Mark Birnbaum - Creating Catch Hospitality Group

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What is going on everyone? Kasey Adams here. Welcome back to the Rise of the Young podcast. On today's episode we have Mark Birnbaum here with us. Los Angeles based restaurateur Mark Birnbaum played a major role in transforming New York City's Meatpacking district into one of the most sought after areas in Manhattan before settling in California to operate the West Hollywood outpost of globally influenced seafood restaurant Catch. Dubbed by Forbes magazine as one of the new kings of New York's hospitality, Catch Hospitality Group co founder Mark Birnbaum and his partner Eugene Rem pioneered dynamic hospitality experiences by using food, service and vibe to create seamless transitions between dining, nightlife and entertainment. With a focus on culture and brand, Birbaum has propelled Catch from a standalone New York City flagship to an international phenomenon with successful locations in La Playa de Carmen and Las Vegas and with additional outposts slated for 2019. Most recently, CHG welcomed a new partner, hospitality business mogul Tilman Fertitta, whose previously owned Laundries Inc. Is ranked among the largest corporations in the US and if you've been following the podcast for a while, you know that I've had Mr. Tillman Fertitta on the show last October. So a year later I have the pleasure of sitting down with Mark Birnbaum, the co founder of Catch. And if you haven't been to Catch, I would highly recommend it. It is absolutely amazing when it comes to the experience and like we talk about in the podcast, the vibe of the restaurant. So before we get into the episode, please take a moment to share this episode with a friend. Friend. And let's dive into it.

All right, what is going on everyone? Casey Adams here. Welcome back to the Rise of The Young podcast Today we have Mark Birnbaum here on the show. Thanks so much for coming on, Mark.

My pleasure. Nice to see you.

You as well. So. Well, first off, man, I'm a huge advocate of catch. I know that you are an amazing restaurateur and you have quite the journey when it comes to directing and how you got started. But for people that don't know who you are, I'd love for you to give some context on where you currently spend your time and just what your day to day looks like.

Well, it's different now than it was before coronavirus, but we're trying to get back to some level of normalcy now. I started in New York City really right after September 11th actually, so around 2001, where I shifted gears from being in like the life insurance business at 21 years old till 23 years old and selling like health insurance, life insurance, mutual funds, that kind of thing. A job I took out of college for whatever reason. But I was living in Manhattan and I was enjoying, actually I was living in Long island when I first got out of college and then I moved to Manhattan and then I fucked off for about a year and hung out in the city as much as humanly possible. I think I went out every single night for a year straight and just enjoyed New York City as New York City. Prior to even moving into Manhattan, I was living in Long island and I was in college for four years. But I was always sort of touching the nightlife world through college, promoting in the summertime or on like Thanksgiving eves. Whenever colleges came back to New York City, I would, you know, I would have a guest list or do things like that and get like $10 a person or something. So. So I always liked was fun that I was able to go out and have a good time and also make money at the same time. It made a lot of sense to me and I didn't necessarily know what I wanted to do. So if I was able to gather people and give them what they already wanted, it was a pretty easy thing to do. I just was sort of a gatekeeper and I liked, I liked being a gatekeeper. It was something about people having to reach out to me to facilitate what they wanted to do. And I was able to organize it and handle it, whether it was a big group for a birthday party or a table or something. And I. And then I would be paid to do that, which seemed like, well, I like doing this anyway. So it's nice that people paid me. I probably would have done it for free? Yeah, but. Yeah. So nightclub, huh?

How long were you in New York for?

Well, I've been in New York my whole life. Since, I guess, 1977, which is when I was born in New York, grew up in Long island, then went to college and for the rest of the time in the city. I only recently, about four or five years ago, started coming to California to open Catch LA, which was obviously a big jump from 2001. I think that was in 2016. We really started looking at expanding Catch to the West Coast. We wanted to do Vegas, but we never really got the deal we wanted or the location that we wanted. So when LA presented itself with the location that we got, it was a great opportunity. We saw that a rooftop could be something really special. I started coming out here, you know, two weeks at a time for years, really getting this place built. It took forever, not because of us, but it was part of the whole building. So, you know, by the time they finished the building and then we did construction, it was a three year project. But I enjoyed the West Coast. I never thought I'd live here. I'm in California now. I was a real diehard New Yorker. I pretty much made fun of anybody from LA and their ridiculous lives of nothingness. Yeah, yeah. But the truth is, is that once you hit a certain age or a point in your career or whatever it is, that gives you that, you know, downshift, even though that's going faster, more of an upshift. But you know what I'm saying, metaphorically slowing down a little bit in terms of just the hustle and bustle that's in New York City, nightlife and restaurants. And we were sort of transitioning out of the nightclub business anyway. So to do restaurants and have a reason to be in California and not just be here on vacation, it's a very different experience than is just visiting for two weeks or a month even, for sure.

So when you launched Catch la, you moved out to California for that purpose.

I came out here to temporarily be here, to get it on its feet so that I could get right back to New York City. When I realized pretty quickly, from the time that we opened, about three months in, that this was a much bigger project than just getting it open and going back and leaving it. It was very much personality driven. It was very much a business that Eugene and I really had to focus on. And a lot of our future relied on California success, mainly because it was the first thing we really did outside of New York City. We did a management deal in Miami not the same thing. This was like an owned and operated, big investment to protect. And if this did well, we believed that it would show whoever, someone who wanted to buy part of the company or the next time we raised money or to do a Las Vegas project, that we were not a one trick pony in New York City, that we could get out of our comfort zone and do a continuation of that brand outside. And it was a success. It required a lot more attention. So I spent a year here and then after a year, you know, you kind of get comfortable and you either hate it or like it. And I was enjoying it. And then Vegas came knocking pretty early on within that sort of opening. And so we negotiated and took a space in Aria Hotel in Las Vegas to do catch. And that also is a West coast operation that required attention and building and just getting zipping over there on a jet Suite X quickly and back and forth. So I sort of had purpose here. And I still went back to New York every month, you know, and that was fine. But once you put roots in California, it's hard to deny that it's just the best of everything. I mean, the weather every day is a big deal. I used to say I love the seasons, I love the change of temperature. And that was true. But I don't love them more than always having a sunny day in January and February and March. And if I want to go to cold, I'll go to New York or go somewhere that's cold.

Yeah, super dope. I know that I saw that you guys brought on Tillman Fertitta. I had him on the show last.

Year, but right around this time because he was launching his book. I remember that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, right when he lost his book. Then we did the whole like Mastro's dinner with everyone that interviewed him and stuff. Super cool. But regarding partnerships, how did you guys bring on Tillman and what did that look like, going to your point of, you know, you wanted to move out to California and bring on those strategic people. I'm curious about that.

You know, he came about slowly. We met probably a year and a half pretty prior to LA opening and also prior to him becoming our partner. He liked what we were doing. We had just met. We like anybody that is someone like him. We always gave him our full attention and explanation of what we had sort of, you know, in our mind of our future business. And, you know, and he, he is a very shrewd and smart person. He wasn't like, oh, cool, I'll just buy half your company and you Know, on the spot, he was very much like, all right, I'm happy to know y'. All. And now I'd like to see what, what you got, you know, see if you could deliver on your business plan. And it will probably change from that day. And it did. And, you know, we opened LA again to a successful, successful business operation. And then with Las Vegas being such a premier location in the works, we partnered up almost a year and a half or so. You know, I might have. The dates are on. Could have been a little longer than that later. We didn't really bring him on, so to speak. It was really like a very. A very good partnership for what we wanted to accomplish in the future. And I think we being his only partners in anything, he usually buys restaurants completely. He doesn't really buy 50% or 25%. He might be a passive investor in something I don't know about, but we're his only partner and that was a big deal. But we're not in our 60s ready to retire. We're in our. At the time, we're 39 and 40, or 38 and 39, whatever it was. I turned 40 and we had pretty much closed the deal on my 40th birthday and Eugene's 39th birthday. We're a year apart to the day, the 10th of June. And it was a good timing for us. We want to grow and expand. We're tired of running around in city to city raising money and explaining why, I swear to God, we're not going to lose all your money and projections and all these things. It was like, you know, we do it. But there was this great book says title actually, and it was a great book as well, but the title was very important to remember and something I bring up a lot to people, which is a really good lesson in itself, which is what got you here won't get you there. And I think about that all the time because whatever got us to that point was great. But to do another 10 years of the same thing will never get us there. Wherever there is 10 coffee shops that were doing great are great. But to do 100, you're not going to do it the same exact way you did the first 10 or even 20. So Tillman was an opportunity to get there with his expertise and his backing. You know, not just financial, but also infrastructure, leadership. He's got a team of people that have seen it all, have been with him for 20 more or more years, I think. I can't remember. I mean, it could have been 30, 40 years. His team, a lot of the main guys, and they're great and just learning from them. And I think there is a level of them learning from us. Okay, so, you know, he's not doing this because he wanted us out. He'd like to do this with us because he wanted us in. And we are able to do things that he doesn't necessarily want to do or pivot his company to do on its own, which is Manhattan Primetime or LA Primetime or Las Vegas Primetime. He has a different business model. So now that we have that, what do we do next?

Yep. I love that. I want to ask you too, because I've been to catch a bunch of times in la and I love the culture that you guys have created. And I wanted to ask, like, what was that launch strategy and how have you guys been able to build such a great culture? Every time I'm there, it's packed. You can't get reservations, and, like, you guys are just the spot. And, like, did that start from day one? Was it like that or did it mold into what it is now, especially in la?

Well, I think anybody opening a restaurant or opening a nightclub has the goal that there's a line out the door or that your reservations are ringing off the hook and people have to, you know, fight to get a reservation and wait months to get one. That's always your kind of dream. I don't think anybody opens to not do that. But the answer is, of course, no. On the nightclub side, we did pretty well from 10June on. Like, it was just something that we understood what was kind of missing. But again, it was still a slow burn. Even with 10 June. There's many times looking back of just looking at Eugene and being like, you know, oh, is this going to pop? Catch, roof? 10 June SL. We've had failures. You know, we've had ones that had a lot of problems. You know, that finale space on the Bowery where it was just, like, things that were in our control and not in our control. Hurricane Sandy or residents above and lawsuits and the things that, like, you know, residents didn't want us to be there. There's problems in our industry from a restaurant perspective and the culture perspective. Food service and vibe is our sort of mantra for everybody that. That works with us, who is hired. They learned that from pretty much day one. And it's constantly repeated because it's not one or the other more important than the other. Right. Like, food, of course, is important, but, like, so is service, but so is the vibe. And without, you know, you could get away Sometimes with like the greatest food on earth and have shitty service and a shitty vibe. Like we've all got those favorite restaurants that have like the best service, something and it's a hole in the wall. But that is the vibe. Right. So like the corner bistro to me was a hole in the wall with sawdust or dirty or whatever bar and smelled like beer. And the waiters were rude, they didn't say anything. They threw plate paper plates at you and you know, you almost felt like apologizing. There was always a line. But that is the vibe.

Yep.

So that's. That might be accidental or not, but whatever it is, there's that je ne sais quoi, which I never use that word phrase, but like that there is that. So it's a soul in an essence of the personalities of the ownership in their direction. So for us, large restaurants, 10,000 square feet, three, 400 seats, whatever, that in itself is a mission that you have to be busy. Because if you're not busy in those big restaurants, you're half empty. And that sucks.

Yeah.

And we've said this a million times. No one's ever walked into a place and said, oh, this is nice, it's half full. No, they say it's half empty and it sucks and let's move on. Yeah. So we always have to create that sense of what we call the boom, which is building a weight and making the reservations, you know, hopefully full.

Yeah.

And if it's not, we can divide the rooms up in ways to make it feel full. But it's very important part of our puzzle. And then understanding that chaos doesn't. Sorry, when I get calls, it cuts it off. You know, chaos isn't good either. So there's this balance of busy and wildness. But not too busy, not too wild. Because you could turn people off. A lot of diners, when it's not, you know, the late night diners want calm as well, you know, and like cozy. So we tried to take these big restaurants and give them that intimate feel. Right. So like a 40 seat restaurant I love the most for sure. But we have a 400 seat restaurant. But if I can deliver a 40 seat restaurant feeling for you in a small corner with intimate service and not chaos around you. Who cares that there's 600 people in the room?

Yeah, I love that. I wanted to ask about in Catch la, something that I've noticed is everyone's taking pictures of the giant wall with all the people. Whose idea was that? And just where did that come from?

So we often Thought about I hate the word Instagram moments, because I don't. It's very contrived. But that wall, we had this giant blank wall downstairs in that elevator lobby. And we were going to put wallpaper or just leave it a color or paint it or whatever, but it still screamed like, you know what? This is the lobby of the whole restaurant. It's a moment, you know, do we put reclaimed wood on there so it gives a taste of what's upstairs on the roof downstairs. But it wasn't our building, you know, so, like, what happened was, is if you recall, I don't know if you're familiar with the Palm restaurant in New York, where it has the caricatures on the wall of their customers.

Okay, I have not seen it.

So, yeah, it was like very big in the 80s. You know, you'd like, you'd go in there and there would be a caricature kind of cartoon, I think, from the guy who, like, did the doodles in the New Yorker. Did that for their best customers. And people would love it because they would be loyal to that because their face was on the wall. So if you went to that restaurant all the time and you were an important guy and they had a doodle of you on the wall, trust me, you'd keep going back there, even just to show people that you're on the wall. So we sort of wanted to do some version of that modern day. And we kicked around ideas, like doing a picture of all our investors, like headshots, caricatures, or even just a black and white class picture. Yeah, you know, of everybody. And everyone submits their photo. And we arranged it in a collage sort of way, which built automatic brand loyalty from people that are our regulars and big people in la, whatever, give them props and make them feel special. But, you know, it's a huge wall and a lot of people. And then we're like, well, what about our favorite caricatures or movie stars or, you know, ET or, you know, whoever was on the wall that was like a cartoon character, Snoopy sits on my knee, you know, like, it became a conversation. And then I called Mr. Brainwash, who is sort of the guy who could deliver this sort of, you know, street art waypaper really quick and honestly, we talked about this for like two weeks before we opened. And he did it the night before our first event. He threw up this way paper. Well, we put the people that. So we incorporated the people that are our friends, investors, customers, whatever, and everyone that we could think of knowing that we'd Forget a lot of people because, you know, after the fact, like, oh, my God, I can't believe I forgot my parents or my brother's, you know, like, wife. Like, I just. Like, we were so chaotic. It was just like we insulted a lot of people. Anyway, it came about very quickly. I went to Brainwash's studio. We mapped it out. We had a bunch of drafts. And then he did the first part of it, which was just one wall, which then became two walls, which then became the entire elevator lobby over time, with everyone I could think of that I've been a fan of, both alive and dead. And people that come to that restaurant, and let me tell you, they love it. They love it. They see themselves on it. They identify themselves. Some of them are even all the way at the top, but they appreciate it. And if they're not on the wall, they let you know.

Yeah. I was about to say, like, how did you pick those people? And you obviously said you forgot some people and people were upset. But I'm always curious because you walk in there and it's like this whole high wall with so many people, and it's like, that's super cool. I know when Charlie walk. When I went there, I was walking. I see him right when I get there, I'm like, my man. It's a cool feeling, right? If you know someone, if you're with someone that's on the wall, it has that, like you said, but didn't say that.

Instagram, it's a way of showing love to people that you. That have supported you. But it's also fun for a lot of people just to identify the old photos of, like, oh, my God, it's Andre the Giant next to, you know what I mean, Tina Turner or whatever it is. And. And it's the classic photos of them. Some of them like an Al Pacino young to, you know, Marlon Brando old. It depends on, you know, what. What we liked or Joe Pesci or whoever, for sure.

How did you and Eugene meet?

We met in New York a long time ago when I opened. When I opened, like, my first nightclub business. He was in the nightclub business. And then a friend of mine that was also a friend of his, a mutual friend of ours said, oh, you should meet Eugene. You guys have the same birthday. It's crazy. Like, they would go from one birthday to the other, and I didn't know who he was. And she introduced us in 2000, maybe four. Okay, maybe three, four. Something like that. A long time ago. And, you know, it's rare that someone's got your same birthday. You know, we're both June 10, which is where 10 June came from. And that alone was nice. But then he's also interested in the same things that I'm interested in. He enjoys the business that I loved as well. And you have that common thread. And, you know, we were both hustlers in different ways. And, you know, business partnerships are funny. Like, you think that you need to be two people that like the same thing and are good at the same things and share the same goals or aspirations. But I think in the beginning we did. But as we've grown up, we realized our personality traits are very different and our skill sets are very different. But that's why it works. Not because we're the same. Again, if we were the same person, sort of what we like to do, a lot of things would get left to the wayside. Yeah. So a yin and yang is a great thing to have. We've had many arguments because of that, but those arguments really are debates. And those debates keep you checked and, you know, to have a sounding board. I have a friend who owns his own business and he has no partners. Yeah. And he often feels like he's always second guessing himself because he's not sure if he's making the right decision. It's really nice to have that counterpart, to have that conversation and make a good decision, even if it's the wrong one. I could guarantee you it's less of a wrong one because you're never always going to be right. But if I say we got to go 100 miles an hour and he says, well, I think we need to go 70 miles an hour, maybe the right answer was 85. But you'll never get there if you don't have the guy sort of slowing you down or speeding you up for sure.

How have you guys adapted during the last six, seven months when Covid happened and everything shifted? Like, what was. What have you learned from this year, 2020, with everything that you guys have built?

This is those times where it puts you back in. It's sort of, you know, as much as I hate, forget, like the deaths and the destruction and all that stuff. Just let's look at it as like a challenge in business. There's something really great about a challenge in business. It's a time where, you know, it's maybe easier for me to say because I don't think we're gonna go bankrupt over this. But, you know, we've. We've been in the position of going bankrupt potentially. And We've been in these positions of making big moves and bad timing. So there is some benefit of 20 years experience or 10 years experience because of our previous failures or previous battles or tests of whether it was September 11th for your life or was a 2008 crash or you know, whatever. You live through these moments or just a bad business decision, right? One that cost a lot and lost you a lot, having nothing to do with economy. You just made a mistake. You know, those are those things that prepare you for a pandemic. Even though you never planned for a pandemic. You've insulated your business as best you can with the mistakes that you've made to not repeat them. If you repeat your mistakes, that's on you. That doesn't mean you stop taking risks and it doesn't mean you don't live outside your box in your comfort zone. But when you do take those risks, they're more calculated and they're less risky. So if you screw up, you're not dead. You might be limping instead of full death, right? So with coronavirus, it's a shock first of all, because this is something unique for everybody now you're in a different world altogether. This isn't just a stock market crash or a recession or even a terrorist attack that started and ended. Yeah, this is something that's a little bit nuts, frankly for a lot of people to navigate through. And it was difficult for us. And I'm not going to say I liked the challenge, but it reinforced the belief that if you have a strong, healthy business going into any bad timing downturns or pandemics, and you are set up so that you don't have all your eggs in one basket, you're not over leveraged, you don't have a bunch of personal guarantees all over the place that you can't afford if God forbid, everything doesn't stay the exact same, you are insulated from the horror that is the complete shutdown and lockdown of a coronavirus. I do think that the PPP money and some of the government moves, time will tell, but in the short term, that was a essential part of survival for a lot of people. And I hope that it gets them past the hump of the terribleness of the shutdown. And that as we see New York City or LA or whatever other states that I'm in are softening their restrictions and giving you some percentage of occupancy back. The good restaurants, if we're just talking restaurants, will survive it. The B's and C's bees Are like, they had an okay business. They're fine. They weren't killing it, but they were good. And they've always been around, and they've always been okay. They're suffering this, and they may, if they were able to pivot and be smart, they will survive the C's and D's. If they were around at the time, barely before coronavirus, I think that they will be wiped out. Yeah. And the A's will not only be okay, but technically, if really poised for the next chapter, will probably be A's again and potentially come out way better, healthier, leaner, more efficient, more profitable, and able to expand aggressively after these opportunities. A guy in real estate who's very successful. I don't know if, like, I heard it or he told it to me or I read it, whatever. I don't know. So if this is someone's quote, congratulations. But it stuck with me. He said, look, I've made money in the best of times, but I got rich in the worst of times. And the reason for that is because when it got bad, they got smartly aggressive and took these risks and did things that other people's. Other people didn't necessarily see or were willing to put their chips on the table when they did. And they said because of that, that's how they got rich. But they did fine in good times, but when it's bad, there's opportunity there. You just got to know when to strike. It doesn't mean you have to, but there's potential there to do very well when this all comes out and shakes out, hopefully.

Yeah, that makes sense.

But you still don't want to.

I want to ask you about, like, when you were first getting started, like, graduating college, getting involved in the nightlife scene. Was your plan to open up restaurants or, like, where did that even come from initially.

Man, Every few years, everything that we've done, I think we didn't plan for. So it's like, yeah, I plan to open a nightclub and for it not to fail and for it to do well for us to make some money and to have a good time. Yep, I planned for that in the beginning. We started, Eugene and I, in a partnership with a restaurant group so that we had the opportunity to see how they created a menu, how they hired, how they designed, how they programmed the music and attitudes and bar placements and uniforms and all the things that go into someone building their first restaurant brand. We got a inside look at how that all went down and participated in it, frankly, quite a bit. And a lot of the things that we wound up having on the plates and serving and being were because of Eugene and I's input in a collaborative way. But we were quite capable of feeling like I think our customer wants X and then delivering it anyway. That one stop shop of restaurant with a club in the basement. The SDK10 June, which is what I'm referring to was really a very obvious thing to Eugene and I. It was just a very much, you know, franken beans, you know, peanut butter and jelly. Makes sense. Or it just, it seemed like. I mean, how does everyone not just have a place to eat and a place to party after? There's many examples of it, but we just felt like that was a great way of being in business. A one stop shop for, for fun. If you want to leave, go ahead. But if you want to stay, I've got you. I would really hate for this person. And they're 10 people that just sat at a big dinner, spent $1,000 on a big dinner to go two blocks away and spend 10.

Yeah.

They're ready there. The hard work is done.

Yeah.

And it's really hard to get people into your restaurant. You know, I can go through the hundreds of things that have to go right. But once you're sitting there, I've got you in my Venus fly trap. So, you know, no different than a casino attracting their guests to stay in their hotel, to eat at their restaurants. All were designed for them to gamble. Yeah. Well, I'm using food to sell alcohol. You know, like ultimately that nightlife one two punch. The liquor is, you know, after 12 o' clock to 4 o' clock in the morning in a basement that would have been just bathrooms or office or another dining area. You know, we're doing 12 million in liquor sales in the middle of the night when the restaurant's closed. You know what I mean? That's money on the table. So we went after that really hard and we really never changed until say la.

Yeah.

Which was just catch without a club. If there was a second floor under LA and there was a lounge that we could have had without, you know, any issues, it probably would have been good. Yep. But LA is a little bit different in our opinion than New York City in terms of nightlife. We don't particularly love it or like it that much. It's very fickle. And the reason why things open and close because of the nightclub portions. Yeah. Restaurants stay a long time and it's sort of the, the future for our life and, and, and longevity of a restaurant is great. It's like, you know, you. You've been to restaurants you love probably your whole life that you've been to, from, you know, early childhood to now. They're still there. Yep. Nightclubs, not so much. So we still like the one two Punch. We have it in Catch original and we had a bit of it in Catch steak. You know, just, you're there. It just made morph, you know, like it might become a members club in the future idea or a hotel and a club and a restaurant. But they aren't rah rah crazy nightclubs that, you know, the club days are really hurt right now. So good thing we're in the restaurant world with a retractable roof.

Yeah, for sure.

You know, I would say. But no, I. It's not a plan. It's just the more the natural progression of this business for us. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, it's definitely on my end. Hard to get into nightclubs at 20, so I can't say I've been to a lot of them. But I want to ask you about the signature dessert, the Hit Me. That's something that is a classic staple, especially when it comes to the way you end your meal at Catch. Where did that come from? And how do you think it's became such a popular item when it comes to, like you said earlier, the Instagramable icon of what happens there.

Well, dessert was always something we liked to have fun with. It was the thing that people always screamed and took a picture of when we first started our first restaurant, Abe and Arthur's. Whether it was the donut Ferris wheel that came out with a sparkler or something. And it was just like a celebratory thing that our clientele always enjoyed. And it was just an easy win to get a smile out of people's face and a photo. That was before Instagram. Now with Instagram, it's, fortunately for us, an organic result. Right. Like, the Hit Me cake was fun because it was a reveal. No different than a baby reveal or surprise jump out of the cake. I mean, people are people to tap something. It's interactive. Everything we do is sort of a little bit not kitschy show, but shareable and interactive. Yeah. The mere idea of having many small plates in and of itself promotes sharing and conversation. And try this and try that and here's this and here's that or I'll serve you. And the himi cake was an extension of that our pastry chef came up with many years ago because of the popularity of Instagram and the popularity of food on Instagram. We've certainly promoted it ourselves. But also there is not a. It's still to this day, there's not a table that doesn't get the hippie cake or everyone doesn't say hold on and take out their phone and take a video of it. I'm sure it's if not the most, you know, photographed or video dessert in the country, it probably is up there. The entrance to Catch LA is the number one most photographed according to Instagram, geotagged restaurant in the country, which is a very important thing for our lifespan. Yeah. You know, to be number one of anything is already great. But specifically with a photo, restaurant or geotag, that means total strangers of all ages, of all walks of life are telling their world of followers or friends about us, which in and of itself makes our jobs much easier. So if we can use these fun desserts or entranceways or drinks or wagyu on a rock cooking at the table, those are those moments that like, they're delicious or they're high end and elevated entree to share, but also they get the video play for sure. And that's important in today's world for our type of restaurant. Yeah, yeah.

Was that something that you guys knew, like when you first launched Catch and you know, the different meals, like just having that foresight of, you know, becoming the number one tagged geolocation restaurant in the US like that's, that's a hard thing to do. And like, was that something you guys set out to do when it comes to knowing human behavior and how people interact and where social media is going, or did that just come from what you guys created?

It's both. Right. Like we're not, we're not blind to the fact that people use cameras and smartphones to promote them themselves and whatever they're doing. But I do think that there's something organic again about authenticity of something. So to go out, it's kind of like when I talk to like rappers or musicians and say, do you go, do you set out to make a number one hit for TikTok or a number one hit? And they're like, well, you always want it to be a great song. But you know, the number one hit comes because the people loved it for their reasons. Not so much even for your reasons. I'm sure if Michael Jackson said like, you know, when I made Thriller, I knew that, you know, but like outside of the greatest songs ever made, I don't know that they would know that they are the greatest songs ever made until later. So no different. Here we are Setting out to design both on menu, entree, as pretty as it can be without it being some shticky thing. Yeah. You know, and from a design element, we're not here to be like, I hate this. When a designer said, where's your Instagram moment? If that's the case, then we might as well not do it. Right. But we do recognize that an entrance is something that people transition from street to our restaurant and they walk through this long corridor. To me, it's like, what do you remember about Disney World? And I was like, smart Space Mountain when I was a kid through that tube that lit up. Or when I watched Star wars, like, I don't know. Or when I went to my first time in France or Italy and I went to a vineyard that had this incredible pergola of wood and floral or Mykonos. And you have to like traveling and doing those things naturally, if you're interested in what's going on in the world for what you're trying to recreate. Sorry, got interrupted. Another call. You know, you're automatically gathering ideas of how you can apply it to your own world someday. Yep. So that's the go. That's the focus. Authentic love for beauty of whatever that is to create with your designer or yourselves or whatever and your chefs, to give a customer what we think that they would like. And if they take a photo of it and tag it, because it's so pretty, great. But I'm not going to paint something hot pink and put a fluorescent sign that says, you're beautiful so that people stand in front of it to take a picture. I think that's what we don't do for sure. I think it matters, and it makes a big difference, I think.

Absolutely. Last question before we wrap up. And that is just what are you excited about with Catch moving forward?

So many things. I think this is the time, like I said, for us to dig in and double down on what we do and what we've got going for us. There is opportunity, you know, on the other side of what's going on. We have plans for the near and long term for Catch as a brand. Both Catch original, like the seafood and sushi restaurant and Catch Steak, which is our newest brand in New York. It's a year old today, by the way.

I've never in New York, so I have to get out there sometime.

Well, it's pretty amazing, and people love it. It's the grown, sort of elevated version of Catch OG It's a little bit higher price point. It's a little Bit more sophisticated in food. It's a steakhouse, so you have that sort of, you know, big wine customer versus the cocktail customer, but they totally complement each other. They're blocks away from each other. In New York City, nothing happened, you know, to the original Catch. It was as busy as ever. And, you know, we're doing hundreds and hundreds of people a day now. Even in a pandemic. You know, I look at the numbers that went from like 200 to 300 to 400 now, up to 600 people a day. You know, that's a lot. Just outdoors and. Yeah. Very shortly, we will announce a new project that's coming to California for Catch Steak. I'm not doing it right now because it hasn't been signed yet, and I don't like to jinx things, but if things go the way we want right now, we should be one of the only restaurants opening during a pandemic. Hiring 200 people to open another restaurant now. Not in a year from now, but like in three months from now. Wow. So that's a function of believing in your brand, your menu, your team, and the following that you have and going out and saying, yeah, the world's shitty right now, I guess, but we're still willing to invest and be the new thing for people to be excited about now. And when indoors comes back end when the world bounces back, will be the new shiny toy for those that didn't travel or whatever.

For sure. I'm excited for you guys and I'll definitely. Next time I'm in New York, I'll definitely make that my number one spot to go to. But real quick, where is the best place for everyone listening to stay in touch with you and just to follow along the journey of Catch moving forward?

Well, obviously, I guess Instagram is probably the best. I do a talk show kind of like this. Not a talk show, podcast, whatever. It's like an Instagram live that I don't do religiously. I did it during quarantine just because I was sort of bored and I was enjoying getting, you know, chatting with some friends and also some smart people that I was getting advice from, whether it was lawyers or doctors or whatever, and then just catching up with. Which is what it's called, catching up.

You got some great people on the show. I love watching it.

Yeah. And I've got. I've got hundreds of people that I could do because I've been fortunate enough to meet and have relationships with really. Not just famous people, but business people, young entrepreneurs, different genres, different, you know, Authors, federal judge, you know, a lot could be all over the map. I just enjoy. Which I guess, like you do, talking to people that you admire in different industries or your industry and getting their story, because everybody's got a story. And it's not always necessarily a perfect success story. Even if there's success now, it generally isn't. And I find that to be, you know, my favorite question would be always be, you know, what were your challenges and how did you overcome them, and what did you learn from them? And how do you apply them now so that you actually don't feel the pain like you might have if we were flying blind? Just success, success, success, Pandemic hits. We probably get really hurt. So it's those things that kind of, like, weigh you down and slow you down to be more calculated.

Is that a full podcast or is that just something you do on Instagram?

I'm just doing it on Instagram and I posted on YouTube, you know, on like, a channel. But, yeah, you know, maybe once Corona and all this shit is done, maybe I'll do a real thing in a studio and sit with people. I think it's a little bit more personal and better quality, all that. For now, I'm just sort of showing that I have the ability to do that. And it's really about getting guests, as, you know, because you've messaged me many times, which I appreciate because it's what it is these days. You gotta, you know, get people to listen to. But, you know, I'm usually on now the other side, where you're sitting to ask people questions, and. And it's just being genuinely interested in what their story is and then allowing other people to hear sort of the inside scoop of, you know, how did you start? How do you become the best. The best of what you do? How does that happen? You just get born into this, right? So, like, what was it? And I could talk for 50 hours straight and probably write a good book about the journey of business and hospitality and all that, and maybe we will one day, but, you know, for now, we're just living it. And we're on chapter 10, you know, and out of hopefully 20 chapters. So often when something goes great or something goes terribly wrong, we're like, well, this is. This is a good chapter.

I love that. I'll make sure to link down your Instagram below so people can go check that out. But, Mark, I just want to say thanks so much for coming on the show today, man. I know that we've been back and forth for a while. So I definitely appreciate you taking the time to come on today.

You're welcome. My pleasure. Thanks for having me. Monarch Legacy of Monsters An Apple Original Series the world is on fire. I decided to do something about it. On November 17th. This place. It's not ours. Believe me. The most massive event of the year arrives. If you come with me, you'll know everything. I promise.

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