How Haley Nutter-Sitek Built Seven Restaurants Through the 2-2-2-2 Rule

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. Let one idea from today shape what you do next. My name is Anthony Cotus-Bode and today’s guest is Haley Nutter-Sittick, owner and director of hospitality at Crown Restaurant Group in Cincinnati, Ohio.

They are a family owned and operated collection of restaurants founded in 2018, known for their welcoming atmosphere and made from scratch approach to new American dishes. Their mission is to bring a warm family style hospitality experience to diners while offering a diverse range of culinary options through several unique restaurant concepts around the city. Under Haley’s leadership, Crown Restaurant Group has grown from a single gastropub into multiple locations.

She focuses on creating memorable guest experiences, training front of house teams, and ensuring each concept maintains its own identity while upholding the same high standards. Before joining Crown Restaurant Group, Haley gained valuable experience in both recruiting and hospitality, which helped shape the people-focused culture that she encourages today. Now, before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, Ad Back Benefits Agency.

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Haley Nutter-Sitek (01:36)
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Anthony Codispoti (01:51)
our program puts more money into your company’s bank account. As an example, we recently helped a client increase net profits by $900 per employee per year. Results vary, but the consultation is free. See if you qualify today at addbackbenefits.com. All right, back to our guest today, owner and director of hospitality of Crown Restaurant Group, Haley. Thanks for making the time to share your story today.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (02:17)
Yeah, absolutely excited to be here.

Anthony Codispoti (02:19)
So where did you first get a taste of the restaurant industry?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (02:23)
boy. ⁓ I would say, I mean, I always think everyone starts in high school at some point, whether it’s, you know, hosting, busing. ⁓ and for me, that was it. I started as a host at just a local family, place up the street from my house. ⁓ and that was really where I got the feel for the buzz of a restaurant. I mean, it wasn’t anything fancy by any means, but it was a community. I think that drew me into that, specific job and was like, I could probably do this, which in turn.

is what made me want to do culinary for my degree in college. I would say the actual fine dining and love of food came during my college years ⁓ more when I was working through college. But I would think the community part, really is like, I could do this, was high school. So yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (03:10)
But you didn’t stay in restaurants. You left for a while and then came back.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (03:15)
yeah, no, ⁓ I never intended to do restaurants. I was a performer when I was younger. I also played tennis. I thought I was going to be either a Broadway star or country star. know, those aspirations. I was just going to Alabama and wanted to do sports medicine and wanted to play on the tennis team where I was going to marry a cowboy. All those things. Those are my little teenage girl dreams. So I definitely did not.

stay in restaurants. think when I got into the serving side and you can see the money and that stuff, that kind of drew me back in. yeah, no, I took a break even in my adult years once we started the family as my husband’s career started to expand a little bit. I took a back seat so I could watch our son when we lived in Miami to kind of let him do that. And in Miami, the restaurant hours are totally different than they are pretty much anywhere else. So I needed more of that nine to five job. ⁓

sat behind a desk for a little bit. And no offense to anyone who does that, just not my thing. I need to be up and at them for whatever reason, my back enjoys standing for longer periods of time than it does sitting.

Anthony Codispoti (04:20)
So what eventually drew you back into the restaurant space and inspired you guys to start your own restaurant?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (04:27)
I think the idea was always to be back in the restaurants. Part of being in a relationship is also like, it’s very give and take, there’s sacrifices here and there. my husband and I were, said from the get go, we got married, we got married young and we looked at each other. I think probably one of the biggest conversations we had before we got married was, okay, if someone’s career started taking off before the others, like who was going to, one of us would,

be the one that compromised a little bit on that. And he got a great opportunity right out of college, which took us to Chicago and then Chicago to Miami. And it was, we had help in Chicago. I was actually the only one in my family not born in Illinois outside of Chicago. So we already had the childcare aspect handled there as well. ⁓ So when we went to Miami and didn’t have that, it was like, okay, it was my time to kind of step back and let him do what he needed to do to kind of learn and evolve. And one of

the biggest food cities, I think, in our country. ⁓ But it was also in that time watching him kind of give so much of himself ⁓ to a company that, yes, they did value him. That wasn’t the case. think it was just, it really pulled on the family aspect that we wanted to have. Like we weren’t able, like he wasn’t there Christmas morning and I would go 16 hours without seeing him because he’d have to.

be at work super late and then super early because everything fell on him. He was in a leadership position there and really looking at ourselves in the mirror and what we wanted our future to be. Is this the type of life we want to live with our family? You always working for somebody else or is this something that we can try to tackle and build ourselves? And that’s kind of when we started building ⁓ our first concept, ⁓ Crown Republic, when we were still in Miami, ⁓ knowing we would come back to Cincinnati and kind of set down roots there.

Anthony Codispoti (06:19)
So I want to explore a little bit of that time that you were in Miami. You moved to Chicago, but you got a lot of family there. So that’s great. Wonderful support system. Now you moved to Miami. Did you know anybody there? No.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (06:30)
No, ⁓

not at all. was, we actually started north. started in the Boca area because that was where the first restaurant ⁓ was opening in the Delray Beach area. And then they ended up expanding. He got ⁓ the opportunity to take over both restaurants within a year of opening the first. ⁓ That speaks to my husband’s talent and I could go on and on about that. But yeah, no, that was literally, we also had a son at that time, which I mean, that can be a story for a later day. ⁓

we had our son in college. So that was another reason why we kind of decided right from the get-go that we were going to have to really grind hard while we were young. was either, you know, we kind of take slow paths to get to where we need to go, or it’s like we grind now. And that was kind of why that one decision came up to whoever got the opportunity was going to, ⁓ the other person would take a step back so we could care for our son Aiden. But yeah, I, when I sit back, it was literally me and my son Aiden, Beth runs just, I think he was, he,

was three when we moved there. So it was just me and him. And I was like, gosh, what do I, what do I do? Like beach every day. I mean, we’re both, I’m a redhead with fair skin. Um, also, this isn’t realistic for us. And, um, yeah. So I think I did about six months maybe with just me and him while Anthony was like grinding and getting his footing. And, uh, there’s a couple, we were fortunate that a couple of people from Chicago that Anthony worked with came down. So we had a little tiny community, like maybe of six people, um,

that kind of helped. ⁓ And obviously people would love to visit us ⁓ from Cincinnati and New Jersey. They would come down and visit. But yeah, that’s hard. It’s crazy when you have so much community for, know, especially when you have a kid, right? So when you have a child and you have that community and then that’s taken away, you don’t realize how fortunate you are in those moments until it’s gone. that was definitely an adjustment. ⁓ But yeah, now we’re back here.

Anthony Codispoti (08:24)
Because you you you’re

craving that like human adult contact you’re with your child all day and that’s great. That’s terrific. But at some point you want to talk more than just goo goo gaga right.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (08:30)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

my gosh, I even say that now, like when I’m with my kids, cause you know, they’re now where they’re all in school, which is great, but like before when you’re home and then you go to work, that transition of getting out of, you know, the kid talk to adult talk, I have to have at least an hour of like, like euphemisms or like one-liners that come from like Bluey or come from Disney channel to like get into adult mode. Cause I’m like, I’m so sorry. I’ve just been with my kids all day.

My staff likes to make fun of me for it all the time because I literally have this awkward interaction with people until I’m like, okay, I can do this. I’m like, I have been around other humans before. Oh, no, no, no, no, but.

Anthony Codispoti (09:11)
No early morning meetings for Haley. We’ve got to give her adjustment time there. Okay, so you start

cooking up this idea while you’re in Miami, and then how do you guys finally pull the trigger? Like, where do you get the money from? How does that move actually take place?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (09:20)
Mm-hmm.

Well, so my family is born and raised or like when they moved to Cincinnati when they had me back in the 90s, like we they set down roots. So like I’m born and raised Cincinnati and ⁓ my husband’s from New Jersey and his dad always wanted to support him as soon as he committed to culinary school. His dad’s like whatever like it one day if you have a restaurant, I want to be part of it. So we actually the idea of our. ⁓

restaurant came from a drunken night in college with all of our culinary friends. I actually wasn’t even part of the drunken night. It was a guy’s night out. They ended up creating this gastropub idea. you know, as we, my husband actually, the reason we kind of had this like, okay, it’s time moment. He was working so much. He ended up falling asleep behind the wheel, driving home from work one day, not like just, I think he had maybe like a 15, 16 hour shift.

and just was in traffic at a red light and just like fell asleep. And I had just found out I was pregnant with our second son. I’m like, this is not it. Like we cannot, it’s not worth your wellbeing and your health. And it’s not, it’s not fair to our kids. It’s not selfishly, it’s not fair to me. ⁓ But that was kind of our wake up call to be like, okay, this is when we have to kind of start figuring out what our next move is. And our buddies from culinary school were like, again, anytime they come to visit, like we talked about this restaurant and

⁓ so it started with this idea from this junkie night. Hey, this is the Skasho pub. ⁓ it was, I may have like a little play on words, they were catering an event for Providence college. So Johnson and Wales is, Providence is a very small little city and all these colleges in Rhode Island are very close proximity. So they were at a bar, Providence college kids were there. They had to do some sort of mock wedding event for a class that they were taking, ran into my friends and were like, ⁓ you’re Johnson and Wales.

Can you cater our wedding? And I’m yeah, why not? know, like exchange numbers. And then literally the next week, they’re like, we were serious. Yes. Yes. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. So Johnson and Wales, they have a couple, they had a couple of locations back in our days. I think now they just have two, but their main one was in Providence, Rhode Island. So yeah, so it started there and they had to cater this fake wedding and ⁓ they were making the menu for it. And they typed out or attempted to type out fine cook catering, but

Anthony Codispoti (11:26)
Johnson and Wales is a culinary, a renowned culinary school for folks. Yep, go ahead.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (11:50)
did find cock catering instead, put a rooster on it as a logo and just ran with it. And at that point, it was kind of a joke because it was just like a silly little college thing, know, Providence College. But now that’s why if you look at our Crown Republic Gastropub logo, there’s a rooster on it because we’re just trying to pay homage to like really the roots of what kind of started this idea. but yeah, that’s kind of when we, and with Anthony,

He worked in Chicago. He worked under dynamic group and at the time they only had a couple restaurants now they’re really big but he worked at a gastropub and loved the idea of like You know the fusion of this rustic american like all these different ⁓ Cuisines that kind of come to you know, america’s like a melting pot. So why not have a restaurant that literally has all these different flavors? combined and just to a really great food that’s just so much more than you know, like burgers and wings, know, so

Our ideas were really big. really, when we moved after you work in a city like Chicago and Miami, coming to a place like Cincinnati really had to kind of hone in on, you know, what, what the clientele here would like. So, um, I think we were a little bit too bold when we first started, but, know, part of being, you know, a restaurant owner is. Well, I want to say big, I would say flavor ideas. Like we had a chicken, um, a chicken liver, uh, cream spinach.

Anthony Codispoti (13:03)
The menu was too big.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (13:15)
which was so good. was like a great like he served it. We served it with pickled onions and like a mustard and a starter. We had lamb ribs on there when we first started. So think 2018 and Cincinnati. I don’t know. And this is nothing against Cincinnati by any means. Love Cincinnati and I pretty sure everyone knows this. So I feel like I can say this, but there’s a saying that if the world were to end, Cincinnati would end 10 years later. Have you ever heard that?

Anthony Codispoti (13:39)
You’re little behind the curve on the trends. Is that the idea?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (13:40)
Yes.

Yeah. So like we were so excited about all this stuff and some people loved it and some people are, this is great. And then other people like, what is this? So, you know, really just being adaptable to really knowing the city. I mean, it didn’t take us long to figure out. just like, OK, we got to we got to hone in on our ideas a little bit. It wasn’t like we had a large menu at all because we we still started doing all of our own breads from scratch, all of our own pastas. ⁓ But yeah, it was really just like, OK, what what do these people want to see? You know, when you go.

from again, like Miami and Chicago, who literally like everyone’s like trying everything. What they’re now serving like, I think the big thing is fried chicken caviar. know, like, know, anyone who just wants to try anything like in Cincinnati, they are, they’re creatures of habit and they like good hearty. Yeah, they, you know, yes. Yes. And we do have a phenomenal burger and we have so many things. And I think also we had to kind of get the city’s trust, right? They didn’t know who we were.

Anthony Codispoti (14:23)
They want a burger. They want their crispy chicken or, you know, yeah, they want the traditional comfort food. Sure.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (14:38)
I mean, it didn’t matter that I was born in Racer. I’d never done anything in, you know, the restaurant realm when I had been here and I hadn’t been back since I left high school. really just allowing people to come into our space, letting them get to know us was a huge part of, think, what made it successful. I told my staff from the get-go when we were hiring, I want you to know I’m not great with names, phenomenal with faces. Anyone will tell you this, but like it takes me a while to…

get to know names, but I could tell you your whole life story before I could probably tell you your name. I don’t know why that’s my little, my little issue that I have. But I told myself, know their faces, know their names. We’re right under a ⁓ apartment building or condo building. So was like, these people are going to be coming in all the time, like, know who they are, like, create your regulars. And it’s not this by no means a dive bar, like just it just became like that.

Our whole company motto is extending a seat at our family table because that’s what we want it to feel like. When you walk in, someone should greet you by name and then sit down, tell us about your day. We’ll give you your space and respect your time with whatever you’re doing, but really we want you to have this great dining experience that makes you feel like you’re back at being at a family table. Bring the joy and the love and the conversation around eating again. I even told them if they’re out on their phones and you’re watering them, refilling the waters, try to get them out of that.

What brings us downtown tonight? we seeing a show? Like, I, I, nothing bothers me more than when I’m out and I see people now. Okay. Side note, I have kids, right? I will let my kids while we’re figuring out what to eat. Anthony and I will like, do your tech time, do whatever you need to do so we can get this food in. But as soon as the food hits the table, everything goes away. We’re talking about things. So like, I always say, like, bring the conversation around it. Talk about the food. Like we literally do everything from scratch. If there.

If they seem like they’re enjoying something, tell them why we have that. All of our food kind of has a story behind it anyway. that was really. hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah, yes. hmm. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Oh, yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (16:30)
You really coach people to get a little bit more involved with the clientele because you want them to be regulars. You want them to feel comfortable there, you know, kind of like Norm from Cheers. They walk in, everybody knows your name, kind of a thing. So how far

were you into the life cycle of that first restaurant before you’re like, OK, things are finally clicking?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (16:50)
gosh. ⁓

It took a minute. took a minute and ⁓ full trans. Full transparency. It was really, really hard. I don’t think people talk about everyone’s like, you know, your own business owner. This is so exciting. I literally felt like a fraud for the first couple of months because it was it’s hard because when we were building the restaurant, right, it’s not something that just happens overnight. This is like a long winded thing. I was the stay at home mom. had.

Anthony Codispoti (16:57)
Is this months? Is this a year or two?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (17:22)
two sons at this point, who I was with all the time while Anthony was still trying to, you know, while we were still trying to get finances while we were building a restaurant while he was still working, like all these things that we were juggling, then we get into it. And the city wasn’t, they weren’t responding like they should. Anthony was getting calls from Miami, like, come back down, we miss you. ⁓ Like, where so we’re working where people like they don’t understand the food, but then he’s getting calls over here like

come back, need to come here. People think Miami misses you. And it was hard. like, personally, we had that struggle of like, he was valued in this city, this amazing city. And like people aren’t understanding what we’re doing now. It’s not that they didn’t value it. I just don’t think they understood it at the time. And then I had like people like, you must be so proud. Meanwhile, my kids are pissed off at me all the time. They’re either crying or mad because they don’t, I went from being with them, they’re constant every day to not even being existent. So was like, they only wanted me, but they also hated me at the same time. And

because it was like, where are you? Like, why haven’t you been here? But come back. it was, gosh, it was, I’ll never forget it. I think it was father’s day that year. Everyone was coming at like, you must be so proud of yourself. This is so exciting. Cause they watch us build this dream, right? And now we’re living it. And I literally like had my son at the time who was three or going to be three that year. He was just like, like, I think he was like playing with me or he’s like just having a tantrum. Who knows? It was, you know, almost three years old.

And I literally was just like, I think I sat him down and I went into the other room and I just started bawling. I was like, what am I doing? You know, like, my gosh, I should feel so excited about this, but I can’t. feel like a failure and something I felt like I was so good at, which was mothering. And now I’m like, you know, I know I’m good at, you know, my job and stuff, like, what is how it was just, gosh. So like, that was the start of it. And then again, trying to figure out what came from the adaptability of what

dishes we could serve. ⁓ Gosh, we were about six months in and we were like, I don’t think this is going to work. Like we could not, I mean, hard nights, emotional nights, like this. anywhere else would this work? Would this have worked if we stayed in Chicago? Would this have worked if we stayed in Miami? Like anything like, and then we had, my gosh, yes. And I think that’s

Anthony Codispoti (19:38)
just completely doubting yourselves. You’re feeling terrible

about being a parent. You’re feeling terrible about being restaurateurs and business owners. You guys have got this emotional tug of war going on in multiple directions.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (19:45)
my god.

Cause it was. And

it was such a small team. was literally Anthony myself after I had that meant that little breakdown at father’s day, my eldest sister, I’m the youngest of five girls. So she came in and she was in a transition in her life and she just saw me and she’s like, I’m going to come help you. I have some free time. I’m going to come help you. And she came in as a host just to, because again, I was, I wasn’t only the manager, I was also running the door. was also, you know, training employees. was.

⁓ everything I loved doing, but it was a lot for one person and then to go home and give everything I had also to my kids. was just, gosh, like I said, draining. So she came in and loved it. And she was, ⁓ a teacher for years. ⁓ I think she over 15 years. And so she already had that knack for just building into people and teaching and coaching. And so she’s now with us. She’s been with us and she’s our director of operations. And I don’t know what I would do without her, but it was that little.

Glimmer of Hope, at least for me, that really helped ⁓ kind of get me, I would not have made it through it without her for sure and the support of the family. ⁓ it was, we literally had this conversation, Anthony and I, where we were like, don’t, don’t, finances were depleting, like, we knew we had to, you know, provide for our family, we knew we want to do this, but maybe it wasn’t our time. Like, all the questions, like, what if we didn’t, what if, you know, all those doubtful things and

We had a ⁓ reviewer come in from Cincinnati Magazine. And Cincinnati Magazine is definitely the biggest probably publication within Cincinnati when it comes to restaurants and reviews. And ⁓ he’s no longer with them now. I think he moved on after COVID. But he came in and we didn’t know. We knew they could come in, But again, we didn’t know anyone who were new to the city. We didn’t know what they looked like. I mean, we could Google, but they don’t tell you when they’re coming in. They do it under a different name.

So how they did it is they come in twice. come in with a group and they just kind of observe and like whatever. And then they come in singularly where they ask more questions and it’s more of like a date night situation. So he came in and we didn’t realize it the first time. Like my host who we do, we did have photos at the front and my host was like, this might be him, but I’m not sure. And I’m like, I had already left for the night at that point, Brennan and I switched because we would do.

I wasn’t working doubles anymore. had, I had a yin to my yang. would do AM and PM and then we would switch. ⁓ and it like, my gosh, like, you know, you don’t really do anything special. It’s just more so like we weren’t changing what we’re doing. We just would like to make sure that we knew if someone important was coming in, ⁓ he came in then, and then he ended up coming in another time. And then the article came out, I want to say it was April, maybe of 2019. So definitely farther. Like again, we’re in the next year. We’ve been struggling. We had gone through all that and.

it, it, that’s what changed everything for us because no one had really known, like they knew we were there. We had our regulars, we had our built ins. But again, for Cincinnati, for people that they just go to where they’re going. And we were kind of off the beaten path. So Cincinnati, had, when we wanted to open our restaurant, we want to be on Vine Street, which is kind of like our restaurant row, if you will. ⁓ Is it, is it high street in Columbus that one, you know, kind of think of like that kind of it’s like one street of

Anthony Codispoti (22:40)
Uh-huh.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (23:05)
really good restaurants. We’re like, that’s where we want to go. But the city didn’t want another restaurant there. They wanted to pull. We’re in the, in the business district where we’re right down the street for PMG. PNG were right down the like a block away from our Aaron off. need a more restaurants over there for the business crowd and for the residents. So that’s where we’re located or that’s where they wanted to put us. And again, such a blessing, you know, that they did looking back. And then I could touch on that later. But so that happened and

Anthony Codispoti (23:33)
Yeah, talk

about this review. Like what changed when it came out?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (23:36)
Yeah.

So he said something and he talked about our food and he talked about, what he normally doesn’t do is talk about our service. And I think it’s the quote was, and I’ll probably misquote it because I don’t have it memorized by any means, but he said, everyone within the restaurant is unusually turned on. Like from the moment you walk in the building to the people that are busing your table to, you know, as you walk to the bathroom, like everyone is just engaged. And that is how we end. Like he said that comment.

And that for me was like, my gosh, I do know what I’m doing. That was like, you know, you know what you’re doing, but like it was the validation. And I think that’s what set us apart because anyone can have good food. Like anyone could create a great dish. And even if it’s not great, food is very easy to fix. you, we, we know overcooked your steak. Let me get you another one. Not a problem at all. It’ll be up in shortly, but what you can’t fix is.

Anthony Codispoti (24:12)
It was the validation that you needed in that moment.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (24:33)
good service. I really feel like service is what sets the tone and what keeps people coming back. And that’s why I trained myself to get to know people when they walk in the building, because I want people to be like, my gosh, I want to go see them. I had such a good experience because that person made it personal to me, whoever that is. And it doesn’t matter which one of our restaurants you go into now, like you will get the same feeling of our service at any of our, even though they’re all different, you know, it might be more fine tuned at our steakhouse than it is at our gastropub. But that feeling that you get during that service should be the same universally throughout all of our concepts. So

That for us came and that changed everything. So that came out. had someone from a pretty big restaurant company come in the next day and literally said that he read that part. And this is a big corporation. And I should say it’s a very big restaurant group that is now in multiple cities that has a huge reputation. They came in and said, I read this to my staff because this is what it’s about. That one sentence. I was like, so that was super validating as well. And then again,

within the next couple months, then we were approached to do another location. And I was like, do you not remember just like a few months ago where, so 3CDC who is a non-for-profit here in Cincinnati, they basically take ⁓ buildings like and, ⁓ you know, try to bring business back into Cincinnati. And they kind of are the landlords of Cincinnati amongst other people, but ⁓ we have a great relationship with them. But they’re like, hey, we want you to, sorry, go ahead.

Anthony Codispoti (25:38)
Who approached you?

Got it. Okay.

Yeah, so I want to understand what happened to the business itself. So I understand that this feedback was incredibly validating at a time that you’re doubting yourselves and you’re feeling this tug of war in multiple directions. But what happened to the sales? What happened to bottom line?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (26:06)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

I mean, sales just, I mean, again,

people, because if you’re a creature of habit, you’re going to where you always know. So that just put us on the map. So people are like, we’re going to see a show at Aronoff. We literally share parking lot with them. Before shows, we had people like, we would have show turns. It was just like nonstop. We went from like never getting reservations, like, or people, again, we had people come in, but just not what we envisioned it to come to literally just being like booked out doing three, four table turns.

You know, we’re open for lunch as well as dinner. ⁓ So we had the business crowd where we’d have, they’re like, ⁓ we walked by you all the time. We just never thought. We just thought you were fried chicken joint because you had a rooster. No, we’re not. So it’s like people just started to like look more into us and like took a chance on us. Finally like, ⁓ we, saw this and I’m so excited you’re here. And then another restaurant, you know, it made people start wanting to come to this ⁓ area. Another restaurant ended up taking up the other location. ⁓

on the other side of the building from us. like, again, it really just put us on the map and like, again, like you said, validated everything we already knew to be true, but it’s really hard to kind of feel that way, you know, when you don’t see, you know, kind of the fruits of your labor, if you will. yeah, so totally took over. then within a couple months, then we were asked to do another location, like we love what you’re doing here. Why don’t you try on this side of the town, which it was literally is two blocks from Vine Street, which is where

I mean, everything in Cincinnati is very close, but like when I say it’s by Washington, our second location was beautiful space. I mean, we turned it down originally when they asked us, like we were just like a couple months ago, like, what are we doing? Like, how is this going to work? You know, how do we move on from this to another one? Are you crazy? Like, again, not because we didn’t want to, but it’s like we haven’t even been a year yet. Like, let’s get our let’s let’s ride this wave that we’re now like seeing where people are coming in and enjoying it and coming back before we do another one. But

We ended up doing the other one. So the second concept is what we’re getting ready to open in Columbus as well. It’s Losanti. So Losanti is a boutique Italian steakhouse and where we opened it is right next to musical. It’s right next to a park, Washington park, which is a huge park in Cincinnati that does a lot of stuff like that brings people in from every lake. You know, it’s right down the street from the FC stadium. It’s great location, great patio and

Anthony Codispoti (28:09)
So what was the second concept?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (28:36)
So one thing that we do is outside of two locations, we’re a second generation. It’s like second generation restaurant space or company. So we’ll take spaces that have already been restaurants and then we will just reconcept them into like what we would do with them. So this space was already an existing restaurant. Really, we just had to put a lot of interior work into it to kind of make it into this steakhouse. It’s in a historic building, so we couldn’t change the layout. A very intimate, very small, but

In this area of the city, there was no steak houses. So we’re like, we could do what my husband’s really good at because he’s Italian, which is pastas, you know, highlight that, but then do stakes and do it differently than other steak houses. So we specialize in stakes by the ounce. So we have our own in-house butchery program. So at Losanti specifically, we will cut in the morning. We do a filets, we do strips and we do revise. And however, the butcher cuts them is how we’ll sell them at night. like.

filets can be seven and eight ounces, strips can be 11, 12, 13, rib-eyes will be 14, 15, 16. And then you just pick what size you want based off of how you want it. We’ll bring in special steaks for holidays and stuff like that, but that’s literally what it is. So you don’t have to commit to going in and getting a 32 ounce rib-eye or anything like that. And we’re a zero waste kitchen. So all of our meatballs, or all the trimmings and all of our ground beef for our burgers comes from the trimmings of our steak.

I mean, it was just like a no brainer in order to kind of utilize product at both of our locations and they kind of fed off of each other. ⁓ so that’s an, all of our comp, all of our restaurants now, when looking back at it, it’s kind of funny and Sarah dip Sarah did this, you will. So, ⁓ we’re like, how do we, if we’re going to do this, like, how do we make it like a Cincinnati brand? Like we are so excited to be part of the city and like, how do we pay homage to that? And, ⁓ so.

I know if you knew this, but Losanti ⁓ comes from Losantaville, which was the original name of Cincinnati. So Cincinnati was originally supposed to be named Losantaville, ⁓ but it sounded too French. So they changed it to Cincinnati, from Cincinnati, as who is, I think, the general that did it. And my husband, again, from not being from Cincinnati, he knew so much more about the history, and it made me look so dumb. I’m like, I was born and raised here, and I don’t know any of this.

We were like, okay, so and our Crown Republic Gas Show pub, our rooster already had a crown on it, which we did because we were going to be part of Cincinnati, which is the Queen City. So like we can like Losanti, we we literally had less than 24 hours to submit a name for this restaurant, our second restaurant. And I was like, I don’t I don’t know anything we came up with, which is in it feel out. And he’s like, what about Losanti? I was like, why? Like what? And they said it was and he had done all this research. I was like, I love it. And then again, it stays with the Cincinnati and the Queen City thing.

Anthony Codispoti (31:04)
Yeah.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (31:25)
And so yeah, so we ran with that and that was October of 2019 is when we got that one open.

Anthony Codispoti (31:33)
Okay, so you’re just getting that one open, getting things rolling, maybe finding some traction when the world goes into lock.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (31:36)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

The world goes into lockdown. were open, think, for six, maybe six months. And also I was pregnant with my third at the time. So that was another reason why I was like, like, approach us prior to me finding out I was pregnant. ⁓ But I was like, my gosh, do we like to just make things hard on ourselves? I guess we thrive in chaos. I don’t know. But ⁓ yeah, we honestly, what a a crazy time it kind of.

I don’t know if it was because of the service standards we set at Crown Republic that got us through COVID, but the people that showed up for us during the lockdown, again, we had a great first six months. The location was great. ⁓ People were excited to have that sort of concept in this side of the city. But yeah, mean, none of us were prepared for what happened there. I literally gave birth five days before lockdown.

I, it was going to be the first child, we have three, it was going to be our first kid that Anthony was going to be able to be home with me and do paternity leave. He had set it all up and I was so excited to have that. I was like, he hasn’t done any of these night feedings or anything like that. Cause he was always working these crazy hours. But I was, I felt robbed of that. I was so angry for so obviously for so many reasons, but also like,

how blessed I was because we ended up shutting down Lasagna. I mean, everything shut down, but when they were, when they started to let us ⁓ reopen, we were able to do Crown Republic. And because everything we did was from scratch, we had an advantage because we were able to start doing like take-home pasta kits. We would do lasagnas, we would do egg-lant parms, any product that we could get. We were a small fish in a big pond at that point because it was only.

Basically, yes, too, but we had only been open for a few months at Losanti. So any product that was left over or anything that we could get, we started to tailor our menus ⁓ to serve whatever we could. So we would do different pop-ups a day, and I would be home with the three kids, newborn and my two little boys, ⁓ posting on Instagram, like, this is what we have today. Let us know what you want. And it was my husband, my sister, Brenna, who’s our director of operations.

two other people that went into the space and then we just did to goes. And the amount of people that showed up for us, gift cards, we did an online shop apparel, like people, people that moved like away that were like, how do we support you through this? just they might, they’re like, we’ll buy these for when we come back and visit. Don’t know when it’ll be, but like people really showed up for us. And it was, it was, gosh, it was so humbling. Cause I was like bigger picture thing. Like this is why we do what we do. It’s, it’s to create a community.

Anthony Codispoti (34:25)
Wow, that’s incredible.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (34:36)
And they did, they got us through that. Our staff was amazing through that. Obviously no one could really come in. It had to be very, very close, a tight knit team ⁓ because of the regulation. So when everyone was able to come back and work, we still had our same staff. They wanted to come back. They still wanted to be part of it. ⁓ And then when we reopened, it’s almost like because people were so excited to just be out and be in community again, our business skyrocketed after COVID.

Anthony Codispoti (34:54)
Wow.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (35:05)
but we really couldn’t both locations and we could not have gotten through that. think if it wasn’t for the foundation and the relationships we set at our first location, building into not just focusing on the food, but building into the relationships of the people that continue to support us throughout that. don’t, I mean, I don’t want to think what would have happened, but like.

Anthony Codispoti (35:05)
both locations.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (35:28)
We were so fortunate to get through that because people, again, they’re like, they would come and be like, we brought some, we bought some of your t-shirts from your online store. We’re like, we’re so glad that you were able to reopen your doors. Cause again, like six months isn’t a lot of time to set your roots down. So yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (35:41)
You know, what’s interesting

about this, Haley, is I talk with a lot of my guests about the importance of relationship building. And frequently it comes up in the context of you are leaving one place of employment and now what, you know, and if you have developed a good network up to that point, then you’ve got better opportunities to find, you know, your next gig. And in your case here,

Again, the importance of relationship building, but you were doing it with the clients, right? And you were really impressing upon your frontline staff, the importance of interacting, asking questions, giving advice, just, you know, get to know these people. ⁓ And in very much the same way, those relationships not only carried you through the pandemic, but then once doors opened back up, you guys were off to the races.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (36:14)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah.

yeah. It was, gosh, again, goes back to like, cause people would come in and be like, Hey, how are your kids doing? How’s your mom? Like it was more of like, is everybody okay? How’s it was more talking about like how everyone did throughout the pandemic. haven’t seen you in so long. It’s so good to see your face. so excited to serve you again. ⁓ and you know, another thing that we built off of, I, I don’t, when I interview people,

I obviously look at a resume to see if they have like, know, basic, you know, I should just say work ethic, not even like the skills for restaurant. Because for me, it’s all about how I feel when I’m interviewing you. Are you making eye contact? Are you trying to connect with me? Or are you just kind of going through the motions? Like, I can train food, I can train you how to serve, I can’t train you how to be a good person and how to connect with people. So if I don’t feel like you can connect with me, there’s no way you’re going to be able to connect with a guest, you know, and

One guest coming in doesn’t make our business. It’s the repeat guests. And that’s what we need. And I need to get, I need to be confident that you are going to create an experience for people to come back. So literally I’ll look like going back to like our staff coming back, I think. And another thing we, I think we do differently is there will always be some sort of upper leadership within the restaurant at all time. Like at that point in time, Anthony and I were always working shifts like

until probably a couple of restaurants ago. Anthony’s still there a lot. kind of, again, going back to that, I had to kind of take a back seat as our kids are getting more involved in sports and stuff like that to get them where they need to go. But everyone would always say, they’re like, I’ve never worked at a restaurant where literally you see ownership or you see the DO or you see the food and beverage director. Because we want to be involved. We want people to know our faces. We’re very much an open company like that where like,

We are attainable people because if they don’t think we’re like if our staff thinks that we’re ⁓ if we want to do the job we’re asking them to do, why would they want to work for us? You know, and we have like I we open up restaurants with these people. We literally work alongside of them so they get to know us. And then obviously, because we’re growing business, we have to go on to the next venture. But we come in and we try to know your name. We have about 300 employees now. So it’s a little bit harder. As I said, I’m not great with the names, but I know their faces and I know what position they are.

And I always say when I’m walking in or I’m leaving, like, thank you so much for being here. We appreciate you so much. Like have a great chef. Like, you know where to find me if you need me kind of thing.

Anthony Codispoti (38:59)
So I kind of want to fast forward a bit because here we are very beginning of 2026. You guys are at seven current locations. You’re coming 90 minutes up by 71 to Columbus. That’s a pace of roughly one a year, even as you factor in those hardships in the early days until you got that one key review and then having to plow through all the crises around the pandemic.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (39:08)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Anthony Codispoti (39:28)
When do you feel like you really hit your stride and you guys started, you know, coming up with new concepts on a more regular basis?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (39:37)
Well, if I’m being completely honest with myself and everybody else, ⁓ I don’t think I’m never the one that’s like the what’s next kind of like I am but my husband is the one that sees totally like this is what I think we need to do and I think we should do it. And I’ve been that person where I’m like, also, let’s slow down and like plateau for a minute, enjoy what we’re doing. I’ve been the one that’s been more reserved because I think I saw I think probably PTSD for what I saw in Miami and him working as much as he did. like,

just let’s chill for a minute. ⁓ I also think to be successful in business, you have to be able to take risks and you have to be able to kind of push yourself into that next chapter because as soon as you’re comfortable, means like it’s probably not like, if you’re comfortable, that means you’re complacent in my mind. Like I need, we need to be doing more. And also I think we set the standard with our staff. Like we started to have people that are like,

Hey, if I want to grow, what does that look like? And we looked around like, we don’t know, because we had never thought of somebody believing in us enough that they wanted to be part of whatever our future was, which was such a beautiful thing. we’re like, OK, so we will have to open more restaurants because, and I think you mentioned this earlier, know, ⁓ when you’re talking about like growth and stuff and as you move on, like we obviously.

We might not be for everybody and we get that. But if we can give them whatever tools that they need to grow in their future, obviously we’d love for it to be with us. But if it’s not with us, ending on, I think you were talking about like the relationship as you know, in the network that you create, like we, we want you to be as successful as you can in whatever field you can. If that’s with us, fantastic. If it’s not, we will get you and set you up for whatever successes you are going to need because how you perform at your next job is a reflection of us as well. And that’s how we feel.

So again, we’ve had so many people grow with, that’s why we’ve grown so quickly. They’re like, what’s next for us? What’s next for us? And we’re like, okay. So, and then again, with the opportunities with 3CDC, we ended up taking over, you know, the rush that I said had opened up on the other corner of Crown Republic in that building. Like we ended up taking over that space, which is now our Rosie’s Italian concept. ⁓ But kind of going back to your question about when we thought we were, you know, what kind of made it work? ⁓ I mean,

We know what works, we also know that we’ve had to, like, Rosie’s was not supposed to be Rosie’s Italian. It was actually Rosie’s cocktails and pies. My husband wanted a New Jersey pizza place ⁓ in Cincinnati. And I was very, I was like, you can’t come to Cincinnati and say that this is the best pizza. Like we don’t, we were raised on chains and I can say that because I’m from here, but like there’s great pizza, but I don’t care if it’s from Papa John’s or Domino’s because I just wasn’t raised with pizzerias on every other corner up on the East coast. So like.

So Anthony’s like, I just want my tomato pie. And I’m like, you can’t call it a pie either because when I went to Rhode Island and everyone was telling me, let’s go get a tomato pie, I’m like, I don’t think I would like that because I was literally thinking of pie crust with tomatoes layered in it. ⁓ we kind of butted heads on that one a little bit, and that was right after. So we had signed that lease pre-COVID, like right before the shutdown, like, hey, we’ll take over this space. And then COVID happened. So like the original concept totally changed when we had to reopen. We’re like, okay, how do we make this successful?

in a location that, or in a time where we wanted it to be a late night cocktail bar that served pizza. Because all the residences were coming down like after their nights out at Crown and like would want to hang out and have an extra drink, but it wasn’t like it’s still a restaurant. So was kind of hard to create that kind of late night vibe there. So we’re like, we’ll do this and this concept. Well, that didn’t exist after COVID. There was no late night vibes. So we changed that up. And then it went great for 30.

30 days and then we had a drunk driver run right through our restaurant. So we had to shut down and it was like luckily we were closed at that time because if we were open people would have definitely died. ⁓ It was crazy and but again that was during the time where literally you couldn’t get anything. We were closed for over 90 days because we couldn’t get the framing for our windows like and then after that all the stuff that we had hired there we put in our other location so they still had a job.

Anthony Codispoti (43:32)
my gosh.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (43:57)
but then we couldn’t find people to work at once we reopened. So it was literally bare bones like skeleton crew working at this place and we couldn’t do another PR launch around our reopening because we had already done that. And it was just like, they’re open again. That, I mean, that was hard. And we ended up looking at ourselves and being like, this isn’t gonna work because we couldn’t get, we had everyone going to Crown Republic, which was literally you had to walk past, if you were coming from PNG,

You had to walk past Rosie’s to get to Crown Republic. Excuse me. And people just weren’t coming in because they didn’t understand what it was. They were like, what is this place? Excuse me. I apologize. So Anthony was literally like, okay, we got to reconcept. And I’m like, I mean, what do you mean you got to, ⁓ excuse me. Goodness gracious. ⁓ my gosh.

Anthony Codispoti (44:46)
There’s a lot of effort and a lot of time that goes into

coming up with the menu, what the ambiance, what the decor is going to be like. It’s not just like, it’s not that easy.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (44:54)
I tell you, and,

and like, when I tell you when Anthony’s like, or when people are like, my gosh, this must be so great to work with your partner. And I’m like, yeah, it is. But also like, like, cause when you try to leave it all work out the door and you come in the house, but you’re like, I got to reconcept. He gave me two weeks, two weeks to totally change the decor in there and totally reconcept that restaurant. And I did it. And it went from Rosie’s cocktails and pies, which was this like bright, fun, like

cocktails that we have like flaming limes in it and like, like matcha man, just super fun, like eclectic ⁓ cocktails with like, again, great food, but like to being a red sauce restaurant. And it’s all of his family recipes. ⁓ And it’s literally eggplant parm and chicken parm. but he was right. He, he recognized that it wasn’t going to do well and we can continue to watch it. The numbers are kind, or we can be proactive and accept like, Hey,

This didn’t work. It worked for the first 30 days that we opened and people loved it, but it’s not going to work now. So like, how do we do this? Change it. And it is, I mean, it’s one of one of our most profitable restaurants right now. People love it. And it’s literally just his family recipes. And again, going back to that Cincinnati tie, my name is actually Haley Rose and my nickname was Rosie growing up. But Rosie is also the name of the red legs mascot, the female red lights mascot. So it’s still playing into that whole.

Anthony Codispoti (45:55)
Yeah.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (46:18)
that Cincinnati theme ⁓ there as well, but Rosie’s is killing it and people love like our eggplant parm is made like a lasagna. And people talk about that. they’re like, my gosh, this is the best eggplant parm I’ve ever had. And I’m not, I’m, he already knows this. So I always feel bad saying it, but I am actually not like an Italian girl. I’m not someone that likes red sauce. This will make his grandma flip over in her grave, her soul.

Anthony Codispoti (46:42)
Hahaha.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (46:43)
But like his, ⁓ his grandma’s name was grace. And so we now sell her gravy because those East coast or certain parts of Italy call it gravy. If you came from certain part of Italy into the United States, but Gracie’s gravy, we now jar that because like, how do you get this gravy? Like we would sell it during COVID just in pints. If people wanted pasta kits or like, you guys need a jar of this. So last year we just had an opportunity and we did it. And now we sell Gracie’s gravy and there’s a photo of

my husband and his grandma, like right when you walk in the restaurant, because he’s the one who taught, she’s the one who taught him how to cook and his love of food. And it’s again, all the recipes he learned sitting right next to her in the kitchen. So that’s what it is. And she’s doing great.

Anthony Codispoti (47:20)
You know,

Haley, I’m just chuckling a little bit because people who, you know, follow the show, they understand that my favorite question to ask in the interviews about a big serious challenge that you’ve overcome, how you got through it, what you learned. But I feel like we have been covering multiple. But if you had a bigger one in mind for that question, I don’t I don’t want to cut it out. But ⁓ there’s certainly other places we can go with the discussion here.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (47:41)
⁓ god.

I

Well, when you said that, I went, my gosh, I’m getting so excited to talk about how all my sinuses of this weather are killing me. ⁓ When you said like, preemptively, like this might be a question. was like, gosh, which one do I pick? Because so many, I could think about ones that even got me to where we’re at today. Like that happened in college. If I talk about ones in business, that’s literally an everyday challenge. Like we’re in them all the time. ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (48:03)
Yeah.

Well then let’s

shift gears then, because I want to hear more about your hospitality program. I know that this is something that really sets you guys apart. Tell me more about that.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (48:22)
Yeah.

Yeah, kind of going back to when we had that review come out, I was like, again, that that gratification of knowing like, this, this is what people want. They do they do respond to how we’re treating them. And it is something I mean, we have so many great restaurants in Cincinnati. ⁓ But like, what is going to make people choose us over over them? You know, so again, going back to building into that, and that’s now his what he said in the magazine is now in our employee handbook. And we’re like, if you

If you can’t meet this criteria, if you don’t think that you can work as a team in this space, then you’re not gonna be able to work for us because it really is. I mean, you’re only as strong as your weakest link. like when you come into our space, let’s be honest, serving can be a very competitive industry, right? How many tips can I make or how many people are gonna request me coming in or can I get my name on any reviews? And yeah, that’s all great because that kind of fuels how you want your service to be anyways. But it’s also like,

if somebody has a bad experience, they’re not coming back. So how can you help your team while that diner or while that guest is within our building to make sure that they do come back? literally it’s, if something happens or if someone misses a greet, because we have very specific rules, you have to say, we have a two, two, two, two rule. Two, two, two, two. Four, two. Within the first two minutes, they have to be greeted.

with if someone comes within two feet of you, you have to acknowledge them. Hi, how’s it going? Welcome, whatever that is. Two inches. So if a guest glass gets with a beverage, whether it’s water or a cocktail or anything, if there’s only two inches left of that glass, if it’s water, you’re refilling it. If it’s a beverage, may I get you another one? I’d love to refresh that glass for you. Just because it’s like, I don’t know if maybe you’ve ever noticed this, but.

If your glass is empty and you’re like kind of on the fence of ordering another drink, if it’s empty and you’re waiting for it to be refilled, you’re probably not getting another one at that point. Right. So like you kind of having that wherewithal to be like, let me refill that for you. So you don’t have to think that’s another thing. Like don’t let the guests think when they’re in here, that’s your job. You’re the salesperson. You’re the one that’s kind of tailoring this experience. Like they need to just sit and enjoy and be like, my gosh, from start to finish, like I didn’t even realize I was just, it was just like a, like a boat ride. just got to sit back and enjoy. So.

⁓ and then the other one is two bites. So you drop off food, matter what course, like how’s our steak prepared this evening? Is it cooked to our liking or how are we enjoying that pasta dish? Because if for whatever reason it doesn’t need to be up cooked, like within two minutes, you’re making sure you rectify that situation. Or if it’s not, if it, anything’s not to their liking within two bites, I’m going to let you know that I’m aware or that I’m.

going to take care of whatever issues you’re having. then that way it doesn’t impede on your dining service. Let me get you something in the meantime while I fix whatever problem, if there’s a problem, because you don’t also want to wait more than two bites and then their dinners push aside and they’re sharing off somebody else’s because, you know what? It was just a little under for me. So I’m just not going to eat it. Like that sucks. That’s not what we want for you. So we have very specific rules when it comes to ⁓ how our, yeah, four twos. That’s why was like two two. Cause what do you say? I’m like, did I get the four? ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (51:38)
2222.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (51:44)
But yeah, so that’s a huge rule of ours. And then also like, again, like I said, you’re only as strong as your weakest player. like, if you notice somebody like your team member, because depending on what, know, where you’re at in sections and server sections, ⁓ you know, walking around dining rooms as you’re checking on your tables, just help your teammates out. know, like if I see like a glass that’s not filled and I know that that server’s at another table, just, you know, answering questions or doing whatever.

Why wouldn’t I ask if they want that? Because again, it’s like you want to make sure that that person comes back because even though they’re not your table now, they could be next time. Right. And it’s I think that’s kind of what the reviewer were saying. And like everyone was in tune and turned on because so many people touched his table not to talk to him, but just like again, to assist him in whatever if it was like needing an extra fork or if it was like water, refilling his water, like and again, doing it with a smile, just like

being that presence that knows like, hey, we know that you’re here to enjoy your experience and we’re going to make sure that that happens kind of thing. So yeah, I think that’s really just the basis of that whole program. ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (52:53)
And I’m

starting to connect the dots because everybody would like everybody in the restaurant business would like for their hospitality to come across the way that you’re describing. Not everybody has been able to pull that off and execute on that. And I’m thinking, tell me if I’m correct or if there’s things missing here. A big reason that you’re able to pull this off is that you get very specific with the training and the instructions that you give the two, two, two, two rule. Right. As an example of that also.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (53:03)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Anthony Codispoti (53:23)
the way that you were describing earlier how you interview people. You’re checking the resumes, have a work ethic there. Not necessarily looking for restaurant experience, but mostly you’re looking for, they looking you in the eye? Are they engaging with you? Does it seem like they’re a people person? Because that’s the kind of thing that you can’t teach. I think those are sort of two big pillars, two big reasons why you guys are successful in pulling this off. Is there something else in that landscape that I’m not paying attention to?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (53:36)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

also think, I mean, you also have to know who’s in your restaurant as well. Like there are people that come in that have all the experience in the world that like, you know that they’d be a great fit and a huge asset to your team. Cause also there’s some people that probably could benefit from learning from like a restaurant server, you know, like a lifelong restaurant server. And we get people and we employ them and they’re fantastic. ⁓ But really like you have to think of,

staff members as like units as well. So like when I’m interviewing someone, if I think that it only takes like one bad apple to kind of mess with the tree, if you will, right? So that’s also something I’m very cognizant of. And I tell, you know, our GMs, I’m not involved as much in the hiring. Like, yes, we set the foundation, but I fully trust in these people that I’ve put in positions to do the hiring now that they are upholding like those standards that we’ve set. But like,

Anthony Codispoti (54:32)
Mm.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (54:53)
Really, I mean, a service is also, you can feel it when you walk in the room if something’s not right. Or I can, like, if someone’s like had a bad day, or if someone’s going through something like I also train my leaders and I don’t like the term managers we only use because I feel like with management, it kind of reminds me of that poster within elementary school growing up when it’s like, I think it was like, like a Pharaoh or something, when he’s like standing ⁓ on his throne and pointing and all the slaves are pulling him.

And then it was like the difference between a manager and a leader. And then the leader, the bottom part of it is the Pharaoh or whoever the king was in front of all of his people, helping them pool. So that’s really the mentality I try to create. like, you’re going to be on that floor with them. You’re going to be on that floor, making sure the two, two, two, two rule is being implemented. You’re going to be talking to guests. You’re going to be a presence so that your team feels like you’re with them in this and you’re not going to let them go through the trenches alone. So, but if someone, but also by being there, you can feel like, Hey,

something’s going on with the server. Did he just have a negative interaction with someone or did he feel like he just mess up or is it something outside of work that’s now affecting them? So training them to pull them off the floor. Hey, what’s going on? Do we need to talk about this? Is this something that we can work through right now? Because I’m noticing it’s affecting you, which is affecting kind of the flow. really being, I mean, cognizant of what the vibe in the restaurant is at all times, knowing that a negative vibe can literally trickle, right? It’s a trickle down effect.

Um, so that’s, that’s a huge part of it as well. And, know, our staff, and I think the reason they wanted to come back after COVID are just, have staff that’s been with us literally since day one. Like our director of operations, obviously our food and beverage director started as a bartender and has worked his way up. our GM that’s coming to Columbus from Los she started as a bartender at one of our locations here. And it’s like, what’s next for me? I will go somewhere. And she wanted to go and she was like, what about Columbus? She’s like, I have family there. Perfect.

So she’s running our restaurant there. ⁓ But I, excuse me, I also think it goes to show that the community you create within your restaurant space, like over the summer, we lost one of our employees to suicide and it was at our flagship. He had been with us for a few years and obviously his memorial was going to be during one of our shifts. And we, you know, as a team, we were

talking about closing down, but our team members from our other locations decided to cover all the shifts of the staff members that were gonna go to his memorial. And that in of itself, I think speaks to the type of culture we create, not just with our guests, but with our team. Like we literally are a family. want people, we all go through days where we don’t wanna go to work. I mean, and I still have those, but when I go to work,

I’m going to be around people that I know support me and are going to lift me up and are going to make me like feel better. And I would much rather be in that situation than be at home and swulking and you know what I’m saying. So that’s a huge part of our culture as well. And I think that’s why people like to stay with us because we want people to feel like their family again, not just as guests, but as our staff. Like, again, I want to be able to be home with my kids because

If I didn’t have staff members that believed in me and supported me to be able to be home with my kids, right? So I just want to make sure that when people come into us, they know our hearts, know who we are, not just from a guest perspective, but from an employee perspective, because I don’t, I would never want to not work for someone or like not know who I’m working for. I feel like that just adds to the passion that they have when they’re in that space, which bleeds into their service as well. Like I know who my quote unquote bosses.

I don’t like that term, I know the owner of this restaurant. I know their hearts. know their families. You know what I’m saying? So I think that’s also a huge part of our hospitality program as well.

Anthony Codispoti (58:53)
I’m sorry to hear about the loss of your one of your team members. ⁓ But wow, what, ⁓ what a great emblem that team members from other locations came in to fill shifts so that the restaurant could stay open and everybody could attend the service. I think that’s just that speaks volumes about the kind of organization that you’re running. What’s behind the decision to go to Columbus?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (58:56)
Thank you.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, thank you.

I really think that again, kind of going back to like day one, like this was never part of the plan. And I think part of growth is evolving and pushing yourself and going into other cities with something like, I’m sure my husband would say he would love to go back to his hometown and New Jersey or New York or whatever. But it’s like, okay, what’s tangible for us right now? And what’s something that we feel like we would not lose like that whole

that I just spoke to is that piece where people know who we are, right? I want people to still know who we are. So where I’m located is, I don’t know, are you familiar with Kings Island? Okay, so we live out there. So that giant theme park, yeah, sorry. ⁓ So that’s where we’re at. So I’m about 30 minutes from all my businesses downtown and I’m about an hour and 10 minutes depending on the flow of traffic, if you will. ⁓

Anthony Codispoti (59:56)
I am. ⁓ Giant, giant theme park, folks. Yep, go ahead.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (1:00:14)
So it’s still like a tangible thing that we can get to and still be present and still support our staff. And that’s really where we want to start ⁓ as we kind of grow into other cities. And again, Columbus, I I went up there all the time, growing out, Coastside field trips, you know, stuff like that. ⁓ One of my best friends growing up went to OSU, a huge Buckeye fan and what a great city. Just, mean, Anthony and I go up there all the time for date nights, have already created a huge community there. ⁓

And I just think the promise of what that city is doing, I think there was an article that came out last year that said it’s one of the fastest growing cities in America right now. And that kind of excites us and where we’re going in Columbus is the Franklinton area. So it’s newly being developed. It kind of is giving us the vibes that Crown Republic gave when we first there, you know, there wasn’t many restaurants there right now, but it was all residences and businesses. And that’s kind of why we picked that space because it kind of gave us that like, oh, like this could, if we get in on the forefront of this is

this could be a huge, know, for the future of this company. ⁓ again, staying super tangible to where we’re at, ⁓ personally, like commute wise, like we can get there if need be. And we’re gonna be up there training. just, you know, we got a little short term apartment for our team. We’re gonna pull our team members from Losanti here to help train. So again, everyone can really understand that because I think it’s something, if you don’t experience it for yourself, it’s kind of hard to, like, you can speak to it all you want, but like, I think experiencing it is a totally different, beautiful thing.

So if we can pull staff members from here, which we are like our chef of Losanti here is gonna go help opening up. already have our chef there. Like I said, our GM that’s been there since September that’s kind of building into the roots there and hiring currently. ⁓ So yeah, that for us, Columbus was the best way to kind of dip our toe into the possibility of what it looks like to go into other cities where it still feels close enough that we can still be part of it and immerse ourselves in it.

and also challenge us to see, if we can do Columbus, what’s next? I mean, our dream would try to be within four hours, because that’s still workable for us, ⁓ since it is a very centrally located city. So if it is Lexington or Louisville or Columbus or India or whatever that looks like, ⁓ that’s kind of where we wanted to start to see if it’s something we can even do.

Anthony Codispoti (1:02:35)
Yeah, spread your wings while still staying close to the nest. What is the projected opening date?

Haley Nutter-Sitek (1:02:38)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

So right now, well, it was supposed to be July of last year. But I think we’re looking, the week after Valentine’s Day is really what we’re shooting for. We don’t want it to be any farther than that. But honestly, after going through this snowstorm, like dealing with everything here, I’m kind of glad we’re not opening, dealing with the chaos of weather and the untangibles that you can’t really plan for.

We’re up there once a week now checking progress. I think we’re getting all of our inspections done in the next couple of weeks. So yeah, it’s moving. again, hopefully the week after Valentine’s Day, we’re going to get through that crazy service that we’ll have here and then focus all of our energy up there.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:20)
Well,

fingers crossed then you’ll be open by the time this interview hits live. So folks be checking it out. Yeah. Haley, I’ve just got one more question for you today. But before I ask, I want to do three quick things. First of all, anybody who wants to get in touch with Haley, she’s given us her email address, Haley, which is H-A-L-E-Y, Haley at C-R-G-CINCY, C-I-N-C-Y dot com. Haley at CRGCINCY dot com. And we’ll have that in the show notes for folks too.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (1:03:25)
That’d be great. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:50)
Also, if you’re enjoying the show, a quick comment or review on your favorite podcast app goes a long way towards helping others discover our show. So thank you for taking a quick moment to do that right now. And as a reminder, if you want to get more restaurant employees access to therapists, doctors, and prescription meds that, as paradoxical as it seems, actually increases your company’s net profits, reach out to us at adbackbenefits.com.

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

Haley Nutter-Sitek (1:04:25)
Professionally, just think just an upward trend of business. I think this past year was very rough on our industry. The year before, we thought it was like, oh, that was a rough year, but 2025 will be great. And then 2025 kind of, I Cincinnati got a lot of…

news over the summer. So it kind of hit us pretty hard personally with Cincinnati, even though I know it’s kind of like a nationwide thing. But ⁓ I just honestly just I mean, it might seem so like, you know, sugar coated, if you will, or ⁓ butterflies and rainbows. But honestly, just success with everybody that everyone just feels like they can breathe a little bit and not feel so strained. And that people just again are

get back out to sitting across the table and enjoying a great plate of food with fantastic service. That’s just, that seems so silly. maybe, maybe minuscule, but like for me, that’s, I just want people to enjoy going out again and really ⁓ want to do it more and just remember, you know, that food is what unites us and brings us together. And I think we could use a lot more of that. So.

Anthony Codispoti (1:05:36)
Love it. Haley Nutter-Sittick from Crown Restaurant Group. 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.

Haley Nutter-Sitek (1:05:45)
Ew,

thanks, I enjoyed it. lot of fun.

Anthony Codispoti (1:05:48)
Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us today.