Advice Line with Danny Meyer of Shake Shack

Context

Danny Meyer founded Union Square Hospitality Group (Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, The Modern) and turned a temporary hot dog stand into Shake Shack, now a public company. He is now executive chairman, spending his time on culture, the culinary product and new ventures. This is an "Advice Line" episode of How I Built This: Guy Raz and Danny take calls from three early-stage food and drink founders. It matters to PMs because each call is a product and go-to-market decision, and Danny's culture ideas from his new book, What Could Possibly Go Right?, apply to any team.

The Big Idea

Culture is the wanted behaviors you celebrate minus the unwanted behaviors you tolerate, and hospitality means making people feel cared for even when you are not in the room.

Danny uses the same lens on every caller: ask who or what carries the brand when the founders are absent, and be clear on your goals before choosing a growth channel.

Key Insights

Culture is behaviors, not values

• Danny defines culture as "how we do things around here". Every company, family or sports team has one, on purpose or not.
• His equation: culture is all the wanted behaviors you celebrate actively, minus all the unwanted behaviors you tolerate.
• His company used "family values" for about 15 years. He dropped the term because it was not specific to their culture, and because a business is not a family. Every time someone was let go, people grieved as if a family member had been fired.
• He replaced it with "expected behaviors", so everyone knows exactly what is asked of them.

Spot hospitality in a few minutes

Danny's test for a real culture of hospitality has two boxes. First, are staff focused on doing the job as well as it can be done? Second, are they having fun with each other? If both are true, that human energy becomes "one of the ingredients in your meal". He has eaten in restaurants where everything was technically perfect but there was "no love", and he does not go back. He says the same check works on flight attendants: if they enjoy each other, passengers usually get a playful experience.

Management owns the culture

Asked how much hospitality is about management, Danny said "probably about 120%", and 150% when it is not happening. His view is that management should take responsibility when it fails and deserves much of the credit when it works.

Keep a day one mentality

• Danny's teams are asked to imagine every day is day one: no scratch on the floor, no smudge on a glass, every plate as perfect as possible.
• The prompt is to assume three restaurant critics are in the room on any given night.
• He credits this for keeping restaurants fresh at 41 years (Union Square Cafe), 31 (Gramercy Tavern) and 22 (Shake Shack and The Modern).

Make the package the host

Janelle Bass sells a canned bourbon cocktail (Ponyboy Slings). Her problem was recreating the warmth of an in-person tasting, where 60 to 70% of tasters buy, once the can sits alone on a shelf. Danny's answer:

• Ask who personifies the brand, and what a shopper should feel when neither founder is present. He said the answer to that is the brand strategy.
• Treat the can as the bartender. Guy suggested something unexpected under the tab, or a playful line like "come on in", since the current label is nice but conventional.
• Events already build a community, so the goal is to make buyers feel they belong to a group of people who do things like this.

Match the channel to your goals

Jade runs Angel Oak Smokehouse, a premium smoked salmon brand in 42 Whole Foods stores, with 20 Harris Teeter stores coming and 170 Fresh Market stores next month. She asked whether to add direct-to-consumer shipping, fearing spoiled fish on a doorstep. The advice split:

• Guy: wait. It is early and retail is not yet solid. If you try DTC, start in a small region and track repeat orders, because without repeats you only have "an expensive way of sending people salmon".
• Danny: first ask why you want it and how much growth you want. Check salmon supply and smoking capacity if demand tripled, and ask what happens if it goes really right.
• Danny's middle path: dabble through a logistics platform like Goldbelly, which ships perishables (he mentions ice cream and stone crab). His daughter's ice cream shop sells there one or two days a week, and the sales show where national demand actually is.

Scarcity beats wide distribution

Jade floated a B2B option: gourmet shops emailing to ask for the product. Danny called that smarter than DTC. Pick one or two places you would be proud to own, and let only them have it, so the brand gains luster. Guy added that with 42 Whole Foods stores she has leverage, and should set a minimum order of $250 to $300 rather than $40.

Prove it small before big chains

Bar Brujas makes Boostcous, a couscous from chickpea, lentil and pea flour with 18 grams of protein and 11 grams of fiber per serving. It has shipped over 150,000 boxes direct to consumers, runs at about $2 million, is bootstrapped and is first order profitable. He asked how to get into fast casual chains like Cava and Sweetgreen. Danny's advice:

• Big chains have supply needs, quality assurance and purchasing checklists a young company may not meet yet.
• Start with a one or two location restaurant that already has couscous on its menu. Win there first.
• Move to a chain only after the product works in places that need no education.
• Guy added that Impossible Meat began by sending product to chefs like David Chang, and that chains will want proof it holds up in large containers without getting mushy.

Scaling adds cultural responsibility

Danny reminded Bar that scaling is not automatic. More people, equipment and sourcing all arrive together, and hiring brings culture work. Bar said his first employee is coming in about a month, and Danny's point is that culture starts with that hire.

Mental Models & Frameworks

Wanted minus tolerated behaviors

• Add: every wanted behavior your team celebrates actively.
• Subtract: every unwanted behavior you let slide.
• Result: what is left is your real culture, whatever the wall poster says.

Use it as an audit: list behaviors you praise, then behaviors you tolerate, and see which list is longer.

Who personifies your brand

When a customer meets the product without the founders present, ask what they should feel. Danny's suggestions were a person tied to the brand (a celebrity, or the founders themselves, since people love a homemade story), events that build a community, and the packaging acting as the ambassador.

Match channel to goals

Danny's frame for growth decisions is that the choice is "not really about DTC versus in-store versus on-premise" but about goals. Ask what growth you want, how much you can supply, and what you would do if things went very right.

Trade-offs & Nuance

DTC learning versus focus

• For dabbling: a platform like Goldbelly gives demand data by region without new stores or new capacity.
• Against: Guy warned that a young brand should solidify retail first, and that DTC without repeat orders is a costly way to ship a product buyers can get in a store.
• Risk: Jade's real worry is losing control once UPS or FedEx holds the package, and Goldbelly's logistics is meant to ease that.

Big chains versus small proof

Chains offer scale but demand supply, quality assurance and education. Small restaurants that already use the ingredient give faster wins and credible proof points. Guy noted a risk on the other side: a brand with strong momentum should not neglect the channels already working.

Common Mistakes

Mistake: Calling your company a family

Danny used family values for about 15 years and later saw the flaw. A business is not a family, so accountability decisions cause deep grief when framed that way. Expected behaviors are clearer and fairer.

Mistake: Chasing big buyers too early

Going straight to national chains means facing supply, quality and purchasing hurdles before you have proof. Danny's fix is a couple of small wins with businesses that already use your ingredient.

Practical Application

Write your expected behaviors list

• Do: draft a short list of specific behaviors every person on your team is expected to show, and share it with the whole team.
• Then: name one unwanted behavior you have been tolerating and decide how you will address it.
• Why it works: it makes Danny's "celebrated minus tolerated" equation concrete instead of abstract.

Ask what the product does alone

For your own product, write down what a customer feels when no one from your team is present: in the app, on the shelf, or in onboarding. Then find one place, such as packaging, first screen or error message, to add a playful, welcoming touch.

Set a goal before choosing channels

Before adding a new sales channel, write what growth you want and what happens to supply, support and quality if demand triples. Choose the channel after that.

Test a channel in one region

If you add a channel like DTC, start with a small region and track whether customers reorder. Repeat orders show whether the channel is a real business.

Win small customers first

When targeting large accounts, first sign one or two small accounts that already use something similar. Use their results as proof points for the bigger sale.

Questions to Consider

• Which unwanted behaviors on your team are you tolerating today, and what are they costing your culture?
• If a customer used your product with no one from your team around, what would they feel, and who or what is carrying your brand in that moment?
• If demand for your product tripled next month, could your supply, support and quality hold up, and do you actually want that growth?
• Which one or two small customers already use something like your product and could serve as proof before you approach a large buyer?

Bottom Line

Culture comes from the behaviors you celebrate and the ones you tolerate, and hospitality is about making people feel cared for even when you are absent. Choose growth channels by your goals and capacity, and prove the product with small, credible customers before chasing the big ones.

Resources Mentioned

Tools & Products

Case Studies Mentioned

Ramona canned wine launch

Danny pointed to Ramona, a canned wine launched by Jordan Salsito, who once worked for his company. She set out to give women a product to drink while others chugged beer, and the launch was so specific that buying a can felt like being with her. Lesson: a packaged product can carry a person's point of view.

Impossible Meat's chef-first rollout

Guy noted that Impossible Meat did not start on supermarket shelves. It sent product to chefs like David Chang and asked them to experiment, which brought attention and buzz. Guy admitted it is an imperfect analogy since the brand has cooled since, but the lesson is that chef advocates can build credibility before broad distribution.

People to Follow

Danny Meyer

Founder of Union Square Hospitality Group and the force behind Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, The Modern and Shake Shack. He is now executive chairman and author of What Could Possibly Go Right?

Notable Quotes

"Culture is ultimately all of the wanted behaviors that we celebrate actively minus all of the unwanted behaviors that we tolerate." (Danny Meyer)

"The root of the word hospitality is hope." (Danny Meyer)

"Problems is the definition of business." (Irving Harris, quoted by Danny Meyer from his grandfather)