Restaurant Finance & Development Conference (RFDC) Recap 2022
Last month the RFDC was in my hometown of Las Vegas again. I’ve been going to this show since 2015, and if you have never attended and do anything that has to do with the restaurant business I would highly recommend it.
First of all, the convention was held at the Wynn’s new convention space, and if you didn’t book the room at the Wynn early (under $300/night for convention rates), the rooms were going for $2,400/night right before the show. The casino was packed with guests and conventioneers everywhere from Monday – Wednesday (November 14th – 16th) during the conference.
Who goes to this show? High level executives and owners that are very meaningful to the restaurant business. Economists, bankers, equipment suppliers and lots of corporate and private restaurant owners and operators. Oh, and a group of 13 retail real estate brokers from the Retail Brokers Network (RBN) from all over the US. Jonathan Serrano and I represented Nevada for the RBN, but we had folks from TN, PA, AL, MN, CO, NM, and WI as well (we all had an amazing dinner at Monzu https://monzulv.com/ Monday night)
Tim Tebow at RFDC 2022
Workshops started on Monday morning, but things got really interesting in the main opening session that afternoon with an economic presentation by professor of Economics Austan Goolsbee (who sat on President Obama’s council of economic advisors). He broke down the Fed’s interest policy into very simple form. Essentially the only factor they look at when setting policy is last month’s inflation number and compare it to a 70-year data set. Based upon their information, they either raise or lower interest rates rates (and decide by how much based upon that data), or they don’t. They don’t want to crash the economy, but they don’t want to super heat it either (he compared it to trying to balance on a Bosu Ball on top of a telephone pole). Pretty easy to understand why they have raised them so dramatically this year. The good news is things seem to be settling down. His crystal ball also didn’t see us going into a deep recension, so that was good news.
Tim Tebow spoke for a while. He’s quite an amazing individual, whether you liked him as an athlete or not. Of course there was a Crimson Tide heckler in the front row who certainly did not like him as an athlete, and who probably waited his whole life to tell him how he made the mistake of not coming to Alabama. Tebow took him down in stride. People…shish. Anyhow, the reason he was at the conference is that he is a brand ambassador for Clean Juice https://www.cleanjuice.com/tim-tebow/ . We got to hear about that for a while, but mostly on how to be a better person. Again, he’s an amazing individual.
Wolfgang Puck at RFDC 2022
The show was packed with great content on Tuesday. Wolfgang Puck was the star of the morning for me. He basically told stories on how he got into the business and why he still keeps working. He genuinely loves it. Heads up if you are trying to interview as a chef in his company. He’ll make you shop at a farmer market with him, and he’ll see what catches your eye and what kinds of foods you’d like to make with the products. And don’t pick something that isn’t fresh or you’re out. Last, he’ll make you make some scrambled eggs for him, which he says almost every chef candidate fails at and overcooks them. Interesting!
There were other great speakers and panels throughout the rest of the show which ended on Wednesday. The general takeaway was that the restaurant business is strong, but constantly evolving to stay in business with the drastically changing costs of equipment, labor, and product, all while staying relevant and delivering what customers want. In other words, it’s as hard as it’s ever been, which is totally normal. As a former owner/operator in the restaurant business, the only advice I give to people thinking about getting into the business is not to get into it for the money or quality of life. If you truly love the business, like Wolfgang Puck does, making money is just a bonus.