How I Built This with Guy Raz - HIBT Lab! Slutty Vegan: Pinky Cole

Episode Date: March 23, 2023

It’s hard to miss a Slutty Vegan when you’re driving past one. No, we’re not talking about a person… We’re talking about a fast-casual burger chain — and a vegan one at that! Since launching Slutty Vegan in 2017, Pinky has seen her plant-based brand through several iterations: a ghost kitchen, then a food truck, then eventually several brick and mortar locations that continue to pop up across the east coast. And with a valuation of $100 million and expansion into other sectors, Pinky is only getting started... This week on How I Built This Lab, Pinky talks with Guy about her journey as a TV producer-turned-restaurateur, and how Slutty Vegan is a prime example of Seth Godin’s Purple Cow theory: companies must build things worth noticing into their products and services. Plus, Pinky reflects on her roots, sharing the valuable lessons about discipline and work ethic that she learned from her parents. This episode was produced by Carla Esteves and edited by John Isabella, with music by Ramtin Arablouei. Our audio engineer was Neal Rauch.You can follow HIBT on Twitter & Instagram, and email us at [e-mail] Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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tall windows, beautiful old details, and plenty of space for all of us. And being in that home on Airbnb, right in the middle of Vienna, walking distance from so much of the city, made it feel less like a visit and more like we were actually living there. Plus, taking a trip is the perfect time to host your space on Airbnb. Your place with a place with a all of its personal touches and its amazing location could make someone else's vacation even better. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca slash host. Hello and welcome to how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. So it's hard to know how many Americans are vegans. Estimates range from 2 to 6% of the population. And this means that if you're a

vegan restaurant, you have to figure out a way to bring in non-vegans if you want to build a sustainable business. Now, imagine you start a vegan restaurant and you call it, say, vegan delight or plant-based heaven. It is not likely you are going to get a wide range of customers through the door. So in 2018, Pinky Cole came up with a different idea. She wanted to open a greasy fast food joint with all the hits, sloppy cheese steaks, double bacon cheese burgers, smothered french fries, except entirely vegan, totally plant-based. But to get lots of people into the door, vegan, vegetarians, carnivores, flexitarians, etc., Pinky decided to start with a name that would attract, well, a lot of attention.

And the name of a restaurant is slutty vegan. Sluddy vegan. The company now has nine locations, mainly in, and around Atlanta, but also in Brooklyn and soon in Washington, D.C. And her plan, quite simply, is to become the McDonald's of vegan food. Pinky actually grew up in Baltimore. Her parents immigrated from Jamaica, where they practiced Rastafarianism. And her mother ate a strict vegetarian diet.

You know, I tell a funny story about how I marinated in the womb of a vegetarian. Like, I've never seen my mother wear earrings. I've never seen her wear makeup. She's a very holistic natural woman. Yeah. So I grew up under the wing of that kind of woman. So you could only imagine the traits that I got from my mother growing up. Yeah.

She was like Earth's mother. She was like the Earth mother. And my mother has hair that touches the ground. And she's about like, my mom is 5'9 and her head drawer eggs on the ground. She's been growing her hair for almost, what, 50 years now. So she has lots of love. Yeah. All right. So you were born in Baltimore, right? Yeah.

And your dad went to, was incarcerated from the day you were basically born. So I guess did you get to know him by visiting him in prison? You know, that's an interesting question. So when I was a kid, I could remember going to Hagerstown in just up Maryland to see my father. And then when you enter him. to a room, you sit around a six-inch table and you get to talk to your loved one. Like, I grew up doing that. Yeah. So did my father do a good job at like doing the best that he could by raising us by way of the prison system? Yeah, like he would call me. He would tell me to read so many books, rich dad, poor dad. He was teaching me about stocks. He was telling me that like I'm going to be an entrepreneur and things that I could do to set my life up. Like he was doing that from jail. Wow.

it was definitely a life that was a roller coaster ride to say the least, but I realized that I learned about resilience through my dad. Yeah. And even in the midst of his circumstance, he still said, you know what, like, I'm going to make sure that I pass this down to my child. So, you know, he taught me life from behind bars. Wow. And your dad, I mean, before he went to prison, I mean, he was an entrepreneur. He ran nightclubs in Baltimore. Yeah. Now, obviously, I wasn't born to see it, but like, I hear so many great stories of my father. He tells me all of these stories of how he was like a top shoter, and I'm like, so I get submitting to know that my father had this level of energy and confidence as I'm the man.

Like, that level of confidence I admire because I know where I get it from. You know what I mean? And he was just a businessman. Was it always legal? No. But at the time, you know, I don't know what his psyche was when he made decisions to do what he did to take care of the family. But I respect him for who he is as a man. Yeah.

Tell me about how your mom supported for kids when your dad was, you know, incarcerated. What'd she do? So all I recognize my mother for it, mostly for it, is hard work and being consistent with hard work. Like, I have never seen my mother be lazy. Like, she works hard when she's at home. She works hard in the world. She's a lead singer of a reggae band and has always been since I was a kid. So she would do, like, all the weddings, all the local events.

So my mom became like a local celebrity, right? And I watch her do all of these things with so much great. So one time she worked at McDonald's. Then she worked at the bank. And then she worked at another bank. And currently, she's been at the same company for about 40 years. Wow. So I watched my mom commit to causes that she cares about.

Yeah. I read that as a little kid, like you started basically businesses. I mean, you started, you know, you would sell sandwiches at school and then started to organize parties like local parties in charge admission when you were like 14, 15. Tell me about that. What would you do? So my mother was a museum. position, right? So she would always play throughout the city. So she had a lot of friends. And she would rehearse in the basement. So like we always had like people over. Like we were just the house

that had everybody coming over. Like it was a through house for the right reasons, obviously. So I had a couple parties as a kid. And I'm like, you know what? I'm going to have a recreation party and I'm going to charge people to get in. And I'm going to sell bottle waters for a dollar. And is that your house that you, or you did it like a rec center? I did it at a rec center, my first one. But let me tell you, what I did was I would call the local recreation centers and I would pretend I was an adult. So I would say, hi, this is Miss Pinky Cole. I'm 14 years old calling myself Miss Pinky Cole.

So like, when I tell you, like, the hustle was in me since my early teenage years and I would have these parties and the whole entire city would come out to my parties. I was the youngest party promoter. And I... Sorry, I'm just curious. So you would have a party at a rec center and you would basically, what, advertise it on flyers? Yeah. This was before Facebook and Instagram. This was like you print out some flyers and you have them cut.

I would go to the place in Baltimore that printed obituaries. So we would send them the design and they would put it together and make us flyers. And then after school, every time a school let out, we would literally post up at the school and pass out flyers. Wow. It was a DJ. It was people dancing, having a good time, and bottle water. That's it.

No decorations, no frills. Just to DJ it in the front, bottle the water for a dollar, and like five bucks to get in or something? Exactly. Wow. And so these rec centers would just be packed with like middle school and maybe high school kids? Yeah, we would have between like 8 to 1,000 every party. Wow. They would stand for hours just to get into my party.

You going to pinky parties? Oh, Pinky Parties be lit. Like, let's go to Pinky Parties. And I had everybody coming. And I'm like, I built a movement. I know how to bring people together. Yeah. I mean, if you had like, you know, up to 1,000 kids and charging them between $5 and $10,000,

you were clearing like $7,000, $8,000 sometimes after a party. Do you hear what I'm saying to you? Yes. Yeah. I remember one time specifically, me and my mother were in the living room in the house that I grew up on, counting money. It was more than her paychecks sitting on the floor account money in a shoebox. Wow.

Yeah. When you graduated high school, you went on to Clark Atlanta University. And, I mean, you had gone to college with some considerable experience under your belt as a music promoter and a party organizer and an entrepreneur. Was that your goal? Was that like your intention? I'm going to go to college. I'm going to get a business degree or something like that. And then I'm going to go start a business.

Was that what you were thinking? So I don't know what I was thinking at the time. I'm going to be honest. You know, it's interesting because this is a part of the story that I don't often tell, but I got kicked out of high school. And after I got kicked out of high school, I was expelled from all Baltimore City public schools. What happened? I got into a fight.

And I was the aggressor in the fight. And I feel like I'm having therapy. But I was the aggressor in the fight, so I got put out. but I wrote the superintendent and they gave me another chance. Like I literally got a second chance at life. Yeah. And when I got to college, it literally was a transfer of skill set. So that character, the organization, the maturity, I just put that in my books.

And I put that in the experience on campus. Yeah. When you finished, you left, moved to L.A. and decided to maybe try your hand at acting or getting at a TV or something. You did your research guy. I love it. Yeah, I've always been a big dreamer. And I was laughing just now.

I get so excited about this and I'm like, let me tell you, like, how life was for me. So I packed up my bags, a duffel bag, a suitcase in a Bible. And I moved to Los Angeles, California. So when I was in LA, my sorority sister, she told me that like, hey, I got an opportunity for you. You need some money. I'm going to help you out. And I'm like, okay, cool. She was like, I'm going to get you the job as a production assistant.

Now, I have never gotten an internship before, right? Yeah. I have never worked in TV before. Like, TV what? I don't know anything else about TV at this time. But literally, that's how it happened. And this would, I guess, basically start a period of several years where you worked in TV as producer and eventually TV brought you out to New York. And I guess while you were there,

you were working in a show called the Jeremy Kyle Show and what you decided to like, like sock away almost all the money that you were earning at the time. Yeah. So when I was working at Jeremy Kyle, I used to always do these things. I've always been like this super conscious thinker, right? So I said that I was going to do a saving. challenged. Don't ask me why. Now that I think about it, it's not a little bit crazy. But what I used to do is I used to live off $5 a day. Like I was that like disciplined. But now that I think about it, I'm like, oh, that was a little extreme. But I was learning discipline. It wasn't just about saving money. I was like discipline was the name of the exercise. It's almost like somebody that goes to

work out, right? Like you go to work out and that muscle memory got to come back. Like you to keep that. So you got to work out. You have to do the same thing over and over again, even in the moments when it don't feel good. Yeah. I mean, that, I mean, and that's what a lot of these business books that, like, your dad was talking to you about tell you, like live very frugally and put as much away as you can. Yeah. Because ultimately, that will help you build, you know, a life where you can live off what's left. Absolutely. And, and retire early. Yeah. One of the things that that enabled you to do was to open your first restaurant in 2014, which was a Jamaican restaurant, Pinkies. Tell me about that idea.

I mean, you grew up, you know, in a home where food was central and important, but, you know, the restaurant business is hard. Very. As you know, tell me about this idea to open up a restaurant in New York and Harlem in 2014. So working as a television producer is very eventful. Yeah. But while I was working on the show, a good friend of mine who had a restaurant in Harlem told me about a property that was available for lease. I could take over somebody else's lease. And I'm like, okay, I don't know the first thing about restaurants, but I like to eat. So this is a recipe for success. And it was a restaurant already. It was a restaurant already. Yeah. So I had all the gear in there. It had all the cooking stuff. It had like 65% of the gear. I had to like upgrade and do all of this stuff. Right. And I got that space. And what I realized is, I don't know about business, but I'm going to try this thing out.

That was like practice. That was like pictures practice. Yeah. And when I opened it, guess what I had? A line down the block. Wow. This was this restaurant, I should mention, this is Jamaican food. And you were not the cook, right?

And this was not necessarily food that you knew how to cook well, I think, right? So how did you, did you, like, hire somebody and find somebody to make? the food or teach you to make the food. So it's a funny story. Not only was I not the cook. I was vegetarian at the time and I was selling oxdale. You were needing the food. I wasn't eating the food. So I was selling something that I wouldn't even consume. But when I had the restaurant, I had people coming and supporting, but it wasn't just for the food. I believe it was also for the experience. Like it felt like you were in Jamaica when you came to my spot. Like I had the Jamaica music booming. It was colorful and it. It felt tropical and light and airy. And I had a Jamaican at the

cash register. You know, like, it was that. So I thought it was successful at the time. I made money. You know, I was just learning how to be a restaurateur and a business person legitimately. You ran this restaurant. It was doing well. And two years in, the fire destroyed the restaurant. And you weren't there at the time, right? No. I worked that night and I closed at like 9 o'clock and I went home with my friend at the time. And we were sitting in the house and I got a call from the fire department telling me that my restaurant was on fire. And I'm like, on fire, I just left. And when I got there, the fire had been out at this point. But all it was was smoke, the windows were busted. So like smoke was coming out the windows.

Everything was black on the inside. And I'm like, holy shit. Like, everything that I worked for is literally gone up in flames. We're going to take a quick break, but when we come back, how Pinky reevaluates everything after the fire and gets back into the food business in an entirely different way. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This Lab. Welcome back to How I Built This Lab. I'm Guy Raz, and my guest today is Pinky Cole, the founder of Sluddy Vegan. So Pinky, you pour your heart and soul into this restaurant, Pinky's Jamaican, for two years. And then in an instant, it literally all goes up in flames.

I can't even imagine how horrible that must have been. But of course, you are the owner of this restaurant. You can't close your eyes and make it all go away. So what happened once that fire was at? What did you do? So there were things at the front that were salvageable, but majority of the items, in there, the roof had came in. Like, it was not salvageable. So I'm like, okay, cool. Like, fire insurance is going to take care of this. So I called my insurance agent. And they were like,

no, you don't have fire insurance. And I'm like, what? Like, you just have regular basic business insurance. And if you want to be able to, you know, get the things that you got back, like, we aren't responsible. Like, we don't have a policy for that. Yeah. So that's literally blood, sweat and tears down the drain. And I don't wish that on my worst enemy. You lost everything. I lost everything. And I make a joke about it like I almost lost my mind, but I really almost lost my mind. You got to imagine what I've told you so far is I used to throw parties. I was the girl on campus. I got this job working in TV. Like everything that I've done have always been successful. Right. Like anything I touched turn to gold. Pinky, Coke.

got the Midas touch, but I didn't have the Midas touch on this one. And I felt like the biggest failure at the time. It didn't feel good to me at all because my pride and my ego wouldn't allow me to be that vulnerable. So when it happened, it really humbled me in a way that it's never happened in my life, but I needed that level of humility guy. Yeah. I mean, going into the, as you know, going into the restaurant business is so complicated and the margins are so thin and it's so challenging because, I mean, it's a crash course in running a really complicated business, which, you know, I've never done it, but I've just seen people do it. It's hard.

Yeah. Tell me about what you learned doing that. I wish I could come here and, like, tell you, like, it's all rainbows and lilies and, like, but it's not. Like, it's really not. I walked in so blind. And when I say blind, I didn't have. have anybody that has done it before to ask those kind of questions. So I was in a lake all by

myself. But being in a lake, like, I really stuck myself out there to, like, do the research. So I'd be on Google all night. I'd be on YouTube. Like, I would go to different restaurants and just look around and, like, it was a lot of trial and error. Hell, it still is trial and error. But what I realized is that creating it the way that it was created gave me the opportunity to learn every side of the business. Yeah. Like I had no choice but to learn accountant. I had no choice but to learn how to like cook burgers and fries and I didn't grow up eating burgers and fries. Like I had no choice but to be customer service.

So you lost your restaurant. So that's like not a good place to be. I can imagine you were depressed. I mean, what else can you be? I mean, right? I mean, but within a week or so, you get this call. I think it was from a show that's on the Oprah network, right? Yeah.

And they offered you a job and you went and you took that job. Yeah, I took that job. And I don't know why I'm having all these revelations while I'm talking to you guys. But you haven't been in a situation where you like, okay, it's time to move on. okay, this is not working. Yeah. Has that ever happened to you before? Yeah, totally.

Yeah. So that was the moment that I was in when I had the restaurant right before the fire. And it was so many things happening at that time. And when it happened, I didn't understand it then. But then I got the opportunity to go on a show. And I'm like, I don't got nothing to lose at this point. Like, I might as well go and be great and fly and start over. Because one thing about me is I was never afraid to start over.

And when I got to LA to work on the show, it was the best thing that could have happened to me because it was actually like a healing therapy show. I'm like, go figure. Healing therapy, like I'm coming from a depressed space. Like, great. But I needed it because it allowed me the opportunity to get the therapy that I needed to heal. Yeah, this show is called Fix My Life. And it was conversations about struggles and challenges, right? And in this show, they would kind of try to resolve these challenges. or just talk through them. Yeah. It was like a therapy show. It was like a therapy show. But what I liked about the show is that I got the opportunity to connect with people who are also going through it. Yeah. So you're working for the show in L.A., back in L.A., right?

Yeah. And while you are working on the show, you decide because you are a little bit of a masochist that you want to go back into the restaurant business. Because I'm crazy. That's why I mean. And you come up with this idea for like a vegan fast food place. Tell me about how you came up with this concept at first. So again, I told you that like I got a couple of screws loose, but it's okay. So right before I started slutty vegan, something just went over me.

I don't know what it is. But now that I look at like the holistic picture, I'm like it happened on purpose. So when we were on hiatus, you know, when you're, you have hiatus on the show, you got to find ways to supplement your income. Right, because usually there's a season. You work, it's like four to six months and then you've got four or five months off. Yeah. So like you can have a whole lot of money and then you can be trying to figure out like how you're going to pay the next bill. Yeah. Like that's how it works. Nobody really talks about that world, but it's the truth. Because TV work is project based. It's like a salary. You get paid for

the project and you're done. Yeah. And then you got to figure it out while you're done until it comes back. So I'm like, okay, all right, let me do DoorDash. So while I was doing DoorDash, I'm I'm like, all right, let me start working out. Let me start reading a book every day. And I did that. I read a book every day. I was raw vegan. I did DoorDash.

And I ran five miles a day consistently. Like, I did that because I was practicing discipline. Can I just pause from one? This is just five and a half years ago we're talking about that you were doing this. It's coming up on five years. I mean, because we're going to talk about where you are today, which is incredible. This is five years ago. You're like, okay, I'm going to figure out, I'm just going to, there.

was no end goal. You were just like, I just want to be disciplined. I want to run every day and read a book. It wasn't like, and then that will lead me to this. It was just, I'm going to do this because it's going to focus me. Well, you know what my thought process was now that I think about it. I'm going to do this because discipline breeds rewards. I know that if I'm disciplined on something, there will be like a cosmic effect that happens when I display that level of discipline. And I did that. And now that I'm thinking about it, I did it all of my life. There was certain levels of discipline. And some of it probably was a little bit more extreme than others. Yeah. But that level of discipline really, like, opened up my mindset to be able to receive what it is that the assignment was. And the assignment was to open up slutty vegan and build a multimillion dollar brain.

By the way, I hope my mom is listening to this interview because you sound exactly like my mom. I hope that's a good thing. to say to me when I was a kid about discipline and the connection between discipline and rewards. And my mom always used to say, the busier you are, the more time you have because you have to be efficient. All right. So you are being disciplined. And how does this idea of a vegan fast food, like comfort food kind of, you know, fast casual restaurant comes to your mind? Okay. So when I was the casting director, because I had gotten promoted within that time. Yeah. they asked me to move to Atlanta temporarily to do the show.

So while I was living in Atlanta, I was in my two-bedroom apartment and God, I can only be transparent. So I'm going to tell you the honest truth. I don't smoke, right? I'm not a weed smoker. But on this night, I smoked. And after I smoked, slutty vegan literally like hit me like a light bulb. And I got to be transparent about that story because literally, I don't know if I was super relax if my conscience was open i'm still trying to figure it out but when i when i came up with slutty vegan it was literally like the universe just put it in my hand like okay run fly and be free yeah and i called up my best friends and i asked i'm like what y'all think about this idea and they're like oh pinky that's good like you need to do that i'm like all right cool you had the idea and the name

all in that night yes all in that time literally it was going to be called slutty vegan which is I mean, it's not, it's not, it's not pinkies vegan. No. It's not vegan fast food or, you know, vegan burgers. It was, I mean, you picked a provocative name. Listen, because slutty and vegan ain't supposed to go together, right? Like, right? When you're thinking, that's like how peanut butter and jelly goes together.

Like, slutty and vegan don't go together. But what it did is, it really was the biggest oxymoron. So I'm like, if I, we all know veganism to be like very rich and wealthy. like clean and like the person who's vegan works out all the time. No, this ain't that. But it literally really like took all the politics out of what being vegan was. So came up with the name, literally started to do the work. Like I got all my permits. I did everything that I could all on my own. And I got the shared kitchen and I asked them. I said, hey, can I, I saw something in LA when I was working for DoorDash and basically it's a cloud kitchen. So can I do a cloud kitchen here?

This was before Cloud Citchens got popular guy. Yeah. This was one of those like, right, these, a lot of people who have like farmers market stands. They'll use these. They're commercial kitchens. They're shared kitchens. Yeah, exactly. And that's what it was.

You rented space in one of these kitchens. Yeah. And so they allowed me to do it. So I hired two employees and we were making burgers and fries. And I came up with the recipe for the sauce. It's like a similar to like a what a McDonald's sauce would be. but not. Yeah.

Right. But vegan. So no egg in the mayonnaise. Yeah. Right. So mind you, I'm not a chef guy. So I came up with a recipe. Like I was just tasting and putting my finger in like, okay, this is good.

Yeah. And came up with that. Came up with the fry seasoning. And I was just like doing as I go. And like everything was tasting really good. So we started selling it. How? Online through DoorDash, Postmates, Grubhubh, and Uber Eats.

You started. literally a ghost kitchen called Sleddy Vegan. Yes, Sleddy Vegan was a ghost kitchen before it was anything else. Wow. Yeah. This is so interesting. There's this famous book by Seth Godin where he talks about the purple cow. The purple cow theory is like if you're going to start a business, you want to think about a purple cow business.

Because like if you're driving through, you know, the countryside and you just see a cow in a field, you're just going to keep driving. But if it was a purple cow in the field, you would jump out of your car and hop in front of that. cow and take a selfie with that cow and then put on Instagram and say, look, I found a purple cow. That was slutty vegan. It was a purple cow because people are going to say, what a weird name. I have to know more about this thing. It's so weird. Yes. And guess what it did? I love the purple cow theory, by the way. Purple is my favorite color, so it just works all the way around. I got to grab that book. But what I realized is this concept came at a time where people wanted something new. wanting something new, if I can make them uncomfortable and ask questions at the same time,

or laugh or chuckle or be surprised, then I know that I have their attention. And when I have their attention, I can teach and educate them on whatever it is that I want to. So I took the approach to educate people on how veganism can be cool and be fun and not be stuffy and uptight, but you can have a good time and we'll meet you where you are. Yeah. So when you started out, Right, in a ghost kitchen, which is true. Like if you go to DoorDash or Uber Eats today, like a lot of the, and I do it all the time, I'll order it. I'm like, oh, this looks pretty good. I don't even know if it's a restaurant.

I just, I'm ordering it. I don't know where it's coming from. And it is often coming from one of these ghost kitchens. You were doing this in 2018. And were you just buying like garden burgers and buns just off the shelf initially at the beginning, just from the grocery store? No. You know what I did? There was like a procurement director.

And she was showing me some new products. that they had. Like there's this newer company called Impossible and I'm like, oh, let me taste it. And I tasted it and I'm like, oh, this is good. And I'm like, I want it. So she got me a delivery of the Impossible Patty and I started from there and I added my little razzle to the already dazzle. Wow. And I started growing and building. Those were hard to get. I mean, restaurants could get them. But now, of course, Impossible Meat is available everywhere. But you were basically, turning those into patties and getting vegan cheese again. Yeah.

And basically packaging them up. And then some driver would pick them up and then that was it. Well, that's how it started. How it ended is that I got kicked out of the facility. And I appreciate them for that because they pushed me to get uncomfortable. Why? Because I had too many people coming. Like people started talking about the brand so much that customers started Instagramming us, sending us private messages saying,

hey, can I order the one night stand with the fries, ketchup on the side? And I'm like, okay, I'm not going to not take the order. So I would take the order from Instagram while taking orders from these online platforms. And it got out of hand guy. When I tell you, like, people from everywhere were coming, literally it was like 300 people standing outside to get their food. From, I mean, you're on DoorDash, but if you type in vegan, it'll show you a bunch of restaurants. And usually, you know, they're, you know, I live in. the Bay Area. So I'm not, I mean, there's some great ones, but nothing called slutty vegan. No. If you see that, you're going to be like, what is this? Yes. But people didn't come for the

food. The food was good. That was like the cherry on top. Yeah. But to say that you were a part of this experience that felt cryptic and you could only get it at a certain time, people love the art of scarcity. Yeah. You know, like the art of scarcity makes you want it more. So I would only open up for like three hours at a time. And once I closed the block, that's it. Nobody else can order. So like, I put people on a time frame on when you can get the food and they complied. And I'm like, wow, people really want to be a part of this movement just to say that they got it. And when I got put out, they told me that I could use the parking lot. Like, hey, you should get a food truck and you can do it out in the parking lot, but you can't do it in here because it's disrupting the other tenants.

Because people were so many delivery drivers were coming to pick up orders there. Yes. And it was disrupting the business of the other tenants. And everybody was like, what's she doing that I'm doing wrong? How is she getting all this business? Yeah, so it was crazy, man. Listen, when I got that food truck, I went to this place called Mr. V's in Atlanta. So I went inside and they told me that the food truck would be $45,000.

Wow. So I'm like, all right, well, I'm making a lot of money, but like I don't have $45,000 like in my hand right now. But what I could do is I can pay you $10,000 a week for the next four weeks. So it was like $10,000, I think. And this was the cash flow from your business and maybe also some savings you had from that TV show? I never had to tap into my savings. Wow. This was just the cash flow from the ghost kitchen business.

Yes. Wow. So when I got the food truck, the owner allowed me to pay every single week. And I would go on the east side and the west side. And I would post up three hours before and say, hey, the slutty vegan food truck will be here from four to seven. Those were my hours, like four to seven or four to nine. I would post on Instagram. Yeah.

And every time I post on Instagram, I literally had between three to 500 people that would stand outside. Waiting. Yes. Yes. Waiting for a burger. Wow. And I realized, but it wasn't about the food. People wanted to be a part of the experience.

You're like McDonald's in Moscow in 1989. Just like lines with thousands of people. So you have this food truck. And obviously you're, I mean, you started this. I read that within six months of starting the Ghost Kitchen, your revenue is $4 million. It's incredible. I mean, and this was based on burgers and fries. Yeah, burgers and fries.

And literally, hold up, let me, not even just burgers and fries. I didn't sell drinks. I literally only sold burgers and fries. I didn't sell desserts. So you were literally coming for some French fries in a sandwich. But guess what else you got? You got the cultural capital of being able to have the currency of food and take a picture with it and people get excited because they want to hear about your experience. It's a brand.

It's a brand. Yeah. And do you know my business is almost five years old and I still got lines down the block? It's incredible. People still come and support me. But I realized I am the slutty vegan. I'm raw in the tongue. Plus I'm educated.

You know, I move with intention and I'm intellectual. Plus, I like to have a good time. And I'm real. And I meet you where you are. And I'm just a vibe. Sleddy vegan is a vibe. And as long as that happens, my business will continue to be successful. We're going to take another quick break.

But when we come back, Laura from Pinky Cole about her work to build one of the first major vegan fast food restaurant chains in the U.S. Stay with us. Guy Raz. And you're listening to How I Built This Lab. Welcome back. You're listening to How I Built This Lab. My guest today is Pinky Cole, the founder of Atlanta-based vegan food chain, Sluddy Vegan.

You opened the first brick-and-mortar in Atlanta in January of 2019, and initially the people in the neighborhood were not supportive, to say the least. They did not want a restaurant called Sleddy Vegan on a block, right? And this was serious. They battled it out in, like, the city against this permit. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I laughed because it didn't feel good when it was happening. Yeah. But what I learned about like failure, like really rising above that and realizing that this two always passed, like that literally is the motivation that keeps me going. So let me tell you about that first location on Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard. My grand opening, I had 1,200 people standing outside.

Wow. So I came in as a disruption. So I get it. Like, you know, big a picture now. I understand I was upset about it at first. But like I'm literally bringing so many people to a neighborhood that often some of the people in the neighborhood felt like, you know, it was turning the neighborhood and like making it worse. But what they didn't realize is that I was bringing more value to the community. People wanted to be a part of that area more.

The real estate increased. And I went to court. and I had to literally fight for my brand. And at that moment, I'm like, yeah, this is my child. Because I don't play about my child. And my child ain't here to hurt nobody. We just want to have a good time for everybody. And I end up staying.

I'm still at that location now. When you open that first location in Atlanta, did you have the menu you now have? Because you have a lot of different burgers. And I don't know if I can say. Do you know, by the way, Pinky, I also... This is your show. You could say it. I also host a children's science show.

And sometimes those kids listen to how I built this, too. So if you're listening, please forgive me. I'm just going to say the names of some of the burgers. There's the Hollywood Hooker. There's the Menageratatat. There's the Super Slut. There's the Ho-Boy. Anyway, a lot of different kinds of burgers.

Some of them are plant-based chickens. Some of them are plant-based burgers. Some of them have jalapinos, guacamole. Some of them are vegan shrimp. So, yeah, did you initially, was it just the burger that you had? Or did you already had this big expansive menu? No, it was just burgers and fries. That's it.

Like, I didn't know how to build a menu. I didn't know how to do P&Ls. Like, I didn't know. Like, it was literally just, okay, burgers and fries. Let me throw this and see if it works. And I threw it on a wall and it stuck. Yeah. And people loved it and they love it because of my sauce.

So my secret sauce I made from scratch. So people come from around the world to taste this sauce because it's so overwhelmingly good. What's the name of the sauce? It's called slutty sauce. Got it. Yes. It's called slutty sauce. But you know it's so cool about my concept.

God, like it has nothing to do with sex. The names are just a draw to pull you in to understand it. Like, vegan is a vibe. It can be cool and you can reimagine food in a way that you've never seen it before. Yeah. But when you do that, you have to deliver. The food has to be great. Otherwise, people are going to say, oh, this is just a gimmick. So you also had to make sure that the food was great. Absolutely. I mean, you know, I'm fighting two battles. I got to make sure that the food is good just because it's good. And I got to make sure that the food is good because it's vegan food. And historically, people don't feel like vegan food tastes good. So, like, I'm at war with two things at the same time. So I make sure that all of the output is just as good. Tell me about the vegan side of this, right, for a moment, which is, you know, this is not necessarily, like, better for you. It's not, like, lower in calories, but it is vegan.

No animals died to produce this food. And so just part of you, or maybe not just part of you, maybe a big part of you, want to encourage more people to stop eating meat? Yes, but this is twofold. So my agenda has always been, I'm going to meet you where you at. Yeah. Right? Like, if you don't want to be vegan, just incorporate some vegan options. A little bit of vegan ain't going to hurt nobody.

And because I've had that messaging, like, I'm not going to hate you if I see you eating meat, but I'm also going to encourage you that, like, this tastes just as good, if not better. And no animals were compromised. So people feel comfortable trying new options because they don't feel like the pressure was put on them. Yeah. And we know, I mean, I say this as a meat eater. I do eat meat. And I'm friends with some cattle ranchers in Northern California who listen to the show.

So forgive me when I say this. But we know that in general, the livestock industry obviously causes a lot of carbon emissions. Not like, you know, small grass-fed farms, but I'm talking about mass industrialized, you know, beef and pork and chicken production. So the idea is to get people to also think about the planet a little bit too. Climate change is real. Like it's real. So, you know, you know how they say it's levels to this? Yeah.

Like the first level is getting people to understand that like vegan isn't gross. And it can be delicious. So we're going to start with the thing that universally everybody is familiar with and that's burgers and fries. Yeah. And now we got you locked in. Now we're going to go on to the next thing. After I opened up Slutty Vegan, I opened up a bar called Bar Vegan that sells vegan bar food. So now not only can you have burgers and fries over a slutty vegan, now you can have chili and rice.

Now you can have more chicken sandwiches. Now you can have a salad. So I'm literally growing with people who want to learn about veganism, which is why my book is called Eat Plants, Bitch. Because it's an in-your-face approach to get you to understand that, like, we just want you to like good food. And that's it. And then you realize that it's vegan. And then you realize certain foods are really good for you and so on and so forth. And you really like caught this perfect wave of like all of a sudden beyond meat and impossible foods just blew up and they were everywhere. And it was like this wave that just kind of really began with where you started in 2019. I mean, it really started around that time. Yeah. So, you know, I like to call myself the guinea pig. Yeah.

But it's interesting because not a lot of people were doing it. There are some great vegan restaurants in Atlanta. But I'm like, okay, I want vegan food on a late night. I don't want to just eat a side salad and fries. You want to like after you go to a club, I want to have a greasy vegan burger at two in the morning. Exactly. And I knew that that was a market that did not exist because me as a vegan myself, that was the food that I wanted at a certain time. at a night sometimes and I couldn't find it. So coming up with this concept, it really gave people

an opportunity to see that there is a need for vegan food on menus and restaurants across the world. Yeah. And putting it on my menu, now I realize other big companies now have impossible this and chicken that. And, you know, there's one side of me, this is like, wait a minute. Like, I know I'm at the head of this movement. But then the other side of me was like, you know what, the idea that more people want to eat this way tells us that we're doing the right thing. And there's a market for it. Pinky, given the long lines and all these people who are just, you know, just like showing up to eat and your revenue and like it was profitable really quickly, I have to imagine that like already in 2019, you had all kinds of people who were coming up to you saying, you know, you got to do this or you got to do that. Or you're doing this wrong. Or you know, you got to focus on this. Like, were you getting all this endless. input from people that sometimes wasn't helpful? So much. You know, growing slutty vegan, you know, everybody has an opinion, right? So like people who know you, colleagues, everybody's like,

well, you need to do it this way, do it this way. But I decided to do it my own way because I was clear. And there were a lot of people like, well, you know, there are people talking about your vegan burgers and, you know, there's other vegan burgers, this step. But I'm like, I wasn't listening to the noise because I've never seen anybody do it in this capacity, bootstrap it. a business and turning it into a multi-million dollar business before any injection of anybody's capital. So to be able to do this before, you know, all of those things, I'm like, okay, I got to figure this out in trial and error. I mean, you were growing this restaurant purely through cash flow because it was doing so well. And you resisted taking in outside investments for a while.

But last year in 2022, you did raise around $25 million. And that was less. by Danny Meyer, who was on how I built this many years ago, obviously known for ShakeShack. And they're obviously, it's a great partner, huge restaurant tours. Was that the reason why you wanted to partner with them? Because they had all this experience and they could help you scale this. So interestingly enough, Richie Lou Dennis is my lead and Danny is my coley, both collectively leads. And Richie Lou Dennis, he's a beauty entrepreneur.

Yes. Right. Yeah. So Richie Lou is a great guy. And my relationship started with him first. And we knew that we needed to have someone who was strategic in this space in order to get to where we want to be. When you talk about, like, growing startup companies, first of all, it's hard as hell. Secondly, you got to be able to rub shoulders with the right people so that you can have the right resources to do the things that you need to do to scale this company.

So when we realized we had a scalable and sustainable brand, we're like, okay, all right, we need to bring the big dogs on our team when it comes to restaurants. And I had a conversation with Danny first on Zoom, and it was a great conversation. And he was such a vibe. He was so cool. And I'm very intentional about who I like to do business with. And he was on my wish list because I'm like, I really like his energy. He's very calm and pure in his approach to how he communicates. And I like that about him.

So then I get an email a couple months later saying that Danny came to the restaurant at our Edgewood location. And he came a little after midnight. And it was him and like 12 other people. and he had a blast. So we reconnected. And that reconnection turned into them being one of our investors as slutty vegan. And I'll be honest, a lot of people don't talk about this, right, when they're growing companies. When the conversation started for me to get an injection of capital, it gave me anxiety.

Yeah. It gave me anxiety because I'm like, okay, this business is not mines anymore. Like if I get all this money, then I'm a sellout and it doesn't worry. And I'm like, wait, wait, wait, wait, no, I'm scaling a company. And I need people to come on board with me who have the expertise that I don't to help me make it better. And obviously what's so cool about ShakeShack is it's like it's massive. It's like in and out burger, Shake Shack, Chick-fil-A, like those are the, you know, the kind of the 800-pound gorillas in that world. They're so successful.

Right. So why wouldn't I want to be a part of the eight-pound gorilla? Like I want to be affiliated with minds who have created something so special, just on the business. side because I want to be clear, I don't eat meat, so I don't eat shake, shak. But I like what they represent when it comes to community. And because slutty vegan is a community-driven business, I'm like, okay, there's some alignment here. Yeah. Tell me about the branding, because the branding is really, really good. I mean, it's the colors that you picked, you know, the yellow and, and even like the cups, I can't, I can't repeat what it says in the cups. Maybe you can't because I just can't.

What does it say on the side of the cup? On the cup it says drink the f a cup. Yep, got it. But the psychology again, right? Again, when I tell you I'm intentional about the marketing, it's like two meanings, right? But it's whatever you think it means. Yeah. It's really, I mean, just things like that, you know, like on the side of the cup, right?

Or the colors or the names of the burgers or the way that you branded this whole business, right? I mean, that's a huge part of its success because if it was just like, I don't know, boring branding and, you know, boring colors, it might not have the same impact. Yeah. I am very raw in my approach to everything that I do. So when I was thinking about the branding, I said that I wanted to resonate in a way where I didn't have to pay for marketing because the people were going to market the business because it was so raunchy and in your face. but everything has two meanings to it, right? And while it may sound like sex and sound racy, like it's not that at all. So when we talk about making the colors bright and the messaging and how we talk, it's tongue-in-cheek, right? We want people to have a good time and not feel dirty when you say the word slutty.

We're really redefining the term, and we've done that through the experience when you walk through the door. When you come to slutty vegan, we are yelling at you before COVID. We were hugging you, dancing with you. Yeah. But the music is booming through the speakers and the employees are just screaming through the microphone. There's a microphone at my cash register guy. Right. And tell me some of the things that are said into the microphone, right?

Because from what I understand, one of the objections originally from neighbors on that street, on Abernathy Street, was that like, I guess through the loudspeaker, they say, I don't know. What do they say? We got a slut in the building. We got a slut in the building. Yeah, but listen, you know, slut is a person who is being sluttified for the first time. Right. You've redefined that word. Yes, I did.

There's a new dictionary definition for that word. It doesn't mean what people think it means anymore. It's a new word. It's a new time, which is so cool because there's so much power in the tongue. So we've created something that initially you think is uncomfortable, but it really is no uncomfortability to it at all. So we'd be on the loudspeaker. saying like we got a slut in the building and you would hear it in the neighborhood. But people got excited to be called a slut. You understand what I'm saying? Like people get excited to be called

a slut. But a slut is not what it used to mean. Yeah. A slut is somebody that's experiencing this for the first time. And when they eat the food, they're like, I've been sluttified. And it's a movement. And this is that same thing like having the parties back in the day where people put the water just were excited to be there. This is that all over again. Yeah. All right. So you're you're now in, I think, nine locations, and mainly in Georgia, but also you've got stores in New York and in Alabama. And soon you're going to have locations in Baltimore and then in D.C. in Washington, D.C. Tell me about your ambitions. Tell me about what your vision is. Where is this going to be in 10 years? In 10 years, slutty vegan will continue to be a household name, not just for restaurants, but for the lifestyle side of the brand. I want slutty vegan to embody all parts of the vegan lifestyle, not just food, because we are helping people to reimagine everything at this point, right? But we start with food. So, slutty vegan

locations everywhere. Sleddy productions will be at the top of the food chain when it comes to entertainment and TV. We probably get a egot for all of the movies and documentaries that we push out under the Sledy vegan brand. will continue our CPG model and put products in stores everywhere. So when you ask me, where do I see the brand? The brand is going to be what Pepsi is to America, what Coca-Cola is to America. They're not selling products. What they're selling is an experience. And however that experience comes is what Sleddy Vegan is going to do. So you're not talking about just being like five guys. No. Or Shake Shack. No. You're talking about being PepsiCo. Yes.

That's exactly what it is. You know why? Because I am multi-dimensional, right? I am the person that, you know, as a kid, they would tell me like, Pinky, like, you got all these things going on and, like, you need to focus on one of them. So I've always loved to do multiple things at the same time. But I realize I can use the umbrella of my business to do all the things that I've ever dreamed about in my life. And that is how you build empires. So I'm building an empire in real time.

Amazing. Same. Pinky Cole, thank you so much. It was a pleasure. Thank you so much. Guy, can I say something to the people? Of course. I want whoever is listening to this to see me and know that how you show up and everything that you do through your business, show up in the most authentic form possible. Guy, a part of the reason why I believe that I've gotten so much success is because I'm

always myself. Like, I'm always me. I'm loud. I'm raw, but I'm passionate and I'm real. And as a result of that confidence, it's allowed me to get into every single room that I'm not going. Now I'm building my own doors. I love it. It's awesome. And now I'm going to go eat a Hollywood hooker. Hey, thanks so much for listening to How I Built This Lab. Please do follow us on your podcast app so you always have the latest episode downloaded.

If you want to follow us on Twitter, our account is at How I Built This and mine is at God. And on Instagram, I'm at guy.org. If you want to contact the team, our email address is H-I-V-T at ID.wondery.com. This episode was produced by Carla Estevez with editing by John Isabella. Our music was composed by Rumpstein Arablui. Our audio engineer was Neil Rouch. Our production team at How I Built This includes Alex Chung, Casey Herman, Chris Messini, Elaine Coates, J.C. Howard, Sam Paulson, Kerry Thompson, and Kiro.

Jo Jo Joaquin. Neva Grant is our supervising editor. Beth Donovan is our executive producer. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This.