And its always been a place for dreamers. But when you get on the ferry, and you land on Staten Island, it may be less hectic, but theres still a real sense of possibility. Its one reason that im excited about today. For two years, sammy lazoja has been bombarding me with emails asking for my help. Hes been hyping this restaurant and how unique it is. And how it sets the standard. But to be honest with you, its kind of ordinary. Sammy marcus. Its a pleasure to meet you. Lemonis are you sammy . How you doing . Nice to meet you. Sammy its a pleasure. Lemonis weve been emailing for what is it, two years now. Sammy two years. Lemonis . Youve been harassing me . Sammy marcus, this is my dream. This is this is it. Lemonis well, come around front. Sammy i originally did the buildout. I put a lot of my funds in here. I put my life savings in here. Lemonis how much have you put in . Sammy around 250,000. Covello sammy sammy this is my partner joe covello. Lemonis joe c. Covello joe c. , yes. Nice to meet you, marcus. Tranchina joseph tranchina. Lemonis joe c. , joe t. Tranchina thats right. Todd todd baslin. Lemonis and youre just todd. So, is it youre 25 and theyre each sammy no. So, i own a 45 share. Tranchina 22. 5 . Covello 10 . Todd 22. 5 . Lemonis is the restaurant making money . All no. Lemonis how much are you losing . Covello currently, 5,000, 6,000 a month. Todd when you dont have the money to pay the bills, and you have to fight with your partners to pay the bills, it becomes an issue. Lemonis who acts as the owner operator, the person that unlocks the door and locks the door . Covello nobody. Lemonis do you have weekly meetings, where youre sitting here going over what we sold for the week . Todd no. Lemonis how [ chuckles ] tranchina keep in mind, none of us have had any restaurant ownership experience at all. Lemonis oh, i dont have to keep it in mind. I picked up on it pretty quick. Look, these guys all have fulltime jobs, but in a business like this, you want to have at least one guy thats responsible for the business, one who opens it and closes it and manages it on a daily basis. To me, it feels like these guys are doing this as more of a hobby than a business. How often are these guys, these owners, around . Antoinette todd comes in and night, randomly checks up on us, and so does sammy. Lemonis but if, like, the place was burning down, who would you call . Antoinette its whoevers available, really. Lemonis even the manager of the place doesnt know whos in charge. She doesnt have anybody to lean on. Whats the first place you look if youre gonna go eat at a restaurant . Tranchina oh, the bathroom. Lemonis lets check it out. Tranchina i just had them scrub this place the other night. Lemonis look at the toilet. Its disgusting. Tranchina yeah, it is. Thats a hot dog machine. Lemonis why do you keep it here . Todd we dont have much storage. Lemonis and how about this back here . This looks clean to you . Tranchina no. Lemonis the cleanliness of this restaurant well, its not measuring up to any sort of standard. I hope the food at least does. What is this back here . Sammy so, this is where we prep our patties. Lemonis you guys have frozen burgers . Sammy yeah. We reform them so it looks more handmade. Lemonis so, theyre not really handmade . Sammy no. Lemonis huh. Is everything frozen . Sammy yeah. Lemonis if youre telling me that your burger sets the standard, you kind of lost me at frozen. Well, what do you normally like here . As i walked around and i talked to some of the customers, youd think that people would go there for the burger and talk about it, how amazing it was. How was it . And they were telling me about a milkshake and fries. What do you recommend . Woman well, a lot of people get the texan. Thats like the most numberone burger. The double standard. Omg. Lemonis ill take one of each. So, who here comes up with all the burgers . Tranchina i did the initial menu. Lemonis you see, you go from 3. 99 to 8. 99. Thats a big jump. So, why is an omg 7. 15, and a standards 7. 25 . Todd theres no logic on it. Lemonis theres no logic. Thank you. Tranchina why are you serving that from right there when you can cook right there and give him a good one . Todd no, no, no. No, no, no. Clean that. Clean that grill so i dont get any of the burnt stuff on there. Lemonis ive been in businesses where controlled chaos exists. This place is chaos without the control. Tranchina recook this thing. I dont want answers. I want results. Dont be shy with the sauce. Sammy its my burger. Its my burger. Lemonis everybodys kind of yelling and complaining and arguing. Tranchina dont tell me why it came this way. Just fix it. This is embarrassing. The whole restaurants embarrassing. Lemonis this business would be best described as a lot of personality and not a lot of process. Sammy so, thats the texan. You have bacon. You have fried onion ring, lettuce, barbecue sauce, american cheese, and cheddar. Lemonis which is which is this one . Tranchina thats the double standard. Its basically a double cheeseburger. Lemonis whats in here . Sammy that is the omg burger. Jalapenos, american cheese, crunchy onions, and you have plantains. Lemonis honestly, i would say the burgers are average. [ chuckling ] i mean, i have to be honest with you. These burgers and the menu concoctions they sound like collegecampus drunkburger concoctions. Sammy wed be painting a wall and talking about, hey, lets do a brunch burger. Lets do a burger with a fried egg on it. Lemonis all right, great idea. Sounds awesome. Throw me another beer. Tranchina kind of, sort of, you know. Lemonis so, most chefs, if theyre creating a multitude of burgers, theyre understanding how the flavors interact with each other. Theres no sort of art and science. I thought this was a higherend burger establishment thats all fresh ingredients and interesting things about it that make the burgers different or the fries different. What i really walked into was a burger joint. Red velvet shake. You guys make those . Todd yes. Lemonis so, are shakes a big deal here . Todd yes. Lemonis are they good margins . Todd yes. A lot of people love our shakes. Lemonis for every burger that you sell, how many shakes are you attaching . Todd probably out of every three or four orders, theres a shake in there. Lemonis so, a 25 attachment . Todd probably. Lemonis and what is the percentage of attachment for fries to an order . Sammy almost 80 . Lemonis look, in a business like this, most people would think that the money is made in the burger. But to be honest with you, its made in other things. In this type of business, i think theres a lot more money to be made with french fries and ice cream, where the margins are 85 . The goal is making sure that you attach those things to as many burger orders as you possibly can. Thats where the moneys gonna get made. Do you guys have a like, an extralarge black tshirt or a red tshirt . I want to put a tshirt on. Sammy todd, i think theyre in the trunk of your car, todd. Lemonis i want to work in the kitchen with you guys. Young man you want red or black . Lemonis uh. Whered you get them from . Covello they were in todds trunk. Todd well, we have nowhere to store them, so we. Lemonis what do you mean, you have nowhere to store them . What about the office . Tranchina todd believes that they take them and bring them home and give them to their friends. Todd they used to disappear, and they used to walk out the door. Sammy so, at that point, your employees are walking out the door with them. Tranchina we also only give an employee one shirt and expect him to wear it five days a week when he works 40 hours a week. Lemonis these guys cant get along, and what ive seen is a lot of dysfunction. I mean, its no way to run a business. Who came up with the red velvet idea . Sammy so, my brother, fuji, helped me design the design the whole burger place. Lemonis and why isnt he here . Sammy the arguments, marcus. Lemonis between you and him or. Sammy no. Between todd and him. It came to a point where they were watching the cameras 24 7. Lemonis what cameras . Sammy the cameras in the restaurant. They were watching them from home, and he would get a phone call why is the refrigerator door open . You know . And he couldnt take the pressure anymore. He couldnt. And he walked away. When we lost my brother, marcus, we really lost the sense of a chef here. Todd his brother doesnt work here anymore because weve all had issues with him. Lemonis did he work . Did he come in early and stay late . Tranchina he lived here. He was like having you here when youre not here. Todd fuji can get the job done. The problem is, you need to give him that direction. Sammy micromanaging. They will micromanage you till they snap your neck, literally. Lemonis who will . Sammy todd in general. Todd todd does this. Todd does that. Todd takes the shirts. Todd does anything. Sammy no, no, no, no, no, no. Covello there was times where the store wasnt open until 1 00 in the afternoon cause he didnt open it. Tranchina fuji was here developing sauces, coming up with ideas, staying till 1 00 in the morning, scrubbing the floor with toothbrushes. Lemonis look, depending on who you listen to, sammys brother, fuji, is either the guy who ran this business into the ground or the one who made it run. Sammy he helped me develop most of this restaurant on paper before we even came here. [ voice breaking ] and thats the [bleep] truth, marcus. Thats the truth. And hes not here anymore cause of that reason. And its and its [bleep] ridiculous. [ sniffling ] [ crying ] lemonis um. It sounds like youre more hurt that your brother was kicked out. Sammy yeah, he he raised me. My parents are hardworking people, you know, firstgeneration, worked two jobs, sometimes even three. Lemonis firstgeneration what . Sammy from montenegro. He didnt have the opportunities i had in life, cause when he was 18, he was watching me. And this was my opportunity to set him up. Lemonis you really built this for him, didnt you . Sammy i built it for for my brother and for my family. [ voice breaking ] i feel i failed them. I really do. Lemonis why do you feel that way . Its open. Sammy hes not here. Hes not here. The restaurant is falling apart. Hes home for the last seven months. Its tough. Its really tough, marcus. Lemonis so, he doesnt have a job . Sammy he doesnt have a job, no. Lemonis does he live far from here . Sammy he lives in the same house i live in. Lemonis how far is that from here . Sammy right down the block. Lemonis lets call your brother just to sammy yeah. Lemonis id love to meet him. The fact that sammy is willing to be vulnerable and be honest about why he started the business and how much he loves his brother gives me reason to want to dig in more. Sammy fujis pulling in right now. Lemonis okay. [ indistinct conversations ] [ light laughter ] sammy marcus, this is my older brother, fuji. Lemonis how you doing, my man . Nice to meet you. You got a good little brother here. Fuji yeah. Lemonis hes got a big heart. Fuji definitely. Lemonis how long have you been in the Restaurant Business . Fuji since 14. Im 41 now. Lemonis since you were 14 . Fuji yeah. My father was a chef. Lemonis did you develop a lot of stuff here . Fuji yeah. The sauces, the burgers. Lemonis why did you decide to leave . Fuji too many differences, too many bumping heads. Like, instead of having one boss, i had like four bosses. There was too many cameras on me. Its just like, i would get a phone call. Sammy whyd you leave the fridge open . Or sometimes, with todd, ill push back against it, and then ill just say, you know what, todd . Whatever. Todd marcus [clears throat] it seems to be that the blame that you want to put is all on me. All i do is i try to make sure that its not costing everybody more money because, if were gonna talk honest, my partners will just spend, and it dont matter. Tranchina how do you function in a restaurant with someone Walking Around telling you, were not gonna let them get paid training. You have to train them all together as a group while theyre working. I dont spend 100 of my time here, but other people do. Is this place 100 successful . Lemonis but, actually, none of you are here 100 of the time. All no. Lemonis the only person that was ever here 100 of the time at some point was fuji. Fuji right. Lemonis hey, guys, can i just have a moment with them two, please . I asked you guys for the first five hours i was here, why dont you have anybody with restaurant experience . And not until five hours later did i even find out that you had a brother, that you had a brother that created a lot of the products, that your brother has 20, 30 years of restaurant experience. Thats kind of, like, the most important detail. Fujis the only guy with restaurant experience. So, when you take a guy out of the equation that had restaurant experience, what did you think was gonna happen . Why dont you make me a burger . Let me see how different it is. That gives me a reason to at least want to give him a chance. What are you making here . What do you have in there . Fuji italian burger. I was, like, trying to make the mona lisa for them, and they were painting a mustache on her. Lemonis right. Fuji definitely has a different process than what i saw earlier. Not only is he using fresh meat, but hes taking the time to use the right spices and the right blends. Thats how a specialty burger is supposed to be made. Bring that knife, please. Tranchina wow. It looks good. Sammy what do we got . Oh, this things bangin. Lemonis these burgers are way better than what i had earlier. Did you try this one . Unbelievable. Tranchina which one is that one . Let me get some of that. Im starving. Lemonis its got the fresh meat and the herbs and the spices. Covello im loving this. Fuji thats the italian. Lemonis theyre not perfect, but there seems to be real potential. Fuji not bad. [ chuckles ] lemonis its time for us to sit down. I want to see the financials. Covello its fairly accurate. Lemonis i hope its more than fairly. Youre doing about 600,000 a year in sales, and so you definitely have a revenue problem, because in this size of a place, you should be doing well over 630,000 a year. Todd i agree with you. Lemonis in the month of october, you did 47,000. 23,500 alone are food costs. Todd yes. Lemonis the reason that todds having to snip you here and snip you here is cause hes looking at these food costs, and theyre offensive. Todd thats exactly what the problem is. Lemonis you want to know why the doors are about to close . You cant make money with a food cost at 50 . Food costs, on average, should be down in the low 20s. Youre doing 47,000 in revenue. Sammy yes. Lemonis 23,500 are food costs. Tranchina foods in there, yeah. Todd your rent and your taxes come out to like 10,700. Lemonis and labors 13,000. Its right here. Theres another 5,200 between insurance, workers comp, and utilities. Theyre only like 64,800 away. So, were not that far from making money. Tranchina no. Todd and thats what ive always said. Lemonis if we can fix the product, then we can change the process, but these guys have to be able to coexist when im not here. And so i have a lot of reservations about moving forward. If i hadnt come today, what would happen . Covello i dont think the place would be open much longer. Lemonis why . Covello money and then the personality issues. Todd if we dont fix the problem, were gonna have to close the doors. Lemonis im gonna have to do a lot of work here. And i cant do the deal without a manager here. And, so, one of you has to be here all the time. Tranchina all of us keeping our nose in this business, especially my brotherinlaw, suffocates the [bleep] out of people. Todd okay, but im willing to step back. So, who wants to do it . Tranchina okay. Ill do it. Lemonis so, joe would be here as my manager designee, running the place on a daytoday basis. Were gonna get our food costs right. Were gonna come up with some very Creative Ideas that are gonna make us different, and were not gonna micromanage people. The Business Needs a manager, but i also think it needs somebody with restaurant experience. I dont do this deal without fuji in the deal for two reasons because its broken his heart that his brothers not here, and his brother is the only one with restaurant experience. I cant do the deal without him. 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Todd for us. Sammy i think fuji should have some skin the game, get at least 10 you know what i mean . To make it serious. Lemonis so far, everybodys on board with some pretty big changes, but i have one more commitment that i want from them. I want them to put their money where their mouth is. Heres my offer. If each of you whose businesses primary businesses are doing well are willing to kick in 15,000 apiece, ill kick in 130,000. The reason that i want each of you to put 15,000 in is i want you to reaffirm your commitment to me. You guys know that when you take my check, i am 100 in charge. And i get 30 of the business. Show me that its not just a hobby. Put your money where your mouth is. Todd i do it every day, so you dont have a problem here. Sammy im good with it. Lemonis we got a deal . 15,000 . Covello 15,000. Lemonis 15,000 . 15,000 . Sammy you got a deal. Thank you. Lemonis fulltime . Tranchina yeah, fulltime. [ laughter ] thats crazy. [ chuckles ] lemonis look, these guys theyre like brothers. And if you pair that with their