Were not gonna wake up every morning wondering if we have a job. Were gonna wake up every morning wondering how many jobs we have to do. Its not always pretty. Everythings gonna change everything. But i do it to save jobs, and i do it to make money. This. Lets go to work. Is the profit. Chicago, illinois, is home of da bears and, more recently, da lobsta. Da lobsta is a quickservice restaurant started three years ago by j wolf. The traditional lobster roll is, by far, our most popular item. Lemonis j exploited a void in the market and achieved initial success, expanding into three storefronts and a food truck that covers the entire chicago area. But those three locations turned to two when his landlord sold the site of his flagship restaurant, and now j is feeling pinched. But even with a smaller footprint, da lobsta has a loyal following and im excited to help take it to the next level. The foodtruck business is very competitive in chicago, so i decided to head downtown and see how da lobsta stacks up. Hey. J hey, marcus. Lemonis how are you . Are you j . J nice to meet you. I am j. Lemonis im marcus. Nice to meet you. Do you mind coming out to chat . J absolutely. Lemonis so is this the primary business right here . J well, i had three brickandmortars. One of them we had just to close. The landlord sold the building for development. Im now down to two, and then the food truck is a supplement to all that. Lemonis how much revenue will you do on a day like today . J ill do anywhere from 1,500 to maybe 2,000. Lemonis right here on the street . J yeah, ill do more in the truck in two hours for lunch than a restaurant will do all day. Lemonis okay. I like the Business Model of the food truck because of the portability. You can do high volume in one area for lunch, and then move it and do even more volume somewhere else for dinner. But if js truck is generating more revenue in two hours than one of his restaurants all day, then im wondering why he would even have the storefronts. Can i take a look inside . J absolutely. Lemonis whats happening, guys . Man whats going on . Lemonis id like to actually learn how to make a roll. J you take your bun. Lemonis so youre just doing this deal . J yep. Lemonis put it on the griddle . J yep. One thing i stress to everybody is we have a very visual product. Presentation is everything. Its a 12. 95 sandwich. Not only does it taste good, it needs to look good. Lemonis im ready to work. There you go. J marcusmade. Lemonis now, it goes without saying that before i invest any money in any business, i need to have confidence in the product. I love the concept. J thank you. Lemonis the bread was nice and soft. The lobster meat great. J thank you. Lemonis whyd you start the business . J when i was in l. A. In 2008, i pursued opening my own barrestaurant. Lemonis whered you get the money to open that . J my dad gave me my part. He lost a little over 300,000 when it was all said and done. I was having partner issues. That was back when i was living in l. A. And trying to be the l. A. Lifestyle. Lemonis so what does that mean living the l. A. Lifestyle . J everyone has to have a bmw, an audi, nicest clothes, go to the nicest restaurants. Lemonis were you living that lifestyle . You were spending money . J yeah. Lemonis whyd you start this business . J because i was so frustrated with that business, but i knew i still loved the food industry. Lemonis how much money did you invest to start this . J so the original investment was 185,000. That came from my grandmother. Lemonis from your grandmother. What did you do with that 185,000 . J we built the first store in gold coast. Lemonis the one that closed. J yes. Lemonis so that money that went into that is gone the buildout. J the buildout, yes. Lemonis none of your own money went into it. J no, i dont have any. Lemonis i always want people to have skin in the game, and its a little bit of a red flag when i find out that j hasnt put a single penny of his own money in the business. Well, now that ive seen the food truck, i want to understand what the brickandmortar locations are operating like. Its a nice spot. J thank you. Lobster chandeliers. Lemonis yeah. How you doing . Isaiah im isaiah watkins. Lemonis im marcus. How you doing, sir . So are you the head man in charge here . Isaiah one of the guys in charge. Lemonis can you give me a little tour . All right, so, front of the house right here. We got soups over here, as well. Lemonis did you make this soup . Isaiah we say we make it, but we dont make it. Lemonis you say you make it, but you dont . Isaiah no, we dont. Lemonis and so why do you tell people that you make it if you dont . J i just try to be vague as to where it is. Like, its a home recipe, doesnt say homemade. Lemonis j is trying to trick people into being convinced that his soup is homemade. I wonder what hes trying to trick me about . Can you show me the back of the house . How you doing, sir . Carlos carlos. Lemonis carlos . Im marcus. Nice to meet you. J carlos is the kitchen manager. Lemonis who do you report to . Carlos isaiah. Lemonis isaiah. You guys get along pretty good . Isaiah yeah, sometimes. Lemonis sometimes . Why not all the time . Isaiah the problem is the last time me and carlos got into an argument we have a 400 order in the morning. These people are expecting their food at a certain time on time, and guess what . If you ruin their lunch, you just blew it and theyre not gonna order from us again. So what happens is im fittin to start getting this order and im fittin get this order out. Lemonis so you back here cooking . Lemonis yeah. Nicholas when i was brought here, nobody told me the chain of command. They just told me, hey, well hes the kitchen manager. He comes off as a jerk sometimes. Lemonis so give me an example of, like, what that looks like. Nicholas uh, yeah, i should just fire everybody. And just, winter times come, its gonna slow down, so its just gonna be me in front. J but i also told you a few weeks ago, facetoface, that nobody will be fired in this kitchen without me being the one to do it. Lemonis you say to him, nobodys getting fired without you knowing about it. Thats like basically saying, i dont give a [bleep] what he says. What kind of authority does he have now . Zero. Carlos zero. Lemonis the chain of command is important, especially in the restaurant business, but it also has to come with respect. And thats all youre asking for. All right, so you guys got to work on that. We know that js the owner. He owns 100 of the business, right . J no. Lemonis what do you mean, no . J no, i have partners in the business. I own 52 of the business. Lemonis really . Can we sit by ourselves and just go over some j i have an office downstairs. Lemonis oh, you do . Oh, yeah. How much money has been put into this business overall . Your fathers original investment was 300,000 . J my father gave me money for my first investment, which went south. I gave him 10 of this company. Lemonis but you got you started this business with your grandmas money. J she gave me 150,000. Lemonis 150,000 or 185,000 . J 150,000. My sister put 35,000 in and i gave her 15 of the company. Lemonis okay, so how much does your grandmother have . J zero all she asked is that i pay my father back at some point. And then i have a partner. His name is dan. He has 23 . Lemonis that leaves you with 52 . How much debt . J ill show you right now. Lemonis do you have the financials printed out or anything, or no . J no. Lemonis but dont you have Financial Statements . J yeah. I dont know how accurate they are. Lemonis i dont know what rock js been living under, but he contacted me. I dont need him to have, like, the most beautiful presentation, but how about having a printout that has your Balance Sheet and your Financial Statement . J heres where we stand right now. Lemonis you owe 120,000 in sales tax . J yes. Lemonis thats past due . Lemonis sysco you owe 55,000. 140,000 in internet loans. Square loan thats another loan. Thats 40,000 . J yes. Lemonis whats bill . J bill is my wifes grandfather. Lemonis how much is that . 26,000 . Whos debbie . J debbies my sister. She also gave me some money as a loan. Lemonis so you owe her 20,000. Dan you owe him 30,000. J yes. Lemonis so thats 431,000 in debt. So you borrow money from family. You borrow money from the government by the taxes. You borrow money from sysco. If this business doesnt get real cash, i dont know how it survives. If da lobsta closes, you got a lot of issues. All the employees are out of jobs, the city comes after j personally for the pastdue taxes, and js grandmother, js father, js sister they all lose their money. Its bad news real bad news. If you dont have a job, what happens to you . J i dont have any money. I dont have money saved. I dont take a paycheck. Lemonis couldnt you just go to your dad or your grandma . J no, me and my dad are hardly on speaking terms. Lemonis because of the money . J yeah. Lemonis how much do you end up having to take out a month just to kind of keep your head above water . J probably about 3,500 or 4,000. Lemonis in cash. J yeah. Lemonis whats the total revenue of the total business, overall. J well, last year was 1. 4 million. Right now, were at 1. 1 million, and its august. Lemonis 1. 1 million . J yeah. Lemonis this location . J no, all of it. Lemonis all three everything combined. And how much will it lose on paper . J right now, its not losing anything on paper. Basically, that sales tax not paying it, thats whats making it break even. Lemonis hit run report. Meals and entertainment, 25,000 whats that . J for, like, we go out to dinner. Do things, like, that goes on that. Lemonis so youre running it through the business . J yeah. Lemonis do your lenders know that . J no. Lemonis 134, 116 amc. Is that the Movie Theater . J yeah. Lemonis you went to a movie, like, about lobsters, or. J i dont know. Lemonis amc, amc, amc, amc, hugos, amc. Whats this one for 358 . Sunda a very expensive sushi place. You know what the unfortunate thing is . I live here. Hub 51 . J yeah. Lemonis 194. Another movie. Anoth jesus. J its my only relief i get sometimes. Lemonis i know, dude, but honestly. I mean, brother, i got to tell you something. J hmm . Lemonis im not feeling so bad for you. Youre taking out 3,500 a month in cash out of the business, and youre going to mortons and hugos and going to the movies all the time. J yeah . Lemonis and so this is not fair to the people that i mean, if i do a deal with you, do i have to. J no. Lemonis . Be thinking that youre gonna be going to the movies on my money . J no. Lemonis in my mind, as i sit here, what i feel like is, let me call marcus to see if hell put some money in to kind of continue this lifestyle. Im not that far off, am i . J no. Lemonis you need some discipline is what you need. I was so aggravated by what i was finding that i just needed to get some space and take overnight and just think about it, because i was pissed. The fact that you just told me that i wasnt that far off was not a good thing. I was hoping you were gonna try to convince me that i wasnt right about the fact that you called me here so that you can continue this lifestyle, because as an outsider j its not me wanting to continue the lifestyle, i was saying you were right that i need your help. Why, so that you can continue to go to hugos . J [ scoffs ] lemonis im gonna tell you right now, its [bleep] up. And i apologize for cussing, but, man. When i left da lobsta last night, i had no intention of making a deal with j. J how you doing . Good to see you again. Lemonis but theres a lot of people that work there a lot of people that invested money in this business. I felt like i just needed to hear him out to see if there was anything worth salvaging. I wanted to kind of maybe just have just a youandme bull[bleep] session for a little bit on kind of what happened yesterday. J i feel like we werent on the same page on some things. Lemonis the perception for me, yesterday, is that you werent being straight with me. Its probably the same perception that your dad has, right . J mmhmm. Lemonis and so we have to fix that behavior. Why dont you talk to your dad anymore . J one night, ill be honest, i just i was in the middle of building the river north store. We were so cashstrapped, cause the store was way over budget. I was using cash flow. It was the middle of the winter. I mean, i just kind of went off on him over the situation. I tried expressing to him that i really am trying to do everything to ultimately get his money back. I just need time. And he just didnt, you know, quite understand that. Lemonis understand that or believe it . J believe it. It really bothers me. Its. He didnt even come to my own wedding. Like, that was that was horrible, so. Lemonis he didnt come to your wedding. J [ sniffles ] [ voice breaking ] so i just need this company to fulfill that promise. I want to make this big enough where his shares are worth something that makes up, if not more, for what he gave me. Or i make enough out of it where i can repay him somehow. Lemonis in hearing jay talk about his lost relationship with his dad and him wanting to pay him back, he was accepting responsibility and i think thats what i really wanted out of him. He was deserving of a second chance. Just based on our little conversation here, youre a guy that wants to have a relationship with his dad. You want to fix that. You want to have a successful business. I feel like i learned more about you. And your honest conversation helps me do that. J thank you. Lemonis okay. J how you doing . Lemonis good morning. J good to see you. Lemonis how are you . Whats the good word . J pretty big day. Lemonis the reason that i came here is cause i like the idea. J right. Lemonis its in my hometown. I saw the people standing in line at the food truck. There was nobody else there that had a food truck like that. I have a product that i think has a lot of potential, and its a model that could be scalable. What i didnt know is that you didnt put any money in and you were taking money out for more than just your cost of living. Most entrepreneurs have some skin in the game. This skin isnt everybody elses skin. They have some of their own skin in the game. J most importantly, i want to pay those people back. I want to make good on it. Lemonis and im willing to help you figure that out, so im willing to make an offer. J okay. Lemonis my offers 210,000 for 51 of the business. It requires you to sell this location, to use those proceeds to pay down the sales tax. It requires you to go on a payment plan to pay your dad back and to service this other debt. One of the other things that i would want to do is put you on a normal salary. My confidence level in your ability to not put your hand in the cookie jar is low. And so youre gonna have zero access to the cash. If your business is in trouble and you need my help, log on to. By day, they must stay warm. Challenges to the feet. But by night, beautiful, smoother and ready to impress the other party animals. Dr. Scholls dreamwalk express pedi ok, weheres dad. Mom. The twins. Aunt alice. You didnt tell me aunt alice was coming. Of course. Dont forget grandpa. Can the test drive be over now . 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Now i can download my dvr recordings and take them anywhere. Ready or not, here i come whispers now hideandseek time can also be catchuponmyshows time. Here i come cant find you anywhere dont settle for uverse. X1 from xfinity will change the way you experience tv. Lemand so youre gonna 210,000 have zero access to the cash. J what salary would you be putting in place for me . Lemonis whatever you got last year. I dont want to pay you less. I dont want to pay you more. J 60,000 is what i took, so thats not what takehome pay would be. Lemonis thats not my fault you didnt pay taxes. Ill pay you the 60,000, but im 100 in charge. J i put too much in to give up full control of the company. Lemonis why do you think you should have operational control . So you think going out for elaborate meals and taking cash is consistent with being a good steward of the business . Why do you think you should have is it a pride thing . J sure. Lemonis cause if this sales tax doesnt get paid, theyre gonna lock the door and there goes your pride. J i know for a fact i can operate my company. Lemonis i mean, im not gonna budge off 51 . We have a deal, yes or no . J i dont want to give up 51 . Lemonis your answer is no. J yeah. Lemonis okay. J its not that im not respecting you or your opinion. Lemonis no problem. Whats obvious to me is that in this moment where j has an opportunity to do whats right for the business and for the people that have put money into the business, he chooses himself. And thats where pride turns into ego. Nice meeting you, i wish you a lot of luck. J thank you. Lemonis okay . There are plenty of people who do not deserve the help, like j wolf, cause theyre unwilling to change or theyre ungrateful or they just dont respect the process, but there are other people who do deserve a chance, like this woman who reached out about 500 times. Betty harris is the owner of bettys pie whole a pie shop based in encinitas, california, specializing in both sweet and savory pies. Betty do we have chicken pies . Shay they are out on the rack. Lemonis a veteran of the restaurant world, betty started her own business nearly 10 years ago and soon gained a loyal following. The shop consistently made money, but after she opened up her second location, he