Right About Now - Legendary Business Advice - How Big Dave’s Cheesesteaks Went from Gas Station Restaurant to Multi-Location Franchise | Derrick Hayes

Episode Date: January 27, 2026

Success rarely looks the way people expect it to — and almost never happens on a straight line. In this episode of Right About Now, Ryan Alford sits down with Derrick Hayes, founder of Big Dave’s Cheesesteaks, for a candid conversation about patience, belief, and the discipline required to build something that lasts. Derrick walks through the early days of entrepreneurship, including failed ideas, long nights, and moments where progress wasn’t visible — even when the work was real. Using powerful analogies and lived experience, Derrick explains why many people confuse movement with momentum, hustle with mastery, and ambition with execution. He shares how learning the business of what you’re building is what separates long-term success from endless grinding. Key Takeaways: Why most people quit before the payoff shows up How patience functions as a competitive advantage The danger of “hobby hustling” Why discipline beats motivation every time How real leaders think about scale and responsibility This episode is for anyone who wants more than quick wins — and is willing to play the long game. Keep up With Ryan and Derrick 🌐 Learn more at https://ryanisright.com 🎧 Subscribe to Right About Now on YouTube & podcast platforms 📸 Follow Ryan Alford on social for clips and insights 🍽️ Discover Big Dave’s Cheesesteaks and Derrick Hayes’ journey nationwide If this conversation resonated, share it with someone building something of their own.

When you throw a hook in the water, you can't see the fish at the bottom. You can't see what's in front of you in business. You just got to believe. It's the same scenario. Both of it worked for me. You just got to believe in what you're doing. And I fish every day, whether I'm fishing in business or I'm fishing in the water. I'm throwing my line out there with my bait on it every day.

And I'm trying to catch a fish. Whether it's a big one or a small one, I'm taking one step at a time. If you don't catch one fish, that's big enough. You can catch a lot of little ones that can add up to that big fish. That's the way business works. This is right about now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast, Net. production. We are the number one business show on the planet with over one million downloads a month.

Taking the BS out of business for over six years and over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping next and cash in checks? Well, it starts right about now. What's up guys? Welcome to Right About Now. We're always talking about how you get right in business and life. And ultimately, what's happening today. It don't matter what happened last year, but it matters five.

years from now. We've got to talk about how to make it happen now. That's why we're always talking to legendary people doing legendary things. That's what we got the CEO and the founder of Big Dave's Cheesesteak. It's Derek Hayes. What's up Derek? What's up, man? Thank you for having me, Ryan. Hey, man. My pleasure. I love seeing a man getting after it, thriving in America, doing the hard things well and success. It looks good on you, brother. Hey, man, it's a lot of hard work, a lot of sleepless nights. I want to change it for the world, man, because it made me who I am right now battle on all these roller coaster rides and getting it out of the mud. You know, man, I'm a big dude.

I'm 6-5, 260 on a good day. I like to eat, brother. Oh, man, I got it. You know what I would give you? I would give you my 18-inch cheesecake. Oh, okay. I might put that thing down, man. 18-inch cheesecake.

I'm going to give you the 18-inch Dave's way. That got beans, peppers, three cheese, a loaded sandwich. Oh, man. Did I just fall on the floor and pass out or did I get this? You did me up? You definitely, after 18-inch, for sure. I got a couch over here. If we get there, Derek and I are talking a pre-episode.

They're opening one in G Vegas down the road in Greenville. We might have to do a follow-up when he does it. He's going to bring that in here. We're going to have that on screen. Even if you're on that treadmill, which a lot of our listeners are, you don't want to hop off and run. Hey, listen, listen, run for the Dave's way. Talk to me, man.

Been building this business. I know you bootstrap this thing. It came together because I wanted to honor my father. It passed away in front of my face through the cancer. And for me, it was calling. It was a purpose. When I moved to Atlanta, I tried to figure it out, didn't know what I wanted to do. I'm going to do the thing that I told him I was going to do.

I'm going to open a business. I started out selling Italian ice. Nobody in Atlanta knew what water ice was, so I couldn't get anybody walking the door at that point. I'm like, oh, man, what am I doing? What year are we talking about, roughly? This is 2014. This is early days. This is me as a young entrepreneur that really don't know what the hell he's doing.

He just wants to do something good. I'm going to slings some ice. And then going to. I remember it was people who thought that I was selling just cups of ice and it was like, what kind of concept is this? Shots out to my mother. She's like, it's time for you to put the kitchen in and do the cheesecake thing that you really wanted to do.

I decided to change the name to Big Dave Cheesesteaks. And that's where it all started. 2016, that year was like the year for me where I went from not having any customers to start transitioning to customers start transitioning to a community, start understanding that it's a good sandwich and done with it, Georgia, which is still not in Atlanta. you're still about 35 minutes from the city, you got to be damn good for somebody to drive that far out. But after Eve came, she came in 2015, I started to get the hype built up. But 2016, I like to call it, was my transition in the year letting people know who I am.

2018, I represented Georgia in a sandwich competition where I ranked number seven in the world in sandwiches. When I came home, it was almost like a kid won the scholarship in college. The community was proud. They were happy. I can remember that moment. And then we just started getting so big that the gas station wasn't working for us anymore because we couldn't get the orders out fast enough. I only had a three-foot grill, one broken friar.

And, I mean, we're doing 800 tickets in some days. It's just, wow, sometimes a thousand on the weekends. But I was able to now spread my wings and go downtown to 57 Forsyth Street, where I think the real magic happened for not just my life, but for my career in the community. because this became a staple to the community of Landmark. People would fly into Atlanta. First thing they do is they're going downtown to go get a cheese stick from Big Dave. So we started to have that. I'm flying to go get a cheesecake or I'm flying in town.

Big Dave's is there. I'm going to go get one. I see it on Instagram. It's a destination. Yeah, it started being that. And then through over the years, we just started to grow. I was able to get food trucks. I was able to go into different arenas, Mercedes Ben Stadium.

You name it, it goes on. So we was able to put more brick and waters in the city of Atlanta. And now over the last 10 years almost, we became this from the mud type of business to a national chain. And I think a lot of people, they love it because they've never seen nothing like it before. They hear stories about how McDonald's was built or how Chick-fil-A was built. But now, they ain't just hearing the story of how Big Dave's is built. They're watching it. That's true.

It's all out there, man. It's all out there. Especially social media. Exactly.