Meet the Man Taking on Britain’s Failing Fast Food Industry & Building Young Entrepreneurs

You've already picked up a lot of criticism for this.

So how much are you putting into this?

2.5.

Of your wife's yacht's money?

Yep, but fortune favors the brave. I'm doing 25 stores straight off the bat.

Surely the food industry, the billion-dollar corporations, surely they're going to want to do everything to stop you.

Yeah, and I can't wait. The demographic in society that really has been forgotten about is the young men between 18 and 25. Money certainly Technology brings convenience, but it doesn't necessarily bring complete happiness.

Like, why do all this? There's got to be easier businesses.

Less about money now and more about purpose.

What do you think it takes to be an A&R?

Oh, that's a good question.

Everyone thinks they're disruptive, but what makes you different, Will?

Oh wow, that's a good question. I've been disruptive Ever since I can remember. When I was at school, I was the kid selling sandwiches in the school playground, like a lot of other entrepreneurs. Um, I actually built 4 houses in 2016. I, I did them in 60 days. So I know you were in property, Rob.

I still am in property.

Yeah, you still are in property.

And how old would you have been when you built the houses?

I was 31 at the time. Right. I decided to build 4 houses in 60 days in market deeping. I did it over and over in my head many times, got told it couldn't be done, and I, I just convinced myself it could be done, and I did. So yeah, I guess I've always looked for an angle on things where I can change things up and get ahead. Sometimes it doesn't work. On the houses, it wasn't worth doing it in 60 days, but we still tried.

Okay, and, um, what's the most disruptive thing you're doing right now?

I'm going to start a food chain that is going to get— I won't say kids, but young adults from hard backgrounds between the age of 18 and 25, ones that haven't been dealt the best hand in life. I want to give them the opportunity to run the food concept I'm starting and then have their own food concept under the Austin Stads brand.

Okay, and how is that different from any other restaurant or food business?

So we're not going to use delivery apps at all. We won't be on Just Eat, we won't be on Uber Eats or any of the delivery apps. We've got our own delivery app being built at the minute. It's going to be the most advanced delivery app in the country, allowing voice-activated ordering, GPS tracking, which the others do have.

Do any of them have voice-activated ordering?

None, none at the minute. They will do soon.

You mean you can just go, I want a 12-inch pepperoni pizza?

Spot on. And it will say, that will be with you in 20 minutes, Rob.

Wow.

And that won't be much money either. That'll be between £5 and £8.

Okay.

Plus the delivery, which is £3.99, so it's still very cheap. But even though it's very good value, the other thing where it's different, we will not buy in as a company any food with more than one ingredient. So absolutely everything is made from scratch. So if you took a Caesar dressing, for instance, that might have a bit of salad cream in it, we're not even buying the salad cream or the vinegar. We will make the vinegar, we will make the rest of the salad cream that goes in. into that. So absolutely everything will be purchased as a single ingredient, sourced, showed with complete transparency where it's from, even how much it was. Everything we do on this company is going to be shown transparent— how much everything is paid for, how much everyone earns out of it, and what I make out of it myself.

Right. So You've got tech, which means people can just talk and order. You've got one single ingredient, which therefore makes it healthy. It's very cheap. There's full transparency on what everyone earns, and you're not using Uber Eats, Deliveroo. How are you going to make this business work? How are you going to make margins? How's anyone going to make money?

Well, I don't think people realize how cheap ingredients are, even from British farms. I can produce a very good pizza with a 128— sorry, with a 120-hour fermented sourdough. Let's say pepperoni, for instance. That's popular with burrata and hot honey and every nice thing you could think of on it, whole cheese. And that would come to about £1.30. Now, if we're selling that 12-inch pizza for £8, there's margin in it. Now, the business does only work if we have high volume of people, but that's the only way IKEA works. IKEA has a huge volume of people buying their furniture, and that's why they can sell, uh, relatively acceptable furniture. I'm sure you have much of it in your rental properties. No, I don't have—

maybe in the rentals.

Yeah, in the rentals, not your own house. I won't go that far. I'm not I'm not saying it's the best furniture in the world, but it's fairly good for the price it is. Would you agree with that?

Yeah, I think so. Yeah.

So that's what we're doing. We're trying to do good, honest, basic food, uh, that people like for an extremely low price, but we need volume to enable that.

Okay, so if you're doing high volume, are you talking about this is going to be a global franchise of Restaurants? What's the business model?

Eventually. So it's, it's not restaurants, so to speak. It's fast casual, which is—

Fast casual?

Yeah. So there's no waitress, there's no plates, um, it's— everything's disposable, but you can eat in. So like a McDonald's or Wendy's, uh, or even a KFC. Initially, we're going to start it in the UK. Um, I'm, I'm doing 25 stores Straight off the bat, they will all be open by the end of 2027. Uh, that's as far as the budget runs that I'm, uh, that I'm willing to put into

it. Are you opening all of those at once?

Not at once, but in quick succession. So we've got the first 2 stores already lined up.

Physical locations?

Yeah, physical locations. So

you're not worried about the state of the high streets or anything like that?

Not at all. That doesn't concern me. And, uh, the first one's opening in Warrington Peterborough, right, uh, in the Warrington Centre, right next to Tesco's. The second one will be opening just a few weeks after that in Stamford, which is the old Adams premises on the Meadows in Stamford. So they're the first 2 stores. The third one's in St Neots, and then we expand from there.

Like, why do all this? There's got to be easier businesses.

There certainly is.

Just do some e-commerce. I mean, you sound like—

Yeah, I know. So I think it's important to have purpose. We both sit here as wealthy gentlemen, and I'm sure you would agree that money certainly brings convenience, but it doesn't necessarily bring complete purpose or happiness. I learned long ago that kindness is a hugely powerful thing, and to get the best out of people with kindness is something I want to do.

Okay, but you've still gotta make money out of this, haven't you?

Sure, yeah. And I've got no problem admitting that. make me many hundreds of millions, if not billions. I, I don't mind admitting that it's not a completely selfless act I'm doing. I have a huge vision for what I want to achieve. I believe it can do a lot of good. I believe it can solve a lot of problems and help a lot of young gentlemen that haven't been dealt the best hand of cards in life.

So how does a pizza restaurant help young people?

So I'm going to give this opportunity to 18 to 25-year-olds, and the, the councils are going to help me source those, uh, gentlemen. That they will often be out of the care system, um, and I want to teach them manners, I want to teach them values, I want to teach them other things than business and give them some direction because, well, until very recently It seems that young gentlemen have been following the manosphere, following the likes of Andrew Tate, and I don't think that's the path to go down. But likewise, they have to be inspired by someone, and I think there's a lot of hating going on on this demographic of kids. And really, uh, my mum taught me this a long, long time ago. She said all these kids need is love and someone to point them in the right direction. And I, I genuinely believe she's right. And I don't think society can point fingers at all these so-called bad kids and troublemakers without doing anything about it. You know, if, if you were born to a crackhead mum in the middle of Tower Hamlets, London, and didn't know your dad, you wouldn't be sitting here now as, as, as one of the best podcasters in the UK. Everyone was dealt different hands in life, and some worse than others. And if we can give a hand to those that were dealt a bad hand, it improves society overall.

And, and how does that integrate within your business model?

Okay, so we, we teach them a set of skills, uh, how to run a kitchen, so to speak, how to run a little business within a business.

So they will be employed Employed in your businesses?

So this is, this is where I'm able to only offer this opportunity to young men. They're, they're self-employed. Uh, initially they're doing deliveries on a 300-day program where they do deliveries in the evenings and at weekends, as well as a bit of kitchen as well, because someone's got to run the kitchens. Um, and then in the daytime, so they go to the training center And after 300 days, they will graduate, so to speak, into being allowed their own partnership with us in their own kitchen area. So if we're doing burgers, pizza, and fried chicken in the first stores, then someone will be running a burger station. Someone will be running the chicken station. Someone will be running the pizza station.

So let me get this clear because there's a lot going on here.

There's a hell of a lot. It's very complex.

So you are taking underprivileged 18 to 25-year-old males. Yeah. And you are getting them involved in cooking food and delivering food, which is cheaper, healthier than anything out there, and setting up essentially Casual fast food but not low quality food restaurants. You've already found 2 locations, you're going for 20 and then beyond.

Domino's is on notice.

Okay, so, um, have you had anyone tell you you're crazy for doing this?

Nearly everyone. Yeah, nearly everyone apart from my wife. Pretty much everyone. But I would— I'd be more concerned if I didn't have everyone telling me it's Crazy idea.

Because you're trying to merge kind of competition with fast food and like the biggest chains with billions of budgets, with health, low cost, and bringing in underprivileged men to run the business.

It all contradicts. Yeah, but fortune favors the brave.

So what— how did you come up with this idea?

Uh, it evolved over time. I've, I've always loved food. My first business when I was 17 was a burger van, actually just down the road from here. And it's actually the business I enjoyed the most. I'm afraid I didn't enjoy the property business much, Rob, because it is quite slow.

There's more for me if you don't enjoy it.

Yeah, so it was quite slow for me.

Why are you doing this? Are the odds stacked against you? People are calling you crazy, everyone except your wife.

Yeah, they might be. And my wife is willing to sell her yacht to, um, use all that money from the proceeds of the yacht to put into this. And—

So how much are you putting into this?

£2.5 million.

You're putting £2.5 million of your wife's yacht's money?

Yeah, the yacht sold for just under that.

Are you putting your money in as well?

Well, my money's her money.

Right, okay. Yeah, so you're putting in £2.5 million to get this off the ground?

£2.5 million to get this off the ground.

And what if it fails?

If it fails, it fails. It doesn't really concern me. My life style doesn't change, uh, regardless. So if it fails, it fails. All I can do is give it my best shot and hope for the best.

And, um, aren't you going to need a lot more than £2.5 million to grow this?

Not to get the first 25 stores, no. But then it should be self-fulfilling, self-funding, self— yeah, it should, it should. The test should be done after 25 stores to see if it's a go or not.

And will you be buying these premises or leasing them?

Uh, leasing them initially. The, the whole benefit of doing high volume is if you take the average takeaway that does, uh, let's say the rent's £25,000, the rate's about £5,000, and the energy's £30,000— that's just a kind of rule of thumb for your average takeaway— that's £60,000 a year. Now that takeaway, again, I'm Talking averages here, will probably do 300 customers a week. That is a £4 acquisition cost against fixed costs per customer. And out of that, quite a few of them are only ordering cheesy chips or something. If you can get 3,000 people through the door with those same fixed overheads, then your acquisition cost against the fixed, fixed costs is only 40 pence. And that's why the volume is so important. If, if we get the volume, it will work. And the reason I'm on this podcast, the reason I'm doing so much to, to, to get the message out there, especially locally, is so that we've got the volume. I can't see why we won't have many people turn up if we're offering a great product for less than a Happy Meal.

Staffing's hard anyway.

It is, yeah.

So if you're bringing in Let's say underprivileged, undertrained, poor background kids, do you not risk almost mixing like a charity with a business and you having real staffing issues?

I actually love this question because these people that I'm giving the opportunity to, I think, can actually become the very best characters. They haven't had an easy life, they've had a hard life. So they can take hard knocks. They haven't had anyone believe in them, so they're going to remain loyal to the person that believed in them and gave them a chance. So I actually think it's a huge benefit. I think I'm, I'm finding an opportunity here with this demographic of people.

Okay, so I want to come back to your business and your vision and the model in a moment, But how have you got here? What gives you kind of like experience to launch a very big, bold, brave, what some people are calling crazy business?

Well, I sit here as nearly 42 years old. I'm pretty successful. I've done many, tried my hand at many different things. I think I have a very thorough understanding of how the world works. I'm lucky enough that I have almost a photographic memory. on certain things, especially numbers. So if you ask me the price of mozzarella cheese out of Poland at the minute, I would know the exact price by the day. So I know the price of everything, where it is, where it comes from, you know, where it's cheapest. I can remember the stats behind it, what's good, what's bad. I think that gives me the edge over any McDonald's or Domino's or KFC. And what people need to remember is when it comes to food commodities, it's not the more you buy, the lower it is. Once you go past a ton, the price is the price, whether you're having 1,000 tons or 10 tons. In, in actual fact, if, if the demand spikes, the price actually goes up. So it can have the opposite effect if you're ordering loads of something and there's not not much around, but we, we certainly won't be swaying the international commodity markets with 25 stores. Not yet anyway.

And what specific businesses have you run?

Um, so I have an import-export business that I used to do. Um, during COVID we actually imported hand sanitizer, uh, from Latvia, uh, We actually lost money on that in the end. Um, but yeah, uh, property, uh, building houses in property, uh, it's a good business to be in, property is. Uh, I just didn't enjoy it myself much. It wasn't exciting enough for me. Um, and yeah, that's about it.

Okay, so does exciting to you mean taking massive risk?

I don't really see this as a risk.

I mean, you're putting £2.5 million of you and your wife's money in.

Yeah, but we'll still turn left when we walk onto a plane, so it, it won't really bother me. And even if we didn't, it wouldn't bother me. I've never been— and I, I guess this is a benefit of coming from nothing and not having a materialistic wife. My wife is extremely supportive, and as long as I—

She's not materialistic, but she has a roof over her head. A £2 million yacht.

Yeah, I guess, but she's happy for me to sell that yacht and put it into this idea. So you could argue that she's not materialistic at all. We've just enjoyed, uh, time on the yacht in the South of France, and we absolutely loved it. And she's, she's as happy as I am when we got the offer to sell it, because that means I free up that money to put into this venture, and she's fully behind me.

Right. So, um, Would you say you're addicted or obsessed about big goals?

Yes. Yeah. And less about money now and more about purpose. So I eventually, if, if this does make a lot of money, I will get back into property one day. I want to eventually build houses and sell them at cost price eventually. This is ten years down the road, so don't worry.

Why? Why do you want to build? Why? Why do you want to build houses and sell them at cost? That's not a business.

So when it comes to luxuries, I don't even have a watch. Now, I'm not being obnoxiously humble at all. It's just the fact that I'm not into watches.

Obnoxiously humble. I've not heard that phrase before.

I've still got a Bentley outside. I still travel well and live well. But there is only so much I need to spend each year for me to really enjoy life, and that will be a luxury life. But I've got no desire to have billions in the bank or spray £50,000 bottle of champagne up the wall in a club. It's just of no interest to me whatsoever. I'd rather offer something better to the wider audience once, once I've got everything I, I can enjoy. You know, I make no apologies about the fact that I do live a nice luxury life, um, but it— once I've reached that level and can sustain that level, everything else can be for everyone else.

Okay, so what do you think it is about you that gives you the almost blind confidence? Because you've not done this before, from what I can pick up, to be able to build a Sustainable, healthy, does good for the world, profitable, national fast food restaurant chain.

I've done it over and over in my head so many times across the past 7 years that I think doing it now will almost be a formality. I can't see a way in which it will fail, and that will probably be my downfall, but I do it fearlessly. You know, I'm reminded of the Teddy Roosevelt quote often, which is actually my favorite quote, which is, it's not the critic who counts or whether the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena. And if you succeed, you taste the triumph of high achievement. And if you fail, then you fail whilst daring greatly. I kind of try and live my life by those, by those terms.

Okay, so what could go wrong? Have you thought about what could go wrong so that it doesn't go wrong?

Yeah, everything.

Well, everything could go wrong.

Everything could go wrong, but you're doing it anyway. Go right, and I'm doing it anyway. And that's the same for anything in life, you know. We're, we're, we're blessed to even be born, you know, so we have to make the most of life. We can't just sit back and live half a life. I'd rather absolutely go for it, even if I do fail on it. I'll have thought of the next thing whilst it's, uh, if it does fail. And if it, if it fails, then I did my best. I go to sleep with peace in my mind.

Okay, so, but let's talk about what could go wrong. I mean, yeah, I'm sure, you know, there's going to be entrepreneurs that are watching this. I think it's good, um, sure, to try and plan It's almost like you want to disrupt yourself and figure out the things that could go wrong first before someone else figures it out.

That's— yeah, that's good.

This show's called Disruptors. Yeah, and I like the phrase disrupting yourself. I sometimes think about, okay, if I was a competitor, how could I disrupt me, my own business, and try and plug those gaps?

I'm not one bit concerned about the, the big fast food chains. They have franchise models where They take a high percentage off the franchisee, and then the franchisee pays an extortionate amount for the, for the food they purchase. So they actually can't compete against me. It's not the other way around. What if, if I worry about anything, and I'm sure you have this, if you could clone your best member of staff, you would probably have 10 times the net worth that you do at the minute. And, and that's the same for any— anyone. So as much as I'm going to give the opportunity to these 18 to 25-year-olds—

Males.

Males, yeah. They've, they've got to be good at what they're doing for this to work. And I'm taking a leap of faith on them and hoping that, that they end up doing a good job. Otherwise, it will be a disaster. And I notice, especially since COVID that the downfall in service is crazy. And I don't know whether it's the attention span of young people, but you can be in a Michelin-star restaurant now and ask for a Coke with no ice and you'll get a Coke with ice and lemon. And it's like, if that's happening in a Michelin-star restaurant, the standards are so low now on expectations. And the attention span seems to be so low on young people. That is something that really concerns me and that I'm going to try my best to drill in hard to everyone working in this industry.

Okay, and, um, why are you excluding women?

That's another good question, uh, and it's, it's for good reason. And I've already picked up a lot of criticism for this. It's not that I don't trust myself. I completely trust myself. But I'm a 42-year-old wealthy male, and this is an opportunity for 18 to 25-year-olds. But when people start, they will still be teenagers. I don't think it's appropriate for a 42-year-old man to spend each and every day with 18 and 19-year-old girls being a mentor. So to say—

Why not, if you're just teaching them business?

Yeah, I know, but society judges it differently. Uh, false accusations could be made.

You don't seem to be the person that worries too much about judgment.

I'm not, but also the, the, the demographic in society that really has been forgotten about, the demographic of society I can help is the young men between 18 and 25. I don't know what value I can add to an 18 to 25-year-old girl, or what, what I can advise her in life. My wife can do a great job of that, but I can't.

Yeah, but aren't you teaching them how to work and earn through the delivery driving and build the little business inside the restaurant?

Yeah, and again, I don't think it's appropriate to send an 18-year-old girl on a moped on an in— on a winter's evening to some ghetto to deliver pizzas. And there is— I'm sorry, Rob, there is some ghettos still around. But, you know, the reasoning behind my decision is not because I'm sexist. It's because I want to— I didn't say that. I want to protect the girls and myself from any backlash in the future.

Interesting. Okay, um, I know you've been doing, um, a fair bit of work with Greg, Greg Wallace.

Yeah, so Greg Wallace is a lovely guy. Uh, he came and visited us on the yacht last month. Uh, he's really kind. I feel he was dealt with very harshly by the BBC. He was obviously made unemployed, uh, from that. He's a household name. I got in touch with him. Yes, I see it as good publicity to have a household name fronting part of your business. So in that sense, I've took advantage of him being a household name, but he's a really good person and I will be the first to defend his, his moral character.

Right. And you're— I'm working with him to use his popularity in the food world to help promote— Yes.

So I, I used to love watching MasterChef. and it was because of Greg Wallace I enjoyed it. He's a great character, he is a great presenter, and I still believe he is loved by the majority of the country that are interested in food.

So do you think he's, um, not guilty of these charges?

I think he's guilty of making some inappropriate jokes that were overheard by women of a certain age. Is that the terminology you used? Sure. Uh, I mean, I'll give a perfect example of, of Greg. When he arrived on the yacht, he had some nervous energy. That's because he's autistic. He just wanted people around him to feel at ease. The way he did that was to tell jokes. And when I introduced him to the deckhand called Ali, he said, oh, I feel sorry for you, Ali. And she's like, what? And he said, because you're stuck between 2 houses. Now, that is a joke. It's a— it's a pretty bad dad joke, but it's a harmless joke. She wasn't offended. We weren't offended. But that could offend someone. And over 20 years of his career, or 24 years of his career, meeting thousands of people, when the BBC put out a dossier to say, have you ever been offended by Greg Wallace? something like 45 complaints were held up, and, and none of them were for assault. I'd like to get that through to people. None of them were for any kind of sexual assault. It was women overhearing jokes, women not liking an innuendo he used, women not liking the fact that he criticized their apple crumble. It, it's quite ridiculous, and I, I won't go into too much, but I know he has a court case coming up. I know he's gonna win that court case. I've got no doubts of that. And, uh, I know he's gonna, um, be compensated for the, for the misfortune that he had.

Okay. Would you say you're a normal person?

No, no, I'm definitely not normal.

Okay, so how are you not normal?

Uh, I think I don't like the Bud's words like autistic and ADHD. And I haven't been tested for anything, but I'm pretty sure I'm a bit neurodiverse.

Right. And do you think that's a bad thing or a good thing?

No, I, I think it has its pros and cons, just like anything. Um, it, it has its upsides in the fact that I can remember most facts and figures for life. Um, it has its downsides in the fact that every Life feels very short. Everything feels like it was last week to me, even if it was 20 years ago. So that, that is quite a difference.

Explain that. What do you mean?

So I've got such a good memory that I can remember things that happened when I was 11, and it seems like a week ago, right, in detail. Yeah. And, um, so life to me, even though I'm 42, It feels like it's been extremely short because I can remember everything from probably the age of 4 in great detail if I take my mind back to that point. So life just feels like it's very short. I'm, I'm 42 and I don't feel like I'm anywhere near halfway through my life.

So you believe you're neurodiverse, you don't believe you're normal, you believe you have a Um, almost photographic memory, and life feels very short because you can remember things like they were last week even if they were 40 years ago. How does that affect you in the downsides of your personality?

Um, you come across quite strange to, to normal people, I guess, quite often.

How do you mean strange?

Um, I don't know, strange probably isn't the correct word, but the— because, because I think differently, because I am different in the way my mind works, you, you don't feel normal, so to speak. And although I'm very comfortable within my own skin, I'm very aware of the fact that I'm not a normal generic person.

How do people respond to you when you tell them of your business vision and idea?

Mixed, very mixed. So I seem to be quite liked when I, I talk to people in general, but they do often think, Jesus, he's different. So I'm perfectly okay with that though, and I think the more, uh, content I give, it will also help other people that are neurodiverse, and it's okay to be different. The thing I'm most proud about within myself is the fact that I've made mistakes in life, I've done stupid things, but I believe I've always been kind overall, and I'm proud of myself for that. And that's the reason my wife chose me, because she said out of all the men she dated, not that it was many, she said I was very kind, and I believe there's kindness within everyone and it just needs untapping. Even the kids going around London on an e-bike stealing mobile phones, I believe if they're given an arm around them, some unconditional love, and some pointers in the right direction, I believe we can get the best out of them.

What would you say are your Biggest weaknesses as an entrepreneur?

Uh, my self-belief. It's my biggest positive and my biggest weakness. I go into everything believing it will be a great success, and more often than not it isn't. But I think, I think that is entrepreneurship. It's, it's doing something with full intent to make it work, and if it doesn't work, then you adapt With no less enthusiasm. That is the journey of entrepreneurship, is it not?

Surely the food industry, the supermarkets, the fast food chains, you know, the, the billion-dollar corporations, surely they're going to want to do everything to stop you.

Yeah, and I can't wait. I have to have an enemy. I have to. It's, it's like the fight within me. So the reason I'm—

So who's your enemy?

Well, firstly, it's Domino's. So Domino's give a terrible product for terribly high price. I'm not gonna sit here and slag off someone like Pizza Express because I actually think the product's fairly good. The service is incredible and the experience is nice. I've had some of the nicest, most enjoyable memories with my friends in a Pizza Express in Stamford over the years on Thursday night boys' night. So Not everyone is offering a bad product at a high price, but prices— people are getting less and less for more and more costs. And it, it's the greed from private equity, it's the greed from the structural setup of the, of the corporations that set up the franchisee system. And I'm going to disrupt it and If I succeed, then I'll enjoy succeeding. And if I don't, then I at least tried.

So it sounds like you're saying that these ridiculously high food prices, which have gone wild since lockdown, they don't need to be this high.

They don't need to be this high at all. If you want to ask me the price of a food ingredient, I can tell you what it is per tonne. And then we can break that up into what it is per portion.

All right, well, I'll tell you what winds me up.

Do you want to do cheese? Let's say 100% mozzarella cheese. So out of Poland at the minute, that's €3,600 per ton. So if you use 150 grams of mozzarella on a pizza, the cheese element of, of that dish is 36 plus 18, uh, 54 pence— sorry, €0.54. So if the euro's uh, 1.15 to the pound like it is today, then you're at 5.4, you're at about 47p for the cheese element of a pizza. And that's the most expensive ingredient on the pizza. For the tomatoes, you're about 8p. For the base, you're about 6p. That's if you get the flour from the UK. If you got the flour from Ukraine, it'd be half that. So you can produce a nice margherita pizza for 65p of food cost. Well, I can. They can't because they're not as bright as me at buying the ingredients. But

how can they not?

They can still do it much cheaper than they are.

So you can produce a finished pizza for 65p?

Cost to me, yes. Right. Yeah, that's without the energy cost, but the energy cost per pizza is very small.

But I mean, there are loads of other overheads involved, aren't there?

Of course, which is why I need volume. So the, the fixed overheads of the rent, the rates, the energy is extortionate, but it's a fixed rate. So if you're doing a small amount of volume, that's what pushes a pizza up. That's why Pizza Express aren't making any money even while selling a pepperoni pizza for £20. They're still not profiting much money, right? Because there's so much fixed overhead in that product. Yeah. But if they took the high-volume market So, when Ryanair, I hate to use them as an example because we will be much better quality, but they noticed 30 years ago that the airline industry wasn't filling the seats. And they said to themselves, if he worked out, if we fill the seats, we can bring down the price this amount, but it would only work if he filled the seats. It's the same concept for me. this will work if, if people come and buy from us. Yeah. If they don't, it will fail. But then I see it, if I'm doing huge amounts of publicity, I'm budging half a million for publicity over the following 12 months out of the 2.5 million budget. If we do huge amounts of publicity, we're doing good within the community, offering a chance to the most marginalized people in society Then surely, like, would you like to bring your kids here one day to an Austin's Dad Pizza one day? If you knew what you know so far and there's one in Warrington, would you give it a try?

I certainly would come. You

certainly would come. And if it was great, if, if it was much more delicious than a Domino's, a McDonald's, or a KFC, and your kids loved it, would you come back?

Yeah, of course.

Well, great. That's, that's what I need.

Yeah. Are you not scared?

I'm not scared at all. I wake up in the morning and as long as I'm breathing and alive, I'm pretty grateful for being on this planet. And I'm being very genuine there. For the times in my life when I've had no money, I've been no less happy than I am now. And sometimes I actually dream about having to start again. I don't want to jinx it. And my wife Wouldn't be happy if, if I went completely to zero.

So you dream of going back to zero and having nothing?

I'm sure you do as well.

No, I do not.

No, you don't. You don't drive by a lorry down the A1 and see, you know, searching for drivers and think, oh, if I started again, I'd be a lorry driver in the daytime, I'd be a pizza delivery driver. Definitely not. This, this, and this. I'd save 50 grand in the first year, then chuck it into that, then do this. You don't do that? No. Okay, that's where I'm really odd.

I've done that. Well,

the thing is, what I'm saying is the hustler never leaves you, I don't think. And my favorite business was when I was 17 and had my own burger trailer. I enjoyed that so much and I learned so much from it. And when I watch Spudman on YouTube or Instagram, I kind of envy him and wish I was in my burger van trailer selling burgers.

Well, I mean, surely you can kind of go back to that. Of course.

And that's one of the reasons I'm doing this business, because it at least gives me some elements of that.

Well, I'm pretty blown away, to be honest. This has taken me a little bit by surprise.

Sorry.

No, no, you're not really sorry, are you?

No, no, not at all.

No. So can you tell everyone what the brand is?

Yeah.

You know what the business is? Um,

so it's called Austin's Dad. Why? Because I'm Austin's dad, right? One, one year, one month old son. Yeah. Um, I think the pressure of having his name on it gives me a bit more incentive to get up in the morning on the hard days and give it my best shot.

Yeah.

And yeah, it's a strange name for fast food, uh, place, but I hope to be a father figure for my followers in some ways. I hope to give a lot of good content of what I believe a man should be. Like I said, I'm certainly not perfect, but I believe I'm good overall. I believe most people have an angel within them and a devil, and the job of us to do as humans is to make the voice of the angel win most times. I don't think anyone goes through life where they haven't made some mistakes or done something they're not proud of. Uh, but it's about being good human beings overall, and that's something I'll try and instill to my audience and especially the, the guys I'm giving this opportunity to.

So Austin's Dad, does that have social media? Can people follow it?

Yep. So Austin's Dad Pizza at the minute. We're going to change the name to just Austin's Dad.

Yeah.

But we've got the Instagram up a few days ago. Uh, we'll have the YouTube up very soon. Uh, that, that should be today.

Okay, so by the time this is published—

Yeah, TikTok, Facebook, everything else, LinkedIn, YouTube. We're gonna do the whole shebang. And yeah, this side is all new to me. This side of things I have no clue on whatsoever, but I will learn as I go. Don't hide the truth. Yeah, I'll learn as I go and I'll, I'll show what I'm doing. And I believe being on a Rob Moore Disruptors Podcast as my first ever public interview, so to speak, was jumping in at the deep end. And I don't think jumping in at the deep end is a bad thing at all.

All right.

I'm gonna find less, lesser podcasts easier than this in the future.

Yeah, go straight in. Well, um, this show is Disruptors. Yeah. So what does that word disruptive mean to you?

Uh, it means you're changing an industry. So, I'll go back to IKEA. I've actually got a lot of respect for the founder of IKEA because it's not the best furniture in the world, but what he realized in furniture is what I've realized in food. He thought something can be fashionable in design without it costing any more to make. And that's what I realized in food. You can supply good ingredients without it costing more. I mean, in some cases, the good ingredients actually cost less. So, for me to produce a 120-hour sourdough base for the pizzas, I'm not needing to use any yeast. So, it's actually cheaper to make, but it's a much better product, but it does take time. Yeah. And I think the fast food places now, they're trying to eliminate time on the process whichever way they turn, and that's why after Domino's you end up with stomachache because the dough hasn't naturally fermented. It's got dough accelerators in it so that they can make it at 4 AM in the morning and it'd be sold to you at 1 PM in the afternoon. It's not a healthy way of consuming food.

Okay, so if someone is a bit stuck or wants to change or move forward or grow or start some kind of business, what advice would you give them?

I would—

because you don't seem to have any fear about jumping in at the deep end.

My advice would be to be totally fearless, to know what you don't know. So get advice from people that know things on subjects you know nothing about, and to hone your skills. So do something you're really interested in to start off with. I think that's fairly obvious. Everyone would agree with me on that. Mm-hmm. And really learn the depths of Depths of it. And on the things you don't know, at least learn who, who to go to to enable you to give a better product. And I believe that if you give a better product for a lower price with better service and good values, you should do well. Not always, but you should. Overall, if you keep on plugging away at that, you should eventually succeed.

And something you've said about 3 times probably is kindness and how important you think that is. Where's that come from in you?

2 things. So when I was, uh, much younger, I grew up in a hard area. It's been gentrified a bit now, but Stanground, Peterborough, it wasn't the easiest place to be in the '90s. There's a lot of so-called bad kids, and my mum didn't have much, but she was very kind. And every Friday afternoon my mum would put some frozen pizzas in the oven, homemade chips, and she'd invite the kids loitering around on the street corner in for pizza and chips and some blackcurrant squash. And over the years, I realized how much effect she had on those, to the point where I bumped into one of them in hospital, uh, 7 years ago. My mum suspected she was having a heart attack, but it wasn't. It was just stress. And I saw one of these guys in the waiting room, he's similar age to you, Rob. I said, oh, hello Pete, how you doing? And he's like, yeah, yeah, good. How's your mum? And I said, oh, she's actually in— she's had a suspected heart attack. He burst into tears. This was a grown man, 45 years old at the time, and he burst into tears. And he said, your, your mum is the kindest lady I've ever met. Aww. I'd jump in front of a lorry for her kind of thing. And, um, and yeah, I realized that, that my mum had a huge impact on so many kids' lives from hard backgrounds and, uh, how effective it is and how loved she is. Um, there's one other story that, that comes to mind, and it's more about getting the best out of people. So When I was at school, amongst selling things in the school playground, I was pretty much the class clown at the first school I went to. When I was 14, 13, I realized parents' evening would be very tough. I realized I wouldn't be getting good feedback from the teachers to my mum. And I actually avoided seeing my history teacher, Mrs. Kilby, because I was terrible in her class. I was the absolute class clown. And we were going through the parents' evening, And she actually approached my mum and said, hello, Miss— Mrs., I'd like to speak to you at the end, um, about William. We haven't got an appointment. And my heart sunk. I'm like, oh no. And we went and saw her. It was 10 PM. And she sat down. She said, I just want to say your son is a wonderful young man. He's a great historian. He puts his hand up. He has such good intellect. He's great. I, I I have huge affection for him. I think he's a great boy and I think he's going to go a very long way in life. I'm sitting there completely perplexed. I have no clue why this woman has done this. I'm on my way home with my mum and she's like, Good boy in history. I'm very proud of you. And I, I took no interest in history whatsoever. I went into class the next day. She's like, Morning, William. Sit down. I'm, I'm literally scared. I'm a 13-year-old boy who's been so badly behaved to this woman, and she's just given me a glowing report for parents' evening. Get to the end of class and I stay behind, and I'm loitering around, and I say, uh, Miss, why, uh, why did you say to my mum I'm well behaved? And she said, well, I thought you'd have gone through a hard time with all the other teachers, so I thought I'd do you a bit of a favor. And she said, have you got plenty of sandwiches to resell in the playground at lunch? I'm like— and I didn't even know she knew. And I'm like, yeah. She's like, good boy. She said, do you realize you're going to be an entrepreneur one day and a leader? And William, I've noticed with how good you are at remembering dates, you are a great historian. I left that class as the class clown kind of thing, went back to the next lesson. I didn't want to be the bad kid, I wanted to be the good kid. She's like, so what year was the Battle of Hastings? And I'm like, 1066, pick me! I ended up top of the class in history just because I liked the teacher, because I had respect for that woman who let me get away with murder initially, who gave me kind of unconditional kindness when I needed it. My loyalty to her was, was through the roof, and I actually took her for lunch 3 years ago in, in Stamford to thank her. Oh. Uh, yeah, I came across her by pure chance and had a great chat with her. So thank you, Mrs. Kilby. She, she made me realize that if someone believes in you and gives you a chance, you, you can get the best out of them.

Yeah.

So it's— you remember the kind actions, and she was very kind, and I remember how much effect it had on me, and I hope to give that same effect to some others.

Are you a millionaire?

Yes.

What does— oh, you asked me.

No, sorry for answering it like that, but yeah. I'm not going to say my net worth if you expect me to do that, but—

When did you become a millionaire? What age?

I don't actually know. I think when I worked it out at 25, I was worth nearer 2 than 1, and by 26, I was worth less than 1. Right.

So it's been up and down.

It's gone up and down over the years, but yeah, I've learned through trial and error what to do and not what to do. And now I'm— I won't say I'm on a steady trajectory upwards because I'm about to throw £2.5 million into this venture, but—

Right.

Yeah, it's—

What do you think it takes to be a millionaire?

Knowing your subject and knowing how the world works. I think that's a massive thing that school doesn't teach. So if If I understand something else very well, it's how the world works. And you actually get that from traveling. You actually get that from speaking to people from all walks of life. There is not many people that I sit down with and they blow me away with intelligence, even billionaires. So I am— used to be a member of a car club called Ascari in the south of Spain. it had many billionaires, and I never felt out my depth sat around a table with them. Um, I don't mean for that to sound arrogant, but I think intelligence, uh, in a, in a subject is very important.

Okay, Will, Austin's dad's pizza.

Yeah.

Thank you very much. Any final words?

Do something you love. Be kind. Don't give yourself such a hard time for mistakes, as long as they're not terrible mistakes. And make the most of life. Everyone was dealt a different hand, but everyone is lucky to be here. Make the very most of life. Try and get advice, especially from older people. They'll be very kind to you. One thing I'd like to mention, which I totally forgot, Is my friend's dad from years ago. So when I was 16, I joined a very small private school for one year with the money I'd made from sandwiches from previous years. And my friend's dads from that school were exceptionally kind to me and pointed me in the right direction many times. I won't name names, but they, they all know who they are. And older people are certainly willing to help younger people that are a bit lost if they approach them with, with politeness and manners. I'm a, I'm a strong believer of that.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.