The Glenn Beck Program - Ep 275 | Cracker Barrel CEO Finally Addresses ‘Woke’ Rebrand Controversy | The Glenn Beck Podcast
Aired: 2025-11-22
Duration: 37:04


=== Fighting Lies and Censorship (14:56) ===

[00:00:01]  And now, a Blaze Media Podcast.
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[00:00:51]  This is probably very unfair to ask you.
[00:00:55]  We'll see.
[00:00:59]  Were you surprised you weren't fired?
[00:01:05]  It was summer of 2025 when Cracker Barrel announced that they were going to go do something different and they were going to have a makeover.
[00:01:16]  New logo.
[00:01:17]  No nice old man, no Cracker Barrel, just Cracker Barrel.
[00:01:21]  Any other time in American history might not have been a big deal, but it became a big deal and it was one of the biggest, dumbest moves, honestly, that I've seen in my life of a corporation.
[00:01:37]  Because people felt like something that they held onto and cherished and loved was under attack.
[00:01:45]  Was that the intent?
[00:01:50]  Who are the people that made the decision?
[00:01:52]  What have they done to reverse the decision?
[00:01:56]  And quite honestly, I heard from the guy who picked me up at the airport.
[00:02:02]  I heard from one of the guys who was handling the baggage at the airport.
[00:02:07]  He said, what are you here for?
[00:02:08]  I said, I'm going to meet with the head of Cracker Barrel.
[00:02:12]  And he said, give her hell.
[00:02:14]  The driver said, I don't know what they were thinking, but tell them we didn't like it.
[00:02:22]  What you're going to hear in the podcast today is my conversation with two people, the CEO and the senior vice president.
[00:02:30]  Senior vice president was brought in to fix the problems.
[00:02:35]  There are parts of it that are very uncomfortable.
[00:02:37]  Parts of it are honestly the usual blah, blah, blah PR stuff that you get.
[00:02:42]  Well rehearsed, quite honestly, because the last time the CEO was on television, she was on ABC, Good Morning America, and it did not go well.
[00:02:55]  This is her first television interview since.
[00:02:59]  I don't know if they thought I would go easy on them, but I didn't.
[00:03:05]  But I'm anxious to hear your thoughts, especially if you're watching and not just listening, because there is one moment that I think changed everything, at least for me.
[00:03:17]  See if you see it or sense it.
[00:03:21]  We have on today's podcast the senior vice president of Cracker Barrel Store Operations, Doug Hazel, and the CEO, Julie Messino.
[00:03:33]  As we came out of COVID, A, trying to hire 50,000 people back, and we got a lot of our employees.
[00:03:39]  We were original back, but we did, we lost a lot of very long tenured employees, a lot of them a little bit older and scared to come back into the environment.
[00:03:49]  And so there's a lot of institutional knowledge.
[00:03:53]  It hurts.
[00:03:54]  It really hurt.
[00:03:55]  And in 22, as we started opening back up, we had that new menu that we had.
[00:03:59]  So we lost all the people.
[00:04:00]  We put a ton of training into that new menu.
[00:04:02]  Now we're coming back, trying to open up.
[00:04:04]  We're trying to get guests any way we can get them.
[00:04:07]  Like it is, we had patio dining.
[00:04:11]  We were testing a rock garden dining.
[00:04:13]  Like they were going to sit out in the landscape.
[00:04:17]  And I always say that COVID even made Crafter Barrel start drinking alcohol.
[00:04:23]  Because that's how it happened.
[00:04:24]  It was out of COVID that it was like, how are we figuring out how to drive top line sales and try to get a guest in?
[00:04:32]  And is this something that we could put in?
[00:04:34]  Okay, so that is a good example of.
[00:04:37]  If you don't know any of the story, you think Cracker Barrels never surfed alcohol before.
[00:04:43]  Why are you shoving alcohol?
[00:04:44]  That's a cultural.
[00:04:46]  And so it's easy to think, you're selling people alcohol now.
[00:04:51]  What other values are you?
[00:04:52]  You know what I mean?
[00:04:53]  That's fair.
[00:04:54]  And I think it's, yeah.
[00:04:55]  It's at least, that one is at least understandable.
[00:04:57]  Yeah.
[00:04:58]  And so now you understand the story.
[00:04:59]  Yeah, exactly.
[00:05:00]  And so, you know, as we got into 23, I came out of my ops administration role and came into operations.
[00:05:09]  And I was leading field operations.
[00:05:12]  Best way for me to describe it is we were throwing Velcro balls at a wall to see what would stick.
[00:05:17]  It was like, how can we get people in?
[00:05:19]  And not just guests, staff.
[00:05:22]  Like it was, I can tell you many stories of us sending SWAT teams into areas to just find people to work.
[00:05:29]  We couldn't open the doors because we only had four or five employees.
[00:05:31]  It takes a lot of people to run a Craft Barrel.
[00:05:34]  Like, I mean, you were taking a picture of the paper.
[00:05:35]  How many do you think we're here right now?
[00:05:36]  How many people do you think we're?
[00:05:37]  And this is normal Saturday.
[00:05:38]  We didn't add anything.
[00:05:39]  I can't tell because I don't know, but 50?
[00:05:43]  52.
[00:05:44]  50?
[00:05:44]  Yeah.
[00:05:45]  52.
[00:05:46]  There's a lot on the line.
[00:05:47]  Yeah.
[00:05:47]  And each store has about, averages about 100 employees.
[00:05:50]  Our volume stores like this in the legacy market is 130 to 150.
[00:05:54]  That's total.
[00:05:55]  Total.
[00:05:56]  And 50 at a time.
[00:05:57]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:05:58]  And so it was hard.
[00:05:59]  I mean, we were struggling to get staff.
[00:06:01]  We were struggling to get guests in.
[00:06:02]  We were struggling with the new menu.
[00:06:05]  And so when Julie came in, she never said it to me, but if I was her, she was probably looking at us like, wow, we are a bit in shambles.
[00:06:15]  And we were.
[00:06:16]  I mean, we were, like I said, we were throwing velcro balls at the wall.
[00:06:19]  We put menu items on that we thought would drive a new guest.
[00:06:21]  We added complexity.
[00:06:25]  We didn't start with the kitchen and let's make the heart of the house the kitchen that can deliver the menu.
[00:06:30]  We started with the menu in 2019.
[00:06:33]  And so I think I've mentioned you on the line.
[00:06:35]  It's a mirrored steam line.
[00:06:37]  And it's basically the kitchen is cut in half and you can operate the menu off of that one steam line.
[00:06:42]  And the menu that we had in 19, it needed fryer stations.
[00:06:46]  It needed a whole different setup.
[00:06:48]  And unfortunately, we went after the menu first and not the kitchen, which impacted our employee experience.
[00:06:55]  So it was tough.
[00:06:56]  So food quality, I would say service to some of our service opportunities has been just trying to get back up.
[00:07:04]  The Januses of the world have been here 35 years.
[00:07:06]  We lost a lot of tenure.
[00:07:09]  Especially on our second shift, we've got some younger servers that are coming on, never served before.
[00:07:14]  And so we had to revitalize our training program and just a lot of new things that we frankly, with a 56-year brand, had never dealt with before.
[00:07:22]  And we lost sight.
[00:07:23]  I mean, we were focused on going to take care of something instead of the base foundation.
[00:07:29]  And frankly, built a house on sand.
[00:07:33]  The average person is finding it difficult to pay expenses every month.
[00:07:37]  And in most cases, there's nothing left over to cover any extras.
[00:07:40]  You feel like that?
[00:07:42]  Most are not getting a big raise.
[00:07:43]  Expenses are up.
[00:07:44]  It's very hard to manage without grabbing for credit cards.
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[00:08:33]  So when you came in, where was the company?
[00:08:38]  That's a problem with eating and talking.
[00:08:40]  I know, sorry.
[00:08:41]  No.
[00:08:42]  Don't apologize.
[00:08:43]  We're happy you're here.
[00:08:45]  Look, the company had not been performing.
[00:08:49]  At that point in time, probably, I don't know, five or six years of TSR decline, traffic had been down for you.
[00:08:59]  That's all right.
[00:09:00]  That's all.
[00:09:02]  Turn my business head off, turn my guest head back on.
[00:09:06]  So our shareholders weren't happy.
[00:09:09]  We didn't have as many guests as we had been.
[00:09:12]  This is a business of, I mean, you can see right now, I'm looking around, it's a lot of people.
[00:09:17]  It's a lot of people taking care of a lot of people, right?
[00:09:19]  We have a low check in the industry.
[00:09:22]  Our average check is $15.
[00:09:24]  You look at even our competitors, like a Denny's or like an IHOP, somebody like that, $18.
[00:09:29]  Look at people like Chili's and Longhorn and Texas Roadhouse, $27.
[00:09:34]  So for us to maintain that value, we need a lot of throughput.
[00:09:39]  So we count on a lot of people at a lower check.
[00:09:42]  We're about abundance.
[00:09:43]  Like, look at your plate.
[00:09:44]  I know.
[00:09:44]  Look at my plate.
[00:09:45]  Our guests tell us abundance at a fair price.
[00:09:49]  That's what they want.
[00:09:50]  So we had been losing guests, as Doug described, since probably what, 2018?
[00:09:56]  18.
[00:09:56]  17, 18 is where the decline started.
[00:09:59]  So I was tasked with how do we create change in that?
[00:10:03]  How do we get more people in?
[00:10:04]  The people who love us.
[00:10:05]  This is always about like how do we keep our core guests and make them happy, delight them, and just get more people to love Cracker Barrel the way they do.
[00:10:15]  So started in 2017, 2018?
[00:10:18]  2017, 18 was menu chicken.
[00:10:19]  What was the thought at that time?
[00:10:22]  What were you thinking should be done at that time?
[00:10:25]  Just didn't know what was causing it?
[00:10:27]  Yeah, well, one, I was an operations admin, so I wasn't close to the strategy or culinary piece.
[00:10:33]  So I'm kind of receiving the information, but frankly, it was about how do we create new menu offerings that will attract a new guest.
[00:10:42]  That was everything about 278 and 1780 was that.
[00:10:46]  In particular, it's dinner day part.
[00:10:47]  So breakfast, we are very strong.
[00:10:50]  At dinner, we've got the competition expands, and we're trying to figure out what are those things that are going to bring the guests in.
[00:10:56]  And Southern Fried Chicken was, it was kind of the anchor.
[00:10:59]  That's where we thought we could potentially see an impact.
[00:11:03]  Don't think we realized the complexity it put on the kitchen.
[00:11:06]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:11:08]  And then, like, literally right after we rolled it, going to COVID.
[00:11:11]  So.
[00:11:11]  And think about how many more choices guests have today, right?
[00:11:14]  I mean, even just from 2018 to today, brands that weren't around, you know, I say it all the time when you think about it.
[00:11:22]  Like, Cracker Barrel was founded in 1969.
[00:11:25]  Like, there weren't a lot of brands at that point in time.
[00:11:28]  There wasn't a lot of competition.
[00:11:30]  McDonald's wasn't even big.
[00:11:31]  Like, those things weren't around.
[00:11:34]  And now, look, today, you drive down this road, you drive that way.
[00:11:37]  Like, every brand, every competitor is here.
[00:11:41]  But you don't.
[00:11:42]  I don't know.
[00:11:45]  When you said, you know, some of your competitors, Denny's, that doesn't seem right to me.
[00:11:52]  Denny's seems like an old brand.
[00:11:55]  You know what I mean?
[00:11:56]  Cracker Barrel is not, I don't know why.
[00:11:59]  To me, it doesn't seem like an old brand.
[00:12:01]  It seems like a brand you know, but it doesn't seem old and dusty.
[00:12:05]  And I think that's what.
[00:12:09]  Well, you tell me.
[00:12:10]  The industry classifies us with that.
[00:12:12]  Yeah, yeah, I know, I know.
[00:12:15]  But I don't think people do, but the industry might.
[00:12:21]  When did you hire the consultants to come in?
[00:12:25]  Well, I think you all have had consultants in over the years, but.
[00:12:28]  The consultants.
[00:12:29]  Yeah.
[00:12:30]  So when I got here, part of what I was tasked with was changing the trajectory, right?
[00:12:35]  And so we really dug in first on where were our opportunities?
[00:12:41]  What could we do better?
[00:12:43]  Food and experience was one that raised to the top.
[00:12:45]  We were not winning in that space.
[00:12:48]  But there were other things that we needed to do as well.
[00:12:50]  And that's when we brought in some consultants who helped us dig into our data, look at competitive data, look at people who used to come to us, who don't come to us anymore, people who come to us, like what's the magic there?
[00:13:02]  How do we do more of that?
[00:13:04]  And people who've never even thought to come to Cracker Barrel.
[00:13:06]  What do they think about Cracker Barrel?
[00:13:07]  So really looking at all of those things to really say, how do we improve our food and experience?
[00:13:13]  Because Doug is right, one of the first things that we really tackled, and that was one of our biggest problems, is we were losing people at dinner.
[00:13:20]  And dinner is an important day part for us because, believe it or not, we actually, your check is a little bit higher at dinner at breakfast.
[00:13:29]  And so that's important when we don't have that traffic.
[00:13:31]  Yeah, that's important.
[00:13:32]  It changes everything.
[00:13:33]  Yeah, so we really started there.
[00:13:35]  But we actually started at the other end of it, which was early dine.
[00:13:39]  And so we put early dine specials out for our guests because we'd heard that was important to them.
[00:13:43]  So $8.99, come in, you get meatloaf, home-fried chicken, all of that stuff.
[00:13:49]  really just listening and making sure that we had the things that people wanted so that they would choose us um i'm sorry just to get it let's just get this out okay Okay.
[00:14:04]  What happened?
[00:14:06]  The choices that were made.
[00:14:09]  I said on day one of this, I remember when they rolled out New Coke.
[00:14:16]  And I thought that was the dumbest marketing move, the dumbest thing I've ever seen.
[00:14:22]  We're taking the original formula and ditching it.
[00:14:26]  And let's start over with a brand that people love.
[00:14:31]  The day this broke, I said on the air, welcome to New Coke.
[00:14:37]  That's what this is.
[00:14:39]  And it was, no offense.
[00:14:42]  Stupid.
[00:14:43]  Just stupid from start to finish.
[00:14:47]  Can you walk me through how that happened?
[00:14:51]  Sure.
[00:14:52]  Look, our guests have a right to be upset.
[00:14:54]  I feel it in you when you're saying that they have a right to be upset.

=== The New Coke Mistake (04:24) ===

[00:14:58]  We messed up.
[00:14:59]  The intent was not ideological.
[00:15:02]  It was not to put the old version of Cracker Barrel in a box.
[00:15:05]  That was not the intent whatsoever.
[00:15:08]  The logo was one piece of a system.
[00:15:11]  The old-timer was never going anywhere.
[00:15:13]  That's why actually when we said, okay, okay, we hear you, like, it's because he was never going anywhere.
[00:15:18]  When you walk out of here, there's a big sign over there by the side of the freeway.
[00:15:23]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:15:23]  Huge, bigger than this booth, right?
[00:15:25]  We were never taking those down.
[00:15:26]  That's so expensive.
[00:15:28]  And they're beautiful.
[00:15:29]  People love them.
[00:15:29]  It's a beacon to the weary traveler from the interstate.
[00:15:33]  The day we rolled that, we brought Uncle Hearsel's menu item back to the menu, which our guests have been asking for for like 10 years.
[00:15:40]  It was like, it was so unfortunate that we could.
[00:15:44]  But I get it.
[00:15:45]  Like, what we didn't see in the data, again, it was one piece of what we were doing.
[00:15:50]  But what we didn't see in the data was that the way people see themselves in the logo.
[00:15:55]  So when the old timer and when the barrel were gone, it was like we had taken them out of it and that we weren't valuing what they valued.
[00:16:03]  And we've heard that loud and clear since we did that.
[00:16:05]  And I'm sorry.
[00:16:06]  Like, I really regret that that was not the intention.
[00:16:09]  We were trying to make it, think about your phone.
[00:16:12]  You know, your logo has to be this big to fit on there.
[00:16:15]  We were trying to simplify it because honestly, we got a guy, we got a barrel, we got a lot of stuff going on.
[00:16:20]  I have to tell you.
[00:16:22]  Did I have the logo?
[00:16:23]  I think I have the logos.
[00:16:24]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:16:25]  To me, I'm not upset.
[00:16:28]  I don't care.
[00:16:29]  Okay.
[00:16:30]  I mean, that is a very busy logo.
[00:16:33]  This is a more modern logo.
[00:16:34]  I don't think it was about the logos.
[00:16:36]  I don't think that was.
[00:16:37]  It wasn't.
[00:16:38]  It wasn't.
[00:16:38]  So what was what?
[00:16:43]  What was America saying to you?
[00:16:45]  Yeah, they were saying our values, our traditions, that's what Cracker Barrel represents to us.
[00:16:54]  Look around.
[00:16:54]  The story of America is on the walls.
[00:16:56]  Yes.
[00:16:57]  And they thought when we did that that we were saying that we didn't care about that.
[00:17:02]  And that was not the intent.
[00:17:04]  And we are, I'm so sorry for the misunderstanding.
[00:17:08]  I regret it.
[00:17:08]  I don't want people to be mad at us.
[00:17:10]  My job is to make people love Cracker Barrel.
[00:17:12]  Right.
[00:17:12]  Not be mad at Cracker Barrel.
[00:17:15]  We're all getting older.
[00:17:16]  I don't know about you, but I felt the aches and pains that come along with that kind of thing.
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[00:17:30]  And I said, I used to.
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=== Making a Difference (02:58) ===

[00:19:23]  What was the what was A, the thinking of the remodeling?
[00:19:27]  And was it ever intended to get rid of all of this?
[00:19:32]  Because it seemed very sterile compared to this.
[00:19:36]  I'm glad he asked.
[00:19:39]  I think a lot of people think that Doug and me and other people sit around and are like, let's remodel Cracker Barrel.
[00:19:45]  Nothing could be further from the truth.
[00:19:47]  The notion for some of that truly came out of a lot of the work that we were doing on how do we improve food and experience.
[00:19:54]  When we were talking to our guests, they said, stores could be a little bit more comfortable.
[00:19:58]  They're real dark.
[00:19:59]  I can't read the menu.
[00:20:02]  Seats are real hard.
[00:20:04]  Tell them your Memphis story.
[00:20:06]  You'll love this.
[00:20:07]  Maybe not.
[00:20:08]  I don't know.
[00:20:09]  We were in a store.
[00:20:10]  I had maybe been here a hot minute.
[00:20:12]  Two or three months.
[00:20:12]  Like, yeah, two or three months.
[00:20:13]  And we were out in Memphis, one of our older stores.
[00:20:18]  And we were talking to the team and we were working.
[00:20:21]  And I literally saw this man walk in with a stadium cushion.
[00:20:25]  Now, I've only been here a couple months.
[00:20:27]  I'm like, what?
[00:20:30]  And in my mind, I'm going, it happens all the time.
[00:20:33]  I've seen them all over the country here in stadium cushions.
[00:20:35]  I suddenly stopped in my tracks.
[00:20:36]  I'm watching this man with a stadium cushion.
[00:20:39]  And I'm like, I gotta go talk to him.
[00:20:41]  So I waited till he got his food and, of course, interrupted him while he was eating.
[00:20:44]  But I said, sir, I've just got to understand.
[00:20:49]  Did you just have surgery?
[00:20:51]  Yeah, right.
[00:20:53]  And he said, I love your food.
[00:20:56]  I love it here, but your chairs are so uncomfortable.
[00:20:59]  And he's like, oh, yeah, this has all of the time.
[00:21:03]  And I'm like, wait, what?
[00:21:05]  This happens all the time.
[00:21:06]  And like, we haven't done anything about it.
[00:21:09]  Literally, Glenn, I was having breakfast with my nephew and his girlfriend, not four weeks ago on Charlotte Pike that way, in a store, and we were sitting in one of the window seats and gosh, darn it if it didn't happen again.
[00:21:23]  A guy gets out of his pickup truck nine o'clock on a Saturday morning with a stadium cushion and starts walking in.
[00:21:28]  I'm like, look at my husband, my net.
[00:21:30]  I'm like, and and that's really where it all started is how do we make the stores more comfortable?
[00:21:36]  We also heard from our guests that that's why they weren't coming as much for dinner, because they want to sit in something like this.
[00:21:42]  You are sitting in the second booth ever, in a cracker barrel.
[00:21:45]  Oh, you're kidding me, it's, the second one.
[00:21:47]  Guess the one.
[00:21:48]  And the reason this corner is cut like this is because the first one is right around the corner.
[00:21:52]  We can figure that out.
[00:21:53]  And it was a square, it was a square table, and we have a group that comes in for a Bible study three times a week and they couldn't get around the corner.
[00:22:00]  They call themselves the corner crew now because they they helped us learn uh, that we needed to do this.
[00:22:07]  So the Romanos have been a test and learn project.
[00:22:10]  How do we get the right balance of investment, of comfort, of nostalgia, of the tradition that everybody knows and loves here, but in a way that's easy for our teams to take care of?

=== Balancing Comfort, Nostalgia, and DEI (14:42) ===

[00:22:22]  It's also hard to clean some of these things, oh I bet.
[00:22:25]  So how do, how do we make sure that we we do all of those things while keeping the stories and the traditions and the things that people love about Cracker Barrel and the feeling?
[00:22:33]  For me it's like the feeling when you come in and the fire's going and yeah, you know.
[00:22:37]  So that's really testing activities.
[00:22:39]  This is very different than the, the drawings or the, the.
[00:22:45]  There were only four of those and so, and they were again, we've got all different levels of kind of testing and learning that we were doing and that was out there.
[00:22:52]  Are these corporately owned or are these franchises?
[00:22:55]  We own them all.
[00:22:56]  The thing I thought people were gonna not like about that is that store has so many booths, like we actually took out because people have been loving the soft seating in the Renatos that we've been doing and so that has.
[00:23:07]  I mean, usually Cracker Barrel is a sea of tables, like when you look around we've got a lot of tables and chairs and that one is all boosted.
[00:23:12]  I thought they're gonna kill me for the boost.
[00:23:14]  It's too many booths, it's too many booths.
[00:23:16]  And it wasn't that, it was the black and white and the decor.
[00:23:20]  So that's why, when people got upset about it, we were like, oh gosh, that's not the intention.
[00:23:24]  We can revert them like no problem, changed the logo, painted them brown, like we're in the pro.
[00:23:30]  There's a couple still because of Florida permitting, that aren't fully turned back yet.
[00:23:33]  But we're getting there.
[00:23:33]  There were only four.
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[00:24:49]  In some ways, I'm going to get so much heat for saying this.
[00:24:55]  In some ways, I think it was unfair.
[00:24:58]  Because I don't, doing my research, I don't think it was intentional.
[00:25:04]  I think it wasn't political.
[00:25:08]  It was just a lack of understanding of the brand and the time in which we live.
[00:25:15]  You know, I can take it from Nike, but Budweiser, any of these brands that said they were like me.
[00:25:29]  I don't care how you vote.
[00:25:30]  I don't care.
[00:25:32]  But don't slap me across the face.
[00:25:35]  And I think it felt like that to a lot of people.
[00:25:39]  That you were just like, we don't care about your values.
[00:25:42]  We want new customers.
[00:25:44]  This is who we are.
[00:25:45]  And this is unfair to you.
[00:25:49]  There was that one picture that was going around of the rainbow seats.
[00:25:54]  That wasn't you.
[00:25:56]  That wasn't part of this new deal.
[00:25:59]  But was there DEI and all that crap going on in the company?
[00:26:03]  This was truly about, you know, we, as you look around, we embroider that logo on so many things, hats and shirts, and it was truly about making it more simple as part of a system.
[00:26:14]  No, but I mean, was DEI, was the had the company embraced DEI as a culture?
[00:26:27]  Look, the Cracker Barrel has always been about welcoming everybody in.
[00:26:31]  I think before I was here, we had different policies.
[00:26:36]  We're here to take care of people.
[00:26:37]  We're here to make sure everybody can work here, can be welcome here.
[00:26:42]  Right.
[00:26:43]  So there's a difference between, I think, every American wants that.
[00:26:47]  There's a difference between that and promoting, you know, when a brand, I don't even know which one, it's probably Nike, all of a sudden makes it a point of saying boys can be girls and they should be in the girls' locker room.
[00:27:08]  I don't need that from my brand.
[00:27:10]  I don't want that from my brand.
[00:27:12]  You as individuals can make whatever choice you want, but don't preach to me from a corporate place.
[00:27:19]  Don't preach to me on that.
[00:27:21]  Just leave me alone.
[00:27:22]  I'm here to buy your shoes.
[00:27:24]  I'm here to eat your meal.
[00:27:27]  Can we just not have that thrown in our face?
[00:27:32]  What I'm asking you, was that part of any of the strategy that this was becoming we have to make political statements?
[00:27:42]  No, it's pancakes, boys.
[00:27:44]  Not even one down.
[00:27:44]  Yeah, we're not trying to make political statements.
[00:27:47]  Your point earlier about you think it potentially unfair.
[00:27:52]  I think the logo was the straw that broke the camel's back.
[00:27:55]  I think from 2018 forward, we had frustrated him so many times with menu items we had deleted.
[00:28:02]  Horrible service, bad food.
[00:28:05]  We couldn't execute food out of the kitchen.
[00:28:06]  We're holding guests for 50 minutes to an hour when they want to get out in 45.
[00:28:12]  And they were telling us, our guests, they keep coming back and keep coming back, keep coming back.
[00:28:17]  And every time they come back, it's like, come on, guys, we're going to give you another shot.
[00:28:20]  Get the food right, get the service right.
[00:28:23]  And we did not see that as our North Star.
[00:28:26]  I call them blinking lights.
[00:28:27]  We had all these blinking lights happening, forgetting about, you know what, our guest is coming in to eat.
[00:28:33]  And we've got to provide that experience.
[00:28:36]  And then it becomes an experiential brand.
[00:28:40]  Where unfortunately it became transactional because the guests, they couldn't take time to even understand what was happening on the walls because they're frustrated that we can't get food out or get it right or the quality.
[00:28:50]  Our focus is food and experience.
[00:28:54]  I mean, we have to.
[00:28:56]  It sounds so simple, but it's why you're here.
[00:29:00]  Doug says it all the time.
[00:29:01]  You're here because you're hungry.
[00:29:02]  Maybe you need a gift on your way in and out, but you're here because you're hungry.
[00:29:06]  We have got to make sure that we're doing that.
[00:29:08]  I know you're.
[00:29:10]  I don't even know if it's your mission statement.
[00:29:11]  It's part of your mission statement.
[00:29:13]  That whole...
[00:29:13]  Pleasing people.
[00:29:14]  ... plaque.
[00:29:14]  Yeah, that whole thing that has all the different...
[00:29:18]  And part of it was to be a family.
[00:29:25]  That's why the fireplace is here.
[00:29:26]  That's why the checkered board is there.
[00:29:28]  Because it's meant to be a warm, safe.
[00:29:32]  Home away from home.
[00:29:33]  Home away from home.
[00:29:36]  It's like Uncle Ted moves in and he's now taking care of grandma, but he's getting rid of all of the doilies that have been on grandma's table.
[00:29:45]  And you're like, that's not grandma.
[00:29:47]  Even if grandma was saying, I don't care about the doilies, that's grandma's house.
[00:29:52]  And you were messing with grandma's house.
[00:29:55]  And we're sorry that that's what people feel.
[00:29:59]  That was not the end time.
[00:30:00]  It was not the end time.
[00:30:02]  And it hurts me because I don't want people to be mad at Cracker Barrel.
[00:30:07]  Our job is to make people love Cracker Barrel the way that our guests do, right?
[00:30:11]  And so even trying to invite new people in, it was always about how do we show them the magic that is Cracker Barrel, the stories of America, the stories of our guests, the stories of the people like Janice and Doug who've spent their lives making it great here.
[00:30:27]  That's what we want everybody to love.
[00:30:30]  And we missed the mark.
[00:30:31]  We missed the mark.
[00:30:32]  You were on Good Morning America.
[00:30:37]  That wasn't fun.
[00:30:41]  And this is your first interview since then.
[00:30:44]  I thought we weren't having an interview.
[00:30:45]  You told me we were just talking.
[00:30:48]  Didn't you tell me?
[00:30:49]  Just a discussion.
[00:30:51]  I'm sure this is not your first discussion since then.
[00:30:57]  What'd you learn from that?
[00:30:58]  Anything?
[00:30:59]  From Good Morning America?
[00:31:00]  From that interview and the response in that interview?
[00:31:06]  That so many things have gotten in our way of, and we've lost focus, focus on the things that matter, which is what we're talking about, food, taking care of people, telling the stories, letting people see themselves in this brand.
[00:31:29]  You know, you asked me earlier about a place that I've worked, and the thing that struck me about Cracker Barrel and that continues to strike me about Cracker Barrel, this is a humble brand with humble beginnings here in the center of this great country.
[00:31:45]  Other brands that you go into, you sit down, and when you look around and you see things on the walls, they're the brand's story.
[00:31:53]  They're telling you about the ingredients, they're telling you about their founding, whatever they want you to think.
[00:32:00]  We don't do that here at Cracker Barrel.
[00:32:02]  There's nothing on the wall here that's Cracker Barrel or the Yogo.
[00:32:05]  This is America's story.
[00:32:07]  This is our guest's story.
[00:32:09]  This is Janice's or Doug's story, and people's ability to feel that when they come in, whether it's grandma's house.
[00:32:16]  And so we don't want to move the doilies around.
[00:32:18]  We want to make it comfortable for you and comfortable for you to bring your friends and family.
[00:32:22]  So can I ask you, how do because part of me absolutely agrees with the way people reacted.
[00:32:34]  But part of me also is like, that's a little irrational, you know.
[00:32:39]  It's a product of the time.
[00:32:44]  And it's honestly, it feels like a corporate boardroom not understanding what people are feeling about the overall picture of their life.
[00:32:56]  You know what I mean?
[00:32:57]  And of other things, too, that are going on.
[00:32:59]  Right, right, right.
[00:33:00]  Politics, everything.
[00:33:01]  Everything.
[00:33:02]  I mean, I hate the fact that everything is about politics.
[00:33:09]  You know, it's ridiculous.
[00:33:11]  We can't survive if everything is about politics.
[00:33:13]  Pancakes are pancakes.
[00:33:14]  That's right.
[00:33:14]  Football is football.
[00:33:16]  Politics are politics.
[00:33:19]  But how do you, if we don't correct this, I'm asking you to put a philosophical hat on here.
[00:33:27]  If we don't, if everybody is afraid to change, afraid that everything's going to mean six layers down something else, how do we survive?
[00:33:44]  How do you make change in business?
[00:33:48]  Very existential question for our coffee and country fresh turkey.
[00:33:53]  By the way, very good.
[00:33:56]  Very good.
[00:33:57]  It's a star.
[00:33:58]  The guy who picked me up at the airport said, have you had this?
[00:34:01]  And I was like, no.
[00:34:02]  So that's why I'm having it for breakfast.
[00:34:04]  It is.
[00:34:04]  It's a home run.
[00:34:05]  And you've got to get it while you can.
[00:34:06]  We usually sell out right around Thanksgiving.
[00:34:09]  We bought a little bit more this year, so hopefully it'll last through the holidays.
[00:34:13]  Look, I think that's why, frankly, that's why I was anxious to sit down and chat with you.
[00:34:20]  Because I do think a lot of things have been misconstrued.
[00:34:23]  And I want to set the record straight.
[00:34:26]  I want people to know that this is the brand that they've always known and loved.
[00:34:30]  And that our job is to take care of it and just set it up for the next 55 years.
[00:34:36]  And that when you walk in here, it feels like Cracker Barrel.
[00:34:41]  The spirit, the feeling, the legacy, the traditions, the food that you love that's made by hand by people who care, it's still here.
[00:34:49]  Are you surprised?
[00:34:51]  This is probably very unfair to ask you.
[00:34:55]  We'll see.
[00:34:59]  Were you surprised you weren't fired?
[00:35:05]  I feel like I've been fired by America.
[00:35:08]  I bet you did.
[00:35:09]  Yeah.
[00:35:11]  That's probably worse.
[00:35:13]  Yeah, because it's hard because, again, all I've wanted to do was help people love this brand the way I love this brand, the way Doug loves this brand, the way everybody who works here.
[00:35:25]  I mean, the responsibility for the 70,000 people who work here, I bear that every single day.
[00:35:32]  They are here to make a better lives for themselves, to take care of their families, to put a roof over their head, food on their table.
[00:35:38]  And my job is to make sure that Cracker Barrel helps them do that.
[00:35:42]  And it's not just those 70,000 people.
[00:35:44]  Like Doug has four other people depending on him.
[00:35:46]  They only have people depending on them.
[00:35:48]  And that's why we're doing what we're doing because this brand deserves to have another 50, 60 years in front of it.
[00:35:56]  We're trying to set it up for the future so that people, the stories are here and they're told and people can come in and feel that.
[00:36:05]  The feeling that you get here is so special.
[00:36:09]  It's so unique.
[00:36:11]  I'm talking about you personally.
[00:36:12]  And I want, I want, but my job is to keep that, you know, protect that.
[00:36:21]  And I feel like people don't think I can do that sometimes.
[00:36:24]  But my job is to invite them in and let them see that they know and love.
[00:36:30]  I mean, hopefully you feel that today, but maybe your listeners can feel that through you.
[00:36:36]  I do feel this.
[00:36:39]  The beginning of that answer, which is all that mattered to me, was the most genuine thing I have heard from somebody in your position in a very long time.
[00:36:52]  I can see that it actually, I can see in your eyes right now, that hurt deeply personally.
[00:37:03]  I want people to love this place.