Coffeez with Joe Shalaby - Love & Sandwiches ft. Ike Shehadeh | Coffeez for Closers with Joe Shalaby Ep. 41

Episode Date: September 27, 2024

Ike Shehadeh is the charismatic founder and current President of Ike's Love & Sandwiches. Renowned for his innovative approach to sandwich-making, Ike started the brand in 2007, and it has since grown into a beloved chain known for its unique and flavorful offerings. Ike's sandwiches feature the iconic "Dirty Sauce," which has become a signature ingredient across their menu.Under Ike's leadership, the brand has expanded rapidly, with locations now spread across California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Utah, and Colorado. Ike Shehadeh is not only the creative force behind the brand's eclectic menu but also a key figure in the company's community engagement and marketing efforts. He continues to lead the brand's strategic growth, focusing on innovative menu items and unique customer experiences.For More Check Out our Playlist: https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgPwyhl8CkXiM0cBtuY8A_6JS60FueLz3&si=0_2dnoPkYV6jcSGwCheck Us Out on all Platforms!Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffeez-for-closers-with-joe-shalaby/id1726674707Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2KkQWRqHSHcCK3TVfsRKUK?si=hjTnUOjFS5eTDxBjgf4RwQ&preview=noneAmazon: https://www.amazon.com/Coffeez-Closers-Joe-Shalaby/dp/B0CRYLQRW6 Coffeez and Closers Socials & WebsiteWebsite: https://coffeezforclosers.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coffeezforclosers/TikTok: https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbnU0T3RrLXdPbC1BR2NLc2lWcExqWklQaHlQUXxBQ3Jtc0tudi1GV2Zod3hRYzRhTkhONFBuMlptblNGSlJ1QzhpV0tzbHh5YThNR0R3Y2RnNnU5NV9ER3E5ZUhxMjdUUWp1UWo4MVl6Q2szeXo1cFh1OHNkYkxDR1F0MXZtMTZ6QnZoakdzSnJpVl9PcWZBOU9zZw&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tiktok.com%2F%40coffeezforclosers&v=uXvk6LY9lS8Facebook: https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqa2pLZ2pMaUxmSTh4dy1qazMtdlBjX2pVN1AxQXxBQ3Jtc0tua2RUTUNsRmJob0RKWlVqeDhNaUN4US1rdlRvUG9Fdm5SNk1jU1pQNzNLQnVmUmtGMGtMYUViZ2pLMXJkOVJUci1kMk9DN2poTThVV2NFd0tISWdDMzNwOEZ2c3pVb09lbEhjemJHblRsS1RKdHZqbw&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fpeople%2FCoffeez-for-Closers-with-Joe-Shalaby%2F61556355642488%2F&v=uXvk6LY9lS8 Joe Shalaby SocialsInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/josephshalaby/TikTok: https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqa3p6VlRzR1BWMkJQM1ZIaUdVZHhYVTYyak43QXxBQ3Jtc0tuUXVBOE1oZUJYTmZIZnNENUgxQkhjamk4RXJHb09MWU9OczJhLWpnX0JwN2pENzRhaV9NajJROW5nek1tQ1VvVE40ZFJuUUI2cnI0ajNKLXE4d1VMUUpkTGFHR0tGY0o5NUhnWnZnaXJoZXdEM0piaw&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tiktok.com%2F%40josephshalaby&v=uXvk6LY9lS8Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/josephshalabyE Mortgage Capital Socials & WebsiteInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/emortgagecapital/Website: https://www.emortgagecapital.com/Twitter: https://twitter.com/Emortgagecap #1 Mortgage Company on Social on 🌎#1 Non Delegated Lender in the Country🌟#1 Broker in CANMLS #1416824"Mortgages Are What We Do Not Who We Are"™https://finance.yahoo.com/news/learn-why-e-mortgage-capital-192000740.htmlAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

What's up, everybody, and welcome to another episode of coffees for closers where success is served daily. In today's episode, we're going to walk through a journey of an entrepreneur who turned a passion into a massive household brand. Starting from humble beginnings, our guests now boast over 100 locations across the country, from California to Florida. and even Saudi Arabia. Get ready to hear from the mastermind behind Ike's sandwiches. Some of the best sandwiches you've ever had in your life. The one, the only Ike. First off, I never knew Ike was real, right?

A lot of people, we met the guy from Travis Matthew or Tommy Bahama, and it's always a fictitious character behind the brand. But Ike is really Ike. And not only is Ike really Ike, but the logo of Ike is Ike. So it's amazing. I was like starstruck yesterday. Like that's like that really is hike. Well, thank you.

Super cool. And it's super cool that, you know, we related on a cultural level as well. So it's like, it just was like, it was just destiny that we got to meet and to hang out. And you're super cool. And you immediately agree to come to the show. And I was just, you know, I'm truly honored. I'm blessed to have you here. So thank you for popping in.

I appreciate you having me. You're welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Now, many people want to know, where did the vision of Ike's sandwiches start? Like, how did you start this whole thing? Well, which part? Because as you know, any journey, it's what part do you want to know about?

Well, before I dive into the vision of Ike, I like to start every podcast with the same question. What is Ike's morning routine? My morning routine? Oh, man. So 90% of the time, maybe even more, I look at the clock and I set my alarm for eight hours after whatever the time on the clock is before I go to bed. So I set it for eight hours. Guaranteed, so you sleep eight hours. It doesn't matter. I'm blessed in that unless I schedule something, I don't have to be anywhere at any time. So that's the first thing. Let's say 90% of the time this morning I had a shoot with David Melzer and that had a specific call time. And unfortunately for me, it wasn't eight hours from when I went to bed.

So, but for the most part, I could do however I want to do it. Then I wake up, make sure there isn't any emergencies on my phone. Usually the emergencies are on emergency breakthrough. So I will have been awoken if there was. Do you have an emergency breakthrough on your phone? Yeah, some people can, some people have access to me, even if my phone's off. I mean, I think it's a common thing, right? Yeah.

right through. And then after that, I do a morning, my morning routine is I do 50 burpees, 50 pushups all in a row, 50 burpees, then 50 pushups, do some ab work, some, some, is that just your only workout? Do you do additional working out besides that? It depends where I'm at. If I'm by a gym, I'll do that whole workout, but in the gym, and then throw some weights around as well. If I'm in a hotel room like I was this morning, it's going to be pushups, burpees, and some lunges and some ab work. Total. like total time, 20 minutes, maybe 25 if I'm slow or lagging or, you know, tired or whatever. And so I automatically start my day with, oh, I'm like I already won.

Not that doing what I just said is a huge thing. But for me, it's, I don't have to worry about, oh, I didn't get a chance to work out yet today. Yeah. There's not, oh, I lost track of the day. Normally, I like to do multiple workouts in a day. as long as I get the first one out of the way, then there's no pressure on me to do it later. And if the cards are in it, I go and do another workout.

And then after that, fix myself up. Sometimes I've got to shave my head. Sometimes I've got to shave my face, shower. You've got to look the part of Ike. And then if there's nothing for me to go to, then I don't go. Then that's when I'm getting in my phone, returning texts that are not emergencies, return and get on social media respond to comments there I eat usually between one in three like my first meal so you're intermittent fasting though so you

haven't eaten yet not yet oh cool I got meal preps for you once once you're done yet I've had some folks were having little samples of this new product they have some beef jerky type things those are pretty cool I had a package of that I'm I'm excited this is my this is my first meal of the day did you have it black all black no this is I got a you had dirty chai and I It's a little dirty. Yeah, we have the dirty chai lattes too. Normally I'm not a caffeine enthusiast.

Just when I was a kid, I didn't realize I was addicted. And I was like, I'm never going to be addicted. I'm totally addicted to a lot of other things. Just caffeine's not one of them. Love it. So now we'll dive into the vision of Ike. So what year did you start Ikes? Open Halloween 2007, October 31st, 2007.

And it stars Ike sandwiches. That was an original name. Hasn't changed. It was Ikes. We were a full cafe when I first opened. We sold at a full espresso bar, full, like everything, whatever you can get. In fact, I had more than what you could have gotten at a Starbucks or a Piz. We had, this is in 2007.

I had rice milk, soy milk, macadamia nut milk, almond milk, regular milk, low-fat milk, non-fat milk. I opened with seven different milks. And mainly because I was like, well, what if you want? What if you can't have soil? What if you can't have nuts? Then I had the rice milk. What if you... And so I just wanted to make sure that anybody that came in would have that.

And then I did breakfast, full breakfast menu. Sandwiches, obviously, salads. Man, you got to bring Ix place back. I'm working on one. I can't say where because it's a surprise. But I'm working on one right now that'll be a sit-down version of Ikes with some items. I can talk about the items. The items would be my breakfast menu is coming back.

I'll have a specialized coffee menu, but instead, because I'm not a big caffeine enthusiast. I'm going to do all those. I'm going to have my own mushroom coffee blend. So there'll be coffee in there, but also the mushroom stuff. And then kind of functional elixirs for breakfast and for, say, like, instead of a bar, it'll be functional elixers. So non-alcoholic, but all with functionality. That's awesome. You might get high off of them, but it won't be alcohol.

And then we'll also have alcohol, too, for the regular old person. that wants alcohol and caffeine for the regular person that wants caffeine. Yeah. Well, that sounds like that concept in 2007, that's just like breakthrough in 2024, 2025. So to do that in 2007, like, you're a true visionary as a restaurateur. And I don't know where that, how did you get that sort of vision for, you know, a sandwich spot? You have the biggest menu in the space. I don't think there's anybody that has a larger menu.

There's no, not even like in a restaurant, a regular restaurant doesn't have a cheesecake factory. And you see their menu. Yeah. And it's overwhelming for people like you, like, you just broke it down though and you simplified it. But like, how did you get so many ideas for sandwiches? It all stems from, and this is something that anybody can do in whatever their line of work is, is it all stemmed from me focusing on what do I like. And what's the reason why I was doing it. So not just what I like, which is food and to eat, but how come?

And it was to feed people to create memories on a table and to be creative in the kitchen. So if you combine all three of those things, for me, I was like, okay, well, I want you to want to come to me for breakfast. I want you to come to me when you don't want breakfast. So you wanted coffee. I want you to come for me when you want lunch. I want you to come to me when you want dinner. And I want you to come in when you want dessert. Or if you don't want any of those things, which is why I'm adding the elixirs at the end.

And obviously, people drink coffee all times a day. So it stemmed from that. When I opened up my first Ikes, which was a full cafe, I didn't know, because I didn't have any experience, that you're not supposed to have a million different things and do all these things. I just thought, I can make breakfast, I can make coffee, I can make dessert, I can make salads, I can make sandwiches. So why not do all those things? And in fact, all of my beginning mentors that were all in the restaurant space that had way more locations than I back then, and a lot of them now with 3,000 or so locations. They were like, what are you doing kind of thing? And I'm saying, well, I just didn't know any better because it was only about feeding people,

creating memories, and being creative. So obviously that's going to lend to a longer menu and a larger menu to. And so it's all about that. Whatever it is that you love to do, if you only do those things for the reasons that you want to do them and only focus on those, whatever those are, whether it's five reasons, five things, then it doesn't matter what you do, even if it's crazy to do it. you're likely going to be successful in that area because, well, you'll want to do it, and you have a why for why you want to do it.

It's incredible that you've really managed to bring a whole new element to the sandwich space. And it's inspirational because you really brought in your vision, which to many people, I'm sure, was contested. Like, you were like, people were like, what are you thinking? Right. How did you deal with that backlash when people would, you would explain your vision? Well, I'll say that I learned when I was younger and by younger being like 12, 13, 14, that people are going to talk smack about you if you don't do something and they're going to talk smack about you if you do something. So if they're going to talk smack no matter what, and I would use a cuss word, no matter what, if they're going to do that no matter what, you might as well do stuff because they'll be like, oh, you're a punk you didn't do. or you're scared you didn't whatever they're gonna say or if you're gonna go do it you're a clown you think you're better than everybody like some people say about me now so it's the same kinds

of criticism i just now they say that and i'm doing what i love to do versus the other way me worrying about what people are going to say and then me not doing what i want to do so that was the first realization that i had when i was really young and i'm i'm blessed i guess i had a lot of detractors back when i was younger and then but one i was specifically to ike so when I was like, hey, I took my ideas and I thought to myself, I should open up a cafe. And I started telling people, say, in my family or my friends, that's stupid. Restaurants go out of business. Oh, you should be the best, like, especially for our culture and probably a lot of cultures.

You went to school. You should do what, you know, fill on the blank, whatever you did. Or the only approved engineer. Engineer. Doctor. Lawyer. Yeah. That's it.

That's the only. You know, here and there, right? And so for me, I just was like, okay, well, I'm going to do this because I want to. My life up until that point was unsuccessful financially, but also unsuccessful from a happiness factor. Like I was doing things that I didn't enjoy doing, and I was also not making money. So that's probably the worst place to be. And probably most people that are listening to this aren't in that space, but we know people, and we've definitely been into place where you're not making money and you're not doing what you like to do.

do. So that's the crappiest life I know possible. That's where I was. And I said, well, okay, if I'm not going to make money, if everybody is right and it's not going to be successful, at least I'm going to be doing what I like to do, which is better if I'm not going to make money. I'd rather do what I want to do and not make money than do what I don't want to do and not make money. So I just stopped talking about it. If I knew that so-and-so family member or so-and-so friend is going to be like, oh, that's this dumb idea. After they said it one time, I just shut up. I had prominent family members of mine. Give me a call. I ended up in the newspaper like four or five months in to Iex, maybe six, lots of newspapers, lots of articles. Hey, I read about this.

Like, that's you? When did you do? Why did you open up? We were like, when did this happen? And I was just like, remember, I told you, say a year ago I was going to do this and you said it was dumb. Yeah, that's why I didn't tell you that I did it. So I had very prominent family members and friends that found out about it through the media, through social media. My gosh, you're doing a restaurant. And back then it was more like a cafe than a sandwich place. And so I was like, yeah, I did. And obviously, at that point, they weren't talking smack if they're reading about me in the newspaper. So then it turned into, no, I didn't say that, you know, obviously. What'd you go to school for? Computer science and engineering.

Oh, wow. How did your parents take it when you told them, mom, dad, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to go put everything I have on the table and be an entrepreneur. Well, so my mom was actually the one who gave me the money for the first one. So that's how she responded. That's good. Moms are always the best. And then my dad was like, well. It's Arab dads.

They have the problem. So not that he had an issue with it. He was just more like, well, are you sure? Like, he wanted me to be smart about it. And I'm thinking it's a freaking restaurant. I don't think there's anything. No offense to anybody. But like, if you're getting into the restaurant business and you don't want to do it,

that's an idiotic thing no matter how smart you are about it. And so I figured that out just living my life is the things that I like to do, even in the jobs that I had that I didn't like, I did anyway, even though maybe I wasn't going to be rewarded for it. Often I was rewarded for it. And I was able to link that to, okay, well, if I just do these things, I'll do it. So I was like, I wasn't looking for smart eyes on my project. I'm just going to open up a restaurant and kind of do what I love to do.

And I assumed that that is better than doing not what I love for not money. So that's basically my dad. And then my mom was like, here's money. Now, one thing I really want to ask you, because I was actually talking to this with the CEO of Wahoos yesterday, it's like, we're in California. We're dealing with random labor lawsuits, margin compression, insane minimum wage. and you're still delivering deliciousness and variety for a very cheap price. Like your sandwiches are very inexpensive. Especially for California.

Especially for California. Like in the Midwest, I mean, they're probably the same price, but still like very reasonable and a big portion. How are you still able to maintain such profitability and expand and do it at those prices in this current environment in extreme margin? impression. Oh, it starts with, well, first of all, we're probably seeing less of a percentage of profit. And actually, I want to talk about this real quick. Often I see, especially on social media, and probably on the platform we're talking on right now, so they're like, everybody's

at record profits and whatever. Think about it. If I made $1 more than last year, and last year was my record, I made record profits. But it sounds like I'm a trillionaire because this company's making record profits. And that company's making record, record. Take that out of the equation. Also add in, say if everybody has a certain percentage they want to make, whatever percentages you make on your, you want to make, meal, I want to make. If everything goes up in price, and I'm still only making, say, 8% or 10% or even 20%, 20% of a bigger number is going to be a bigger number just because that's what mathematics is.

But it doesn't mean we're making record profits. It's just what happens when prices go up is everybody makes more. And so I want to take that into common lexicon. Realize what it is when people are framing things. But first of all, I think we're making less as a percentage of profit. But how we're doing it, it's just been doing it for so long that we've been able to negotiate great pricing with our vendors. We've been doing that so long we have great goodwill with people that they're willing to pay the prices that we're charging. And then the same with the staff.

The people really love the product that work with us. So they're able to put out a great product. And all that put together kind of helps us so that we can expand. So I can't open up in, say, a brand new city like Houston, which we did a couple years ago. And even Salt Lake City, which we did a couple years ago, Vegas, all these places is where people have heard of hikes. So it allows us to expand in a less than risky way. It's not guaranteed, though it's less than risky when we open a location in Austin. half a California move to Austin.

So if anything, maybe the bad price is here in California, forced everybody to go to Austin, and then they know about Ix and Austin because they're all Californians, so to speak. Now, do you cut your parents, are they entrepreneurs? Did they run their own business?

My father did, yeah. So, okay, so at what age did you realize that you're going to be an entrepreneur? So I've been going, my father was in the supermarket business. He owned, I don't know, four to six supermarkets and then got into real estate. But where I saw him work was the supermarkets.

And I remember sitting on the counter and watching people count money. And I'm like, oh, that guy is giving my dad money. I want to be like, oh, money. I was young enough to sit on the counter, but we'll have to know, oh, that stuff buys me like this toy or whatever it was that was high in my values back then. And then I started bagging the groceries for my dad. And I started, oh, I want to take their money and count the change. And so learning stuff like that. I don't know what age that was, five, six, seven, eight.

It's just in the Arabs' genes, basically. You're like, I was born an entrepreneur. Essentially, and then one of the other things that I saw through my father doing that, I probably only went in like 5% of the days that he worked, is that he went every day. He went there when he was sick. He went there when there was good stuff going on. He went there when there was bad stuff going on.

He went there when there was problems at home. He went there when there was not problems. at home. So I learned to show up every single day by watching my father do it as an example. And sure, perhaps like, oh, we had to. I had to support his family. Still people don't show up even in those scenarios or they complain about it in those scenarios, even though they, quote, have to do it kind of thing. So I learned about that stuff from my father. So you watching him work. You would say that the biggest source of inspiration and motivation from you stems from your father and his work ethic. That's where you think you learned it. Well, that's where I got.

my work ethic from. Yeah. I show up to work. The only days I don't go is like when I'm doing stuff like this, although, well, this is work. Probably work, right? People hear this and everything like that.

This is marketing. Ike. Yeah, I'm often on planes, like three or four a week. And invariably, I'm traveling and the person picks me up like, oh, are you coming or you going? You know, we have that conversation. Oh, is it for fun or is it for work?

And for me, it's, my work is fun. I wouldn't get on four planes a week and, and sometimes more. If I didn't enjoy doing that, I can delegate the flying on planes part or those things out to someone else if I didn't want to do that. We're at that position where I don't have to do those

if I don't want to. So for me, it's doing it, but also on the days where, oh man, this task needs to be me to be the one to do it, but I don't feel like it or I'm tired or whatever happens, something's going on in my life. I'm just going to go do it because I always feel better

after doing something that's uncomfortable instead of waiting and lagging on it or delegating those tasks out that need to be me, which aren't a lot. So for me, it's, it's all of that stuff rolled up into, through the package of this is what I want to be doing and this is how I want to be doing it. Like the reasons why I want to do this and all that in one package becomes, holy crap, you're Ike from Ikes, you know, like kind of how your reaction was or the other other people in this office's reaction was. And that's not what I set out to do. It's just how I'm doing it through all the entrepreneurial and love aspects and

inspiration aspects. Yeah. And it does help that the logo is your face. Oh, yeah. So you're asking about the logo. I think that's how we started a long time ago in this part. So eventually, I got people who's like, who's like? Who's like?

And we'd have three hour wait. and people are doing all these things I'm running around passing out sandwiches and like, Hey, three hour wait for Ix Cafe? The first one,

we had three hour within six months we had three hour waits. It was like, we went viral before being viral was a thing because Instagram didn't exist back then and TikTok certainly didn't exist back then.

It was basically Twitter and MySpace, Facebook was kind of coming up and it was more like we got social media back when it was the newspaper. So I'd be in articles all the time. I'd be doing live,

TV interviews where it'd be like Jack Dorsey right before me and then me and then someone like Mark Zuckerberg or whatever would be would be one of the guests but me being you got to hang out these people because you're in the bay and that you had the hottest restaurant in the bay yes so you got to meet everybody in Silicon Valley 90% of whoever this since that CEO found or whatever I have fed them yeah probably even more that that I don't even know about and that's the beautiful thing about being a restaurant tour and like you get to to hang out with everybody. When you, everybody eats.

Everybody eats. To the CEO. You fed Steph Curry. You fed Mark Zuckerberg. You fed everybody who's anybody in the Bay. Anybody who's anybody. And some that I don't even know that I fed. Yeah.

And everybody loves good food. And you have everything under the sun in terms of good food. Yeah. If they eat sandwiches, I've fed them in the Bay Area. Yeah. I think if they've eaten sandwiches, most people listen to the show. you fed. Yeah.

Thank you too for everybody who is a fan of Ikes and has eaten it. And if you're not a fan, I still love you. Yeah. But if you're not a fan and you haven't eaten Ike, like, yeah, you need to try it. Yeah, go eat there. Now let me ask you, what are some of the hardships, the biggest hardships you dealt with when you started Ikes? So most of the, so the first Ikes infamously got closed down because we were, we

didn't have permit for selling sandwiches. Apparently you need a specific permit to sell sandwiches in that neighborhood in San Francisco. I'd say from the day I opened till today, the number one issue is the government permitting. This part of the government needs, you need this permit, you need these kind of things. You need these people to say hi, yes.

Sounds just like my business. So, and it's, it's, I recall, and this is way before we were famous and way before the, the rest of the government got in and shut us down, like the Supreme Court of California is like, don't sell any more sandwiches. That's it. Otherwise, you're going to go to jail, is that I remember putting up a sign on my window because I got all these permits. Like, I needed the fire permit. I need all these permits. Got all these permits. They don't talk to each other.

One, and I remember I had to put a sign. I had to close one day because I had to go to City Hall and, in. get some permit that somebody said that I needed. And back then, I was the only one that worked there. So I remember writing a note saying, sorry, the man said I had to go in and get permission to do whatever it was. I don't recall what it was. But I remember putting that on the window,

like me being actually upset that it closed my business and walk over there and get whatever something that they wanted me to say that I needed to do to stay open. And that was like the first month I was open. And I remember crying in my car, like what the hell is going? on? Why can't I just sell sandwiches? And I remember I was just sitting in the car, listening to some music, and gathering myself and just, I had to take the day off because I had to go into the city and get some stuff. And so since that day, literally the first month in until the city shut me down in 2010, until now when I want to open up in this city or that city, the only biggest, I don't want to say the only issue, the biggest issue is, please, let me open up a sandwich up in this place. Please, please. Please. Please. pretty please, can we do this? How about this? Can I get this signature and that signature? That's the number one issue. And I think a lot of times that's going to be a lot for a lot of people, the same exact answer. The biggest issue is going to be the regulation. So it's how you

deal with that, how you set yourself up so that whatever it is, it's an issue in your field. Like I'm sure you got a lot of things covered, even though it may take extra time because you have to jump through this or do that. And so setting yourself up so that happens. So you can just go out and do what you love to do or what you want to do yeah i mean you're in a hyper-regulated space and now how are you dealing with all the regulation as you expand in all the different states well a lot of states are different and heck a lot of counties are different i remember it took us three years to get a permit two plus years to get a permit in san francisco because we were a chain now and you needed a conditional use permit even though i start like to move across the street i wanted to open up across the street and

They're like, you can't, you're a chain. What I mean? But I'm here. I can be here, but I can't be over there. Yes, you can't. So we had to get a permit that took two years. Same exact time period. I put in a permit to get something in Oakland, and this was in the 2012.

At the time, they were small business, small business. We opened in 45 days after getting the space. 45 days or two years. It took me two years ago. Certain cities just want franchises there. States and things like that. So now as we're expanding, there's some places. like, no, we want people to open. So here's some, here's some over-the-counter

incentives, right? Ways to get up. You just come and be like, hey, I want to open up in the sandwich shop. They have somebody to their stamp. And the thing is, they can do that anytime they want with anything that they want. Literally any, any county, any city can do that anytime they want with anything that you want. You know, how do I know that? Because you're telling me that Oakland is that much different than San Francisco. I can do it in 45 days in Oakland, but two years in San Francisco? The answer is no. The answer is somebody said you can't do it in San Francisco, and that's why it took two years.

You don't even have to use, and those cities are really close to each other. And then somebody in, say, in Texas, you can go right now and get your permit. You go, like, hey, I want to open up a sandwich shop in this address? They're like, boom, why can't they do that everywhere? Yeah. Well, they get the health inspector to come in, get the fire inspector to come in, get the whoever to come in, all the health and safety stuff. But we all know that that stuff doesn't take that long. They'll come in and they'll say, yes, this is not a fire hazard.

Go. But it's usually the permission to do things. And I feel like that that is artificially put in place. I use it as a test from the universe. Like back then, like, do I really want to do this? If I do, I'll put up with this BS. If not, then I won't. And maybe that's the reason why it is, like not why the cities do it.

They do it because they make up that they need to do it. But I mean, the reason why the universe puts that in front of your God or Mother Nature, whatever you want to believe. and puts that in front of you is so movies they got here. Prove to yourself. Some people might not. I'm down with God.

To prove to yourself and God that you want to do it. Because if you're like, oh, man, it's such a pain. I'm not going to do it. Then that means you wouldn't have done it anyway. You would have just quit at the first sign of drawback. You'd be like, oh, I don't want to do this anymore. You'd quit. What is the easiest city you've dealt with so far?

So far. That one in Oakland was pretty easy. Because some cities are just paying you now to just come open business because some cities are just totally deprived and they want chains to come in. There are times where we reach out and like, hey, we want to open here. We'll literally message the mayor, the mayor's office. And they're like, yes, please. Those have been, and that's been, I don't want to, it's been a lot of places like that. Like probably 20 something places of we hit up the mayor's office and they're like, yes, please open here.

What do you need from us? Yeah. And even paying you to come in, like, we'll front you. There's, so I found the city, actually, I don't want to talk smack about the city. So there was a city that offered me 300 grand to open up in an area part of the city that they were attempting to economically revive. And after looking into it, 300,000, you know, that's not a joke. It was a grant or whatever that you wouldn't have to pay back. And I looked at the area and I go, actually.

If you want me to come here, it's going to be more like $750,000 for me to do it based on the area and the lack of opportunity in the area, how much is going to cost to redevelop the space, all that stuff. Like $300,000. I was like, no, that means me doing it for free for that space. Obviously, if the Oakland location gave me $300,000, I would have done it in a heartbeat because I would have done it for no money. But the demand in Oakland is so high and housing and affordability. These people have. And my experience is every time a city has offered to give me money. It's usually a bad sign.

Yeah. Because that doesn't make sense. Why would you want to give me money? Like they did the math and they're like, okay, if we do this, we're going to do well on it. So I'd say, I mean, but just simple economics says just because if it's dependent, you know, population growth is happening at such a rapid speed that that Ikes will eventually work. Yeah. Will it work this year? Maybe not.

Will it work in three years? Probably. Just because just we are getting populated. And especially any city in California. And yeah, this was a city in California. I would, that city still, is that city still terrible now if you look back and go today, today, this was in like 2010-ish, maybe 2012. It's probably booming now. So this city is still a, it's a world famous city, obviously.

And that same exact spot that they were offering me 300,000 for, I still wouldn't do it. Really? Even though it's been 10 years. Yeah. You still wouldn't do it. Not in that part where they wanted me to be. Yeah. Oh, wow. So, okay, then you, okay, well, then you were right. Just keep in mind, California did kind of get, a lot of areas did kind of get killed by COVID and not even by COVID, more like the COVID policy where literally areas of cities were shut down, shut down, and they still haven't revived. And in a lot of areas, not everywhere. You opened the Ikes near me and Tustin during COVID. Yeah.

Okay, so how much did it COVID impact your business? We were lucky in that DoorDash, Uber Eats, PostMate, all these companies that you maybe even never heard of, we launched on those back when we were the preeminent sandwich place in San Francisco, one of the top ones in L.A., but for sure in the Bay Area. And so all these, when they were becoming ideas, they're like, hey, Ike, come on our platform, we do this. And I remember back then, I'm like, you should pay me to be on this. And so we did actually get paid to be on a lot of these platforms that now it's the opposite where people have to pay to be on them. And then, so we were blessed in that we already had delivery capabilities.

We've already been on all those DoorDash, Uber, and all the other ones. I mean, you were rubbing elbows with their owners, the CEOs of all these problems. I was thrown out of a few of their parties. Places, yeah. We've had some disputes here or there. And some of these places, they have conference rooms named after the business Ikes. So we have got a lot of pros and cons or people are coming over my house and then be like, what they're all? So we got some nitty-gritty.

Like one day it'll be a book and they'll be like, oh, this person and this person and that person. But we launched with all these things. So with COVID, what happened is, well, we were already on every single delivery platform. And we had been on there for five, six, six, six. eight years some of them. So we already had high placement, high reviews. And when it became natural for people to order from their phone, it was just we kind of were able to, we kind of, well, we did have more sales during COVID than we did the years before. Wow. You scaled during COVID in the restaurant space. We opened locations during COVID. Obviously, profitability came down because cost would,

you didn't know one day something was going to be there or we had to not have chicken for a week or roast beef or whatever it was. So there was difficulties, but we actually had higher sales year over year through COVID, probably because we were already on all these. We already had an app. So we were set in place, but this was back before places had apps.

This is back before. You were Tech Forward before Tech Forward was a thing in the restaurant space. Yeah, we had an app since 2010. So that's how long ago we've had an app. We were just able to adapt and make our app better once COVID and stuff happened. And then keep in mind, DoorDash and all that stuff, they were way less of a percentage of businesses

than they were during COVID, which was like 100% of most people's businesses were that during COVID. So you have, do we have the ability to order Ikes from the Ikes app directly? Yeah, and get delivered. Yep. You can, you have drivers right here.

So we'll save money. We'll save the... You'll save all the fees. I don't know if they want me to say that. It's cheaper if you get delivery on my app than whatever app you're using, even if they're giving you VIP. That's great to know.

Yeah. So order to go to Ikes sandwiches.com and find somebody, hopefully somebody's close enough to deliver to you. Yeah, so from Tustin, what's this? Yeah, I'm just asking for the office. Yeah, well, there's Costa Mesa, there's Tustin. There's, you have one of Costa Mesa, too? And Newport. I'm sure all those.

Yeah, when I was Googling earlier from my hotel, I'm like, I was like to do that. Where am I? Where's an Ix? And I pull up the map. And it was like, there was three of them within 20 minutes from my hotel. I was staying in Costa Mesa. So for me, it's like, oh, look, there's four here. So if I want, if I, because I get obviously free Iikes, right?

So if I'm like, I want to get food delivered to me, like, let me just check it out. And yeah, they all four delivered to my hotel. So that I was close enough for all of them and deliver to where I was. So there's delivery. So you have cars for every Ikes? It's through a third party service, but yeah. That's pretty cool. I did not know I'd save the delivery of you.

That's great to know. Well, it depends on where you're at. The delivery may still be there, but there's not that spread on the price. Yeah. You know how... It's about a 15, 20% stretch. And then also we mark up the food as well. Oh, wow.

Significant savings. Yeah. That's good now. And then you also get rewards. There's going to be like, oh, my God, you want to teach... Like, we're doing crazy stuff. We did a thing. We're probably going to bring it back.

Spoiler alert, guys. You will order, and if I'm in your town and I'm at the store. I'm going to personally deliver it instead of having the third party be like, Let me roll up. You're going to personally? I'll be like, hey, how are you doing? And then, yeah, we're going to do a few of those. We did that a long time ago.

That's going to be some good content. Show up and be like, hey, what's up? And you're like, oh, my God, Ike. And I'm like, here's a $100 gift card. Thank you for your order. Where are you going to do that? Oh, it's going to be like, it's going to be dependent on where I'm, like, if I'm traveling. Yeah.

We should have done it here while you're here today. We don't have it set up yet. Oh, man. We have to find a way from us to cancel the driver. Okay. Once you order, the driver gets kind of like if you ordered a car, the driver gets booked. So we need to find a way to deliver it without. We'll figure it out.

Multiple spoiler alerts for people who are like now. Now I saved everybody who's listening right now 20% on their food. At least, yeah. Yeah, like 20%. You guys are all getting, and they're getting rewards because you can't, you don't get the rewards through Uber. You can only get through me. And then the possibility, yeah, possibility Ike's going to deliver your food to you. So if you follow me on Instagram, you like, oh, Ike is it.

in Seikost Mesa, well, he might bring me my food and then do the order. And heck who knows, sometimes I do like three of them in a day. Sometimes I do 10 of them in a day. Sometimes I'm like, oh, not that guy again. I'm not going to go to his. That's so cool, man. What a cool job. Now, the restaurant business is a very risky business.

So is there a specific skill or mindset that someone's got to have right now to succeed in the restaurant space? for any space. So like I started, if you want to get in the restaurant space, when I talk to entrepreneurs, food entrepreneurs, specifically, I go, how come you want to do this? And they'll say whatever they want to say. If they don't say I want to feed people or I want to make people happy, I'm like, don't do it.

Not that there's no money in the restaurant game. It's just going to be a lot of headache and you're not going to want to do that stuff. So unless you love cooking, you love feeding people, then there's no reason to get in the food space. Absolutely at all. It doesn't matter how amazing your recipe is. If you don't care about making food, then you shouldn't sell food. You should be like, hey, I have a recipe and find somebody else that likes to make food and license your recipe.

There's ways to make money in the restaurant business without you being a restaurant operator. So for me, it's I didn't give up when I sold nothing on the first end and give up when I wasn't making anything and couldn't pay myself for two years. The reason why I did it is because I wanted to feed people. and I wanted to be creative and make new menu items, and I wanted to do all those things. And if I had three hour waits and I still wasn't making any money, like you imagine working that hard seven days a week, and then at the end of the day having like $1,000

for the whole month at the end of the month? Absolutely not, but I would have done it for free. Literally I would have done it for free because I did it for free for two years. Nobody can say that I wouldn't do it because I have proof that I would. And because I would do it for free is why I'm successful, because most people will quit when they're not. making money. If you're like you're going to work every single day for a month and I'll give you

a thousand dollars, maybe you'll do it for one month if you needed the money, but after two years, you'd be like, I'm quit. I need to do something else. You can literally make more money doing anything else. And so that's basically the formula. If you want to feed people, you will feed them and then you'll make money because you want to feed them. And because you want to feed them, you'll feed them better than other people can feed them. And then hopefully your food also taste good. That's incredible advice, especially for those who are like, man, I can't do this anymore. Like, you got to do it out of love. You got to do it from the heart. Yeah, and it's anything. It's not just food, but whatever it is that you're doing, I talk to a lot of entrepreneurs

grew up in Silicon Valley and somebody's like, hey, what about this app? Okay, okay, why do you want to do it? And if they don't say, I want to connect people, whatever their app is, I'm like, no, I'm not going to invest in you. And no, I don't even want to, like, I can't help you. Because if you're looking at it and you don't want to do whatever the thing is, you're going to quit tomorrow. You're going to quit when there's no money in six months or when you burn all your, you know, your burn rate or whatever's gone, then you're going to quit. And it's not a good investment. No matter how good the idea is, you just need to find somebody that wants to do it for it to be successful. That's the key.

Somebody that wants to do it. And by one, I mean, having the desire from within that that's what it is that they care about. Now, that leads me into this question. I guess you kind of answered as after all the success you've had, hundreds of Ikes and you continue to scale, and you don't really need to grind, like, as hard as you grind. Like, Ike himself delivering the sandwich. That's insane, right?

But you're doing it. And you're doing it with a humble heart. After all this continual success, how do you find your motivation? How do you continue to find this motivation? I think this is where the myth stands. I don't need to be motivated to come up with a new sandwich. I don't need to be motivated to feed people. I don't need to be motivated to if I'm at the store

and somebody looks like they're confused to get up like I'm playing on my phone or I'm on a call. Hold on and let me go and walk them through the menu. I don't need to be motivated to do that. I do it because I want to. And a lot of folks out there, so I don't like motivational speakers because anybody can say something

and then you get raw-rod up for a little bit. I'd like to be internally transformed internally inspired. And so for me, in fact, if I have to motivate myself to do anything, I literally don't do it because then one day I'll stop doing it. So I would just delegate that out. So it's a trick question or a trick answer is I'm not motivated at all to do it. I do it because motivation doesn't even come into play. I love that. Now, and I guess, you know, that's kind of like your why too. If, Today, we catered the event with David Meltzer.

I didn't make any extra money because I was there passing up. By the way, you catered in Vegas, too, and that was excellent. And I didn't get money for that. Like, if I didn't show up, it would have been the same amount of whatever you want to call it. Brand recognition. Well, obviously, I'm a little bit different because I am the brand. But I didn't get a bonus because I showed up. I showed up because I want to do it.

And again, this is why motivation doesn't even come. come into play. Like, I'm just going to do it automatically. And all of us out there have those things that we're already doing in our lives already that you're going to do even with, not that you don't even expect to get recognized. You're not going to get recognized for. Nobody's going to say, oh, way to go for walking your dog or whatever it is that you did. But you do it anyway. We just make up that we can't turn that into a career. Why? Because somebody said that, not because it's not actually true. And you can make money literally doing anything.

You've seen that you're doing stuff like this and it's generating, even though that's not the reason why you did it, in the end, you're seeing your tremendous success because you want to do it and it inspires you to do it. So why not make money doing the things that you actually are already doing? I'm not saying go out and find what you love and you're not already doing it and then try to find money, make money doing it, you already, look at your day to day,

yesterday, and this week, and this month, and next month, and look at what you're already going to do, and how can you generate a way to make that into a career? Because you're already doing it for free. And I feel like somebody would, it would just be unwise, or even idiotic, to not go, like, if somebody's going to give you a nickel for every time you brush your teeth, like,

if you brush your teeth tights today, and somebody's like, here's 10 cents? Would you be like, no, don't give me the 10 cents? me like, sure, I'll take 10 cents. I was going to brush my teeth anyway. So it doesn't matter if it's pennies that you're making if you're going to do it anyway. It doesn't matter if it's pennies that you're making if you're going to do it anyway. Great advice. That's excellent advice. Now, in the C-levels, like, because Ix, does it run like a typical corporation where you got like a C-O, a C-O, a C-O, and then your headquarters is also in the Bay, or it's all

in Orange County. Here? Yeah. We moved during COVID. to Orange County because most of the staff is Orange County based. So your sea level folks, your management, all your leadership team is here? Basically, everybody but me is here. Yeah, I travel. So why don't you want to, but you have a place in Orange County too, don't you? Santa Monica. Yeah.

That's where I used to live in Venice, actually, for eight years, 12 years. So where's your actual headquarters in Orange County? Yeah, it's in Long Beach. Awesome. Yeah. How are you fostering talent at Iyx? How are you continuing to develop your talent there? So talent is coming through the Ix is doing something.

Like even if I'm not on an Ix, whatever the culture is that's in that store, cultivates people that want to stay. It also helps the fact that we have the culture that we have also kicks people out. Like not literally like you have to leave, but you're like, man, I don't want to be here because it's whatever that. Like we get rid of jerk customers and jerk employees. It's just a fun place. It just happens that way.

If you're a jerk, you're not going to come work there, be like, wait, I actually have to work here. Well, I can get paid to do the same job at selling books or I guess these days in California. Everybody is paying $20 an hour because that's the minimum wage. So you could leave and go McDonald's or any place, basically, and make $20 minimum. So why would you do it if you didn't want to at ICE if you didn't like it? So that's one way that we cultivate the talent is the people that stick around are the ones that are they, we don't even have to sell them on it. They get bought in because they're there and they're like, wow, I really like this way.

I really like how things are. And then we attempt to grow the people that say, hey, I want to do this. It's kind of, you know who here when you bring in somebody new. If they're doing great for a while, if it was fake in the beginning, you kind of know. And we just take those people or they take themselves and they move their way up. The next thing I'm like, oh, wow, I remember you and you used to just make sandwiches and now you're running the region of Orange County or whatever kind of thing. And then we do also mix that in with a few folks that we find from outside that are already doing amazing jobs at their current job and bring them in because they fit the culture too. So a combination of from inside and from outside.

And again, they will just quit if they're not down with the culture so you don't ever have to worry about a bad fit. That's excellent. Yeah, yeah. Now, you're so, you know, you're so busy all the time. So what kind of hobbies do you like to have? You know, like you're always traveling. You get to where you do outside of 50 burpees and 50 pushups. Like what else you get to do? Well, my side hustle, my side hustle is I play video games or I play an online game called Mobile Legends and another one called Plunder Pirates. I would love to go pro. I was talking to Clinton. Clinton. Did you know he's starting the global gaming league? I would love, that's what I was asking about mobile games. I would love to be a pro. Maybe I'm not good enough to be a pro right now, but I feel like. Well, he's starting that.

That's good enough to get there. Global Gaming League. He's going to have, you know, Kevin Hart's going to have a team and 50sons can have a team. I can be on their team? Yeah. Well, you can't, you can't have your own team unless you're superstar. That's not me yet. Yeah, I'm like, can I get a team?

I'm like, he laughed at me. He's like, well, you. That makes sense, though. If LeBron's your cousin, he could be the team lead, and then you could be on his team. So we just have to know a superstar. No, like B-Lister doesn't count. It's got to be a superstar. That makes sense.

It's got to be Beyonce. So when I have like a thousand locations, then I'll be able to own my own team because I'll be like a space across the whole entire United States. Because I was like, I don't qualify. Like, you know, I got millions of followers. I have a big brand in the mortgage space. Like, no, no, but he laughed at me. Like, no, no, superstar joke. Superstar.

Maybe that's why one of your goals is $100 million. Yeah. Then once I get to 100 million followers, like, yeah, like, all right, I'm going to tell Clinton, like, what's now what, Clinton? I'll be on Shaq's team. That would be a great. Yeah, Shaq gets his own team because he's a superstar, of course. So I play this one game called Mobile Legends. I think I'm in some characters, there's different positions, some positions, like my worst position, the ones that I play, the worst position, I'm probably like the last person. Like if there's a team of 12, I'd probably be the 12th man.

But I'm good enough to make the league is what I think. Really? Well, I mean, I think so. I haven't played professionally because I don't, I mean, I don't even know how to start that. And there's some characters where I feel like I could start on a team that is like a pro-level team. Maybe a minor league team, but definitely I could start. Well, I mean, you know, we're going to hit them up because, you know, I'm getting in on the global gaming league. So like.

I come in for like a little percentage, but I also want to be an owner player. Yeah, yeah, no, that's what I'm doing. Because I got my kids. They're all gamers too. So I should have had you with me today. with the global gaming presentation. We'll talk about it. You obviously got his info, or I'll put you on a thread with them.

I'll text in me yesterday. Yeah. And then another thing that I do is I do a lot of my own talks. I have my own podcasts called Food and Philosophy. I basically eat food and go through books and espouse how I go through a book and how I apply it to my life, whether that's business or relationship or my physical body or spirituality. things like that. So I do that.

I spend a lot of time on that. And I read. I hang out with my friends. I travel. I eat a lot. I know it might not people like, how do you eat a lot? I see you post on your Instagram.

Well, it's because I worked on my mind and my body, but I also work on my body, literally, and I work out twice a day. I mean, and that's important. I'm the same way.

I think it's part of our high achiever syndrome, which is also known as ADD. Yeah. Well, I also literally feel better when I'm strong. Yeah. I did a, oh, I was in, I was in Phoenix, Arizona area. And I went to this western place. Somebody was like, hey, come to this western like a bull riding place.

So I went there, it's like a country bar. Definitely they have country line dancing and things like that. And they mentioned, hey, I turn to clock, we're going to have a pushup contest. And my buddy was like, dude, don't you do a lot of pushups? And I was like, yeah, I'll do it. So I started for the pushup contest. And I'm by far the smallest person. How many can you do in one?

One in three quarters inches. So the end, and how many I can do? 136. And one in a row. That's my record. I would, no know if I could do it right now, but for sure I can do 100 right now. No problem. Even in this suit, I'd be afraid that it'd be like maybe rip the suit or something or get sweaty.

But 100% right now, right here. Dude, I could barely do like 60. And so we do this contest and it was like, I think 10 people in the contest, maybe more. And we're going down and everybody was like, oh, what you're, you're, you're, you're, They're all looking at me. They kind of all knew each other. They're in the middle. Just to the ground, 136?

I put my chin down to the ground. And so we're doing the push-ups, and it was a little different. It was more like, when I say down, go down. When I say up, come up. So, like, you kind of had to do it on its cadence. And sometimes it would be down for like three seconds or five seconds and then push up. Anyway, so I'm doing the thing. And everybody's like, oh, this guy's going to get demolished.

And then at the end, it was just me and this one. And this dude is huge. I'm talking about like NBA play, NFL, fell player, like tall, obvious. I'm like, dude, that's unfair to him. My arms are way shorter than his, and he also weighs way more than me. So once it was just us to me, like I looked out and they're

like, that's last two. So I kind of peaked him. I was like, oh, I'm going to destroy this fool. I don't care how many pushups he can do. He's not going to be able to hold it down for five seconds, like the guy was in coming up. And I don't want to say I destroyed him because I don't want to disrespect him, but I won the competition. And he was like, oh, man, good game.

And I was like, I easily had another 30 to 40 in me and he couldn't do it. So that is, like, I felt strong, not because I beat him, but I was like, when somebody goes, you want to do a push-up contest, knowing that I can beat, like, nine out of ten people, makes me feel good physically. And then I'm also like, it's like.

I was going to challenge you to one, but I don't know, I feel uncomfortable doing it now. In the suit, let's go. I mean, I was thinking, like, well, I got the advantage of it, because I got a sports shirt. He definitely got better or better. I would unbutton my this, but I'd keep it on.

You got a vest. If your best is 60, I would say that you probably don't want to do it live. Maybe we do it off of it. Yeah, let's not do it now. So a couple of things I want to ask you. So what's your favorite quote? My favorite quote, and I end my podcast with this. It's your well-being is your greatest contribution to humanity.

No exceptions ever. And that's from Dr. Carl Bukite, who I've studied with since 2008, so for a while. And then it's your well-being is your greatest contribution to humanity. No exceptions ever. Because think about it as you're out there and you're doing what it is that lights you up, like me with sandwiches, you with all the things that you're doing. And everybody has what they're doing. And everybody that you came across with was doing the same thing.

Do you think there would be much conflict? You think there would be much animosity between people. Like you and I, we're just vibing. We're totally similar in a lot of areas and totally different in a bunch of areas. But we're just chilling because you're doing what makes you well, and I'm doing what I make what feels well. And the reason why I like that quote a lot is because we're told out in society. The opposite is true.

We celebrate when somebody sacrifices to themselves. Look how selfless this person is. And in reality, that makes that person worse and also makes everybody else worse by thinking that they should be selfless too, instead of, well, what lights you up? Literally inspires, will inspire other people. That's an amazing, amazing quote. And, you know, I think that a lot of people need to hear that more often.

Now, what's the best piece of advice you've ever received? Ooh. If things go the way that you want, great. And if they don't go the way that you want, even better. Awesome advice. And I think a lot of people listening right now I need to hear that. You don't know how things are going to show up.

And I'll give it a real-life example, which is why this particular thing really hits me. So I had my previous, my dad's supermarket. I ended up buying it a long time ago after he retired. And in 2004, I ended up having to close it. I was 50-50 business partners with one of my cousins. We ended up having to close it because of lack of money and I didn't want to work 20 hours for like 50 bucks,

like literally for $50. and I was like, I'm not going to do that anymore. So we closed. And I remember on that day going, oh, man, all my life savings was into that. And I had to sell my car. I had a house. I had to sell my house. And I ended up basically with just a little bit of cash, like $5,000 or $6,000 after everything got sold and all debts got paid.

And I was like, man, I'm a loser, and I'm crying. And I remember closing the store like the last time. And I'll put the locks on the store. And I was just standing in there and watching the city of the city of, San Francisco, like on the street, passed me by and thinking, oh, my God, this is so terrible. And then three years later, I ended up opening up Ikes. Wow. And I remember as I started becoming popular, busy, one, my cousin was older cousin, and he was

pretty successful. Like, I went out of business and I had to sell all my stuff, but he was still really financially well off because this restaurant or this supermarket was not his main bread and butter. For me, it was. And I noticed that all the good ideas that I'd have, him and I would go out and we'd be 50-50 partners because we're partners and we were partners on everything. And he would never let me call all the things what I want. He would never approved of opening up a sandwich shopping, naming it Ikes. He would have wanted it named after him. So when I started looking at it, I was like, oh my God, that was one of the worst days on my

life and I was a loser and I had to sell all these things. But in reality, it disconnected me from him, and it disconnected me from a lot of folks that were in my life that only were around because of success. And so when I went out to go to Ikes, I got to do it how I wanted to do it, put my name on it, do all the recipes and all the crazy things that I wanted to do. And I would have lost 50% of that off the top if I had stayed, if that business had stayed in business, or even worse, that business would still be in business and I'd be doing that and not exactly what I love to do. And I would have lost this whole entire opportunity. So even then, I really wanted a successful business, even better that it didn't work out because now I have this.

Yeah. I mean, every door that closed on you, just a bigger one opened. Now, let's go back to when you were 20 years old. What would you tell your 20-year-old self to do to build wealth? Well, the first thing is, I would have been like, start now. Whatever it is, the ideas that you have in your head, you're not going to know if there's, a good idea or a bad idea. Heck, you're not even going to know if you want to do it or don't want to do it until you do it. So go and do it. Especially my 20-year-old self, totally

has time to fail and go and do things. So one is start today. Doesn't matter what it is, start today. Nothing that's going to come up. You don't need to have a business plan. You don't need all this stuff. Just do it and create and adjust. Like trial and error. Do that. That's one thing. to like specifically regarding wealth. I'd be like, dude, just save 10% of everything that you, every time you get money, just put 10% aside. 20, you know, 20 to where I'm at now, that'd be a couple, I don't know, 20 million or so, like if I actually did that.

So that would probably be the one thing that's from the richest man in Babylon. Pay yourself first. So that would be what I would tell my 20 year old self is start now and pay yourself first. Just put it inside. You're not going to miss a dollar every time that you might. make, you're not going to miss it. Now, what's the most painful thing you've ever been told? Ooh, sides from getting, like, broken up with.

Painful thing I've ever been told. When somebody that I respect doesn't believe in me. Yeah. Yeah, we get that a lot nowadays. It's part of just life. It's just part of our growth. Now, what do you think the most popular business mindset are principle is that you use right now on a daily basis.

It doesn't matter what people want to buy. It only matters what you want to sell. So just sell that. And the people that want to buy that will find you. And in fact, the less people that want to buy it, that means the less market there is out there, that means the more that if you do it, you're going to be the foremost expert in that. And so anybody that wants to buy, you know, whatever, ceramic mugs or whatever, they have to come to me because I'm the best ceramic mug person, period.

So it doesn't matter what people want to want to buy. It only matters what you want to sell. So sell that. And you know what? Now you're at a point where you don't need to sell. Like you, you know, because everyone knows AICs. Like they got to like AICs. You don't need to sell it because they either like it or they don't.

Yeah, we were talking about that earlier. Oh, hey, do you want to, do you want somebody to do this? I'm like, hey, if they like AICs, let's move forward. If they're like, oh, hey, I need to tell them why they should do Ikes, then we don't need to do it. Yeah. Yeah. Now on. Never don't eat there.

On that note, like. What do you think the biggest obstacle is that you face starting Ikes and how did you overcome it? The biggest obstacle I think with me, I know for me, but for everybody, is deciding to do it. We all know, I guarantee every single one of us know exactly what we want to do with our lives. Whether it's one thing, seven things. Like there's things that we want to do that we don't do out of fear or we don't see how it connects or how we can make money off. of it or is it realistic, stuff like that, or even outside influences. Like your parents say that's stupid or your peers say it's stupid. So the toughest thing for me, because I had the idea

of Ikes between when I had it and I opened was a year, between when I wanted to do it and before I actually started working on it, almost three years. So I would have been three years ahead of time if I just did it versus, oh, should I do it? Should I do it? Should I'm kind of comfortable here should I do it and at that time I was probably making like three grand a month so not terrible but also not like not enough that to be disturbed enough to stop and so the

toughest part was going I'm going to stop doing what I'm doing and I'm going to focus on what became Ix that was the toughest part the toughest obstacle was my own head with the outside voices we're always our biggest obstacle and overcoming that is

it takes a lot and that's the hardest part like deciding to do it is the hardest part. Everything else, if you're out there and you've decided to do it, just know that was the hardest part. And then the second hardest part is your first iteration of your product.

That's the second hardest part. So if you already have or that or at the first iteration of your product, you're literally 99% of the way there. The only difference between you and succeeding and not succeeding is if you quit or not. That's, I don't wanna say a hack, because it's not really a hack.

If you have the product and you already decided to do it, you're almost, there. Amazing. And you don't know if it's going to be this step or that step. Like, you're just literally steps away. Now,

I got a couple questions and we'll adjourn here. And this is a two-prong question. What's a personal goal that you have for yourself? And what's a business goal that you have for Ike? Ooh, business goal. I would love to feed people on Mars. I would like to have. He's coming.

Yeah, I'm soon coming soon. And he's been in my house. So, you know. Elon's been your house? Maybe we could, maybe we could work something out. I don't know how we would get the Dutch crunch bread up there or how we can make it.

Wait, wait. You had Elon at your house? That's pretty cool. I mean, you know, you know, Silicon Valley. I know a lot of. What does Elon think of your sandwiches? I assume he thinks that they're amazing. I mean, he came to your house.

I mean, that's pretty cool. The funny part is he didn't know that it was the Ike. The Ike. That's awesome. Anyway, and then. Do you have any Iikes at Tesla? by the way? There's not an Ix at Tesla.

There is, I don't want to talk about Silicon Valley stuff, but there's not an Ix. We had the AX at Stanford, and that kind of gave me all the connections to basically every single, and actually, it's really weird. I met a bunch of these guys before Ikes. So it's not a, you know, it's one of those like energy things. Yeah. There's famous billionaire tech people that I met before Ix was, like when Ix was just an idea in my head.

So then later on, when it turns out, like, wait, oh wait, you're that guy that did that? Yes, that was me. So it's kind of one of, I believe, the world foreshadows a lot. Yeah. I've been hanging out with celebrities since I was 20, 21 dating celebrities since I was really, really, really, really young. So it makes the world foreshadow. So it makes sense that I have a lot of celebrity sandwiches. It makes sense that a lot of the tech world is enthralled with my food.

It's like kind of the world tells you. So what is the world showing you right now that is kind of a foreshadowing for your future life? Just pay attention. The world's always talking to us. God's always talking whispering in your ear. Some people say it's the muses. Whatever it is, it's being spoken into your ear and you just need to listen. And then so that's like a business goal to feed people on other, you know, Mars.

If you want to keep it to more like in this lifetime kind of thing, I would love to be in every single state, which for sure is going to happen. I'd love to be international, whether that's Dubai or Paris or... You're somewhat international now, but, you know, that's... And then I would love to... And then for a personal goal is one day, well, besides the gaming, I already shared that, so I'll share a second one. I would love to put out a...

I'm not... I feel like I'm a terrible singer, but I'd love to get voice lessons and put out a freaking album. That's awesome. I could listen to my own... What about movie? I heard you're doing a movie. We didn't even talk about that. It's not a dream of mine because I'm already doing movie.

Yeah, that's why I have this beard is they're like, hey, we need you to look like basically an ungroomed deputy. So I said, don't shave. So I'm not shaving. And this is like 12 or 13 days. I'm kind of impressed myself. I normally don't let it grow out this long. What movie is it? It's called Killing Faith.

It is Guy Pearce is the lead. Hopefully I'm allowed to talk about it, but I already talking about it. And so I'll be a deputy or something on that. It's a Netflix movie. Are you producing it? This will be like a real. Motion picture. That Netflix is not real.

But I mean it'll be like in the theaters movie. Yeah. Nice. And I'm a co-executive producer on it as well. Nice. Give myself a role, you know. Oh, yeah. It's nice when you produce a movie.

Normally I play myself in movies. So this would be the first acting gig I've had in like 20 years. Really? So you just play Ike. Yeah. I'm normally. Yeah, the last movie I was in, which I was an executive producer on. And that one's called Caitlin.

chance. That one's going to be more like Hallmark or Lifetime or something like that. It's totally a chick flick. That one's going to be, I play I play Ike from Ike from Ike. I'm wearing an Ike shirt in there. There's Ike's sandwich wrap sandwiches in the audience and they like cut to me and I think I'm eating a sandwich. Like I ate like five sandwiches during the shoot because they kept like, oh, should I be eating the sandwich now? Should I be eating the sandwich now? And then I just had to keep digging sandwiches out of the, you know, had to eat five sandwiches. And then my last question, and I ask everybody this question, we adjourn with this question every single time. When you're in front of the pearly gates, what do you think God's going to tell you?

Did you bring me a sandwich? That's the legacy. Let's go. It's been a pleasure to have you on the show, my man. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I look forward to having you on again. And, you know, we're going to be connecting all the time, viving all the time.

You've been awesome. Thank you so much for coming. You're welcome. I appreciate any time. Guys, if people want to connect with you, if people want to follow you, how do they get in touch with you? Yeah, I'm at Ike Shahada, S-H, I'm sure you put it out there, S-H-E-H-E-H-H-E-H, and that's every single social media, except for YouTube for some reason somebody has Ike Shahada and it's not me. So it's Vote, the number four, Ike Shahada. So a little bit of foreshadowing maybe. So it's at Vote for Ike Shahada if you want to see basically my podcast called Food and Philosophy.

and I have probably 400 videos up there by now. That's awesome. Food and Philosophy. Cool. Or at Ike Shahat on everything. I put out great content whether that's food or philosophy and a combination of both. Thank you so much, Ike. All right, guys.

Ike, make sure you get sandwiches. Let's go. Let's go.