so Synergy restaurant consultants started out as a way to help manufacturers promote their products to restaurants. Is that still what’s going on today?

Danny Bendas (13:16)
Yeah.

Yeah, when Dean and I, you know, we’re both chef training, as I said, we both graduated from the CIA. And what we did with that, because we had chef backgrounds, we were hired by manufacturers to promote their product by doing culinary demonstrations, focusing on manufacturer’s product.

showing how a restaurant chain could use that product on their menus in the hopes of promoting that and then the chain would purchase the product to use in menu items that we’ve created for them, right? And then over time, you know, we decided we wanted to evolve our business. We were traveling, I don’t know, probably 30 weeks a year. It was pretty crazy, you know? And, you know, I had a young baby and wanted to stay home more.

So we ended up diversifying, which over the years we’ve done quite a bit of, into more operations and other culinary work, but directly for Chains. So as we did work for manufacturers to restaurant chains, the chains would ask us to do additional culinary work for them because they obviously liked what we did. And then gradually we branched into operations and then we decided that rather than he and I trying to do everything, we would expand our business.

So we brought in other consultants, other subject matter experts, and we have become pretty much a full service restaurant consultant. We can help with design, know, we help with obviously R &D, we help with training systems, ⁓ new concept development, operating efficiencies, and almost anything you could think of outside of construction that a restaurant would need.

We can help them with so, you know, it’s been a 35 year evolution. We have a great team of people Tremendous amount of experience and it’s been a real pleasure to work with them to work with

Anthony Codispoti (15:17)
What do you think sets you apart from other restaurant consultants in the space?

Danny Bendas (15:22)
⁓ Experience for one, I think caring is another. We never lose sight of the fact that we want to help our clients become successful. And we listen to our clients because if we don’t collaborate and we don’t offer solutions to people that are doable, they’re not going to be successful. And so I think just that the idea of we listen.

We care, we’re passionate, and we have a tremendous amount of live hands-on experience over the years that we can bring to our clients. ⁓ Obviously nothing that would be proprietary to any of the previous client. When you’ve been doing this for 35 years and we’ve worked with hundreds of people around the world, you learn a lot of great things to do. You learn a lot of things that aren’t so great to do, which you learn either way.

so we can impart all of that knowledge and all that experience ⁓ into our projects and helping our clients ultimately become successful. In some instances, they survive. In some instances, Anthony, we’ve actually tried to talk people out of going into the restaurant business because it’s just not right, given either their experience or financial circumstances.

Anthony Codispoti (16:37)
Really?

Danny Bendas (16:45)
Sometimes people say, I’m going to open this up so I can give it to my kids and give them a living. Well, you know, I’ve actually literally talked to people who say, well, my kids aren’t interested. Why are you doing this if they’re not interested? Right. So we just, you know, we want to help. That’s ultimately what we want to help. Well, a little bit. Yeah. A little psychology. There’s a lot of everything involved when you do this kind of work, but it’s always enjoyable. We’ve been fortunate to have really great clients over the years and work.

Anthony Codispoti (17:01)
You’re like a little bit of a life coach too.

Danny Bendas (17:14)
a lot of really wonderful people.

Anthony Codispoti (17:17)
So who’s a good fit for you? Are there, you know, like fine dining? Is it QSR? Are they folks with no restaurant experience? Some like one unit, 50 units, like paint us a picture here.

Danny Bendas (17:30)
Yeah, I think, and you know obviously we’ll take all comers right because everything’s a great experience, but our sweet spot generally is somewhere between five and fifteen locations, three to ten, somewhere in that neighborhood. Generally where you say, you know, they’re growing, they don’t have or they can’t afford the GNA to grow or they may not have the experience to grow.

but they need it to grow. So we can help fill that gap for them. You know, in our experience, you have people that develop a really great restaurant. They open a second and they’re pretty, you know, they can manage two, assuming that, you know, geographically it works. They could get the three and it becomes more more tenuous because there’s only so many hours in a day. And so if they really want to grow, that’s a point where rather than being

hands-on entrepreneurial seat of the pants. Now you have to develop systems, processes, you have to learn how to lead in a different fashion because now you’re managing multi-unit not being on site at every location every day. And for a lot of entrepreneurs that’s a real leap in skill requirement and that’s where we can come in to help people.

You know, learn how to be effective leaders, oversee multiple units, grow, potentially franchise if they’re successful and they want to go down that path. ⁓ Or bring on a partner, you know, get bought out by a VE company, you know, whatever. There’s a whole lot of paths that these people can take. But they, our sweet spot again is getting those people that are growing, but they don’t have quite enough GNA to get them going or they need leadership help or they need systems and stuff.

Anthony Codispoti (19:22)
So this is something that I’ve talked to lot of entrepreneurs about, and I’d be curious to get your perspective on Danny, because some people are really effective as startup, right? Like I’ve got my hands on everything, I’m wearing 12 hats, ⁓ juggling all kinds of things, and I’m making it work. But like you said, when you go from one to two units, you’re stretching yourself thin, and then as you go from two to three and four, like that’s where the process and the structure.

Danny Bendas (19:28)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Right.

you

Anthony Codispoti (19:49)
really has to change or it’s not going to work. From what you’ve seen in the past, what do you think separates those people who are able to make that evolution in their leadership style and those who cannot?

Danny Bendas (19:53)
you

You know, this is going to sound really crazy and I’m not trying to over oversimplify it, but I think the big truth of it is learning to let go. Okay. Learning to hire people and then give them, you know, get them embedded into your culture, into your brand. Make sure they understand your expectations. You give them the tools and let them do their job.

And you as the leader, learn and force yourself to come back and observe and train and let people make a mistake because that’s how they’re going to learn and that’s how they’re going to grow. And then you as the, as the entrepreneur need to change your mindset to trust and, verify their skill sets, but then also change your mindset to move from.

being the doer to being the thinker and then taking your position to become more the growth strategist versus the hands-on doer. And that’s not easy because you get embedded, you know, it’s fun, it’s high energy, you’re in there, you know, you’re with the guests and then you have to transition out of that and learn to trust your team. But they have to understand the culture so that when the guest comes back and you’re not there,

leader, they know they’re going to get that same experience because you’ve created this really strong culture of passion and caring and operation. So it’s a hard transition.

Anthony Codispoti (21:45)
Noted, it sure is. I’m curious what other common mistakes that you’ve seen businesses make as they’re in that growth cycle.

Danny Bendas (21:58)
Not having a big enough bench in order to grow. Not hiring the right people. ⁓ You know, there’s also potential for people to not want to hire somebody because they feel like they may know more than you do. You know, I think the key to anybody who wants to be a great executive is hiring people that are smarter than you and people that you can trust and let them go, let them do what they do, which is why you hire them. So I think

letting go, hiring the right people, growing too fast, I think also because you sort of drain your bench and then you lose control or you lose the quality because you’re moving too quickly or you’re hiring. You don’t have the bench to support the growth that you want to get to. Especially when you get to a point where you

You you’re a private operator and now somebody buys you, now there’s a whole different expectation on growth and returns and quarterly profits that can stress you and then you’re forced to make decisions that you may not want to make that are going to damage your brand and your concept over time. So all things, know, just really being cautious about how you do things when it comes to growing.

Anthony Codispoti (23:18)
You know, Danny, ⁓ I think specific examples can help our listeners better understand what you’re capable of at Synergy Restaurant Consultants. Can you walk us through a specific client turnaround process? What was the before situation? What did you do for them? And what did things look like afterwards?

Danny Bendas (23:37)
Yeah, I wouldn’t necessarily classify it as a turnaround, but I’ll give you a few examples of things that we have done. So we had an international client, ⁓ quasi, well, depending on what country you are in, full service in Latin America, more fast casual here in the U.S. on a pretty good growth pattern. And they hired us to come in to do a performance audit. And we ended up

after spending time with them, watching how they operate. this first project or the primary project was in ⁓ Guatemala City. And we literally transformed their kitchen and completely redesigned their kitchen and significantly, I think to the tune of over 45, close to 50 % efficiency of operation in the back of the house. This brand in Guatemala.

has a drive-through operation. They’re open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They have a service counter. ⁓ They’re full service. They have a pizza concept that they’re a franchisee of, all under one building. Now, they have like 10 motorcycles delivering food all over the place. So imagine all of that happening under one roof, and this kitchen had the support.

you know, a service counter, full service dining, and drive-through delivery and all of that stuff. you know, I think we were really instrumental in recreating their whole back of house, which we look at the back of house as the engine, right? You get the engine right, a whole lot of other things can fall into space, into place, no matter, you know, the box that you’re working in. And you can work around the building if the engine works, generally speaking, right?

And then they had a sister brand also in Latin America that wanted, they wanted to grow, I like 500 restaurants over a period of time. So we kind of did the same thing where we really studied their operation and we changed a lot of the way they operate to significantly enhance their throughput, you know, through a different kitchen layout and some new equipment suggestions that we made and stuff like that. you know, similarly, sorry, go ahead.

Anthony Codispoti (25:59)
Sorry, sorry to interrupt

you, Danny. Just I want to understand a little bit more of the details of what you’re able to do. You’re saying, okay, you’re buying some different restaurant equipment for them, you’re changing the layout. So that’s like, hey, the fryer was over here, but it works better over here. That way it’s not interfering with the drink station and people aren’t bumping into each other. You’re sort of studying that, I don’t know, that workflow in there.

Danny Bendas (26:02)
That’s right.

Yeah.

Right. Yep.

Yep. Yeah, so efficiency of the employee, how many steps does the employee have to make, what kind of ergonomics, are they bending, moving? I like to work in circles because I hate walking, right? Not that I dislike walking, but it’s very time inefficient. So if you have to make a lot of lateral movements that draw you away from where

you need to be. It slows everybody down. And we literally ⁓ took their primary serving line and recommended it they did it like a week after we finished. We literally picked it up, rotated it at 90 degrees and then changed the way they do things so that half of the serving line took care of all food that went into disposable packaging, meaning take out, drive through delivery. The other half of the kitchen line

took care of all the in-house dining where they used real, you know, plateware, non-disposable. So we completely turned it around so that they could work in a much more efficient manner. So, you know, it’s about studying how people work, thinking logically about what is every step that somebody has to go through in order to execute a menu item. And then what can we do to minimize the steps?

what piece of equipment may there be that might be able to enhance what they do. And often sometimes instances Anthony, we do product re-engineering where we’ll re-engineer a menu item to make it easier to execute or develop new menu items that will fit their brand but allow them to operate with greater throughput, less talent requirement because talent is a real challenge in the restaurant industry today finding it.

and paying for it. And so being able to create recipes and there’s so much great equipment on the market now that is very time efficient, very space efficient. Once you work out the programming, you literally put something in an oven, you push a button two minutes later, it’s done, it’s consistent every time you do it. And it allows you to not need quite the skill level and it gives you consistency over

time which is really critical. So again, process, equipment, layout, ergonomics, all that stuff.

Anthony Codispoti (28:48)
So when you talk about increasing operational efficiency in that kitchen in Guatemala by, I think you said 40 to 50%, does that mean, I’m trying to understand how you calculate that metric. Does that mean the throughput of food coming out of there is 40 % greater with the same amount of labor?

Danny Bendas (28:56)
Hmm.

Yeah, a combination of increased throughput, but also a lot of that percentage which leads to throughput was less distance. People and food had to travel so that they could get prepared with fewer steps on the part of the kitchen staff. So better temperature, better quality, faster service, better throughput, and easier for the kitchen staff to do their job. So it’s a combination of throughput.

time and distance for employees to work, which gets you to throughput. But also, you know, we’ve done work with clients also where we modified procedures and again, sometimes equipment, sometimes not, to make it easier for someone to do their job. You know, as an example, we had a client that, you know, they bred this product.

and one employee basically spends five or six hours running this and it’s a pretty physically demanding job, right? So, you know, the quality of the product when the employee starts working was pretty different by the time they put in five or six hours and we’re getting close to ending their shift because they’re just tired. mean, it’s because it was a very physically demanding amount of work. So…

We made recommendations on some things, some processes, equipment, so that to kind of mechanize that process so it wasn’t quite so manual, and A, to enhance the product, B, help the employee. And, know, in this day and age, you know, another thing that we look at very, very seriously is employee turnover. So what can we do from a process and environmental standpoint so that we can keep employees

keep people happier, keep them busy, keep them productive and reduce turnover. You you can go work at a retail store or you can go work in a restaurant which is very hard, physical, dangerous work. know, so anything we could do to mitigate that, you know, difficulty of work, physically challenging work, dangerous work, know, air conditioning in kitchens. I that used to be unheard of, right?

And it’s all things that now help keep your employees happy and keep retention high.

Anthony Codispoti (31:35)
Do you get involved in any of the administrative advice or support, know, ⁓ payroll and, you know, HR functions or are you guys more in the operations side?

Danny Bendas (31:49)
⁓ We are mostly on operations. We look at payroll just from, know, like what is your labor? How do you calculate payroll? Are there some systems that may help you enhance how you do that to make it more either time efficient or give you better debt in order to manage your business? ⁓ We also take a look at HR practices. ⁓ But you know, that can be a little bit dangerous territory because there’s a lot of legalities involved.

know, break schedules, how do you tip what’s legal is not legal. We review it, but generally in those instances, we oftentimes will recommend that the client defer to a professional that understands the law and so we’re not making mistakes. There’s also some pretty good online companies that can become sort of an HR partner that can help you with, ⁓

determination if it’s necessary, understanding rule changes. You know, it’s an interesting business. At the end of the day, Anthony, most people just want to run a restaurant, take care of guests, and not be hampered by all of these regulations. Unfortunately, you have to be in order to remain compliant. So it’s a necessary evil and unfortunately a lot of independent operators.

don’t necessarily think about, not that it’s a fault, it’s just they’re just busy, they’re just busy running their business, right?

Anthony Codispoti (33:23)
Wow. You I got you piqued my curiosity when you were talking about some of the technology that, you know, has come along a great equipment, you know, oven, you put something in two minutes later, it comes out perfect texture and everything. What is ⁓ give us another example of like a piece of breakthrough technology that is really changing how restaurants operate behind the scenes.

Danny Bendas (33:31)
Mm-hmm.

Well, you know, I think data and data collection, know, years ago when I first started in the restaurant business, you know, again, long time ago, you know, the 60s, let’s say, or the early 70s, there was like no technology. You we used to joke, you you put your cash in the cigar box, right? And that’s how you took care of your money, right? You know, my first restaurant job,

We didn’t have any, you know, they had a cash register. We didn’t have any POS systems. We didn’t have any back office data. These, this restaurant tour, it was a family owned business, you know, the mom and the dad and two sons. They didn’t take inventory. didn’t, they didn’t, they didn’t write down prep charts. They, everybody just did what they did and it worked. Right. And, you know, they made a lot of money and the key to it was, you know, we served great food.

The father was the face in the dining room. know, Mr. Bennet’s knew everybody every you know, he was it was just the culture was was unbelievable. It was a great first restaurant experience for me in a lot of ways, you know, in addition to all the other things we’ve discussed. But then now there’s a lot of technology out there from POS systems, back office systems, managing gratuities, scheduling, AI.

I mean, you name it. And there’s so much now that literally your head would explode. When I used to go to the restaurant show when I was 20, 21 years old in Chicago, there was very little technology. mean, was Microsoft didn’t exist at the time. NCR was like the main cash register. Now there’s an entire half of a floor dedicated to technology.

That’s great, but you have to be careful. You know, there’s a saying, know, paralysis by analysis where you get so much data, you can’t make a decision on anything anymore. Right? So you have to be very careful to structure your technology, your tech stack to what you want to know and what you can react to and what you, do you want to manage your business and use it, use it effectively, but don’t overdo it because it can drive you crazy and can become expensive over time.

Anthony Codispoti (36:08)
from personal experience, I know painfully well that sometimes data can reveal some great insights to you, and sometimes it’s just static, it’s just noise. What are some of the key metrics that you encourage your clients to look at?

Danny Bendas (36:20)
Yes.

Several. So ⁓ prime cost is one big one. Prime cost is the total dollar value of your cost of goods in food and beverage and your labor as a percentage of sales. So we look for prime cost between 55 to 60 percent of your P &L and if you get too high it becomes difficult to make money because then you have to factor in rent.

non-controllable costs, interests, evidah and all that kind of stuff. So prime cost is one and then obviously part of that food, labor and all those things. But the other thing we look at is sales per man hour, which is a really good general measure of productivity. ⁓ So obviously the higher your sales per man hour, the more productive your team is without sacrificing the guest experience. That’s always rule one.

And the other part of that is ⁓ sales per square foot, is a gauge of the productivity of your physical space. And, know, we do a lot of work, a lot of assessment work ⁓ under and the goal is, you know, which is what the client tells us. We need to figure out ways to shrink our box. Right. So when we get down to labor, we get down to better equipment, better

rocking past better efficiency in kitchens, that’s how you shrink a box in a restaurant. And if you can shrink the box, obviously you need a smaller pad, lower construction costs, lower rent, you know, and more efficiency, which gets you to sales per square foot, right? So we look at the entire box and we don’t design just from the floor, we design

all the way up to the top to maximize the entire cube as much as we possibly can. And then, you know, another metric we like to use is, you know, to be successful when you take everything into everything else into consideration in the restaurant business. Rent, we like to say, we’d like to end up somewhere between 8 and 10 % of sales all in. So rent can charge us and stuff like that. If your rent gets too high,

it just cuts into your margin. you know, ideally a great restaurant will run somewhere, hopefully between a 10 and 12 percent margin. So think about that for all the work that you do, every dollar you bring in your pocketing 10 cents. OK, maybe if you’re lucky. Right. So every penny counts. It is very, very tight and a lot of room for error.

Anthony Codispoti (39:06)
It’s a tight margin business. Yeah.

Danny Bendas (39:13)
Let me just say, Anthony, the other fascinating thing about restaurants I’ve always found, restaurants are one of the few businesses that exists where everything that occurs in the business happens under one roof. Okay, so if you think about that, what a manager has to deal with as a restaurant operator. Now, if you’re a car manufacturer, you have a manufacturing facility, you have a sales facility, you have a repair and maintenance facility.

They can be all different places with different amounts of expertise in each. In a restaurant, production, sales, accounting, marketing, food safety, cleanliness, it all happens under one roof. So the operator has to understand the entire production cycle and sales cycle, which is a pretty big task if you’re running a five, six, eight, $10 million restaurant. It’s a lot. And you got to really know what you’re doing to be successful.

Anthony Codispoti (40:09)
In what ways are you encouraging your clients to use AI in their business?

Danny Bendas (40:16)
You know, it’s an interesting question. think we recommend AI to be supportive of the team, not to replace the team. Okay? And I really believe, I know one of your questions here and I tend to jump around a little bit, but that’s okay. It’s all part of the conversation. I think there is a strong desire for people to want to have social engagement again.

and communicate with a real person. And AI is never going to replace that unless, you know, we get a robot that you can become a robot, right? So having AI support people in maybe tasks that detract from the ability to socialize and communicate with a guest, I think is good. But I don’t think it’s ever, it’s never going to replace the human.

especially in the food service business because that’s the whole interaction between server and guest bartender and guest server and cook. I mean that’s what makes restaurants restaurants in my opinion. So AI can support ⁓ in terms of ⁓ data collection, production, planning, ⁓ and lot of behind the scenes things but I hope that it never replaces.

the human touch. There’s a book that I read many years ago about trends and one of the things that I’ve always remembered was the concept of high tech and high touch. The more high tech there is, the more high touch people feel like they want and need to communicate and be a part of something or engage socially. A great example is you call an 800 number. It’s virtually impossible to get a human being on the phone.

It gets very frustrating after a while. And I think people get frustrated with it and they just want to talk to somebody for help. So anyway, in the supporting role behind the scenes, I think more important reason front and center if you will.

Anthony Codispoti (42:24)
You know, I talked to a lot of leaders in restaurants, hospitality, staffing is another area, not necessarily completely related, but all are echoing a very similar thing where they’re interested in AI, they’re trying it out, where they feel like it has the most potential is to take out some of the redundant, I’m going to call them mind numbing tasks that are pulling people, you know, into the back office, you know, in front of their screen.

Danny Bendas (42:30)
Right.

Exactly.

Thank ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (42:54)
and allow them to have more time interacting with people one-on-one or one to many, especially in these high touch environments like hospitality is.

Danny Bendas (42:58)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Yeah, as we talked about, and I think another rule that I use and I think our team does very good at is creating process. Like I was just telling one of our clients the other day, said, ⁓ when you have a great systems and great processes in place, which I think is where AI can help you. ⁓

you can worry about bigger things versus all the little stuff, knowing that the little stuff has been taken care of. So I use the analogy because, you know, many years ago I developed these operational timelines so that every physician had a timeline that said when I come in, here’s between, when I get here and we open, here’s what we do, here’s what we do during service, here’s what we do after service. And, you know, in theory, if you say,

Okay, you know, in central time, it’s 1051 a.m. What are your kids doing, right? So if you as a manager look at your watch, you should know what all of your employees should be doing at that time to give you a great consistency day in and day out with your operation. So that part of that consistency and those systems and processes are truly being AI can help you with or give you the data, you know.

If I’m a fried chicken brand, how much fried chicken do I need to have really between 11 and 12? Based on the data and the weather seasonality promotions past business It can help me in terms of production planning labor planning Equipment maintenance planning and all those sorts of things, but it’s not going to replace the human who has to actually execute it, right? So take them if you can get rid of the little things and let people think about the bigger stuff

That’s a big problem.

Anthony Codispoti (44:55)
Danny, as you think about the growth that Synergy has had over the years, what have been some of the biggest growth levers for you?

Danny Bendas (45:04)
You know, bringing on a team of great people so that we can extend our services has probably been the biggest one. And, you know, it’s funny you mentioned AI. We’re just now becoming, we’ve been thinking about and getting now more engaged in a process. You know, every few years I like to do what we call shake the tree, right? What can we do differently? What are we doing today? Why are we doing it?

And we do this with our clients. So if you say to a client, why do you do this? And the standard answer oftentimes is, well, because that’s just the way we’ve always done it, right? So I’d for us to get out of, well, that’s just the way we’ve always done it, sense. So we’re actually going through a process now of shaking the tree to say, can we do better? How can we change our business model? know, AI could potentially affect consultancies, you know.

You can theoretically use ChatGBT to write a menu for you, to write a training document, to do all kinds of things. ⁓ But I do believe that there still is a human element that needs to interpret that. In our experience, bottom line is, I think we want to take AI to help us service our clients better and use it as a tool to help them be better.

not replace us, right? Because, you know, it’s hard to replace hands-on experience as much as some people may think they can by using chat gbt or Claude or Gemini or whatever it is you use. Experience really outweighs a lot of that. And so that’s, think, transformational where we’re trying to get to is how can we evolve or continue to evolve our business to keep up with

our clients and help them knowing that AI is out there. If there are concerns that it’s going to replace jobs, I personally don’t think it will. I think it will be a good asset and will help us to grow. We had synergy with Anthony real quickly. In 35 years, we’ve been through 9-11, which was a business crush for everybody. We went through the real estate bust in 2008-2009. We’ve been through COVID.

And we’ve always figured out a way to survive through tenacity and constantly evolving our business and figuring out ways to help our clients get better. So I think it’s an ongoing process and as soon as you stop and get run over by somebody else, right? ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (47:42)
And it sounds like the newest inflection point, if you will, is the dawn of AI. How is this going to impact the business? How can you guys not be scared of it replacing you, but leverage it in a way that makes the services that you offer your clients even better?

Danny Bendas (47:48)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Right.

Right.

Exactly. Yeah, I know it may not be the right phrase exactly, but from our perspective at Cinerty is how can we beat AI? How can we get it to where AI doesn’t overtake our business, so we have to it. And the way to beat it is to use it as an aid to continue to help clients get better. And that’s really what we’re going through currently. I would recommend…

AI platforms that are going to help our client as I said before whether that’s sales projections production projections You know voice activated Drive through you know, there’s a lot of things going on How can we help our clients? Understand it and embrace it and not be so scared of it Which is something we as consultants with all these years of experience can also help it can be pretty intimidating ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (48:54)
You know, I think you just hit on something there. I had an interview earlier this week with a gentleman who’s the CEO of a ⁓ bread and breakfast breakfast ⁓ and innkeepers association. So they’ve got lots of members who own like these, you know, independent bed and breakfast. And one of the things that they’re doing is understanding that their clients don’t have the time or the resources or the wherewithal to go and understand.

Danny Bendas (49:07)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Anthony Codispoti (49:21)
and research and choose from all these different tech platforms out there, including AI. And so what they’re doing as part of their service is they’re vetting that for them, and then coming forward and recommending the solution. I see you nodding your head like, yeah, that’s what we’re doing.

Danny Bendas (49:27)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, and interestingly, I was just on a podcast. I was a host with another company and that’s exactly what their business is. So if you’re, if you’re a business that is struggling with systems process and you’re kind of like stuck, right? They, they help create by using AI, ⁓ customized systems for their clients to enhance.

their productivity, their procedures, their processes and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, so they’re basically an aid to people that either don’t have the time, understand or the internal ability to get themselves organized. Like I said, the other big thing about synergy is, or let me just say this first, it’s really good, it’s easy to go in and tell somebody what they’re doing wrong, right?

You can come in and you can probably study synergy and give us 50 things that we could do better or do that we’re doing wrong. The bigger question is, that’s great, but tell me how to fix it. And one of the things that we’re really good at is understanding where the opportunity lies, but giving people the strategy, the recommendations to make the improvements. That’s the bigger part. It’s easy to find the problem, but I’m going hear the solution. That’s all anybody cares about.

Anthony Codispoti (50:58)
Yeah.

Danny Bendas (51:00)
Right, so, okay.

Anthony Codispoti (51:00)
Amen. So tell us about your own podcast, the restaurant roadmap podcast, what inspired you to start this? What kind of content do folks get?

Danny Bendas (51:11)
Yeah, so we have, as I said, we have a great team of consultants and each of them has a very specific expertise. So we created the restaurant roadmap, obviously as exposure to our business. But, you know, we don’t sell when we do our podcasts. We like to inform. And so we’ve done podcasts about the first ones we did. The linchpin to any successful business starts with leadership.

And when we do operations work and we do a lot of restaurant work, a lot of the challenges that we face is that leaders haven’t had the right training or they need help improving the way they operate, which then improves the way the restaurant operates, the team operates, reinforcing the brand, the culture, systems, whatever that is. So we started with leadership and then we moved into operations, front of house, back of house. And they’re designed for

Learning and helping people, you know, as I said earlier my Anthony if I could be a teacher I would have been a teacher except I couldn’t I couldn’t make enough money to do it so the podcast give it to give us an opportunity to teach and coach and Ultimately the goal would be that you know, someone’s gonna say yeah, I really like what that what they said I really let’s give them a call and see if they can help us with whatever the topic is that we’re doing, you know, so

So we’re doing now a six part series, which we’re calling the employee lifecycle. know, turnover is a very expensive proposition. It hurts you in a lot of different ways. And so we’re doing a six part series, you know, the employee lifecycle from recruiting through the exit interview to try to help people understand and give them some ideas on how to improve that.

so that they can reduce their turnover, hire the right people, which is really critical because you you hire the wrong person, you get a bad experience for everybody, and if you leave, if somebody decides to leave, a really great excellent interview to understand why, and hopefully they’re going to leave you, you know, on good terms and you’ve been able to help them throughout their to their next step in your life’s career and you feel good about helping somebody.

So that’s it. We’re in production on that one now. We’re going to be rolling that out in the next couple of weeks. So anyway, all kinds of different topics.

Anthony Codispoti (53:41)
great. By the time this episode is live,

it’ll probably be there for folks. Where can they find it?

Danny Bendas (53:46)
⁓ The Restaurant Roadmap, YouTube, Apple, Spotify, pretty much any place where you can check out and listen to podcasts, you can find it. It’s a good show.

Anthony Codispoti (53:58)
Terrific.

Now, shifting gears, Danny, in my experience, behind most success stories, there’s usually a chapter that almost broke somebody. Can you share a serious challenge that you’ve gone through, personal, professional, how you got through that, and what you learned from?

Danny Bendas (54:10)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, you know, about three years ago, I was diagnosed with some some cancer in my mouth, right? And, you know, when you’re in the restaurant business and you’re eating, you eat for a living basically, right? It obviously presented some serious challenges. So I had some pretty significant surgeries, chemotherapy, radiation and stuff like that. And

You know, I have to thank my wife for being as supportive, tremendously supportive and helping me get through all of that. But, you you go through a period of time where you’re not contributing. You know, we’re all entrepreneurs, all the people that work with us. So, you know, you feel a lot of guilt when you’re not contributing. And, you know, I contributed as best as I could. You know, I tell a lot of people.

You know, when I was going through chemotherapy as I was sitting in the infusion center, you know, with a needle in my arm, I was doing Zoom calls with clients because I just refused to not do anything to contribute to the business, right? And there was never a doubt in my mind that there was going to be, there was not going to be a cure, that I was not going to be better. And with that mindset, my life support, ⁓ friends, family, team members, you know, I got through it. ⁓

And here I am, know, still vertical, right? So it all worked out really well, completely cured, back in the saddle, moving along. But it was a test of perseverance, ⁓ patience, not giving up, which I think in any business, as I’m sure you know, you need all of that to remain successful and keep evolving. So there were lot of lessons to be learned there and a tremendous amount of support.

Anthony Codispoti (56:09)
As you were going through the treatments, Danny, was there, and you were struggling to find ways to contribute and to be involved. I’m curious if there was ⁓ any sense of a loss of identity, like a loss of self. I’m the restaurant guy, this is what I do, I love what I’m doing, and now I’m not able to do it as much.

Danny Bendas (56:24)
⁓

Yeah.

Yeah, you know, there’s some concerns about some of the different services that we offer if I could still do them. ⁓ I do, you know, it’s a little bit, it’s more challenging obviously. you know, again, having team members that kind of, you know, work with you, cover for you, help you, you know, when you’re, when you’re doing the discovery tour with clients, you know, when we do a discovery tour, we may go to 12 or 13 restaurants in a day.

sample food, look at the core, listen to the music, what’s the service, where, what’s the value as part of a learning and then we shake all that into a bucket and that helps us get to, what does this client want to have as far as a new concept goes. So, you know, obviously being able to eat a lot of food is a bit of a challenge, right? But I figured out how to get around it. And, you know, I think a lot of it, Anthony is just really the mental attitude.

instead of saying, I don’t think I can do that. The attitude is, this is not gonna beat me. I am going to do it and I don’t care what it takes and I’m not gonna give up. There were some times when it was frustrating and depressing and there were one or two people, ⁓ it’s not something that I talk about a lot because I put stuff in the past and I don’t really want to deal with it or I’m through it. ⁓

But I’ve been on a few calls with some other people that have had similar experiences to try to help, you know, mentor and just so they can understand how it’s going to work, what the outcome is going to be, what they’re going to go through. You know, and that again, being able to give back and help other people in this scenario based on my experience, I think has pretty therapeutic as well.

Anthony Codispoti (58:19)
What is some of that advice that you offer to them? Maybe you can offer to our listeners if they’re going through, about to go through, maybe in the future would go through something similar, similar healthcare.

Danny Bendas (58:32)
Number one, having no doubt in your mind that you’re going to beat whatever the scenario is. Number two, having a strong support network to help you get through it. Number three, staying absolutely positive through all of it in spite of, you you’re going to have down days. You know, when I was going through chemotherapy on a Wednesday or a Thursday, I can barely get up.

I knew that I would the next couple of days and just keep driving yourself to keep moving forward and never losing sight of the fact that you are going to get better. Never doubt for a second that you’re not going to get better. It’s just a matter of when. And I think that mental attitude is really what kind of got me through it. It never once entered my mind that I was not going to be back doing what I’m doing. The thought never occurred to me.

It was just, this was a blip, a little bump in the road and we’re just going to keep moving forward. That’s the only alternative.

Anthony Codispoti (59:37)
Do you think that confidence in overcoming it, is that strength something that was always there? Or do you think it bubbled to the surface because of this health issue?

Danny Bendas (59:52)
You know, I think in my career and in my life, you know, I’m pretty introverted, number one. know, to some degree, I’ve had a degree of a lack of self-confidence. So that lack of self-confidence, I always view it as being more of an attribute than necessarily a detriment, where it me work harder. Right? And I think that, I don’t know if that’s an attribute or not, but let’s use it.

mindset ⁓ is what sort of forced me to just keep moving forward from all of the experiences I’ve had before. You know, when Dean and I experienced 9-11, we experienced a housing crisis, there was never a question of, we going to survive? The thought never entered our mind. The question was, how ⁓ are we to do this? How are we going to manipulate or how are we going to change our business model? What are we going to do?

to get through this into the next, you know, economy boom versus going out of business when there’s a bus. You know, we’ve been doing this for 35 years, so we’ve done something right, right? And we’ve been tenacious. And I think this, that tenacity in general helps you professionally and personally, you know, with your team, you know, if you, you know.

I’ve always lived by the fact that if I’m not tenacious with making our team better through training, coaching and mentoring, I haven’t done my job. Right. And I absolutely despise the thought of having to terminate someone and I never terminate somebody unless I’ve absolutely convinced myself that I’ve done everything that I can do to set that person up for success. And so again, that whole tenacity of just willing yourself to be successful in what you do, working hard.

taking responsibility for your actions and helping everybody else. mean, just the kids and almost everything that you’re going to deal with, right?

Anthony Codispoti (1:01:55)
What’s your superpower, Danny?

Danny Bendas (1:01:57)
My superpower, my super, I have two, right? My parents are one. And I believe I read somewhere long, long time ago that most successful people believe in heroes. Now you want to call them heroes, mentors, you know, whatever. So, you know, on the way out of my office, there’s a picture of my mom and dad celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. And I kind of looked at that as I walked out the door. That’s part of my inspiration, right?

⁓ Behind you, you’ll see Yankee Doodle Dandy with James Cagney. I don’t know how many people know who James Cagney is, right? Because they’re as old as I am. But ⁓ he’s a, I had a buddy at the culinary and he and I, he was a big James Cagney fan. He kind of turned me on to James Cagney. And that was a way that I used to be able to bond with my dad because my dad used to go see him in the movies in the thirties. When he was a kid, I watched him on TV.

So it gave us an opportunity to bond. So as I learned more and more about him, you know, just the way he lived his life, the way he helped people, you know, he was obviously successful. didn’t let Hollywood get to him, like a lot of other actors have over the years. He did his job and went home to his family and that was it. So that always meant a lot to me. Hence.

That’s actually an original marquee movie poster from the Anti-Divile Nandy in 1942. had that for 30 years, think, hanging on the wall somewhere. So, yeah, but James Cagney’s always been a hero. My parents, as far as coaching and mentoring, they taught me and they gave me a conscience. And I think if you have a strong conscience, you can do a lot in this world. Those are my superpowers.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:44)
I like that.

Love it. Danny, I’ve just got one more question for you today. But before I ask it, I want to do three quick things. First of all, anybody who wants to get in touch with our guests, go to their website, SynergyConsultants.com. Or you can email Danny directly at Danny with a Y at SynergyConsultants.com. Danny at SynergyConsultants.com. That’ll be in the show notes for folks if you missed it. And if you’re enjoying the show today, please take a moment to subscribe wherever you’re listening.

Danny Bendas (1:03:51)
you

Sure.

Anthony Codispoti (1:04:15)
it sends a signal that helps others discover our show. So thank you for taking a quick moment to do that right now. And as a reminder, you could be the hero advisor that helps clients give their employees access to therapists, doctors, and prescription meds while paradoxically increasing their net profits. Real gains that can change how a business is valued. Learn more today at addbackbenefits.com.

So last question for you, Danny, a year from now, what is one very specific thing that you hope to be celebrated?

Danny Bendas (1:04:47)
You know, I think a year from now, obviously I have, ⁓ I told you before the show, I just recently had another granddaughter born this week, so spending more time with her and the rest of them. I have a fifth one coming in May, so, you know, and the way to do that, I think, is to, we’re in the process of developing a succession plan where, you know, Dean and I,

We’ve been doing this for lot of years, know, we’re not the young bucks we used to be ahead. So we want to figure out how do we keep Synergy going and keep our team, which is really a great team of people. You’ll see them on our website. Keep them going, continue to coach and mentor. know, Dean and I think eventually become the consularies of the brand, not necessarily the doers so that they can

continue to keep the brand moving forward and sustainable for them for the next 15 or 20 years. So, I hope in a year from now we’ve gotten more more engaged with them, taking over more of our business than they are now and just letting everybody evolve in their life and in the synergy business so that everybody can be successful.

And then Dean and I, that’s how we, I would like for us to think that we gave back to the industry as we’re having some energy carry on. We do a lot of great work. We help a lot of people and that feels good at the end of the day.

Anthony Codispoti (1:06:23)
Danny Bendis from Synergy Restaurant Consultants. I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate you being here.

Danny Bendas (1:06:31)
It’s been great having me. Thank you so much.

Anthony Codispoti (1:06:34)
Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us. And if one thing stood out, put that into action today.