Chicken N Pickle’s Post

Transcript

My name is Bill Coning, I'm the opening general manager for our North Kansas City Chicken and Pickle and now I'm one of the vice presidents of operations. What has made me stay at Chicken and Pickle for so long? This is actually a concept that I love. I love craft beer, scratch made food, I love live music, pickleball, gathering, hang out with people. Coming to work is actually kind of like coming to have some fun. What I have learned about myself is I will never stop innovating and getting better. I wanted to be in a position to. Lead a great group of people. I'm very fortunate that every morning I get to wake up and I have leaders that push me to be the best version of myself and support me in that way. And I'm also very grateful that at the end of the day, I get to support 2000 people who feel the same way about chicken and pickle. What it means to me for the opportunity to grow with my career is that I get to do what? I love to do. I wouldn't want to do anything else. Maybe play shortstop for the New York Yankees, but that's not going to happen. But I do get to come in and lead people and help them be the best version of them themselves and get to experience what it feels like to succeed. My first memory that I love to tell at openings. That was an in jetway at one of the airports that I travel and I kind of had my head down. I had all my chicken and pickle paraphernalia on. And I hear this lady go ohh my gosh. And she screams really loud and starts running down the jetway. And I'm like what in the world? And she completely bear hugs me and says I absolutely love you guys. You're the best. And just kept saying it over and over. And I just stood there thinking we have done something that I don't think any of us had set out to do first thought chicken and pickle, no filter. I think of it as a place for our community. People can join. Gather and kind of be in the cool house at the end of the cul-de-sac where everyone hangs out and meets up and finds out, hey it's been good to see you again. My go to menu item have to have you gotta get the half rotisserie chicken with grilled lemon house seasoning ahead Verde sauce and order a side of beats. You will not be disappointed. What keeps people coming back? In my opinion, I truly believe that Chicken and pickle does an amazing job of justifying enough of what chicken and pickle is for people to come check it out and then they realize that we haven't fully defined it. For them, so they get to self discover, self experience and that's why people come back because they they're enjoying learning about themselves, their community and the people that they associate with. One of the biggest changes in my opinion, with chicken and Pickles since 2016 is going to be the effect that COVID not only had on us, but on the industry in itself. We lost over 700,000 hospitality workers in this industry and we're still fighting to get the right people back to be able to deliver hospitality and the experience that people expect.