Where’s My Money? Season 5, Episode 5
Season Five of multi-award-winning podcast Where’s My Money? is back to shed light on the common money questions New Zealanders are asking.
enable.me partners with rova to bring this podcast to life and stimulate the conversation about finances with everyday Kiwis. Where’s My Money? follows the story of Reagan – a man chasing the Kiwi Dream but feeling stuck living month-to-month – and his discussions with the experts about what he may be doing wrong and how to fix it.
One man. One million dollars of debt. One podcast to find a way out.
Logan Brown, Depot, Federal Delicatessen, Best Ugly Bagels. Recognise the names? All eateries with Al Brown’s iconic fingerprint all over them. He’s a chef, fisherman, author, celebrity personality, and successful restaurateur, and he joins this episode of Where’s My Money? to share his ‘Reags to Riches’ story.
Farming life shows the “value of an earned dollar”
With a rural upbringing in the Wairarapa, Al Brown was the only boy in the family and grew up with two older sisters.
His family owned a farm, which is where he first earned income and discovered appreciation for hard work – and where he was expected to take the reins as the sole son.
He says, “I worked on the farm from a very early age, and I think that instilled, you know, understanding the value of an earned dollar.”
From lambing to the shearing gang, to working with cattle, Al used his passion for being a “big nature guy,” and loving the outdoors to fuel him. But it wasn’t his “cup of tea,” for the long term.
He sold his dogs, moved to Wellington City and began working in the hospitality scene – with his first job being at the Magic Wok in the food court at the bottom of the BNZ Centre in the CBD.
Where Al Brown cut his teeth
Al shares his story of moving through the hospitality industry, collecting the experiences that would ultimately lead to his success opening and operating the popular restaurants that have made him a Kiwi household name.
Starting out in the hotel industry learning customer service, he moved to assistant manager at a pub where he learned the “booze side of things.”
After some time on his OE travelling, cooking and getting a culinary arts degree, he returned to New Zealand where he began to set the foundations for Logan Brown, his first restaurant business.
Reflecting on this journey, Al shares that he wasn’t “particularly bright,” in the traditional sense – school studies and spelling and understanding numbers – but that it was a joy to find his niche to excel in.
“To find something or find a career or a job and something that you feel you might be able to excel in because there isn’t any of those sorts of residual things on the side that that you’re nervous about or that you know are not your strong points,” Al shares.
“Find something that you think you can do and do it as well as you can.”
Keeping the culture focused on teamwork
Al shares that one of the most important parts of a successful, thriving, restaurant business is the culture of the team.
“I think sense of humour has a lot to do with it,” Al shares, especially with the large teams that hospitality venues attract, where every staff position is a piece of the fast-paced puzzle of service that needs to go right so the customer can be kept happy.
Al says, “and once you start creating a culture, I think that’s the big thing – that you just keep working on that culture – because when you start a restaurant ,of course, you’ll have, you know, 40 people maybe working for you.”
He shares that a team is more willing to work harder and as a cohesive unit “if you spend time on the culture and getting that right and looking after people like you enjoy being looked after.”
Al still works at Depot Eatery on a Tuesday night and says he’ll do the jobs that people don’t expect – like taking the rubbish out.
He says, “it just really sets the value proposition around team and no one’s better than anyone else.”
Diversifying his work life
We talk a lot about diversification in finance, particularly when it comes to ‘not keeping all your eggs in one basket’ with investments. Al shows how he’s mastered this concept and applied it to his career – not one to focus on a single career path, Al has successfully diversified his income streams by having many areas he’s had a “crack at.”
From television presenting, to lecturing at universities, to writing books, to being a national culinary judge and food critic, to his hospitality venues, to having his own range of sauces – and at age 60, he shows no signs of slowing, sharing with Where’s My Money? host Reagan that he’d love to open one more restaurant.
Are you interested in hearing more from Al Brown? Listen to the full episode here:
