I wanted to use this week to do something I don’t normally take time to do. Look at my life to this point. Pull the lessons forward. And ask one honest question. What more can I do. The wins are real. The scars are real. The mistakes taught me more than the wins ever did. But 50 earns a pause. Take real inventory before you stack the next 50 on top of it. Here’s what I know going in. My two boys are my greatest success. Everything else is a footnote. If I built 5,000 restaurants and lost them, I lost. If I built nothing and they grew up knowing what a good man looks like, I won. That’s the only scoreboard. That’s why Craveworthy exists. 22 brands. Hundreds of locations. 100,000 Restaurant Success Stories by 2035. So an operator in Toledo, a franchisee in Tampa, a kid washing dishes in one of our kitchens has a real shot at a life they’re proud of. Next 7 days I share the lessons that shaped me, thank the people who built me, and tell you what I’m putting the next 50 years into. Tomorrow I write about my dad. 🔥

Named a 2026 EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Midwest Finalist. Last year I was a finalist too. I didn't win. I put that loss on my shoulder and carried it into every day of 2025. But that chip wasn't new. I almost flunked out of school. I wasn't the smartest kid, the polished kid, the kid anyone bet on. Effort was the only thing I could outwork anyone on. So I did. Then I got handed a seat at Jimmy John's at an age where I had no business being in that chair. Everyone in the room was waiting for me to fail. I went to work instead. We scaled from 24 locations to over 300 and sold 700 more. I left not because anything was wrong, but because I had something I needed to build on my own. I started Craveworthy from nothing. No PE parent. No playbook. Just a conviction that the industry was broken for operators and franchisees, and somebody needed to build the fix. Franchisees get abandoned. Brands get stripped for parts. Operators who bet everything watch it get gutted by people who never ran a shift in their life. We don't walk away. That's the ethos. Not a marketing line. A daily decision. At every step, somebody has doubted me. That's the fuel. Always has been. Prove the Doubters Wrong is a core value at Craveworthy because it's how I've lived every day of my career. So when last year's recognition came and went without a win, I did what I always do. Got back to work. So did the team. Big Chicken kept opening with Josh Halpern and Shaq, a celebrity-backed chicken concept breaking into markets that don't usually get first looks. Taffer's Tavern joined the house and gave us a full-service flagship with one of the most respected names in hospitality behind it. Gregorys Coffee added a category-leading coffee brand with a roadmap for national growth. Three partnerships that pushed Craveworthy into a different league. Add Taim, Fresh Brothers, Wing It On!, Sigri, Genghis Grill, and everything else under the roof. Twenty-one brands. Hundreds of locations. $300M systemwide sales on the march to $1B. But the number that matters is 100,000. 100,000 Restaurant Success Stories by 2035. Every franchisee who hits their AUV. Every GM who gets promoted. Every operator who buys their second store. That's what we're counting. Twenty-one brands is step one. The plaque has my name. The work does not. This recognition belongs to the Craveworthy Brands team. The operators running shifts. The brand leaders building culture. The franchisees who bet their futures on us. The crew that holds it all together. I get named because of what they do every day. To the EY team and judges: thank you for the second look. To our team, partners, and franchisees: this is yours. To anyone who's been counted out, told you weren't ready, doubted by people who don't know what you're capable of: use it. Carry the chip. Go prove them wrong. There's a seat at our table for people who build like that. Chip's still on my shoulder. We don't stop building. 🔥