Eating With Tod: 9 Crazy Ways to Build a 7 Figure Food Empire from an iPhone 11

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:00:15 00:00:00:15 - 00:02:06:19 00:02:06:19 - 00:02:09:09 00:02:09:09 - 00:02:28:24 Dan Pope Tod. So excited to do this, mate. Actually, love what you've built, and, Yeah, I'm just so intrigued to peel behind the scenes and see, you know, I think when we went for that car, there's a lot of stuff that people don't see that goes into build it, building this. 00:02:29:05 - 00:02:31:17 Dan Pope It's really built into this, you know. 00:02:31:19 - 00:02:40:13 Dan Pope Food empire. You are slowly but, well, not even slowly, but you're rapidly building. Yeah. You were working in construction? 00:02:40:17 - 00:02:41:07 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:02:41:09 - 00:03:12:05 Dan Pope As a project manager. And a bit like today, it was probably gray, snowy rain, miserable. And you sort of going to work, and you've got this burning desire and dream to get into food. Yeah. Talk us through that sort of period of time. Leading up to the moment you did your first ever flip. Cool. And I'd love to sort of just unpack that feeling, because I know a lot of people will listen to this who are in a corporate job or in a job. 00:03:12:05 - 00:03:18:24 Dan Pope They kind of like, but it doesn't set their soul on fire. And how you cross the chat to that. Let's start with the first video, though. 00:03:19:01 - 00:03:29:11 Tod Yeah. I mean, when I saw the first video, because. Sorry. Oh good. Yeah. The first video, I mean, back then when I started it, it was photos. So there were no videos, so. Right. 00:03:29:13 - 00:03:31:08 Dan Pope So what year was that? 00:03:31:10 - 00:03:34:01 Tod This must have been probably four years ago. 00:03:34:03 - 00:03:34:17 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:03:34:19 - 00:03:53:11 Tod Let's say four. Yeah. Four years ago. And I think it, it came out of me just watching YouTube videos of like, people cook mental food online. And I'd go to sleep by watching this, like, probably with watching. I used to watch Mark Eldridge, who, he's obviously associated with Man United and then other nights I would switch out gold bridges. 00:03:53:15 - 00:03:54:16 Dan Pope Is he. He's like. 00:03:54:18 - 00:04:07:10 Tod He it just like podcasts for Man United and sometimes I fall was falls asleep listening to him. And then I found this guy called, I think it was Sam eats maybe some eats, started watching him and falling asleep like these, like burgers. Had some weird. 00:04:07:14 - 00:04:14:06 Dan Pope Dreams. Yeah. I mean, picking about burgers. Yeah. That's hilarious. Yeah. And then I don't think there's. 00:04:14:06 - 00:04:30:23 Tod Always been this thing, like, with my family, I guess, where we always got a lot of excitement from going out and eating meals, whether that's back home where we, you know, on a Friday night, we'd go to a nice restaurant. And then obviously I came to London with and worked in construction for the last seven, seven years, six years. 00:04:31:03 - 00:04:32:18 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:04:32:20 - 00:04:37:23 Tod I'm really like my parents used to come down to London and I used to just email on the office. 00:04:38:00 - 00:04:41:24 Dan Pope Yeah. I see my show. Yeah. There we go. 00:04:41:24 - 00:05:00:14 Tod Yeah, yeah, I basically, I think around the email, around the office and just ask people like, where's the best fish restaurant? Where's the best place to go for a steak? Where's the best Indian food? Yeah, my literally do it every like couple of weeks. And I go off, try these places. And then I started following like bloggers online. 00:05:00:14 - 00:05:18:00 Tod Like I say er, I remember just like religiously watching this guy post like 3 or 4 photos a day of all this amazing food. And I was just like, my mind was just blown on all the different, like, cultures and all the different, like, things you can get in London. And it's like it's, you know, it's a great city for all that kind of stuff. 00:05:18:00 - 00:05:37:20 Tod So I started watching all this stuff, and then one night back in Leamington Spa, which is what I really like from I got pissed with the lads at a pub, started a food account and then posted a photo of my mates vape and a stellar. 00:05:37:22 - 00:05:38:16 Dan Pope Mind to. 00:05:38:16 - 00:05:50:02 Tod Say that wasn't stellar. It was a Peroni and the first post went something like oh this sweet barrel of golden nectar. I can't remember the rest of it. I was drunk. 00:05:50:03 - 00:05:50:21 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:05:50:22 - 00:06:04:13 Tod Woke up the next day in that photo. I got the liters ready. Yeah, but that was that was like the start. And it was like I said, it was just a pissed chat with a mate, with some lads taking the piss out of me. Yeah. And that, that's what kind of spewed it on. 00:06:04:15 - 00:06:18:12 Dan Pope The what I love. And what we said is I think you're the way you describe things. Yeah. And from that first post hasn't changed. So the weather, the ponies, gold, sweet gold. Next I think you'll say like I'm going to get into my fucking Speedos and jump into this curry. But the way you. 00:06:18:12 - 00:06:21:22 Dan Pope Described the food. Yeah. And first is, is. 00:06:21:22 - 00:06:39:23 Dan Pope Is is real. Like, punchy sort of, yeah. Kind of language. It kind of makes you hallucinate with the food. You're like, I'm watching it. I think someone says, like in great writing, when you read great, right? You almost like, kind of hallucinate because it just, it kind of like it just pulls you. It's like, instead of saying something like. 00:06:39:23 - 00:06:52:02 Dan Pope And he, he said, go away angrily. It's like he went away through, through gritted teeth. Yeah. I mean, the way you describe the food is like that. It's it's like not you're not just looking at curry. It's I'm going to jump into. 00:06:52:02 - 00:06:53:17 Dan Pope This or like a. 00:06:53:17 - 00:07:00:20 Dan Pope Shower full of parmesan, you know? But what's hilarious is from that first fucking post. 00:07:00:22 - 00:07:03:21 Dan Pope With a pro ninja vape, it's the sweet gold nectar. 00:07:03:23 - 00:07:21:05 Tod And that's quite funny. Yeah. Because, like, my English is fucking terrible. Yeah I, I've my vocabulary is awful. Like and I don't I can't use a big word to and I guess like throughout the journey what I've tried to do is just try and listen to what other people have said and try and put my, my spin on it. 00:07:21:10 - 00:07:30:16 Tod And again, that's like, you know, with all these phrases and, and stuff like that. Again, it's it's just trying to like elevate, you know what I'm saying. And it's a real. 00:07:30:16 - 00:07:35:24 Dan Pope Crafted it because again, this is the thing. But like when you show me your phone, you've got we'll move that Thai curry which. 00:07:36:01 - 00:07:36:16 Dan Pope Was. 00:07:36:18 - 00:07:38:08 Dan Pope Fucking bang in. 00:07:38:10 - 00:07:45:17 Dan Pope Is Lee sorry, Sam. Easy and big up. Yeah. Yeah. Is, is. 00:07:45:17 - 00:07:56:04 Dan Pope Like all the different ways. I mean there's you can probably you want Tod 8 to 8 to Tod vocabulary. Yeah. Ways to describe the lamb chop in their nature I mean like and I think it's so, so. 00:07:56:04 - 00:07:57:08 Dan Pope You like. 00:07:57:10 - 00:08:01:01 Dan Pope What are some of those phrases in your phone like I don't know if you. 00:08:01:03 - 00:08:02:04 Tod Yeah. I mean yeah. 00:08:02:04 - 00:08:05:09 Dan Pope So because there's a real craft to this, I don't think people see, you know what I mean? 00:08:05:09 - 00:08:18:10 Tod Like, I know and also like when you're on the spot, you're never you never very good. Like when you're, you know, you're got to be quick, quick, quick. There's pressure. You got people looking at you in like a high intensity environment. It's quite it's really, really hard to just be able to. 00:08:18:11 - 00:08:20:02 Dan Pope Go boom, boom, boom. Yeah yeah. 00:08:20:02 - 00:08:34:07 Tod Yeah. So yeah, if I hear something that someone else likes or, sorry if I hear something that I like or gives me like a little thought, like, sometimes I'll wake up in the middle of the night and be like, oh, like, that's a cool phrase. Like, all right. 00:08:34:09 - 00:08:36:19 Dan Pope It's been your burger gasm in the middle of the night. Yeah. 00:08:36:19 - 00:08:37:14 Tod Yeah, exactly. 00:08:37:14 - 00:08:39:12 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:08:39:14 - 00:08:44:02 Tod My girlfriend's like, what the fuck do you do? Yeah. Like this one. 00:08:44:04 - 00:08:44:15 Dan Pope I do like. 00:08:44:15 - 00:08:50:12 Tod This one that I saw on online. So trying to pick a favorite dish is like trying to pick your favorite child. Impossible. 00:08:50:12 - 00:08:51:14 Dan Pope Yes, yes yes. 00:08:51:14 - 00:09:02:11 Tod So I was like then that was that was Gordon Ramsay said that and but I was just like, what? I really like that. Like, I like how he, how that message came across and also like that resonate, resonate. 00:09:02:13 - 00:09:04:07 Dan Pope It's I want to resonate. Yeah. 00:09:04:09 - 00:09:23:21 Tod With. Yeah. With a lot of like the content and a lot of the restaurants that I try to go see because again, like a lot of the dishes are, are good. Like I try to pick the best of the best. Like that's the whole thing with with Tod and how like the dynamic I guess probably changed from what was essentially a burger page like at the beginning. 00:09:23:23 - 00:09:32:09 Dan Pope He let's go back to that. So you put the picture of the vape up, you wake up, you're thinking, oh, what have I done? That the amount of people who will have done that and then stopped. 00:09:32:10 - 00:09:32:21 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:09:32:21 - 00:09:37:12 Dan Pope Well done. Ten posts and stopped or done 20 posts and stopped within 30 posts and stopped. 00:09:37:14 - 00:09:37:22 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:09:38:00 - 00:09:46:07 Dan Pope What what was what were the next 30 posts? What did they look like? Was it a burger page or was it like a well, how did you get starting to post to me? 00:09:46:09 - 00:10:03:02 Tod Yeah. So after that it kind of I started eating out a bit more, start taking pictures of when I go to eat my family, basically because I couldn't afford shit. Yeah, yeah, you know, in London. So like, my fans have come down to London, I'd find a nice place. I'd get them to fit the bill and I take a photo of. 00:10:03:06 - 00:10:06:14 Dan Pope Like, that's what my. Yeah. I also see. 00:10:06:16 - 00:10:28:01 Tod So that's kind of like how how that works. And then we went into lockdown. So then I started watching pages like fit waffle. Who does these amazing, like three ingredient treats? There was, Tom Big Eats and a few other ones, and they were just Creighton's really, really cool short content of just really food during lockdown. 00:10:28:01 - 00:10:36:17 Tod So then I just tried to copy them basically. Yeah, during lockdown. And I've been like, literally copy the same recipe. It didn't do very well. Engagement. Not surprise, but do you. 00:10:36:17 - 00:10:38:03 Dan Pope Doing recipes to begin with. 00:10:38:04 - 00:10:38:14 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:10:38:19 - 00:10:55:15 Tod And I got really inspired by these kind of like chef creators that were making these super cool videos and edits and I to watch all the different angles of like and see that they're going from a fast up close to then to the left, to the right. And it was that. And so then I started like posting my my tips. 00:10:55:17 - 00:10:56:06 Tod No one would. 00:10:56:06 - 00:10:57:23 Dan Pope Start for you posting. 00:10:58:00 - 00:11:14:16 Tod A lot. I came up with I got Babybel cheese. I deep fried it and I know they know cheese. I dipped in egg wash, put it into Chile, heat wave Doritos and then deep fried it and then got a nice little cheese full of it. And that video got like a million views. And I was like, chick. 00:11:14:18 - 00:11:16:19 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. 00:11:16:22 - 00:11:26:04 Tod My first viral video actually was of it was a it's one of the go Louis Tomlinson it's a Louis Tomlinson from One Direction. Yeah. 00:11:26:05 - 00:11:26:15 Dan Pope Yeah yeah. 00:11:26:18 - 00:11:41:17 Tod I took it. He was at the football when we were were at Euro like final thing in a car park. And it's like I just took a video of him, put it on my TikTok. And that was like the the most engaged video. And I've been like, they're slaying for like six months. And I was like, fuck's sake, I just take this 22nd video. 00:11:41:17 - 00:11:42:16 Tod Obviously. I go. 00:11:42:17 - 00:11:43:11 Dan Pope What's he doing? 00:11:43:13 - 00:11:45:13 Tod He's just celebrating England, getting the goal. 00:11:45:15 - 00:11:46:02 Dan Pope It's because he was. 00:11:46:02 - 00:11:55:07 Tod In some, like, car park, like they've some weird place in Shoreditch. So there's loads of One Direction fans. I was like, oh, I quite like, it's like this is the engagement. Like, this is what it feels like. 00:11:55:07 - 00:11:56:18 Dan Pope Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:11:56:18 - 00:12:01:17 Dan Pope So how many posters you've done before it started to boot off then before then six. You said six months. 00:12:01:19 - 00:12:23:21 Tod Yeah. I mean there's a lot of post like post on I post every single day. I really get into it. Yeah. In lockdown. Write all the recipes I'll try and just and again like that where you know, when you're writing the description of those posts again just want to be a bit funny, bit tongue in cheek. And that's kind of like where your brain starts going into that hole, you know, jumping into the pool with the curry and all that kind of stuff like that was that. 00:12:23:21 - 00:12:25:11 Tod That was one mind kind of ticking. I. 00:12:25:14 - 00:12:29:06 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. And then what were your. 00:12:29:08 - 00:12:38:08 Dan Pope Like in that period? What made you keep going and what was the what was the fire in the belly, the dream at that point? Or is it just having fun. 00:12:38:10 - 00:12:38:15 Dan Pope Like. 00:12:38:21 - 00:12:55:11 Tod It's fun. It's I think it was more the fun and then with more love for food. And. Yeah, when you come to London and literally like if you're on, you know, a small salary working in construction, when you first start, you got these high rents and it's like, I've got literally no money to go out and like eat food and do the food. 00:12:55:13 - 00:13:27:08 Tod So this was kind of like a way of like, I can go and get my pleasure and hopefully like the restaurant, like, you know, give me a, give me a meal or something. And that's kind of like where it all started taking a little bit. But I think the main two or the main change from the photos to the videos to when, you know, I started picking up the followers, was really when I wanted to go in and tell people stories and get behind the scenes and you'd see page like devour power in in America, who are huge. 00:13:27:10 - 00:13:47:01 Tod And they were going to restaurants and what they would do is just get behind the scenes, film someone how to make a burger. But no one like at home knows how to make a burger because at the time you. It's all these really cool burgers that double stacked like there's no air pockets in the burger. It was very much like these shitty, like pub burgers that look like like pucks. 00:13:47:06 - 00:14:10:01 Tod I mean, and everyone's like, how do you think? How do you make these burgers? And those, like, they would go behind the scenes. So I was like, right, I'm gonna start going behind the scenes. So I did that with a burger place. It was up there, not around anymore. I think it's called Smash and Pop. Brixton and like messaged them and films like this behind the behind the scenes burger sheet and that was like the first one where it started to tick. 00:14:10:04 - 00:14:16:05 Dan Pope And that's because. And then, and then how did you was that just looking for what was happening in America and thinking like, that could work? Yeah. 00:14:16:07 - 00:14:16:13 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:14:16:13 - 00:14:32:14 Dan Pope It's also because I suppose the other thing is, is a lot of now a lot more and more creators are doing it right. But back then it's like you're basically asking people to reveal their secrets. Yeah. Show is behind the scenes. I know, like some people like tubes is a bit iffy about you guys. It the like and I get it from restaurants. 00:14:32:14 - 00:14:34:11 Dan Pope It's like basically their intellectual property. Right. 00:14:34:11 - 00:14:35:24 Dan Pope Really 100% like. 00:14:35:24 - 00:14:47:08 Dan Pope So how did you sort of before you had the massive following? Like what were you saying to these restaurants to convince themselves, mate, like, look, let me come see you. Chicken burger. Yeah, yeah, I think fried rice. Yeah. Fill in the blank. 00:14:47:09 - 00:15:01:04 Tod Yeah. I think the main thing is persistence. Like. Yeah. And also like, I wasn't asking a lot of these things like free food or anything. I wanted to do it because I wanted to. I just loved it. I loved the experience. Like I loved being able to just go behind the scenes. And it was like a it was like a bug. 00:15:01:04 - 00:15:15:21 Tod I was like, oh my God, like, how can I go and see how that's made? And one like person you go and speak to and they're like, oh, that video like it starts, they enjoyed it. And I go, oh, I've got a mate. I've got him like and then right. So it's kind of like it kind of came through like restaurant connections I guess. 00:15:16:01 - 00:15:17:02 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:15:17:04 - 00:15:24:09 Tod Because I've always tried to stay away from like typical, like PR invites, like, like you get sucked into them, but. 00:15:24:11 - 00:15:25:21 Dan Pope When you say sucked into them. 00:15:25:23 - 00:15:34:05 Tod So like, you know, where a PR agency will send 100 bloggers, your, it's the same invite to say, come here like, come to see. 00:15:34:08 - 00:15:35:18 Dan Pope Okay. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:15:35:18 - 00:15:48:11 Tod So all of that stuff I never really I tried not to do it because, you know, if you kind of want to be like the first in the scene, like. And if five of the bloggers, when you post your content or post in the place, then. 00:15:48:13 - 00:15:49:05 Dan Pope You know, you. 00:15:49:10 - 00:15:51:00 Tod You just join join the band. 00:15:51:02 - 00:16:09:23 Dan Pope Yeah. The so let let's go back to the as you're working the construction job. Yeah. And that graph because as you say, is it's almost the whole ice bird analogy that people see. Yeah. Well, that was the Instagram what I saw before we met. Oh my God, Tod's going to be sick. Restaurants like that must be the absolute dream. 00:16:09:23 - 00:16:28:18 Dan Pope You know, big partnership deals. But like, let's go into that. Yeah. Depth of hell and like that graft. Yeah. Like what were the hardest days. And I think you were saying you're working a full time job. Yeah. You know 9 to 5 posting every single day. Talk me through like a kind of a day when it was like you finishing work. 00:16:28:18 - 00:16:35:01 Dan Pope You know, I've got go and stuff my face for the chicken burger. Yeah, yeah. I mean, so you got to go back on, like, you don't want to eat that, that the whole time. 00:16:35:01 - 00:16:54:17 Tod No, no 100%. No. And like I said yeah. So I worked in construction. I've been in office from 8:00 at leave at six like so. It's a long day and then you know, but I just became I saw what at this point since a few videos started like taking off a bit, the first viral video was of Burger Lobster. 00:16:54:19 - 00:17:11:08 Tod They put out a full lobster. It was on the table for £25 and it was. And I put it up as a cheap and it got like, I think it got like 1.5 million views again, like 3000 followers. And I was like, oh. And that's when I was like, oh God, there's something here. Like I got it ticked. 00:17:11:08 - 00:17:32:05 Tod I was like, right, okay. Like these, like, I only think more ideas like this. And I just became obsessed with these ideas and, and it kind of went from there. But yeah, going sorry. Going back to the point. So I probably get up, I get up at half 4 or 5:00. I would edit my video, I would probably finish it, I'd start to edit the video. 00:17:32:07 - 00:17:46:21 Tod I would then finish it off on the tube. I sometimes probably do a voiceover on my way to work, like literally on the way to work, like behind the street or nip lunch. And I would like literally just go down the back alley into smash office voiceover and cut it out. But literally. 00:17:46:22 - 00:17:47:02 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:17:47:06 - 00:18:07:06 Tod And again, like after work, you go into a new restaurant or a new place like get home at like 9:00. And okay, that wasn't every day. So what, what normally went on was a weekend at like three, 4 or 5, six spots and just go crazy at the weekend. But then you've got to edit it during the week. 00:18:07:09 - 00:18:22:08 Tod So like, I mean, it was basically like lights on at five and I'll go to sleep at half ten and, you know, there'll be something going on, whether that's me engaging with others during the voiceover in my bed like it's it was ridiculous for next. 00:18:22:10 - 00:18:29:14 Dan Pope And how did you what was the sort of the, the dark side of doing that or did that. How did that come up at some point? 00:18:29:16 - 00:18:41:23 Tod I think obviously the dark, the dark side of it is, you know, you don't have time to switch off and you know, you've got family, friends, girlfriend like who? You know, I always was very close to to Mia and with each other a lot, as well. 00:18:42:01 - 00:18:42:09 Dan Pope As. 00:18:42:09 - 00:18:59:16 Tod Me as my girlfriend. So what would happen is like, you know, you coming in and you know, what normal people do is that they haven't told me they have dinner and then they watch a film and it's all nice and relaxed and said, like, you know, it's me on my phone, like engaging with people, like staring at my phone like, 00:18:59:18 - 00:19:00:23 Dan Pope Like, oh what's that? Oh, yeah. 00:19:00:24 - 00:19:35:21 Tod Like. And but that there's no other way really to, to do that, to grow the Instagram account. Unless you're engaging with people, unless you're being consistent, unless you're saying, you know, or visiting all these spots and, and your back dedicated to it, you it's never going to get off the ground. And I think once we started like kind of waking up to the fact that where this could go and the fact that people were enjoying it and the fact the followers are going up and then, you know, you get your first brand deal where you might get paid like £250 and you're like, fucking how to do 50% of my salary, like, wow, like I'm 00:19:35:24 - 00:19:54:11 Tod in this. And then you're like, oh shit, it's £500. Fuck. It's a grand. Like, that's a third of my salary. Yeah. And and it just keeps on going up and up and up. And then, you know, you see your follower count and you see, you know, the money coming in and stuff like that. And again, it just motivates you to, to carry on and do better at. 00:19:54:13 - 00:20:15:16 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah yeah. I love the whole as a as me saying that's what I wanted to sort of shine a light on is the craft and the dedication and like just the fact that you just went like only chips. But we're going all in on this one. Yeah. Yeah yeah, yeah. In the early stages, of like editing a video, like how long would it, would it take you to like to, to do. 00:20:15:16 - 00:20:19:09 Tod That bit to one. It's a lot quicker than it would do now probably. 00:20:19:09 - 00:20:21:23 Dan Pope Like oh really. Yeah. But longer now. Yeah. 00:20:21:23 - 00:20:22:14 Tod It's a lot longer. 00:20:22:14 - 00:20:23:01 Dan Pope Than how. 00:20:23:01 - 00:20:23:11 Dan Pope Come. 00:20:23:11 - 00:20:44:05 Tod Because the videos now I try and post less and everything's more quality. The way that I see it now is before I grow the page, whereas now it's I'm still trying grow the page, but also maintain the engagement levels that I've always shown. So it's finding better places. Now, it might mean that I go to Barcelona for a video now rather than before. 00:20:44:05 - 00:20:48:13 Tod I might just take the risk on a small, you know, a smaller hidden gaff like in London. 00:20:49:11 - 00:21:01:21 Tod But, you know, for me, like, if I get, you know, if I, if I take the risk on some of the smaller places or less known places, then and they get rubbish, engagement and stuff like, I kind of think about it a bit too much. 00:21:01:23 - 00:21:03:15 Dan Pope Oh, you think about the engagement too much? 00:21:03:15 - 00:21:09:23 Tod Yeah, maybe. Yeah. And you know, so it's really important for me to be able to, to, to balance that basically. 00:21:09:23 - 00:21:10:11 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:21:10:13 - 00:21:33:19 Dan Pope And then what would you say in terms I think in your old job, I saw online that the whole thing was like, simplify and complexity. Was your was your company name your own company? I want to use that as a lens to sort of simplify the complexity of growing on socials. So I think people I even myself like, yeah, I've never had any sort of strategy say I've just sort of just kept putting out podcasts. 00:21:33:19 - 00:21:35:13 Dan Pope And so I've just. 00:21:35:15 - 00:21:48:20 Dan Pope Hoped for the best sort of thing. But like how how did you like, if you could boil it down to like a two year old, like do these one, two, three, four things to grow the following year be would it be like engaging on the comments, like what would you say those things are? 00:21:48:22 - 00:21:50:11 Tod Number one, just have fun. 00:21:50:13 - 00:21:52:23 Dan Pope Like okay. Yeah, like like I said. 00:21:53:00 - 00:22:02:13 Tod Even though, you know, there are all the great rewards with running a successful so successful Instagram account, the main thing is like, I fucking love food. 00:22:02:18 - 00:22:03:08 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah. 00:22:03:08 - 00:22:08:21 Tod Yeah. So. And like, food makes me happy. Like I love it. Like, if there's a new burger joint that comes out and I see it, I'm like. 00:22:08:23 - 00:22:10:14 Dan Pope Fuck, this is good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:22:10:14 - 00:22:27:11 Tod I mean, I absolutely love it. And even if I was still working my full time job previously and there wasn't a single penny on Instagram, I'd still be doing this. Like, I still I love it. What? I mean, like, I love the food, I love the people, I love the community. I love the atmosphere. Like it. It's it's amazing. 00:22:27:11 - 00:22:35:23 Dan Pope And what's what's the feeling when you get a new like when you get hire of a new restaurant, you're going to this Gordon Ramsay one tonight. Yeah. Like a new burger joint. Describe the feeling to you. 00:22:36:01 - 00:22:55:07 Tod Yeah. It's it's just it's extremely exciting knowing you know what. What can come to the. Wow. What is the thing I don't know. Yeah. It's it's mainly it's excitement like you you know I'm with Gordon Ramsay. Open this one tonight. I wanted to make sure I was the first like person to get up there. 00:22:55:07 - 00:22:56:22 Dan Pope And he's open tonight. 00:22:57:02 - 00:22:58:07 Tod I was open last night. 00:22:58:07 - 00:22:59:10 Dan Pope Right. So. 00:22:59:12 - 00:23:14:10 Tod But I want to make sure I'm the first person there to to post the video to, to try and share my thoughts on it, because again, if this restaurant would be open two weeks and but the lighting people already done it, then I would, I wouldn't be going, it's it's not it's just not fun. 00:23:14:10 - 00:23:18:12 Dan Pope So I mean, so is there almost like a bit of a buzz in the game of being first? 00:23:18:14 - 00:23:38:00 Tod I think so I don't, I don't know, like because also at the same time, you know, you have restaurants that have been around for ages and you can just go and post them. They always do well on socials. I think. Like it all depends on the restaurant. For example, you know, like there might be I don't know. Let's look at, what's that example of that new burger place? 00:23:38:00 - 00:23:38:20 Tod Supernova. 00:23:39:00 - 00:23:39:13 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:23:39:15 - 00:24:00:07 Tod So like supernova was great. Loads it. Like in the first week loads of bloggers were bloggers went there. Okay. That video and it did it kind of it divided opinion within everyone's world like everyone was I is it glorified Mackey's whereas other people like spew burger whereas. But now like I think if you went and went in trying to do that video, I think it would work. 00:24:00:07 - 00:24:00:14 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:24:00:15 - 00:24:10:07 Tod Because it's gone like the times of passed like, yeah. People now look at like now people are talking about junk like, which is the second one. Like I think they well, even though they were established in Paris, are. 00:24:10:07 - 00:24:13:00 Dan Pope They, are they rest sister, brother sister restaurants or. 00:24:13:01 - 00:24:15:19 Tod No, I don't know someone probably copied to somewhere down the line. 00:24:15:20 - 00:24:19:01 Dan Pope Yeah. But. 00:24:19:03 - 00:24:29:06 Tod Again like you've even now junked past it like people gone there. They've they've said that. They said their opinions now it's like, who's going to be next in the burger. Well like they've kind of been gone. 00:24:29:12 - 00:24:34:08 Dan Pope Yeah. And how are you how are you conceive finding those new places. So your first. 00:24:36:06 - 00:24:58:14 Tod I get it really. It's just through like what? What amounts endlessly scrolling TikTok. Again with Instagram, like again taking some risks. I didn't post everywhere that I go, like, the main thing we're told is like it's a recommendation page more than anything. Like it's for you to just go and visit with your family and you know that you're going to get some good food. 00:24:58:16 - 00:25:02:07 Dan Pope Yeah. How many places do you have you reckon you haven't posted because it wasn't good. 00:25:02:09 - 00:25:04:11 Tod Probably like 10%. 00:25:04:13 - 00:25:05:07 Dan Pope Really. 00:25:05:09 - 00:25:06:05 Tod Of places. 00:25:06:05 - 00:25:06:10 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:25:06:11 - 00:25:35:09 Tod Because again, like I said, I don't want to expose any family owned businesses that I may not like the food. That's not that's not the point of to, you know, like, you might go you might enjoy a well-cooked steak. I want a blue steak. It doesn't mean that any of us are wrong. And, you know, if someone's got a family business where, you know, down to pay 20% VAT and the hospitality and the government is trying to fuck them, then it's not really fair that I go there and I say the restaurant shit, and people stop going there. 00:25:35:09 - 00:25:45:24 Tod Like, that's not really what this about all this really much. It's just trying to build recommendations, grow the community, make people a bit more aware of smaller restaurants. Independent. 00:25:45:24 - 00:26:04:00 Dan Pope What's that one you did like in Epping Forest, that fish place. Yeah. So like the other day I was like, fuck the word I get when I kind of scroll on your page, which is like, it's like there's two words excitement and enchantment. It's like that almost, I think food and get that new recommendation. Like, you know, when you go to a kid, you go and you can go to Disneyland and you're like buzzing your tits off to go to Legoland. 00:26:04:04 - 00:26:16:15 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. I think as an adult, like I get that same buzz of restaurants, like it's just an excitement and I'm like, and then so yeah, you've got that Epping Forest like the crabs. So I'm sort of like, we have to go on these island. 00:26:16:17 - 00:26:18:20 Dan Pope Yeah. That is, you. 00:26:18:20 - 00:26:27:06 Dan Pope Know, sort of and I think it is that enchantment that you kind of lit because life can sometimes get boring, but if you've got banging food and like, as you say, it's the whole story of these restaurants. 00:26:27:06 - 00:26:40:03 Tod And the people like people like so many people like, try and create the perfect meal. And it's like, life's not perfect, but, you know, you kind of have the perfect meal. Not with food. You have the perfect meal with company, and you can have a bowl of cereal. 00:26:40:07 - 00:26:40:15 Dan Pope Yes. 00:26:40:15 - 00:26:48:13 Tod You're like, if I'm, you know, if I haven't seen my parents for six months, I can sit around a table and I have a bowl of rice, Rice Krispies, and it will be the best meal, by the way. 00:26:48:14 - 00:26:49:15 Dan Pope Yeah. I mean, yeah, one. 00:26:49:15 - 00:26:55:00 Dan Pope Hundred percent, but yeah. So I was talking about food or thinking about food the other day. 00:26:55:02 - 00:26:57:21 Dan Pope Who's speaking to 00:26:57:23 - 00:27:14:04 Dan Pope Like also just like the whole, like, supply chain of food, you know, you know, I was speaking to the, you know, Gail's the coffee, like. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Spencer founded Gail's on the podcast that we're talking all about the supply chain of food and actually just the role of food in general. Yeah. And it's like it's like, yeah. 00:27:14:06 - 00:27:16:02 Dan Pope You. Would you ever watch Bourdain March? 00:27:16:02 - 00:27:19:19 Tod Anthony Bourdain yeah, I've I've been watching that much. But I obviously. 00:27:19:19 - 00:27:20:19 Dan Pope Know. Well he's. 00:27:20:21 - 00:27:21:19 Dan Pope He's he's he's. 00:27:21:24 - 00:27:35:02 Dan Pope Yeah he's a genius. Like he, he would he was the only guy he could sit with Barack Obama and like a Vietnamese chef when they have a boat like you've been there. But not that one video made me realize that, like, food. 00:27:35:02 - 00:27:35:16 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:27:35:18 - 00:27:56:18 Dan Pope Is literally at the center of everything. So any political negotiation that's going on right now, food to celebrate anyone who's dying at a funeral like you can have some food like this. Food is like, literally is. And I don't mean sorry, not food in terms of like actually just for, like, sustenance and like staying alive. I mean, I mean, meals actually is a better way to say, not like just a fucking carrot. 00:27:56:18 - 00:28:16:20 Dan Pope I mean, like a nice lasagna. Yeah. Our wedding is at a, like a funeral. Is that, you know, a G8 summit? They're gonna. Adam handling cooked for the G8 summit right now in Cornwall. And I know this food is like the fucking linchpin of everything, and it just all comes out of this creativeness. Yeah, creativity that we just don't really get in anything, any other part of our lives. 00:28:16:20 - 00:28:24:02 Dan Pope Like, I know you know Stuart Black bear burger. Yeah, absolutely. Like I've loved that guy so much. And it's like it's like you eat his his spring roll. 00:28:24:03 - 00:28:26:10 Dan Pope Brisket spring roll things. Yeah. 00:28:26:10 - 00:28:27:22 Dan Pope And then you get a little bit of chili. 00:28:27:23 - 00:28:29:09 Tod Yeah. And your brain just starts to melt. 00:28:29:09 - 00:28:33:03 Dan Pope A little bit. Oh, me. Oh. Is it okay to start from. Yeah. 00:28:33:05 - 00:28:50:06 Dan Pope But it's like that now I get the same sort of feeling of excitement when you're eating that. It's like, fuck. And I think what you're doing is sharing that, sharing that with that world and that, that and the enchantment. So yeah. So so and so we talked about so the first pair sort of fun. Yeah. To keep and I suppose if you having fun just going to keep going. 00:28:50:06 - 00:28:52:18 Dan Pope Yeah. Because I'm off the bat or staying in the game. Yeah. 00:28:52:18 - 00:29:08:16 Tod Completely. So yeah the main thing is to to have fun, to be yourself. Like that's the main thing. Like you can really try and copy what other people are doing that be like disingenuous and do all that kind of thing. But it doesn't really work. Like you just get found out on like John, I mean, like you better off just. 00:29:08:18 - 00:29:15:10 Tod Yeah, just being yourself. Like in in life. Like, I would like to crack a joke with my mates to carry out like. 00:29:15:12 - 00:29:18:15 Dan Pope But to go get swimming trunks. Totally. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. 00:29:18:17 - 00:29:39:17 Tod Yeah. So. Yeah, just be yourself. I think the second thing is probably to be consistent, like if you're going to post one day a week, five days a week, like kind of be consistent, like people want to know on a Wednesday if you're going to post or not. And I think that like the reason why I post every single day last year is because, again, from Gordon Ramsay, like, he like it was like, you need to be humble every single day. 00:29:39:17 - 00:29:41:07 Tod You need to be in someone's mind. 00:29:41:09 - 00:29:42:24 Dan Pope Gordon Ramsay taught you that. Yeah. 00:29:42:24 - 00:29:56:17 Tod Well, and so I was on the podcast, I think or you know, and then you talked about like the social media presence and just always being there, like, does it have to be very long but just be that. So that's kind of like last year where I was like, right. Absolutely. Just try and go for this. 00:29:56:17 - 00:30:06:24 Dan Pope And so talk me through last year because I think we said as well, like, you know, there's the consistency is really up. Yeah. The thing is the amount of times you don't want to do it or like show up, I think it's half. It's showing up. 00:30:06:24 - 00:30:07:13 Tod Completely. 00:30:07:16 - 00:30:14:11 Dan Pope And I think you said like, you know, if you go on to like, oh, it's gone to fabric the next day, you've got to go and stuff your face with some wings. 00:30:14:13 - 00:30:15:09 Dan Pope Like, you know, yeah. 00:30:15:09 - 00:30:16:06 Tod What is going on here. 00:30:16:06 - 00:30:24:01 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like it's a wig. Yeah. What is that talk me through to me through the sort of the the. 00:30:24:03 - 00:30:32:03 Dan Pope The grit and the graft of consistency. And like any stories of fun you've had to get out. Yeah, I'm just saying I've got to go to a restaurant tonight. 00:30:32:07 - 00:30:33:16 Tod Yeah, yeah. Completely like that. 00:30:33:20 - 00:30:33:23 Dan Pope On. 00:30:34:01 - 00:30:35:02 Dan Pope Sunday because they. Look, I'm. 00:30:35:02 - 00:30:39:16 Dan Pope Fucking hungry now talking about what? But yeah. 00:30:39:19 - 00:30:42:23 Tod So yes, like I said, consistency with anything in life is is always okay. 00:30:42:23 - 00:30:43:13 Dan Pope That's okay. 00:30:43:13 - 00:30:54:12 Tod You can't just go and do a video, get a million views once and then expect to grow a million followers. And I kind of thought that at the start, but and I used to I used to beat myself up and I used to get really pissed off. 00:30:54:12 - 00:30:54:23 Dan Pope With what? 00:30:55:02 - 00:31:12:04 Tod Because you'd get a video and, you know, you think it's a really good video and then it would get like 50,000 views and then you grow 50 followers and you're like, oh, come on, I like 100,000 people or 50,000 people in this video. Like more people followed me. Like, and you can really get into like, oh yeah, dark places with that. 00:31:12:05 - 00:31:15:08 Dan Pope What isn't in terms of like sort of maniacally looking at the views. 00:31:15:09 - 00:31:15:17 Tod Yeah. 00:31:15:17 - 00:31:17:01 Dan Pope Looking at views, looking at you. 00:31:17:06 - 00:31:18:14 Dan Pope Sam, is this. 00:31:18:16 - 00:31:19:02 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:31:19:04 - 00:31:20:24 Dan Pope Oh that's a really cut up. 00:31:21:03 - 00:31:28:03 Tod No it's cool. No it's not a good what we talked about I've looked at the food and. Yeah. 00:31:28:08 - 00:31:29:20 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. No no no. Let me just get 00:31:30:01 - 00:31:35:24 Dan Pope It's sweet. Fuck me. Touching me before. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:31:35:24 - 00:31:37:24 Dan Pope I've never been here that much. Mushroom. 00:31:37:24 - 00:31:40:06 Dan Pope Oh my God, I ain't. I haven't. 00:31:40:06 - 00:31:42:09 Dan Pope Eaten yet. All that delicious. 00:31:42:11 - 00:31:44:20 Dan Pope Do we need some? Have we got napkins running? 00:31:46:20 - 00:31:47:06 Dan Pope So you've been to. 00:31:47:06 - 00:31:48:09 Dan Pope This place before for catch? 00:31:48:15 - 00:31:50:14 Tod Yeah, yeah. If I catch a man. 00:31:50:16 - 00:31:53:21 Dan Pope Oh, yeah. I'm starving. I'm crying. 00:31:53:23 - 00:31:56:21 Dan Pope I should have napkins. Napkins? 00:31:56:23 - 00:31:59:13 Tod I guess. What? What were we talking. 00:31:59:15 - 00:32:00:12 Dan Pope Consistency. 00:32:00:12 - 00:32:03:16 Dan Pope And I did it with, you know, actually at the Devon show. 00:32:03:17 - 00:32:04:08 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. 00:32:04:08 - 00:32:19:07 Dan Pope So we did the Devon show the other day, and I ended up eating. I was doing the podcast with him, and we had found the food while also doing the podcast, and I was like, this is, this is fast because I was wanting to eat the food. So that's just it. We can like sort of. 00:32:19:07 - 00:32:21:01 Dan Pope Yeah. These are from focaccia. Mia. 00:32:21:03 - 00:32:23:08 Dan Pope Oh, no. Okay, good. 00:32:23:10 - 00:32:31:07 Tod That is fucking good. I just I had these, like, a year ago. I think I was, like, one of the first people to go there and. 00:32:31:09 - 00:32:34:23 Dan Pope Talk some some of them. 00:32:35:00 - 00:32:37:16 Tod Yeah. And they were really good then. But these were even. 00:32:37:18 - 00:32:50:20 Dan Pope These were even better. Why are these guys based. You've been Good question. I can't remember. 00:32:50:22 - 00:33:03:19 Tod I think it's like Shoreditch way. That's a problem because you go to some places people like you do, you don't forget about it, but it's hot. Yeah. Directions. I've got no chance. What these. 00:33:03:21 - 00:33:07:12 Dan Pope Fucking hell. 00:33:10:05 - 00:33:12:12 Tod That is fucking naughty things. 00:33:12:12 - 00:33:14:20 Dan Pope Doesn't. Oh. 7000. 00:33:14:20 - 00:33:20:20 Tod Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is like a truffle carbonara. 00:33:24:14 - 00:33:35:00 Dan Pope That. It's so, you know, I haven't eaten all day. 00:33:42:23 - 00:33:55:04 Dan Pope I'm actually taking my time to enjoy it with, with, ash, I'm was trying to do the podcast off of eating. Obviously the. 00:33:55:04 - 00:34:00:03 Dan Pope Steak. They're so good. Yeah, I, I just had some draws. I mean, it's just fucking. 00:34:00:04 - 00:34:03:19 Dan Pope Yeah. And then. 00:34:03:21 - 00:34:11:17 Dan Pope Not so to enjoy it, but I'm not eating more now. I'll try some of that one over. 00:34:11:17 - 00:34:14:11 Tod Well, like truffle mac and cheese balls. 00:34:14:13 - 00:34:15:10 Dan Pope Beautiful. 00:34:15:12 - 00:34:16:14 Dan Pope Yeah. There's loads of munch out. 00:34:16:15 - 00:34:18:18 Dan Pope There, so. 00:34:18:20 - 00:34:20:24 Dan Pope Yes. When did you first go there? She went there about a year ago. 00:34:21:04 - 00:34:41:17 Tod Yeah. So went there about a year ago. And it was like the thing that fascinated me about Kashmir were that their mum is in the kitchen and she's making like the catch your breath, the meatballs. So it's all like, I've done those recipes basically. So that was like the hook that was like, oh my God, that's wicked like and went down there and couldn't believe it. 00:34:41:17 - 00:34:47:15 Tod But it's really like when you could just got into this thing. I did a lot of like catering events before. 00:34:47:17 - 00:34:49:08 Dan Pope Like, 00:34:49:10 - 00:35:02:02 Tod And then they just started like selling sandwiches outside the shop an instant sorry, instant. It just went bang. Like it was just. Yeah, but I mean, there isn't actually that many, like, really good sandwiches in London. 00:35:02:04 - 00:35:06:02 Dan Pope But what would you say is some of the best sarnies in London then? 00:35:06:04 - 00:35:09:00 Tod The best one, without a doubt, is Chatsworth Bakehouse. 00:35:09:02 - 00:35:10:14 Dan Pope Which I've never been. 00:35:10:19 - 00:35:11:24 Dan Pope Where is that? It's in. 00:35:11:24 - 00:35:40:09 Tod I think it's like towards like Crystal Palace way. Chatsworth on Chatsworth Road. Yeah. Not that that's very helpful. But yeah, it's. Yeah. To people who, literally like working a day job during the day and then running this bakery like basically by night. And they would release one sandwich a week, the filling each week, and it would sell out within, like a minute, like it's mental and it's just like, the best, the best sandwich I've ever had. 00:35:40:11 - 00:35:41:23 Dan Pope What I'm. What Sonic did you have from there? 00:35:42:03 - 00:35:51:21 Tod It had like, loads of, like, Italian meats in it. So had like, I don't know, salami, mortadella. I had a really nice cheese. And then they finished like a honey drizzle. 00:35:52:01 - 00:35:52:16 Dan Pope Oh yeah. 00:35:52:19 - 00:36:05:23 Tod Like and a nice little vinaigrette on the, on the salad. But it was on it like it was just so good. It was the first time I had like proper focaccia bread that just tasted oily, pillowy like it had depth. It was just. 00:36:06:00 - 00:36:08:01 Dan Pope Deep into the Max's sandwich place. 00:36:08:03 - 00:36:09:14 Tod Max is Max's. 00:36:09:14 - 00:36:10:16 Dan Pope Yeah. In Crouch End. 00:36:10:16 - 00:36:11:16 Tod Yeah. His is amazing to me. 00:36:11:16 - 00:36:28:17 Dan Pope Because he talks about I can never say it for I would say focaccia for Kashia things. But there is something I think that's the best bread to have a sandwich on 100%. Like it's just that that and also I actually think salad I was pretty won't have to have sandwiches on. 00:36:28:17 - 00:36:29:08 Tod Yeah great. 00:36:29:08 - 00:36:31:20 Dan Pope I think it's good to have butter when you're starting a meal. 00:36:31:23 - 00:36:32:18 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, I. 00:36:32:20 - 00:36:35:04 Dan Pope Actually like have it as a song. It's two. It's two. 00:36:35:04 - 00:36:42:15 Tod Yeah. You need, you need them sheets. You need those like that. All that bread to just slurp up all the moisture, all the everything that goes into the sandwich. 00:36:42:15 - 00:36:45:07 Dan Pope I've just had that with these cuts. Yeah. How do you say. 00:36:45:07 - 00:36:47:10 Tod It for the cat? Yeah. No, no. You. 00:36:47:12 - 00:36:50:01 Dan Pope Restaurant is focaccia. 00:36:50:03 - 00:36:50:17 Tod Catch you, Mia. 00:36:50:20 - 00:36:52:05 Dan Pope If I catch you. Maybe that was it. 00:36:52:05 - 00:36:56:20 Dan Pope Yeah. It's obviously got all the chimichurri that's just melting in. It's like it's a good vehicle to soak up things. 00:36:56:20 - 00:36:57:18 Tod Yeah, it's exactly what it is. 00:36:57:19 - 00:37:01:23 Dan Pope But then also with the bacon sarnie, I think. What's your favorite bread to have a bacon sandwich. 00:37:02:00 - 00:37:04:14 Tod Literally just straight up white bread. 00:37:04:14 - 00:37:05:06 Dan Pope Yes. Well yeah. 00:37:05:06 - 00:37:06:20 Tod So fuck loads of butter. 00:37:06:20 - 00:37:09:15 Dan Pope I so I like, you know, those soft floury baps. 00:37:09:17 - 00:37:12:05 Dan Pope Oh yeah. That's good. Yeah. So flattery that if. 00:37:12:05 - 00:37:13:01 Tod You're hung over that's. Yeah. 00:37:13:01 - 00:37:13:21 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah. 00:37:13:23 - 00:37:33:23 Dan Pope Any real extra crispy bacon. It's so good. Yeah. So. Right. So we are saying. Yeah. Right. But back to these pillars of simplifying the complexity of building on socials. So you've got have fun. Be consistent. What else like because me I could line up you know 100 wannabe bloggers outside right. Yeah. Not everyone's going to get to what I don't. 00:37:33:23 - 00:37:37:20 Dan Pope It's 1.5 million. Like what were you doing 1.70 there you go. 00:37:37:24 - 00:37:41:13 Dan Pope So people have not. 00:37:41:15 - 00:37:50:16 Dan Pope I'm not talking. This comes at me but the at what would you. Yeah. So what would you do differently. Because you know as we've said the farm we've said the consistency. 00:37:50:18 - 00:38:09:24 Tod Again like I mean the spots that you find obviously like you can't read like Polish. It's hard that much like so you've got to be showing good food with good stories and good places. So like, you know, I always look at a story of a restaurant, you know, who's working there, like is the, you know, it's the mum, the granddad, the grandma still working in the kitchen. 00:38:09:24 - 00:38:18:12 Tod Great. Like amazing. Like she will have loads of stories. Like she's worked there for 50 years. And normally a restaurant from around 50 years normally is pretty fucking good. 00:38:18:17 - 00:38:20:16 Dan Pope Yes. Yeah. But yeah like. 00:38:20:22 - 00:38:37:19 Tod Because times are tough and restaurants all shot. Yeah. And I think you finding that a bit more these days is like, it's actually really hard for a new restaurant to stay open if they're buying a fridge. Like, you always have to think of things and do and do things a bit differently. Now, I don't think it's like it probably was ten years ago. 00:38:37:20 - 00:38:40:19 Dan Pope What are some of those are underrated? 00:38:40:21 - 00:39:03:09 Dan Pope Like restaurants or like. Yeah, because I think that's what I love about London is it is more than anyway, it's such a melting pot of different cultures and then obviously cuisines. Yeah. Is that you're just basically getting these atoms colliding of stories and just rich histories and stuff, like, what are some of the wildest stories of some of the places you've been, that spring to mind? 00:39:03:11 - 00:39:05:00 Tod Wildest stories? 00:39:05:00 - 00:39:16:00 Tod but I know that there's, you know, places like you have, like Terry's. Sorry, Terry's cafe in, like, in bar market, like, you know, that has been there for, you know, probably eight years. 00:39:16:00 - 00:39:16:21 Dan Pope That is in Boro's. 00:39:16:22 - 00:39:19:03 Tod Market, but it's just next to bum bum. 00:39:19:05 - 00:39:20:08 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. 00:39:20:10 - 00:39:24:17 Tod And Austin now runs it. Now who is Terry Sutton. 00:39:24:19 - 00:39:25:04 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:39:25:04 - 00:39:44:19 Tod But that like the concept of that cafe started because it was close to Smithfield Market so he could go and get his meat and he would get all the meat from, from the market. He bring it back and he set up this like cafe to, to sell like this amazing produce from and I, you know like things like that is what London's kind of all about. 00:39:44:19 - 00:39:54:00 Tod Like it's, you know, it's focused on local ingredients, great produce and, and amazing people to go enjoy that way. 00:39:54:02 - 00:40:01:05 Dan Pope How important is London to eating with Tod and the like. Could you do this elsewhere or how important is this city for you? 00:40:01:07 - 00:40:24:18 Tod I think it's yeah, I think, you know, when I had a million followers, then I think 80% of people were from the UK and 25% from London. But again, London like is great because everything is here. Like, you know, you go to Paris, you go to, what are the other European cities. 00:40:24:20 - 00:40:24:24 Dan Pope For. 00:40:24:24 - 00:40:25:12 Tod The past? 00:40:25:12 - 00:40:27:01 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:40:27:03 - 00:40:42:17 Tod And they're all great. But you know, you can come eat the food from, you know, Portuguese food in Lisbon for a day. How many videos you can get out there? It's probably not. You know, you can probably get like ten, 15, 20 videos, but it's just the same stuff that repeat this. 00:40:42:18 - 00:41:04:07 Dan Pope What's crazy is, like London's busy. I was thinking about the other days, I've sort of made these move out to Dubai. Yeah, it's been fuck all tax. Right. Well, yeah. The city. And didn't you know it was one of those wet days and anything at all, you know, it's just a bit of a slog. Yeah. But then I see that all the time just looking at the news of a sort of morbid and bleak stuff. 00:41:04:09 - 00:41:20:19 Dan Pope Yeah. Then also thinking to watch, actually. Yeah. But, like, for what I want to do is a podcast meet the most Amazing chefs restaurateurs found. Yeah, yeah. London is the best city world in the world for like this. Like and actually mine was more my background was more brand like starting actual brands. They're all based in London. 00:41:20:19 - 00:41:25:15 Dan Pope Like people that people in Oz look at this city and saying, I wish, obviously you might have New York and you can just. 00:41:25:18 - 00:41:26:20 Dan Pope Just yeah, yeah. 00:41:26:22 - 00:41:33:11 Dan Pope The sex. But I do think it's like obviously it's a bit grim, but like the food you get here, mate, is just wild. 00:41:33:11 - 00:41:33:23 Tod It's mental. 00:41:33:23 - 00:41:35:00 Dan Pope Like it's so good. 00:41:35:00 - 00:41:56:18 Tod You know, some like some of, like the, the Indian and Pakistani places in north London are just like incredible. And then you go to like South London, you go to Brixham where you know, like you've got, you know, more like Caribbean influence, which is again is just incredible. I remember, you know, I got onto the train on the train at Brixton once and some woman just come up to me, she's like. 00:41:56:18 - 00:42:01:16 Dan Pope Da da da da. There's a woman selling Caribbean food out of her back garden. You've got to. 00:42:01:16 - 00:42:04:16 Tod Go. And I was like, fuck it, I'm going. 00:42:04:16 - 00:42:08:00 Dan Pope So literally like, yeah, I think I've seen that video. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So like. 00:42:08:00 - 00:42:26:02 Tod I didn't even know anything about this place. And I turned around from where I was meant to be going. Got off the tube station, got Brixton, and then literally went into this woman's kitchen and just kind of like straight into her back garden. And there's just these big pans where they're like fried chicken doing all this stuff, like going into a kitchen. 00:42:26:04 - 00:42:28:19 Tod Yeah. Oh my God, this is wild. 00:42:28:19 - 00:42:30:07 Dan Pope Like, this is crazy. 00:42:30:11 - 00:42:32:00 Dan Pope You could only get that in London as well. 00:42:32:00 - 00:42:34:19 Tod Yeah. Literally. Like there's, there's nowhere else. 00:42:34:19 - 00:42:41:08 Dan Pope And so. So you've been to New York you just to Mexico City. Yeah. You've just been you're in Singapore last year. 00:42:41:10 - 00:42:42:01 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:42:42:03 - 00:42:58:24 Dan Pope Like you've been in these massive cities. Yeah. Describe how each one's different with their approach to food. Do you think a night in terms of like yeah. Like in terms of their approach to food, how it how important food is in their culture and different restaurants and stuff? I think sick what we got here, mate. 00:42:59:01 - 00:43:00:18 Dan Pope Oh I'm fucking I'm now I'm, I'm. 00:43:00:18 - 00:43:03:19 Dan Pope On the food train voice and keep feeding me boy. Yeah. 00:43:03:21 - 00:43:04:19 Tod Yeah. So I. 00:43:04:19 - 00:43:06:01 Dan Pope Think. 00:43:06:03 - 00:43:12:00 Tod Obviously food is a massive important importance in every single culture and every single city. Like everyone gets together with food. 00:43:12:02 - 00:43:22:07 Dan Pope Yeah. What is this extract from no know what is going to see your body? Yeah. What this. 00:43:22:09 - 00:43:23:09 Tod Oh, yeah. Them hash browns. 00:43:23:09 - 00:43:26:12 Dan Pope I know you have this before this, like. 00:43:26:12 - 00:43:31:02 Tod A pot of juice. What the fuck is that way? 00:43:31:04 - 00:43:32:07 Dan Pope So is this the gap? 00:43:32:13 - 00:43:36:22 Dan Pope Yeah. Well, it's. We get a knife, some people and everyone can get involved. Otherwise, I just. 00:43:36:24 - 00:43:39:02 Dan Pope Got an egg in a cup 00:43:39:02 - 00:43:43:23 Dan Pope Was that. Let's go on. I cannot make. 00:43:44:01 - 00:43:51:07 Dan Pope All this up then you just going to have fucking the ultimate one. These are got. 00:43:51:08 - 00:43:55:08 Tod A lot bigger that's been there since this egg. 00:43:55:08 - 00:44:01:15 Dan Pope Guy. This is from I don't know. Yeah. 00:44:01:15 - 00:44:03:22 Tod That was like when I was at my thing I think. 00:44:03:24 - 00:44:06:00 Dan Pope We got big. 00:44:06:02 - 00:44:08:02 Tod Well they're always massive in America. And then they came over. 00:44:08:05 - 00:44:11:09 Dan Pope So I just I just go like how should I do this. Just down the middle. Yeah. 00:44:11:09 - 00:44:13:23 Dan Pope Yeah. So sorry. The different cities right. Yeah. 00:44:14:00 - 00:44:22:17 Tod Just different cities. Oh yeah. So I guess like food in every culture is just so important. Like it doesn't matter whether you're in Vietnam or whether. 00:44:22:22 - 00:44:25:15 Dan Pope Within just 00:44:25:15 - 00:44:44:02 Tod doesn't matter whether you're in Thailand, whether you're in New York, whether you know, you're in your mum's backyard and like, food is so important to to all these cultures. Yeah. Everyone loves to go and eat. I think like in Singapore is pretty crazy because everyone goes to eat out like you have these hawker stalls and it's cheap. 00:44:44:04 - 00:44:45:07 Tod They're like. 00:44:45:09 - 00:44:46:04 Dan Pope It's like a. 00:44:46:06 - 00:45:02:09 Tod The basically like a food market. But everywhere is like a, it's like a pop up stand. So you know that people are just going, they're setting up and you just get the most incredibly, like tasty food, which is so cheap, like some of the hawker stalls are even out. 00:45:02:13 - 00:45:03:14 Dan Pope Make the food. 00:45:03:16 - 00:45:10:22 Tod Like you can get Michelin star meal for like £4. Like some of them have got a michelin star, which is just mad. 00:45:11:15 - 00:45:30:17 Tod And yeah, you can, you can eat there for four. Couldn't get like duck rice, soy sauce with some vegetables or something and it's awesome. But yeah in Singapore people like a lot of people eat out because it's like I said, it's cheaper to eat out in some of these places, but it's to cook at home. And people say that Singapore is so expensive and don't be wrong, it is expensive. 00:45:30:18 - 00:45:43:13 Tod You if you go to if you go to expensive places, it's really expensive. But it's just crazy to see the diversity between the, you know, the street food and the expensive food. 00:45:43:15 - 00:45:54:13 Dan Pope What about, New York? I'm, So good. This is the beef. I mean. 00:45:54:15 - 00:45:56:15 Tod You don't even know where to start with your collection. 00:45:56:17 - 00:46:00:02 Dan Pope You want someone that might not know what for? 00:46:00:04 - 00:46:20:14 Tod Yeah, yeah. New York's just like, why do you even start the New York? Like, you get out, you get off the fly and or you and you get into New York and you just surrounded by these, like, huge buildings and these, like, long roads that you can just see their best with. But the food, they're like, everything's just on steroids. 00:46:20:18 - 00:46:23:24 Tod So, you know, remember when I went for my first New York bagel 00:46:23:24 - 00:46:26:08 Tod So I went to the place that was called Tompkins Bagel. 00:46:26:10 - 00:46:28:21 Dan Pope Right? And. 00:46:28:23 - 00:46:49:24 Tod Like, you just walk in, and just the energy in this bagel shop is like, just mad. Like you feel it, like you walk through the door and you just get this buzz of this line of people, like, fucking buzzing about to have this bagel. Yeah. All the staff, like, they're the pumps. Like they know that their bagels are really good and they want to be the best. 00:46:50:01 - 00:46:52:08 Tod And like, you just get. And then the bagel comes. 00:46:52:08 - 00:46:53:14 Dan Pope To my face with these things. 00:46:53:16 - 00:46:54:02 Dan Pope These are just. 00:46:54:03 - 00:46:54:17 Dan Pope Outrageous. 00:46:54:17 - 00:46:55:10 Dan Pope Me yeah. Yeah. On. 00:46:55:15 - 00:47:01:08 Tod Yeah. And the bagel comes and you open it up and you're just like, what the fuck is this? It's like, it's like a UFO. 00:47:01:10 - 00:47:01:17 Dan Pope Right? 00:47:01:20 - 00:47:20:19 Tod Like the the bagel is that big, which, you know, in the UK, you get a bagel, you're like, yes, I don't know, like, it's as big as your fist. This thing's like as big as, like three fists. Like it's so big and like, I was just like that. I mean, it was amazing, but what do you have, 20 pounds. 00:47:20:19 - 00:47:21:22 Tod 20 pounds for a bagel? 00:47:21:22 - 00:47:24:10 Dan Pope Yeah. That's creative. Crazy. What did you have in the bagel? 00:47:24:12 - 00:47:36:03 Tod Bacon egg. Catch up. Bacon, egg. Ketchup. Cheese loads. It had loads of which. And that basically. I mean, it was so good. 00:47:36:03 - 00:47:37:09 Dan Pope Really? Yeah. So. 00:47:37:09 - 00:47:47:14 Dan Pope And then so what you other places in New York do you have you what's a pizza that's really famous? I mean it's a stupid question because there's loads of famous but there's the one. 00:47:47:16 - 00:47:50:07 Dan Pope Mummies two and a really thin woman. 00:47:50:09 - 00:47:54:06 Dan Pope Oh, looks like a bit of a donkey. Who's this like. 00:47:54:06 - 00:47:55:09 Dan Pope Me? 00:47:55:11 - 00:47:59:16 Tod Well, I don't know. I went, I went to Joe's Pizza, which is like a famous slice shop. 00:47:59:19 - 00:48:00:11 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:48:00:13 - 00:48:18:12 Tod So that was my first slice. No, no, your pizza, which I actually thought was pretty bang average for this. Everyone talks about Neil new pizza and say it's like, oh, it's amazing. Like New York pizza. It's a home to pizza. Like. And then you go to crisp and crisp and London is like legit the best pizza I of that. 00:48:18:15 - 00:48:18:24 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:48:19:01 - 00:48:19:11 Tod Like it's. 00:48:19:11 - 00:48:19:20 Dan Pope Amazing. 00:48:19:20 - 00:48:36:05 Tod Yeah it's ridiculous. But I don't like the it's the culture in America and in New York and in Texas, which really I just find it's amazing. And that's what I'd say that Britain doesn't compete on win. 00:48:36:07 - 00:48:36:19 Dan Pope How so? 00:48:36:19 - 00:49:01:15 Tod So. And the fact that, you know, all these neighborhood spots, like the fact that, you know, you've got this grandma running this Italian shop like, Italian sandwich shop and she's been doing it for the last 100 years. There's like 100 of those in America. Whereas you come to like London and you come to the UK and you might have ten, like, so there's all these stories are just so much longer, like in America and in New York, especially because. 00:49:01:17 - 00:49:09:07 Dan Pope You've got crazy, bizarre history is much longer than theirs in general on that country's only a couple hundred years old. Yeah, but their food. 00:49:09:09 - 00:49:32:04 Tod Yeah, I think they just got very like, involved in that, in that scene. No, not necessarily. Maybe earlier, but, you know, everything's on steroids over there, like everything's about a religion and everyone's so passionate about it and they will shout about it. So, you know, like if you go down the street in America, you might have like three different sandwich shops that have all been there for for an incredibly long time. 00:49:32:04 - 00:49:37:02 Tod And each sandwich is, is literally as big as your your forearm. And just to look at you like. 00:49:37:03 - 00:49:41:16 Dan Pope Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah get involved in that. Yeah. 00:49:41:22 - 00:50:00:18 Tod So I don't know like like I said, when you look at like American logos compared to the UK logos, they've just got so many places to go. Like so many like you've got the whole of America. I mean, that's your audience where is, you know in the UK you've, you've got London, you've got people that are going to visit London, Rome. 00:50:00:20 - 00:50:05:03 Tod But when you compare comparing America to the UK, right. It's just so much bigger. So much more. 00:50:05:05 - 00:50:09:17 Dan Pope Would you say the actual what would you say dish for dish is better. 00:50:09:19 - 00:50:20:02 Tod So my favorite thing I in America I bloody love cats like people Redfin's cats I say like £35 for a sandwich. It's ridiculous. 00:50:20:04 - 00:50:24:20 Dan Pope For listeners. That's a big famous New York pastrami like, sign. It's any place isn't it. 00:50:24:20 - 00:50:47:17 Tod Yeah. Castelli. It's been there for like hundred and 20 years. Still family owned. And you walk into it and like, oh, like there's just this counter of, people that have just got, oh, workers of, like, armed with a knife, just cutting this, this pastrami. And, like, there must be ten, 15 of them in perfect sync. It's like they're literally lined up to be in the army. 00:50:47:22 - 00:50:48:14 Tod Yeah. Like. 00:50:48:14 - 00:50:49:18 Dan Pope Yeah. Just like sawing. 00:50:49:18 - 00:51:11:23 Tod Into this meat. Yeah, yeah. You pay them like, 10 pound extra and then you get and then as a tip and then they'll give you like a free sample, which is like just mental, like it's not Wagyu Joe. I mean, but yeah, but you do it and it feels great. But I mean that that for me was like a highlight just to go in there, just sit there and see and just like soak in all the history that's been in that place. 00:51:12:02 - 00:51:23:22 Tod Yeah. Like it's it's matte but like I said, I think when it comes to, New York food versus London food, I don't know, like they're probably like on the same part, like in terms of. 00:51:24:01 - 00:51:30:05 Dan Pope Well, yeah, I think London in terms of Europe, as you say you can. I went to spend a lot of time in Lisbon because my mate lived out there. 00:51:31:01 - 00:51:37:00 Dan Pope And it's like you can whittle through the best restaurants in two days and then you're out. Whereas Leeds within, there's always something new. 00:51:37:00 - 00:51:43:07 Tod Yeah, like my restaurant list. I'm not joking. Is like five pages of notes long. Like it's so long. 00:51:43:08 - 00:51:48:13 Dan Pope I else is on the list at the minute. On these. I'm going to stuff my face with these mates. Okay, now. 00:51:48:15 - 00:52:00:04 Tod Let's have a look. Showing on this, because whenever you see something, I just write down and then I've got my list of ideas, and then they might get deleted in in a week's time or whatever. 00:52:00:06 - 00:52:06:13 Dan Pope Went away on them. 00:52:06:15 - 00:52:11:02 Tod Okay. So last one I put on my list was a place called Unruly Pig. 00:52:11:04 - 00:52:17:24 Dan Pope Oh my God, mate, he's been on my podcast. Really? Random. Yeah. Now I'm going to show you up with that if you want. Yes, mate. 00:52:18:01 - 00:52:19:08 Dan Pope So I did a podcast with that man. 00:52:19:13 - 00:52:20:11 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:52:20:13 - 00:52:23:09 Dan Pope And, just got voted the best pub in the UK. 00:52:23:13 - 00:52:23:18 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:52:23:19 - 00:52:24:24 Dan Pope Last three years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:52:24:24 - 00:52:26:06 Tod I saw that. Yeah. 00:52:26:08 - 00:52:32:22 Dan Pope So I got that through podcast and got there at 12 to start at like 1230. 00:52:32:24 - 00:52:33:13 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:52:33:15 - 00:52:37:09 Dan Pope And I got on the go. Oh there's your table has you and Brendan have got a table. 00:52:38:05 - 00:52:52:16 Dan Pope And I was like, oh, just expecting us to like do that's where we're going to record the podcast anyway. Brendan comes down. He's is larger than life character in terms of just what I think in terms of doing a podcast site. Every you've got a restaurant. He could be a crazy motherfucker because it's so hard. 00:52:52:17 - 00:52:53:19 Tod Yeah, yeah, it's so hot. 00:52:53:19 - 00:52:54:20 Dan Pope He's had the V8 stuff. 00:52:55:00 - 00:52:55:08 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:52:55:12 - 00:53:04:18 Dan Pope And he comes down this big sort of garrulous character and it's anyway, long story longer, we have a five hour lunch. 00:53:04:20 - 00:53:05:11 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:53:05:13 - 00:53:15:01 Dan Pope We're just having, like, every single dish. And then he's like, you know, we've now got to do a podcast. So we did a podcast for 2.5 hours. Oh, it's got I can talk. Right. 00:53:16:03 - 00:53:35:11 Dan Pope And then afterwards he was like, oh, by the way, it's late, like, just have dinner here. But the food is insane. But he's, you know, he came from, like, no hospitality background at all. Was a lawyer. That's mad. Just loved restaurants, just love restaurants. And then he opened it. And then now he's. It got voted the best pub. 00:53:35:11 - 00:53:49:05 Tod Yeah, but I thought it was like the best pub in the UK last three years and then like, the best roast. And then I saw that he does this like showing style roast and I was like, that looks legit. And then I looked at where, where it wasn't and it was fucking miles away. 00:53:49:07 - 00:53:49:16 Dan Pope Not, not. 00:53:49:16 - 00:54:05:07 Tod At for like 2.5 hours. But for me it's like Sunday's as well. Sunday's Sunday's is always roast day, but because I'm out with my mates at the weekend, now that I'm doing this full time, I try and have weekends off, even though that doesn't really happen. 00:54:05:07 - 00:54:07:00 Dan Pope But I try to. 00:54:07:02 - 00:54:10:11 Dan Pope So when you. So yes, let's go back to, as I say, a little jump round with this. 00:54:10:11 - 00:54:10:20 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:54:10:20 - 00:54:14:00 Dan Pope So let's go back to how you I want to go back into the business side of things. 00:54:14:00 - 00:54:14:15 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:54:14:17 - 00:54:29:01 Dan Pope Because I think that's, as you say, as you can, you can build a following with, you know, a couple of million people, but, like, you may not make make no money off it. And, you know, an equally like, you may have a following with 5000 people making a small fortune off it, right? 00:54:29:01 - 00:54:29:19 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, completely. 00:54:29:19 - 00:54:44:15 Dan Pope Like, how did you begin to, like, taught me about some of the, the biggest mistakes you've made getting turning this into like a big business because it is a big, like one man business like you do. There's no two ways about it. But you're doing incredibly well. Like, you should be, like, incredibly proud of yourself, but like what? 00:54:44:15 - 00:55:04:08 Dan Pope How did you get that off the ground? How did you. I love the Jay-Z quote, which is like, I'm not a businessman. Yeah, I'm a I'm a business man. And it's like you, I think it's important to think of yourself as a business. Yeah, because otherwise you can get pulled into, we won't talk about this, but like the cool we've got after this with the deal, it's like, yeah, yeah. 00:55:04:10 - 00:55:09:23 Dan Pope You know, there's there's a lot of hustlers, all this shit we've talked about with the food stuff. There's all the business side as well. So let's talk about that. 00:55:09:24 - 00:55:10:18 Dan Pope Yeah. 00:55:10:20 - 00:55:46:13 Tod Yeah. I mean yeah, there's definitely there's a lot of hustle bustle and I mean for me, like the money has always been secondary. Like of course the main, the main focus of today is to help these independent brands try and grow as much as they can. Like that's always been. And again, like you asked me earlier about, you know, how you know how how did you, how did you like, have the motivation to carry on doing this with when you're working a full time job and like when you get a message from, you know, this family who is on their ass and like their food so good, but no one's going there and you 00:55:46:13 - 00:55:59:22 Tod transform their business overnight. That's what gets you up in the morning, I remember. Yes. So I think that there was a there's a taco place in Bishop's Stortford, Bishop's Stortford and I went out of. 00:55:59:22 - 00:56:02:10 Dan Pope London that's like towards. Yeah. No, no way. 00:56:02:16 - 00:56:04:12 Dan Pope Miles away and. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:56:04:12 - 00:56:05:18 Dan Pope You gotta go for it. Yeah. 00:56:05:18 - 00:56:13:05 Tod I'm and I remember I went out with like before I went to I actually think I went to fabric, I went to egg anyway. 00:56:13:07 - 00:56:15:19 Dan Pope Excellent. Yeah. 00:56:15:21 - 00:56:27:11 Tod And yeah I got in late and, and I said to this guy, I'll be there, I want to go and film him. I reached out to him. I thought there wasn't much on social media, but I thought, God, his burial looks really good and he's doing a barrier pizza. 00:56:27:11 - 00:56:41:23 Tod And. Yeah, I woke up in that morning. I was like, oh, God, I'm going to cancel. I'm. I just can't do this. I'm going to cancel. And I'm anyway, I'm funny. I found the courage to go there, and I got there, and it's just one guy. He was he used to be a scaffolder. 00:56:42:02 - 00:56:49:14 Tod He set this business up. He got there and he's like me, I've got 50 pounds in my bank account. Like, if you didn't come today, I was. I'll be shutting tomorrow. 00:56:49:16 - 00:56:50:12 Dan Pope Wow. 00:56:50:14 - 00:56:52:15 Tod So I was like, they'd best be fucking good. 00:56:52:15 - 00:56:57:22 Dan Pope That. No I'm joking. He said yeah. 00:56:57:23 - 00:57:11:14 Tod But then we got there and he started making, like, this consommé in the pouring in, like these, like chilies and, the spice blend. And I was just like, I. I've never seen anything like this before. Yeah, it's like the first barrier tacos barrier. 00:57:11:15 - 00:57:13:08 Dan Pope For listeners is like a beefy. 00:57:13:12 - 00:57:15:01 Tod Yeah. Beef. Yeah. Beefy taco. 00:57:15:03 - 00:57:17:10 Dan Pope It's like this. Like what? It's, like more of a saucy sort of. 00:57:17:12 - 00:57:18:14 Dan Pope It's nice. 00:57:18:16 - 00:57:20:04 Dan Pope Like a chewy kind of thing, isn't it? 00:57:20:10 - 00:57:31:16 Tod While the bit. Yeah. Barrier beef is like. It's. I don't know what kind of beef they use, but anyway, they break down the beef. Then you have this like, it's almost like a gravy. Kind of. 00:57:31:18 - 00:57:31:20 Dan Pope Like. 00:57:32:00 - 00:57:32:13 Tod Gravy. 00:57:32:13 - 00:57:32:24 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:57:32:24 - 00:57:52:24 Tod That's infused within the beef. And then it serves for like a blanket, cheese. But anyway, yeah, I went there and did this video for him, and it just went crazy, like, mental, like, got 2.5 million views online. Like queues down the door. He then actually had to shut for two weeks because chicken had sold out of me. 00:57:53:01 - 00:58:07:05 Tod So he just had this like viral video. Doesn't know what to do. He can't. He didn't want to employ anyone else because, you know, how long does the video last? It's still him. Just in this little shop. And they had to shut for two weeks because he couldn't get any beef. And it was just like he was messaging me. 00:58:07:05 - 00:58:08:19 Tod He's like, mate, I don't know what to do. 00:58:08:21 - 00:58:09:22 Dan Pope I really. 00:58:09:24 - 00:58:13:10 Dan Pope That must be so fulfilling though, knowing that you can like help can like. 00:58:14:09 - 00:58:15:22 Dan Pope Change someone's business overnight. 00:58:15:24 - 00:58:22:16 Dan Pope what some other places that you've kind of, pulled from the ether of doom and like. 00:58:22:16 - 00:58:44:07 Tod I think that's I mean, that's the the big one where he, like, he was actually shot the next day. But I think a lot of these, like, independent family businesses, like they don't run their own social page, so they don't really know what they're doing. They're relying on the normal income of people in each week. And when you do do a video and it gets like a million views, like you, you know, for two months, you are fully booked. 00:58:44:07 - 00:59:05:14 Tod Like there's that many guys on these videos now from creators. And even if the video is going viral for the wrong reason, people will still be going there. Like like it's his eyes. Any kind of publicity is good, perverse. You now and people are always going like I'm saying, I try to think of other examples of other businesses. 00:59:05:14 - 00:59:08:00 Tod I can't think of a top right and quite a few, but. 00:59:08:01 - 00:59:37:15 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. You've done I've done a fair share. My, the, in terms of like the different eye types of cuisine in London and there's like a whole sort of, melting pot. What cuisine do you think we're lacking in versus other. So. Okay. Indian, we're absolutely flying. Like he just there's so many banging places watching the way to kind of, cuisines that you don't think get enough love. 00:59:37:24 - 00:59:40:24 Tod I know it sounds weird, but, like, pizza's definitely up there. 00:59:41:01 - 00:59:41:18 Dan Pope Like, we. 00:59:41:18 - 00:59:42:14 Dan Pope Don't think pizza gets enough. 00:59:42:14 - 00:59:45:01 Tod Love. Well, I don't think there's that many good pizzas. 00:59:45:02 - 00:59:45:22 Dan Pope Oh, okay. Yeah. 00:59:46:01 - 01:00:12:11 Tod And the sense that there's loads of people do pizza. Like, you can get pizza on pretty much probably every road in London, but there isn't that many really good ones like you've got. Obviously crisp is amazing. Dough hands is amazing. Bread Head bakery, no bread. I had to give pizza, but bread still is. Yeah. Insane. There's a new guy called Lenny's Pizza, I think, as well, which I haven't been to, which means great. 01:00:12:13 - 01:00:13:11 Tod Yeah. Gracie's. 01:00:13:11 - 01:00:14:10 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:00:14:12 - 01:00:17:00 Tod Yeah, yeah, definitely. Vincenzo's. Vincenzo's? Yeah. 01:00:17:00 - 01:00:17:15 Dan Pope And that. 01:00:17:17 - 01:00:19:17 Tod Yeah. They're fun to like. Yeah. And they were. 01:00:19:21 - 01:00:21:02 Dan Pope Vincenzo's was the first. 01:00:21:02 - 01:00:43:23 Tod One I had where I had like a really good pizza. So like before that you know you, you go to like Neapolitan pizzas and stuff and they're all very like so fast isn't it. Yeah. They're nice. But when I think Food Review Club posted Vincenzo's it got like a million views went viral. And now I kind of went there and I was just like, what is this like? 01:00:44:00 - 01:00:57:20 Tod This is like you get like a nice little like crispy crust, but then you just get the most perfect slice of pizza, which just holds itself to its own shot. I mean, so like, you don't get any flop, you get like a crunch with the cheese and the chili and you're just like, oh. 01:00:57:20 - 01:00:58:10 Dan Pope Yeah, it's so. 01:00:58:10 - 01:01:01:04 Dan Pope Good. My, Yeah. On the pod, actually, he's a G. 01:01:01:07 - 01:01:02:15 Dan Pope Yeah. He's really nice. 01:01:02:17 - 01:01:14:12 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. And it's mad what they're just doing at that one site in like it's as big as this room. I mean, like, is this anyway, it just is like. Yeah, they just change some the most amazing pizza. 01:01:14:14 - 01:01:14:22 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:01:14:24 - 01:01:19:19 Dan Pope But I mean, so you think pizza doesn't get enough, like, it doesn't do what it could do? 01:01:19:22 - 01:01:39:03 Tod It's just like, you know, the London's massive. And, you know, we've just reeled off like 5 or 6 places, but again, like in New York again, you know, you've got you have got really good points on every single street. Like it's really good. So like I said, there's not I don't think there's enough really, really good pizza among them. 01:01:39:05 - 01:01:55:07 Dan Pope And so I just jump around I think there's, there's X slot, there's Brown's doing saints me see, the so back to the business side of things. So like yeah. How did you get that, that, that going where you started making enough money to like really kick on. 01:01:55:09 - 01:02:02:24 Tod Yeah. So again, like I think we're just growing the page organically. Like brand deals come naturally. You know so uncommon. My first of a page 01:02:02:24 - 01:02:11:21 Tod but it was probably like an hour, £250 to go and do a rail or something, which, you know, you I was just like, oh my God, this is just mad. 01:02:11:23 - 01:02:12:05 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:02:12:08 - 01:02:25:20 Tod I never knew at the site that you could really make any money with this, like it was. It was actually because I was going around like doing my thing and someone like messaged me. They're like, mate, I've just been paid £500. I was like, what? Like, like you can make. 01:02:25:20 - 01:02:29:01 Dan Pope Money in this. Like, yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. 01:02:29:03 - 01:02:46:06 Tod I think got that. Yeah. Then he kind of pushed on from there. And then you go around and you know your emails will get more and more and more. You get more and more like brand deals you get and you get like restaurants and you get all these kind of like people just overload you with like, emails and compared do that. 01:02:46:06 - 01:02:53:23 Tod And then it's always been really important for me to like, be able to bounce content, because if you try and get sucked into the money. 01:02:54:00 - 01:02:55:15 Dan Pope Yeah. So how do you balance that? 01:02:55:15 - 01:03:00:06 Tod And it I think by not being greedy it's the main thing like yeah you. 01:03:00:07 - 01:03:01:21 Dan Pope The money but not greedy with the dough. 01:03:01:23 - 01:03:02:15 Dan Pope Yeah. Yeah. 01:03:02:15 - 01:03:21:06 Tod Because otherwise like if you go you know it's working a full time job. If you go down round of the weekend and you fit and you use your time to, to film for money, then the engagement next week, it's never going to be as good. Like you're not going to those places that are really, really, really good. So yeah, it's just for the balance. 01:03:21:06 - 01:03:24:09 Tod It really and trying to not get greedy too early on. 01:03:24:09 - 01:03:25:05 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:03:25:07 - 01:03:39:17 Dan Pope I think did you because you brought in that the agency you helped you do deals. Like what. What would you. Because I'm asking it selfishly, right? I leave like I'm at a stage now where it's like some, this is nowhere near as big as what you're doing, but like, it's getting to the stage now where we are doing bigger deals. 01:03:39:19 - 01:03:45:05 Dan Pope They're more complicated deals. Yeah, but it's not someone sponsoring you £250 is going. Yeah. 01:03:45:07 - 01:03:46:09 Dan Pope Jumping in against. 01:03:46:11 - 01:03:48:11 Tod Like, this black and white contract. So. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. 01:03:48:11 - 01:03:55:08 Dan Pope Exactly. So like it's like how do you, how have you developed on the business side of things? I know you've worked at that. Yeah. These guys. 01:03:55:08 - 01:03:55:14 Dan Pope Like. 01:03:55:14 - 01:04:05:10 Dan Pope Yeah CCI CA that's it. Yeah I'm stuff actually spoke to them that amazing. But the like how. Yeah. How's that come about in terms of doing deals. 01:04:05:12 - 01:04:09:05 Tod Yeah. So I guess like that's always been like very business focused focus. 01:04:09:05 - 01:04:10:24 Dan Pope Like I said, my dad. 01:04:10:24 - 01:04:11:07 Tod Right. 01:04:11:07 - 01:04:13:00 Dan Pope So what does he do? 01:04:13:02 - 01:04:36:22 Tod Electronics. So again, like, he's always been like, you know, he's very been business minded. Like, I could ask him any question. He knows that. So, like, he's been like a massive inspiration, like, throughout this whole journey and the fact that, you know, I would see him getting up at 6:00 to go to work, then come back in at 7:00 to then be able to afford for us to go on a nice holiday to go, you know, drive a nice car to live in, a nice house to do all this kind of stuff. 01:04:36:22 - 01:04:58:12 Tod So when you see that and you see, like his determination, you know. Right. I want that like that. That's what I want. And I think like, I mean in construction I was, I was all I was good at. Construction was never like top of the class. I, you know, I formed great relationships with people. But it was never like I never had that, like, buzz to get up in the morning. 01:04:58:12 - 01:05:15:04 Tod And, you know, people always say like, you know, if you if you're really successful in life, then you then, you know, work not you're not going to work. You're going because you love it. Like that's when you read, you know, that, you know, in construction, that's when you read that article on the way home because your interest in the news. 01:05:15:04 - 01:05:16:09 Tod I would never fucking do that. 01:05:16:11 - 01:05:18:09 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:05:18:11 - 01:05:37:17 Tod And but people that were successful with would do that. That's what they do. They. Oh did you see what happened in the construction times. But I never really had that like willpower to do that. So when the Whole Foods and kind of came around and you started doing more deals more or there's more of that, like, that's just like when my brain just. 01:05:37:19 - 01:05:44:19 Tod I got so motivated, so, sucked into it that, I don't know, I just absolutely love it. 01:05:44:21 - 01:05:51:00 Dan Pope Yeah, I think it, as you say, everything's downstream from what you love doing, and the rest will sort of take care of itself. 01:05:51:03 - 01:06:02:18 Tod Exactly. Like that's the main thing. And I think, yeah, like I said, when. So when you get in for these contracts and stuff like that, I can I was like relied on that to help me out to, to look at things, to read over. What do you reckon about this? 01:06:02:18 - 01:06:07:19 Dan Pope Yeah, I did the same with my, No, I don't know what to say it. Yeah, I have I'm very, very lucky. 01:06:08:00 - 01:06:09:03 Dan Pope And I think that's. 01:06:09:05 - 01:06:31:03 Tod And that's probably the thing and creative world as well. Like there's no it's not like, well you've got the consultancy in, in property where you can benchmark physical against loads of other like competitors and stuff. And you know, you might have a set set rate of ten grand a month, like in in influencing. It's so complicated because, you know, you might have a million followers, but you might have a rubbish engagement, right? 01:06:31:05 - 01:06:42:13 Tod You might be working with a brand who's got a really high budget. You might be working with a brand who's really big but doesn't have any budget. So like, it's it's it's almost like a guessing game for that, for that whole. Yeah, that whole chapter, you know. 01:06:42:13 - 01:06:49:21 Dan Pope What would you say is the best, the best sort of mix for like, potential clients? 01:06:49:23 - 01:07:13:04 Tod Again. What? Well, now with Tod, like, it's not it's not about any kind of, like, small clients anymore, really? Like, we try and work with, like, bigger brands, and then everything else is really organic. And again, like, obviously. Well, the great partnership with Cooper is the fact that we can still highlight all the smaller brands through a partnership, which is unbelievable. 01:07:13:06 - 01:07:50:06 Tod Which is why it works so well, like the videos that we've done today, like average, like 900,000 views per per real, which, you know, for working with a big commercial brand is is crazy. And I don't think there's many creators like in the world that would that have that same average and consistency. And again, that's, that's what everything that we do and everything we choose now, you know, it still has to be focused around your organic content, which, you know, like we've done, you know, with even if we go to, you know, we go to a place and review a burger like 50. 01:07:50:08 - 01:07:59:03 Tod Sorry, 50s, that video is me doing my thing. And then seconds of that is about Uber and and highlighting. Those are the brand. But so yeah, it's. 01:07:59:03 - 01:08:08:07 Dan Pope Very subtle isn't what you would because this is before we even we start working with like the it's very you wouldn't know it's not overt like shoved it on your face like 01:08:08:09 - 01:08:09:13 Dan Pope Yeah. It's yeah. 01:08:09:13 - 01:08:11:06 Dan Pope I mean yeah. So. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. 01:08:11:06 - 01:08:40:10 Tod So like if you know, if you've got a video that gets a million views and you're highlighted for 10s within that video and, and it's really nicely positioned. And then people like, they go into bed or they get home like, like, oh yeah, I'm going to click on either spot and it's like little like subtle reminder. Whereas actually if you put 30s of a brand in the video versus 30s of, of a pizza roll of a burger place, it's people like, disengaged, like it doesn't work. 01:08:41:17 - 01:08:50:09 Dan Pope Don't you don't have to tell me to fuck off on this one. But what sort of money? What's the most money you've made out of a deal or a post? You don't have to answer it. 01:08:50:09 - 01:08:54:06 Tod Yeah, no, I probably like. 01:08:54:08 - 01:08:59:24 Dan Pope You can tell us. Okay. What about deals? 01:08:59:24 - 01:09:15:06 Dan Pope You said no to that because I think I think actually, when you get to this other stage is it's actually the the art changes from at the beginning. You say yes to everything if they're going to give you £250. Yeah. And you're like, buzzing your tits off like, oh my God, I think I need panini for £250. Yeah. 01:09:15:08 - 01:09:34:04 Dan Pope You get to a bigger stage, bigger responsibility. And I think what you said earlier mate, is it's like you've got responsibility. Not I don't think people think you've got you personally. What I'm getting from is you have this kind of purpose or responsibility to, like, help the barrier tacos. God help the nonna who's making focaccia bread. 01:09:34:08 - 01:09:36:01 Dan Pope Help the. 01:09:36:03 - 01:09:57:02 Dan Pope You know, the the amazing little cafe in Stoke Newington, that comes with that responsibility. Like the sort of superhero food, if you want to call it that. Like, you can just do a post and turn these businesses around. So you got that to contend with. The the other tension is if a big, big fucker comes knocking and says why, he's a lot of dough for a post. 01:09:57:02 - 01:09:57:16 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:09:57:16 - 01:09:58:04 Tod Completely. 01:09:58:04 - 01:10:04:12 Dan Pope And and then you've got in between all of these two things is your brand. Yeah. We'll come on to the zoom festival and a set. 01:10:04:12 - 01:10:05:03 Tod Yeah of course. 01:10:05:03 - 01:10:07:08 Dan Pope But what have you sort of had to say no to. 01:10:07:13 - 01:10:14:21 Tod Yeah. I mean there's been like there's been massive deals in the past which have been, you know, huge like almost nearly like six figures, something like that. 01:10:14:23 - 01:10:17:13 Dan Pope You how do you say no to that? Because I don't think I would be able. 01:10:17:13 - 01:10:25:08 Tod To because if they're if they're trying to get you to plug, you know, they're trying to get you a few videos that plug something that's just so disingenuous. 01:10:25:08 - 01:10:31:01 Dan Pope It's such a what did you have to talk? Oh, you can take it out. Just tell me. Yeah, yeah. 01:10:31:03 - 01:10:54:20 Tod No. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But no, it's no, it's not even plug ins. Something like that. It's more just going away from like your organic content, you know, for example, like, you know, trying to do if someone wanted me cooking series in my house, you know, compared to me going out in restaurants, like, I wouldn't want to charge someone lots of money to do a cooking series because the engagement is going to be shit. 01:10:54:20 - 01:11:30:23 Tod It's not going to work like it doesn't really like align with with with what, what it's like the reason why that these ads and and and deals work really well is because I believe in the videos that are going out. And also the way that I look at it is, you know, if I, if I agreed a large amount of something with, with, with a brand, but the videos was so against what today's event could be visiting a restaurant but not the right kind of restaurant, and say that those videos got 150,000 views compared to a million when you work with the next client, then and you then you look at they look at your 01:11:30:23 - 01:11:48:13 Tod previous campaign, they're like, well, what's going on then? So like for me, I always look at like the average of views for brand partnerships is some of the I'm really, really like close to and has to really match what what I'm doing because that's, you know, that is the brand. That's how we charge money to clients. I mean. 01:11:48:15 - 01:11:49:13 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah yeah yeah. 01:11:49:13 - 01:11:56:22 Dan Pope Yeah. No, that makes makes complete sense. And it's like, yeah, doing a cooking cooking demo. It's not going to be the same. 01:11:56:24 - 01:11:57:07 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:11:57:12 - 01:12:00:21 Dan Pope Who is you going to do for Smash Burgers. Yeah. 01:12:00:23 - 01:12:03:06 Tod Or like Speedos or something like that. 01:12:03:08 - 01:12:03:16 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:12:03:16 - 01:12:06:18 Tod Yeah I probably would actually do it right as everyone see me and Speedo. 01:12:06:18 - 01:12:09:13 Dan Pope So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm not sure. 01:12:09:15 - 01:12:13:16 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. You in Speedo is jumping into a pool of masala. Could be pretty fucking good. 01:12:13:17 - 01:12:18:07 Tod Yeah I mean I would do that. Got to fucking do that. 01:12:18:09 - 01:12:26:01 Dan Pope Well talk to me about food then. And your, like, what is that? How's that come to be. 01:12:26:05 - 01:12:38:08 Tod So when so film started because basically like when I took up vlogging as a full time job and what people don't realize really is that, you know, even on 900,000 followers, I still worked a full time job. 01:12:38:10 - 01:12:40:17 Dan Pope Like, why did you do that? 01:12:40:19 - 01:13:00:21 Tod Because I wanted the consistency. I like the environment I can. I'm still learning as a person, like where I was, what, what I wanted to do, where I wanted to be, and for me, like having that rhythm, that balance, having people who are successful to look up to, to ask questions, even if it's not about vlogging, you know, even if it's just, you know, so to listen. 01:13:00:21 - 01:13:11:16 Dan Pope To it isn't so. I used to just quickly go and say, I want to push on this a bit further. This is interesting. So you stayed in the job because of successful people in construction. You could ask me about construction even though it had nothing to do with. 01:13:11:22 - 01:13:41:22 Tod Yeah, because it's the mentality. So what happened? So I went to, a huge corporate company for project management, which involved amazing company. But then I left them to go and join a ten person startup company. Again, purely, this is when I probably had like 70,000 followers on Instagram. Again, I've what I wanted to do is to understand how to grow a business, how to grow with people, understand like that mindset of of that company and how it and how that went on. 01:13:41:22 - 01:14:04:22 Tod And of course, like it was about construction, like I didn't know how to was going to be successful. I always had belief, but you never really know. So that jump for me, like I think, what's the word like? It was always a thought in my mind, even though I probably haven't realized it. Which is why, you know, I went to the smaller company to, to learn and just be inspired to. 01:14:04:22 - 01:14:05:09 Dan Pope I mean, what are. 01:14:05:09 - 01:14:09:08 Dan Pope Some of the lessons you took from that that you still apply to Tod now? 01:14:09:10 - 01:14:25:19 Tod I think again, the main thing as we talked about previously, like consistency, like, you know, those people consistently, I know it sounds stupid, but they consistently got a they go into the office like they set a standard between work life, home life. They were such good bands for The Office. 01:14:26:00 - 01:14:26:20 Dan Pope Really? Yeah. 01:14:26:20 - 01:14:42:18 Tod But everyone knew their line. They knew their place. They knew then they knew exactly where the line was. No limit was. And it was just really important for me to just see how these, you know, amazing colleagues, which would, you know, go about their work, the work. 01:14:42:19 - 01:15:01:04 Dan Pope That was has it been a lonely period on this? Because I've so I worked I worked for starting peanut butter startup for and like one of the it's a crack was fucking banging. Like you just go into the office and it's just jokes like you work with the best. So I still think it was the best time of my life, but then obviously jumped ship to do this full time. 01:15:01:10 - 01:15:05:22 Dan Pope Obviously, this bit's amazing. I'm chatting with you, eating excellent fucking hash browns. 01:15:05:22 - 01:15:07:17 Dan Pope Like, yeah, yeah, amazing. 01:15:07:19 - 01:15:30:21 Dan Pope But like, if I look at my week like this, such a small percentage of of it and actually a lot of it is really lonely and like a bit like. Oh, and so talk to me about that. You've gone from that social environment where you're working with a team of like, amazing people, and then you get sort of plunged into into the abyss of like doing your own thing, like talk to me about the lonely chapters on this 4 or 5 year journey. 01:15:30:21 - 01:15:49:22 Tod I mean, yeah, it's it's it's crazy, like, you know, going back to when it was work, I gave up a lot of my weekends. You know, Sunday roast days is huge. But all my mates would go out on Saturday, so, like, a lot of the times would go out, get in studio o'clock in the morning, and I'd have to pull myself off my sofa and drag myself to a roast place, or to go and eat chicken wing. 01:15:49:22 - 01:15:53:16 Tod I just remember, like I'd wait and I'd be like, what the am I doing? 01:15:53:18 - 01:15:54:03 Dan Pope Yeah, but. 01:15:54:08 - 01:15:56:11 Dan Pope Like this one. You didn't have much followers. No. 01:15:56:11 - 01:16:14:16 Tod This is like when I had like 22,000 followers. Yeah. It started from around there that like the bug. Yeah. Just really wanting to go and. But I knew that if I didn't go there, I had no content to do for the next week. And so I didn't have a choice like it's do not have any content for next week, or do you go and get these two new spots that have just come on the radio? 01:16:14:18 - 01:16:17:12 Tod Well, I better go by them and just get there. 01:16:17:13 - 01:16:19:01 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. 01:16:19:01 - 01:16:33:20 Dan Pope So I'm what's taught me through the lonely like, you know, the trains to bloody Bishop's Stortford or like what's going on your head. Yeah. There's a lot of you know it's much easier looking back now you're, you're smashing it. Yeah. At 22,000 followers told me through the doubts the demons and all that. 01:16:33:20 - 01:16:54:05 Tod Yeah I think like like I said, the main thing is, you know, speaking is one you were literally all by yourself, like you don't have anyone to talk to at all in. It's like, yeah, you can speak to other bloggers and stuff. You know, how much you trust other people. You know, everyone you know, everyone seems is a bit like mum for themself, like in, in that world. 01:16:54:05 - 01:17:09:02 Tod So, you know, we have group chats and stuff and then there will be good fun. There's also like a lot of like, like, you know, oh this person went there like, oh, they copied my video. Oh they've done that. And I just stay clear of any of that. Like I just kept myself to myself. 01:17:09:03 - 01:17:09:12 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:17:09:18 - 01:17:12:05 Tod Which again, like, is even more lonely. 01:17:12:07 - 01:17:12:22 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:17:12:24 - 01:17:20:02 Tod But I didn't mind that too. It's like I was always so set on where, where I wanted to get to. 01:17:20:04 - 01:17:22:01 Dan Pope Which was totally. What was that vision? 01:17:22:01 - 01:17:39:24 Tod You know, it's that vision of, wouldn't you say in the followers got right, I need to get to 100 K. I need to get to. Yeah. Oh, maybe if I get to that, I want to quit my job. Wouldn't that be great? Oh, like. So it's always like a battle in my head. Like to, to really try and and and and get to where we need it to be over. 01:17:40:01 - 01:17:56:00 Tod And so I never, I never really fed feared loneliness. And I've thought like like I said, I've always been really close with my girlfriend, with my mates. The the worst. Like like I said, the worst thing for me was the weekends was. 01:17:56:03 - 01:18:04:11 Dan Pope Why was the weekend so? Because that was then. That was basically when it was time to shoot content. And you had the time. Yeah. Your mates wanted to go out and party. 01:18:04:13 - 01:18:23:18 Tod Yeah. So what I try to do, because obviously you don't eat, you can't really eat out every single day, but you'd be enormous. So I try to like, eat relatively healthy during the week and that weekends ago and do my shoots. But then also at the same time you're trying to meet your mates, you know, you're 23, 24, 25 years old, like, oh, we made some, let's go. 01:18:23:18 - 01:18:27:20 Tod I was like, let's get absolutely, like completely ballocks. 01:18:27:20 - 01:18:28:13 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:18:28:13 - 01:18:36:22 Dan Pope And that was sort of. Didn't you say you went to, was it drum sheds and everyone saying, come out again? You can't take a date. Hey, give me that. 01:18:36:24 - 01:18:47:02 Tod Ready to go. And I hadn't been there for a long while. I hadn't been out in in public for a long time. It's out in public. Like, who the fuck am I? Like, but, you know. 01:18:47:07 - 01:18:47:17 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. 01:18:47:17 - 01:18:58:02 Tod Yeah, I grown probably, you know, the page over like, between sort of like July and Christmas last year. Really, really went up. Probably like 600,000 followers again. 01:18:58:04 - 01:18:59:22 Dan Pope Wow. Yeah. 01:18:59:24 - 01:19:09:02 Tod So, like, I hadn't been out clubbing in, like, a year, so then just going out and I was like, whoa, listen, crazy. Like, everyone's like, coming up to you like, hey, Tod. Tod. 01:19:09:03 - 01:19:11:24 Dan Pope Tod. Tod. Tod. You can't take it day. Take of me. 01:19:12:01 - 01:19:20:06 Tod Yeah, like I got FOMO. And then we went. I got to, like, half eight, and we were like, this is just ridiculous. 01:19:20:06 - 01:19:22:06 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah, but I get. 01:19:22:06 - 01:19:38:04 Tod You can't get, like, shut shut down with that. Like at the end of the day, like it's positive isn't it. Like people are recognizing, you know, seeing your content like it may not last forever. Like enjoy it like and so I enjoyed it enjoyed meeting people like people that come up to me. Like I said, what's your favorite restaurant? 01:19:38:06 - 01:19:40:19 Tod I'll probably stutter and say, I don't know. 01:19:40:21 - 01:19:44:01 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, I like. 01:19:44:02 - 01:19:45:00 Tod I, I enjoy that side to. 01:19:45:00 - 01:19:45:16 Dan Pope It. Yeah. 01:19:45:17 - 01:19:49:19 Dan Pope Well what who was the guy we met at the pub who's my mates? Cousin. 01:19:49:21 - 01:19:54:04 Dan Pope Oh yeah. Yeah, yeah it was. Oh, how do I sell these burgers again? 01:19:54:04 - 01:20:10:07 Dan Pope That goes back to helping some bloke just opened the pub Shoreditch, got a new food menu and straight away. Would you like me? Just one. Give, give out a free burgers. So you advertise on the table. You've got the burgers. It like. Yeah, that's from you. Almost like this. Sort of like the Google of how to make a restaurant good. 01:20:10:07 - 01:20:16:18 Dan Pope You know, like almost like this sort of AI oracle. Like. Right. What do I do is I did it in Bangalore. I do that, and I bet you he's probably selling some. 01:20:16:18 - 01:20:19:17 Dan Pope Fucking burgers now. 01:20:19:19 - 01:20:31:08 Dan Pope Yeah. It's, it's a yes. He went through that sort of, lonely period, which I think everyone is, who's trying to do their own thing and go against the grain is is going to come with that. 01:20:31:13 - 01:20:49:02 Tod But like, that's why I kind of like so I still went into the office, still went to work. Like still I kind of had the best of both worlds I could. I had everything just trying to juggle it, trying to make like a amendment. Yeah. And then obviously then I went full time with like, I think it was nine months ago now. 01:20:49:04 - 01:21:09:11 Tod Just it was about 50,000 followers before I hit million followers. And then we went to Vietnam and then I it was kind of like the realization point where I, my girlfriend flew home to go to work and then I flew to New Zealand for like two weeks. I was just spent two weeks in a hotel room by myself, like, and then I was like, this is pretty bleak. 01:21:09:13 - 01:21:10:01 Dan Pope Really. 01:21:10:01 - 01:21:17:00 Tod It was really good. Like, I met some amazing people. But, you know, sometimes you just wanna have a nice little conversation with, with, with with you messages. 01:21:17:00 - 01:21:18:03 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:21:18:04 - 01:21:35:18 Tod And it's like, oh fucking now I've got a going, I've got like, you know, got to go meet this that someone else. But I'm not naturally like the, the biggest like of chatty like people like, you know, I like to speak to my mates and stuff like that, and, you know, I'm always better in a two in a one. 01:21:35:20 - 01:21:44:03 Tod So, like, having to go every single night and socialize and meet new people like that was quite challenging. But I also learned a lot about myself. 01:21:44:03 - 01:21:45:24 Dan Pope Like, what did you learn about Trev? 01:21:46:01 - 01:22:04:22 Tod Because what someone like that, like if someone said to me, if you don't put yourself into a situation where you're you're alone for two weeks, I would've hated it. Like when I was at uni, like I always wanted to. My mates come join me on the hangover job. I mean, like, you always, kind of always wanted to be with people that bounced off of them. 01:22:04:24 - 01:22:23:01 Tod So, like, for me to be home alone for two weeks, I was like, oh my God, I'm. But also like you. The trip pushed me like outside my comfort zone. Like the fact that we were climbing these mountains. We then go like fishing at sea. Like I've never done any of this before. And just do that by yourself, like, mate. 01:22:23:01 - 01:22:27:05 Tod Just it makes you realize what you. What you can do. 01:22:27:08 - 01:22:32:04 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. And so then you leave. 01:22:32:06 - 01:22:50:17 Dan Pope Just before a million followers. You leave, you go full time. Like how your week, your day changed now because I think one thing putting the rock of discipline consistency underneath you any like you can be like a fish. Yeah. Out of water because you're like, oh shit, now it's just me. Like, how did how did you. 01:22:50:19 - 01:23:08:02 Tod That's the crazy thing, isn't it? Like I remember waking up on the Monday thinking, sorry, then can God, what do I do? Like, do I have to go to work like I haven't got a boss anymore? Like, this is just man, I can. I think I just sat on the sofa, watch TV because I was just like, why not? 01:23:08:04 - 01:23:10:11 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:23:10:13 - 01:23:37:04 Tod But at the same time, that. And like, that's I've always been held back by this whole weekend point, like where you, you're just so stressed in the week and do to check all your plates. So I straight away what we tried to do is do like more like a working week. So like now I very, very rarely will edit in the evenings I try to get off my phone like 6:00 Am or like, yeah, okay, I dabble a little bit here. 01:23:37:04 - 01:23:57:08 Tod And then the other thing might come out. Obviously we're going to film, but that's another thing that now takes a lot of time and energy. But it definitely we tried to get a lot more rhythm. And like I said, this year I've cut down on pacing a little bit. Like last year, it was unhealthy trying to manage all these places. 01:23:57:08 - 01:24:00:00 Tod Then you beat yourself up about views of it. 01:24:00:02 - 01:24:04:00 Dan Pope And how do you deal with that? Because that thing I'm very bad at. 01:24:04:02 - 01:24:05:00 Tod Well, what. 01:24:05:02 - 01:24:07:13 Dan Pope How do you separate you? Because your name is Tobi. 01:24:07:13 - 01:24:08:13 Dan Pope It's not. Yeah. It's not. 01:24:08:13 - 01:24:16:05 Dan Pope So talk me through the difference between Tod and Tobi. I think it's it's interesting. Yeah. So how do you separate Tod versus from Tobi? You know what I mean? 01:24:16:07 - 01:24:29:09 Tod Yeah. Tod. Yeah, it's it's kind of like. It's more like it's like character this like bumbling idiot. Like again just is very smiley, very chatty, very, you know, enthusiastic about food and and life. 01:24:29:12 - 01:24:30:02 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:24:30:04 - 01:24:33:10 Tod And I guess there's not much difference between Tod and Toby's fondness. 01:24:33:11 - 01:24:36:06 Dan Pope Did people call you total Toby? Your mates call you. 01:24:36:08 - 01:24:38:12 Tod To, talk to a lot of people? Yeah. 01:24:38:12 - 01:24:39:12 Dan Pope Yeah. Okay. 01:24:39:14 - 01:24:54:17 Tod Maybe if I've done something really wrong. No. Even even me. Call me Toby. My parents can. Toby. My sister calls me Toby. So, yeah, I'm Toby to to those people. But it's all my mates. It's Titans. 01:24:54:17 - 01:24:55:10 Dan Pope Okay. Yeah, yeah. 01:24:55:10 - 01:25:06:02 Tod It came up like some one of my mates just mis misspelt it on a live chat. When were A-levels? And that's how Tod's, like, came up. Yeah. Just stuck everyone just. 01:25:06:05 - 01:25:08:03 Dan Pope That's what I. Yes. Then how do you. 01:25:08:03 - 01:25:18:14 Dan Pope How do you almost let Tod take the beatings of the of the the bipolar ness of the views? And then let's keep Toby saying if that's the best way to look at it. 01:25:18:16 - 01:25:45:00 Tod I think what I've realized now, after posting so many times and doing all these videos, is that if you do a good video, you get rewarded, like no matter who you are, what followers you've got, if you do a really good video, people will want to watch that video. It's like a TV show, like if you've got a really good film, like if you do a really good film, like this director has done this, it that was really a film. 01:25:45:02 - 01:26:04:14 Tod That film goes crazy. Like if you look at like the Squid Games like that came up knowing anything about Bang. Whereas, you know, people do shit films, no one watches them. But the next time it might be a really good film and loads of people watching, it's the same content, like if you produce, if you're producing the same content, you're gonna get the same views. 01:26:04:14 - 01:26:07:12 Tod But what we're trying to say. 01:26:07:14 - 01:26:07:20 Dan Pope I know what. 01:26:07:20 - 01:26:24:24 Dan Pope You mean. Yeah, it will always make the algorithms a meritocracy, isn't it? Really? Yeah. Like. And it's like, I think, what's it that who's it? MrBeast says it's got a great thing, which is like the algorithm. It's not like the algorithm didn't like it. It's the people didn't like it just could just transfer the word algorithm to the people. 01:26:25:01 - 01:26:40:23 Tod Yeah. So, you know, like people will say like they'll say, oh yeah, I like the algorithm for the moment. And then someone else says, oh yeah, well, you've got to comment on all your posts and you got real in real responses like it's of like, no, you don't like. If you put a good video out, people will watch it. 01:26:40:23 - 01:26:51:16 Tod And you know, whether you post one time a week or five times a week, like as long as you, you know, you have a bit of consistency in there. At the end of the day, if you're content shit that no one's going to watch it. 01:26:51:18 - 01:27:11:06 Dan Pope How do you balance between like creating content that you want? Yeah. And then it what by by the time that you know, like a content's going to absolutely fly. Yeah that because like for example with the podcast, if I know if I do a video about like sorry podcasts interviewing someone about how to get your brand into Sainsbury's and Waitrose, that's going to absolutely fly. 01:27:11:07 - 01:27:31:04 Dan Pope Yeah. But there's I've, I've done this for four years. I can't fucking do that every single time. Yeah. And it's like, actually sometimes I might want to speak to some like Henry Hays, the comedian. Like very tangential link to food. Yeah. But like that really gets me out a bit. Yeah. This is a conversation. How do you balance between like doing stuff because you personally follow your own curiosity. 01:27:31:05 - 01:27:34:08 Dan Pope Yeah. Versus doing of that. You just know who's going to slap the algorithm. 01:27:34:10 - 01:27:34:20 Dan Pope You know. 01:27:35:00 - 01:27:59:20 Tod Yeah I think it's one is everything I try and put out now I'm assuming I'm cautious of, you know, everything I like to do, like normally is kind of like by the algorithm. But following like these, like, you know, you can't just fly to New York and go to cats every single week. You can't just go to like, San Sebastian and go to these like, incredible steak houses that like, have these huge depth of story. 01:27:59:22 - 01:28:21:11 Tod Like at the end of the day, you kind of need to accept that those, these are really good for that reason. And, you know, you might go for a quiet patch for a month, you know, because you're, you're you're in London and you know, you might you might not think of any ideas, but that's okay. I mean, like this world, you might just wake up tomorrow and you think, oh God, yeah, shit, I need to do. 01:28:21:14 - 01:28:41:01 Tod I need to go and do that. So, like, you can't really beat yourself up, and it's. And it's just normal to have those patches where content may not be as good is as how you like it or where you want it. I know that, you know, it's a bit like a music writer, like, you know, they might do their first album, like, which might be you got into a million, million followers and it's great. 01:28:41:03 - 01:28:47:15 Tod Then you just go blank. You're like, what do I do now? All those styles of videos are working, but, with a bit boring, like. 01:28:47:17 - 01:29:07:01 Dan Pope You know. Yeah, yeah. It's interesting. So I think some of the best music, like the Arctic Monkeys, if you like the Ice Monkeys, but like their first album was so different. So I went to see them at the O2 and then like, I didn't know the album was called, but like, didn't sound like the first Arctic Monkeys. Yeah, but I mean, I've got respect for them because they weren't just banging out a different version of a beat. 01:29:07:01 - 01:29:11:21 Dan Pope You look good on the dancefloor, you know? Yeah, he was like David Bowie, like constantly changing his fucking music. 01:29:11:22 - 01:29:12:08 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:29:12:08 - 01:29:23:14 Dan Pope And it's like that. It's a, it's a, it's a balancing act between giving people, you know, who's going to work on your behalf versus following your own. Because as you say, you keep going to Castelli every week. Then it's like you're not going to be wanting to do it. I mean. 01:29:23:14 - 01:29:34:06 Tod Yeah, yeah. And like some things don't work like, you know, like, actually that fish restaurant in Epping Forest, like, I generally thought that story with I thought the video looked amazing. Like for me, it's. 01:29:34:06 - 01:29:36:07 Dan Pope The best thing, one of the best thing you've done, you know, it's not do. 01:29:36:08 - 01:29:56:17 Tod Oh no, I mean, it got half a million views, but normally like the the, the average is around 800 to 2 million. It's like so like for someone like that that's just really organic, really good content with a really good story. Like I was like, oh, like I kind of thought I would do better, but it doesn't really matter like that. 01:29:56:18 - 01:30:10:23 Tod Like at the end of the day, in a month's time, that video is kind of gone, like, and then you've got the new ones, which is why short films are a bit weird because you put out your video, everyone watched it for two weeks and then see, yeah, that's gone. Like, you don't even really access it. You want. 01:30:10:23 - 01:30:12:21 Tod I mean, it's so far down someone's feed. 01:30:12:23 - 01:30:17:10 Dan Pope Yeah, that's what you're going into more long with longer form content now. Yeah. 01:30:17:12 - 01:30:18:22 Dan Pope Like with the YouTube stuff. 01:30:18:22 - 01:30:19:04 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:30:19:10 - 01:30:34:17 Dan Pope Now how do you that's an interesting place to play because you say short form. Well, what we're doing now is almost the complete opposite of that because people can listen to a pod that was done for years. Yeah, yeah. It's a different mindset versus like, yeah, why are you going so more the longer stuff? 01:30:34:19 - 01:30:53:00 Tod Again, I think one, the short form is great and I kind of feel like I've managed to I kind of really understand the short form. I understand the places that I need to visit, the content in the style that I need to to visit and like I kind of get it. Whereas like long format, I really don't understand. 01:30:53:00 - 01:31:18:03 Tod And so like so I want to focus like more of my energy in creating this, more of like a rounded crater against, you know, someone. It's just not known for smashing these Instagram reels. So for me, like as a creator, as a person and also like the main thing is that I can tell more stories like I can tell like the story stories over these amazing restaurants on longform over ten minutes. 01:31:18:03 - 01:31:19:18 Tod And I can for a minute like. 01:31:19:18 - 01:31:41:20 Dan Pope Yeah, because this is what I was trying to boil down. The essence of like like what what what what behind the scenes. I was definitely getting them. But I think ultimately, like, you're just you're like an enchanted storyteller, really. And through those stories, you help thousands of people, like one get into food. And to keep businesses alive is a beautiful kind of almost Robin Hood esque, you know, way of doing things. 01:31:42:00 - 01:32:03:20 Dan Pope But talk to me about stories like, what have you learned about grabbing people's attention? Because I'm just trying to apply this to what I'm my podcast like, and it's slightly different that it's a longer like we have the clips go out. Some absolutely blew off. Right? So like, yeah, we do one with ash from Devonshire. Yeah. That's going to that's doing 700,000 views like I know that's going to work the hospitality episodes I do. 01:32:03:23 - 01:32:23:24 Dan Pope Yeah. Always going to do better because the net is bigger. So I was know you could be in finance and still love food. Yeah. You could be in whereas we've got those sort of hospitality episodes which I know we're going to boot off. Right. Yeah I've got the challenge brand, which is more like, so I wanted to create a, a thing is like a drink and sell it into supermarket. 01:32:23:24 - 01:32:42:12 Dan Pope Right? Yeah. The audience pool is much smaller because like, but if I do that, that this audience solves me or keeps the lights on like that, we do the supper clubs, then. But I beat myself up. Sometimes I'm like, that video should fucking fly. But I'm like, I'm like the the total addressable market for that video for the shuttle challenger. 01:32:42:12 - 01:32:51:20 Dan Pope Brown one is just is is never going to be able to do what the DaVinci is going to be able to do. Yeah. And like I just I don't know how you sort of what was that do I. 01:32:51:20 - 01:32:52:07 Dan Pope Mean yeah. 01:32:52:07 - 01:33:15:02 Tod I think again it's just learning and experience. Really. Yeah. Like I said like when, you know, I, when I first started my page, I was kind of like I was poking burger. I thought burgers is what people wanted to see. Like these big draw to truly huge burgers, but actually kind of what people want to see, like in the UK is like, everyone's really interested in fish and chips, like, because. 01:33:15:03 - 01:33:18:17 Dan Pope I might tell a story about the chip. It was at the chips and fishes. 01:33:18:17 - 01:33:20:24 Dan Pope And then, oh yeah, that was such a good because. 01:33:20:24 - 01:33:33:00 Dan Pope That, that that's what I want. I just want to get to my the again the hash browns are sort of polluting my brain now. But the, the yeah is the attention, storytelling attention. And I think the chips and fish is a great story of that. 01:33:33:00 - 01:33:50:13 Tod Yeah. Exactly. So I first first, thanks for any short form video. The first three seconds and the most important thing ever, like if you're scrolling, you've got to catch someone, you've got to stop someone from scrolling. And that's when you like, when you're on your shoots, when you when you looking at the content, you need to think, how do I stop someone? 01:33:50:15 - 01:34:09:20 Tod And so like the ways that I can I do that is people always complain me. Firstly, I mostly wear a hat in a lot of my videos when I go to a fine dining restaurant, whenever I go anywhere else. And generally I think the fact that I'm bold like. But I wear it again because it causes a it stirs the pot basically. 01:34:09:20 - 01:34:11:09 Dan Pope What why does it serve the pot? As in. 01:34:11:09 - 01:34:14:06 Tod Because really, you should be wearing like a nice hat into into a. 01:34:14:06 - 01:34:15:17 Dan Pope Fine. Okay. That's right. Yes. Okay. 01:34:15:17 - 01:34:17:15 Tod With you and things like that. 01:34:17:15 - 01:34:22:00 Dan Pope Like and say what are the, what are the little tricks and tricks of the trade in terms of wanting people up. 01:34:22:01 - 01:34:31:11 Tod Yeah. So like again there's one obviously. So I went to London's oldest fish and chip shop and I then bought. So I'm they call it chips and fish. 01:34:31:11 - 01:34:33:16 Dan Pope It is also fish and chips. Yeah. Yeah. 01:34:33:18 - 01:34:39:17 Tod And so like I just thought I was going to do it and see what people, people say. And I'm not joking. I lost 2000 followers. 01:34:39:19 - 01:34:40:03 Dan Pope That actually. 01:34:40:06 - 01:34:43:19 Tod Kind of backfired on me because people I didn't realize people were so religious about. 01:34:43:19 - 01:34:44:23 Dan Pope Fishing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:34:45:01 - 01:34:47:05 Tod I'm also I'm obviously joking. 01:34:47:07 - 01:34:47:23 Dan Pope You go away. 01:34:48:00 - 01:35:02:21 Tod But I study this shit and like, I know that fish and chips are popping off in London right now, like, obviously. And people were just like, I can't believe this guy. He calls himself like a food reviewer, like he's a he's got his food page and he calls it chips and fish. People was so. 01:35:02:21 - 01:35:05:00 Dan Pope Insulted. Yeah, yeah. And but. 01:35:05:00 - 01:35:06:19 Tod Again, like, there's a lot of things like that just. 01:35:06:21 - 01:35:07:11 Dan Pope Like tell me some of the. 01:35:07:11 - 01:35:13:07 Tod Ones, you know, wave fell off the back of that I've thought about doing calling it like mash and bangers. 01:35:13:07 - 01:35:14:04 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:35:14:06 - 01:35:20:01 Tod You the whole day. And just like reversing these terms and then I flat it in the end. 01:35:20:03 - 01:35:20:21 Dan Pope Yeah. Yeah, yeah. 01:35:21:00 - 01:35:32:09 Tod But again I think like like I said another one that you know quite often like I'll take an excessive bite of a burger I would like, you know, so food's like kind of like drooling down my beard. Like I'm saving it for later. 01:35:32:09 - 01:35:35:24 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, that was be like, yeah. 01:35:35:24 - 01:35:37:13 Dan Pope You know that old wine sort of not want to be. 01:35:37:19 - 01:35:39:20 Dan Pope You're sort of trying to poke the back. Yeah. 01:35:39:20 - 01:35:50:19 Tod You put the better. Because at the end of the day, if you're content's perfect no one will watch it. There's no one's going to comment on it. Not ever. Yeah. People don't like to say that they love you on social media. They'd like to go, oh, I'm. 01:35:50:24 - 01:35:52:03 Dan Pope Like. 01:35:52:05 - 01:36:09:22 Tod Is that disgusting pig like that? They much rather like give you hay and shoot you down. But what the what the what a lot of people don't realize is that those people are making the video like, you know. Yeah. Exactly. Like and also it's a bit tongue in cheek. So there's obviously there's always a line and there's a standard don't take it too far. 01:36:09:22 - 01:36:13:07 Tod But having these little like planning for planning, planning. 01:36:13:10 - 01:36:14:07 Dan Pope Was. 01:36:14:09 - 01:36:20:01 Tod Funny phrases and just little like bits and bobs just to trigger certain people. Like it always helps. 01:36:20:07 - 01:36:24:00 Dan Pope Yeah yeah yeah yeah, yeah. It's not how, 01:36:24:02 - 01:36:27:04 Dan Pope So then to then to that goes into that that right. Yeah. So that's your hook. 01:36:27:10 - 01:36:27:23 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:36:28:00 - 01:36:34:07 Dan Pope Then to keep people engaged. Yeah. People sharing it or like what's the next step. And so I think storytelling. 01:36:34:07 - 01:36:41:22 Tod For me it's enthusiasm. Like when I do a voiceover I'm I'm never sitting down like I, when I'm do. 01:36:41:24 - 01:36:42:14 Dan Pope You record into. 01:36:42:14 - 01:36:42:24 Dan Pope Your phone. 01:36:42:24 - 01:36:47:03 Tod Yeah. I just like smash it off my phone like this. Like today we're on the hunt for the best. 01:36:47:03 - 01:36:48:11 Dan Pope Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:36:48:11 - 01:37:06:07 Tod But what I do is I'll stand up like and walk. I'll pace up and down the kitchen or the living room and like. And I'm just like, oh, let's, I'm going like this man. Like I'm really get into it. Like I love it. Yeah. Like I've, I've done the I've done the edit I believe. Yeah. That's good. I've got lots of different like angles of a good story that looks good. 01:37:06:07 - 01:37:11:23 Tod Like I'm, I'm pumped. So like when I'm comes the voiceover that's just like the, the cracking, you. 01:37:11:23 - 01:37:12:19 Dan Pope Know, you're not off the. 01:37:12:19 - 01:37:13:17 Dan Pope Cuff. 01:37:13:19 - 01:37:15:03 Tod Yeah. But a lot of the time. 01:37:15:05 - 01:37:15:11 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:37:15:14 - 01:37:34:24 Tod Sometimes, like, I might do a bit more research into, you know, like, if I'm going to cut study, then I want to know when it first opened. I want to know a bit more of the story, like, can I meet the owner? Can I do this? Yeah. But I'd say eight out of ten. I just try and smash off and then I'll probably wait a day, really listen to it all. 01:37:35:05 - 01:37:43:10 Dan Pope I could do that you work at. Here's some. Yeah, yeah, some final bit of one from. What's this one? Smashing plates. 01:37:43:10 - 01:37:45:11 Dan Pope Smashing plates? Yeah. You've been to this thing? 01:37:45:14 - 01:37:45:23 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:37:46:03 - 01:37:47:01 Tod It's, 01:37:47:03 - 01:37:47:22 Dan Pope What is it like. 01:37:47:24 - 01:37:58:01 Tod Greek and it's banging. It's absolutely banging there. Like like gyros. Is outstanding. But the best. 01:37:58:01 - 01:37:59:20 Dan Pope Thing was. 01:38:00:00 - 01:38:01:21 Dan Pope Are these guys based. 01:38:03:00 - 01:38:12:22 Tod That basement rage? I love it. They put honey over a lot of things, and the honey is just so good. 01:38:12:24 - 01:38:16:24 Dan Pope Look at that is huge, mate. Ideal. 01:38:17:00 - 01:38:19:14 Tod Like naughty. 01:38:19:14 - 01:38:22:06 Dan Pope I do love it. A sweet potato chip. 01:38:22:12 - 01:38:23:06 Dan Pope This is absolutely. 01:38:23:06 - 01:38:23:21 Dan Pope Huge. 01:38:23:21 - 01:38:24:21 Tod It's very. 01:38:24:23 - 01:38:28:04 Dan Pope Very esthetically pleasing, isn't it? 01:38:29:06 - 01:38:29:20 Dan Pope how many meals. 01:38:29:20 - 01:38:32:15 Dan Pope You like doing a week. 01:38:32:17 - 01:38:41:07 Dan Pope Well how do you, how do you navigate on three now. It's not an easy gig. Me it sounds like it's I know some of you. 01:38:41:07 - 01:38:44:21 Dan Pope Must have saying, oh, I just want to have a pokey bowl or like, a banana. 01:38:45:00 - 01:38:46:13 Dan Pope Yeah. I mean. 01:38:46:15 - 01:38:49:19 Tod Like I said, because I'm a lot more selective these days. 01:38:49:21 - 01:38:51:04 Dan Pope You know, before. 01:38:51:06 - 01:39:13:02 Tod You know, you're trying to eat, really trying to work as hard as you can to try and get yourself out in and out. You're dropping them to, like, support yourself. It's like you just go around like smashing as many places as possible, really trying to, like, support yourself. Whereas now, like, like I said, because I've scaled back on all of that kind of stuff, it's very much just going to places I want to. 01:39:13:02 - 01:39:15:05 Dan Pope Go to the same. 01:39:15:07 - 01:39:15:20 Dan Pope Know. 01:39:15:24 - 01:39:26:00 Tod I like. It's one if I if I don't really believe it or there's not enough like substance or context there, then. But I wouldn't really. I just probably won't go these days. 01:39:27:18 - 01:39:34:16 Tod Whereas before I probably take more of a chance and be like, oh, try and do that. But I can't do don't, I don't really want to like like people down as well. 01:39:34:18 - 01:39:37:07 Dan Pope You know, you're sort of obsessed in that period of time. 01:39:37:09 - 01:39:59:20 Tod Yeah. 100% like obsessed like I saw like all these bigger like accounts. And I just wanted to I really wanted to be like, the most followed. Kind of like food review or food recommendation page in the UK. And there's always people that like you kind of like look up to and try and really try and like overtake and yeah, now it's happened. 01:39:59:20 - 01:40:03:10 Dan Pope So because you're the biggest in the UK only. 01:40:03:12 - 01:40:12:06 Tod As far as like a following goes on, on, on Instagram for food recommendations I think so yeah that's wild. 01:40:12:08 - 01:40:14:18 Dan Pope Let me just let me smash one bit. 01:40:14:20 - 01:40:15:14 Dan Pope Okay. Back can. 01:40:15:20 - 01:40:17:14 Dan Pope That was good. 01:40:17:14 - 01:40:18:14 Tod These bad boys. 01:40:22:07 - 01:40:25:05 Dan Pope Naughty brother. 01:40:25:05 - 01:40:30:11 Dan Pope what was that Tom. Skinny guy like. He's absolutely legend. Really. My how did that come about. 01:40:30:11 - 01:40:38:10 Tod So I think I'm, I messaged him ages ago saying can we do a video together. He obviously just didn't say it or more. 01:40:38:14 - 01:40:38:21 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:40:39:02 - 01:40:41:16 Tod Or just thought this guy's a twat. 01:40:41:18 - 01:40:42:18 Dan Pope But. 01:40:42:20 - 01:40:52:14 Tod No, he, he he reached out to me a couple months ago and just said, like, total massive fan of your content. Would love to do something with you. And I was like, mate, let's get down the car. Like, let's go to Dino's. 01:40:52:17 - 01:40:54:24 Dan Pope Where is Dino's? It. 01:40:54:24 - 01:40:59:01 Tod Is is in Smiths Field. Is it new? 01:40:59:01 - 01:41:01:20 Dan Pope Smith says he he's down there every day. 01:41:01:22 - 01:41:22:19 Tod He got. I think he goes on there a couple times a week. And the atmosphere in that place is just wild, like you walk in and it's just, it's literally a building made out of concrete blocks, like outside of, where people were. It's, I think it's new Smithfield Market, and it's where all the top restaurants get all their groceries. 01:41:22:21 - 01:41:26:12 Tod So they sell loads of, like, onions. Tomatoes, like it's huge. It's this massive. 01:41:26:12 - 01:41:27:14 Dan Pope Warehouse. What does he actually. 01:41:27:18 - 01:41:28:12 Dan Pope Like, just do. 01:41:28:13 - 01:41:29:08 Dan Pope Like. 01:41:29:10 - 01:41:44:22 Tod Oh, so he sells the sounds, mattresses, but then also goes down the markets with all this produce that he buys from the and these pet foods market fruit veg. Yeah. Fruit and veg like and the I mean he sells everything like what you see him and it's what you get with him and. 01:41:44:22 - 01:41:46:12 Dan Pope It's like it's like so good. 01:41:46:13 - 01:41:47:22 Tod It genuinely like. 01:41:47:24 - 01:41:51:18 Dan Pope I, I can be vans up kind of getting down the pub like he's so good. Yeah. 01:41:51:18 - 01:41:56:16 Tod And he, he's exactly like that in real life. Like he's a, he's a true gentleman. And I would like to spend more time. 01:41:56:20 - 01:41:58:11 Dan Pope Really get a legend. 01:41:58:13 - 01:42:06:06 Dan Pope Is he, And because and so because I suppose you probably learn from him is like his consistency. He's he's so consistent as well as any. 01:42:06:12 - 01:42:10:03 Tod Yeah. It's like if if it's not broken, don't fix it, Joe. I mean. 01:42:10:05 - 01:42:10:24 Dan Pope And. 01:42:11:01 - 01:42:22:21 Tod Yeah he's content. The motivational speeches which by the way, he just raps off like I was like, have you prepared for this? Like what you want me to say? And he's like, I don't know, man. I'm just gonna stand up and know, say something. And I'm like. 01:42:22:23 - 01:42:26:15 Dan Pope Okay, now what's the word? Did you have like a career? Yeah. 01:42:26:15 - 01:42:42:00 Tod So yeah. Gone. Yeah. So I had to carry that 4:00 in the morning, you know, followed by an English breakfast. But again that's like again, it's that hook, like, you know, if I didn't post the curry then probably got three, 300,000 likes views. 01:42:42:02 - 01:42:45:20 Dan Pope Because I guess the curries that you're thinking of the country think of a controversial kind of. 01:42:46:01 - 01:42:48:17 Tod Yeah. No. Yeah. And I mean, and the controversial. 01:42:48:17 - 01:42:50:16 Dan Pope The wrong word, you know what I mean? But like the. Yeah. 01:42:50:16 - 01:42:54:18 Tod Like, where else can you go and buy a curry from a cafe at 4:00 in the morning? 01:42:54:20 - 01:42:55:01 Dan Pope Like. 01:42:55:04 - 01:43:01:06 Tod Nowhere. So people, people watch that because they want to, you know, to see you eat the curry basically. 01:43:01:08 - 01:43:02:15 Dan Pope So the funny. 01:43:02:17 - 01:43:09:00 Dan Pope The, Yeah. So just a few more things in the storytelling. Because I think it's fascinating. Anyone go on to fume. 01:43:09:02 - 01:43:12:12 Dan Pope Yeah. But so, so it's, 01:43:12:14 - 01:43:13:22 Dan Pope Attention grabbing. 01:43:13:24 - 01:43:15:03 Dan Pope Yeah. First bit. 01:43:15:03 - 01:43:26:13 Dan Pope And then you're kind of thinking of those riches. So, I mean, I've literally smashed so much like you. My my heart's beginning to sort of, implode on me, but. Yeah. So then you've got you've got the rich storytelling. 01:43:26:15 - 01:43:27:05 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:43:27:07 - 01:43:35:14 Dan Pope And then you go into the like, how work are you thinking about how people are going to share it? Like, is that something you think about? 01:43:35:15 - 01:43:36:13 Tod No, not really. 01:43:36:13 - 01:43:37:07 Dan Pope Know what he. 01:43:37:11 - 01:43:59:08 Tod I think about just the spot, the story, how how the visuals are going to look like, what's the story? That's the main thing. And but the thing is, you can't grow an Instagram account by posting like one video unless you're that girl that goes booked. Is a that's only happened once in history. Yeah. Like I think last month's the views on the account was were 100 million. 01:43:59:10 - 01:44:18:00 Tod And even at that stage I think you probably grow like 100,000 followers. And in a month. That's crazy like that. That's the proportions are like you, you're working at. So even if you're averaging like a million views a week, which is still a shitload of video to get to a million followers, you're still going to like it's it can take like four years. 01:44:18:00 - 01:44:43:10 Tod So the hard work of having to post so much viral video is, is is obviously it's the crux to gaining all these followers. Like if you're if you post one video that gets 100,000 views or three videos that average like 300,000 views, or one video that gets, you know, 5 million views, that's a one that none of your followers are going to see that vote. 01:44:43:13 - 01:44:45:06 Tod So then you're going to get people. 01:44:45:06 - 01:44:46:19 Dan Pope To what do you mean what's what's. 01:44:47:00 - 01:44:47:18 Dan Pope What do you mean one? 01:44:47:18 - 01:44:59:15 Tod That's not to say that you've got a hundred thousand followers. You post like you're posting regularly, but you're posting. I say that you post every single day for a week and each video gets a hundred thousand views. 01:44:59:21 - 01:45:00:12 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:45:00:14 - 01:45:08:04 Tod Or you post one video one day a week, but then that gets 700,000 views. Yeah. So it's. 01:45:08:08 - 01:45:09:19 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:45:09:21 - 01:45:20:07 Tod Those hundred thousand views that you're getting every single day, a lot of those are going to be your own followers. You don't really gain much. Whereas that one video that goes viral and gets you 700,000 views on that one video, that's where you're going to get your following from. 01:45:20:09 - 01:45:22:02 Dan Pope Right? Okay. 01:45:22:04 - 01:45:22:10 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:45:22:10 - 01:45:44:01 Tod So like and you kind of better off doing I know I've kind of smashed it last year in terms of just trying to pep all these spots. But if there's one thing that I've learned, it would be not to tie myself out so much, trying to grab every single bit of attention or that or every single spot, it just be to pick your spots more wisely, post consistently. 01:45:44:03 - 01:45:48:11 Tod And that's the way that you you're always going to go. 01:45:48:13 - 01:45:48:23 Dan Pope Yeah, it's because. 01:45:48:24 - 01:45:52:09 Dan Pope I'm learning so much from you, mate. Tell me about volume then. Because we've sort. 01:45:52:09 - 01:45:53:00 Dan Pope Of yeah. 01:45:53:00 - 01:45:57:02 Dan Pope Almost jumped into that pool. But let's go into our speed zone and jump straight into some. 01:45:57:02 - 01:45:58:03 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. That's right. 01:45:58:04 - 01:45:59:24 Tod Let's run that back by the curry. 01:46:00:02 - 01:46:01:08 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:46:01:10 - 01:46:19:20 Tod Yes a few. And basically so when I quit my job, I never wanted to just be reliant on, taught like I knew the risks. You know, if someone hacks my account, that's gone. That's a whole business gone overnight. So, like, it's really important for me to be able to grow the pool of businesses using talk while it lasts. 01:46:19:20 - 01:46:45:05 Tod Because like I said, it's great in the moment, but in years time, you never know what might happen and it might go down the shitter. You know, someone else might do something else like you might. It's not sustainable. No one can run top without me. So what was really important for me is to be able to set up other businesses that, you know, I can invest time in and have fun with, and that I get the same enjoyment from talked with as well. 01:46:45:11 - 01:46:53:21 Tod So obviously combining barbecue food, which is like why I wouldn't not that is my favorite food like, but I just love creating content for barbecue. 01:46:53:22 - 01:46:54:12 Dan Pope Why? 01:46:54:14 - 01:47:14:07 Tod Just because you get all these meats, it is the people. It's the enthusiasm. It's like it's like a whole culture of people and everyone's so happy because like barbecue food's the best food in the world, right? Because you can sit on a Sunday and you can boast a, you know, a beef joint, and you're always with with your friends, you're always with your family, and you've always got a beer. 01:47:14:10 - 01:47:15:12 Dan Pope And, you. 01:47:15:12 - 01:47:24:06 Tod Can't do that by cooking a pizza. You can't do that by, like, cooking the curry. I mean, you come with a curry, but, you know, you've got sun on the back of. 01:47:24:08 - 01:47:29:24 Dan Pope Yeah, the meat is is literally like a totem pole which pulls people together. Yeah. It's history. 01:47:30:02 - 01:47:45:19 Tod And the fact it's over time, it's just a great place to, to be. So that I've always loved barbecue and like with my family from when I was a kid through to now when I go to Texas and, and to see all these, like, big, like, bones of rib and, you know, you talk about three seconds like Robinson. 01:47:45:20 - 01:47:46:24 Dan Pope You've been to Reuben Reuben's. 01:47:46:24 - 01:47:47:07 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:47:47:08 - 01:47:50:16 Dan Pope Yeah, that is unreal. He's he's got a place at Derbys now. 01:47:50:21 - 01:47:52:07 Tod Yeah, he made his. 01:47:52:09 - 01:47:54:06 Dan Pope Beef ribs are so fucking good, man. 01:47:54:06 - 01:48:10:22 Tod I remember the first time I heard about Reuben. It was in lockdown and he was smoking salmon from his mum's backyard. I think it was like 18 at the time and everyone was like, this guy, like, is a wizard. Like he's transformed, like London smoked, smoke seen. But he's actually taking his time. He's not pulling it off to three hours. 01:48:10:24 - 01:48:19:04 Tod He's smoking it for ten hours. He smoked overnight. And I remember just trying his food and I was just, like, gobsmacked. I can't believe what this guy was doing. 01:48:19:04 - 01:48:22:02 Dan Pope So what's the what's what? Talk to him about the barbecue. 01:48:22:02 - 01:48:25:22 Dan Pope Like in obviously we're smashing over here. 01:48:25:22 - 01:48:29:09 Dan Pope But like the barbecue in the States. Yeah. 01:48:29:11 - 01:48:43:21 Dan Pope Why. Just why does that enchant you. Why does why do you feel like a kid at Disneyland when you're around? I know we've talked about barbecue in general, and I agree, like if you're in Brixton or you're in, Leamington Spa, a barbecue is a kind of a very symbolic kind of meal. 01:48:44:00 - 01:48:44:16 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:48:44:18 - 01:48:48:17 Dan Pope But like I've heard, you know, I've heard everyone talk about the barbecue in Austin. 01:48:48:22 - 01:48:49:19 Tod I mean, it's just. 01:48:49:22 - 01:48:51:07 Dan Pope What's so wild about it? Tell me about it. 01:48:51:07 - 01:49:07:07 Tod It's it's completely on a different level to anything I've ever witnessed in my life. Like, really, people go, I remember the first we went to, it was Franklin's. And, you know, we got there at 7:00 in the morning and a half, six in the morning were the second people in line. They didn't even open till 11. One hour later. 01:49:07:07 - 01:49:09:00 Dan Pope Off six in the morning. Yeah, yeah. 01:49:09:05 - 01:49:10:05 Tod Because we wanted that brisket. 01:49:10:05 - 01:49:16:10 Dan Pope We wanted that brisket, boy. All that brisket bad. And so. 01:49:16:12 - 01:49:34:02 Tod Yeah, but you get there and like it's before 11:00 in this line, it's like so far down and everyone's like drinking beers like at like 10:00 in the morning. I'm like, this is just crazy. And just the culture out there as of it's like, like I said, it's like having a family barbecue, but doing on a commercial scale. 01:49:34:04 - 01:49:53:05 Tod And that's kind of what, like, you know, the, the people in Texas, it's like a religion to them. It is a religion. Like they will they don't. They, they never cook anything on the day. So they're always one day behind. So they put their brisket in the brisket. They cook for 40 hours before cook it for 24 hours, and then they'll hot hold it overnight. 01:49:53:05 - 01:49:55:05 Dan Pope So for another day. 01:49:55:07 - 01:50:15:10 Tod So you've got like this 48 hour like cooking period. For that one bit of meat you're gonna put in your mouth. Yeah. So I just find is bonkers and yeah, now obviously, Michelin has gone over there and it was quite good because a lot of some of the content I didn't put out, I was waiting for to see if if they got Michelin star and a couple of them did, I was like sick. 01:50:15:15 - 01:50:18:19 Dan Pope I got time to. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah, yeah. 01:50:18:21 - 01:50:22:02 Dan Pope What? So what are some of the dishes you have? These Michelin star Barbie places? 01:50:22:02 - 01:50:26:22 Tod Yeah. So I mean, yeah, it was Leroy Lewis and, interstellar. Yeah. 01:50:26:23 - 01:50:28:04 Dan Pope So. Yeah. So good. 01:50:28:06 - 01:50:49:19 Tod And again, like, is, like, they do the normal stuff. Like it's a sausage, beef rib, brisket, kind of bacon, whatever it might be. But just it is. You can just tell that it's taken 48 hours to cook. Like the way that, you know, it just disintegrates on your tongue, but there's still, like, a little bit of a bite, the saltiness, like the the sauces that they're starting to pair this stuff with. 01:50:49:19 - 01:51:13:09 Tod So what Leroy Lewis and, and interstellar have done is like, they've taken your traditional smoking method salt, pepper a long period of time, but they've like, put all these incredible sides with it. So like, normally, like if you go to someone like Franklin's, you get really like average side. So like you get like coleslaw or, new potato salad, some onions. 01:51:13:11 - 01:51:21:02 Tod But they're really basic. It's about the meat. But these guys have gone like, right, we're going to make some epic somehow. Yeah. And it is. It's just like crazy. 01:51:21:03 - 01:51:33:18 Dan Pope It's the side things. Because that's what I was asking. Sure. At Black Bear Burger, like how do you stand out? Yeah, not quite a lot of, people I've spoken to on the pod is like focusing on things that people don't really think about. 01:51:33:18 - 01:51:34:02 Dan Pope Yeah. 01:51:34:07 - 01:51:50:00 Dan Pope So there's that restaurant in New York that they're like, how do we become the best restaurant in New York? They're like, well, fuck it, we're going to get a beer. Sommelier. You know, no one's ever Somalia. And it was a Union square for everyone. And so they were like, okay, we're going to get we're going to get beers, Stuart. 01:51:50:00 - 01:52:01:05 Dan Pope But I bet burgers like well burger Landscape in London is so busy. Yeah. So so we're well, he says we're not a burger restaurant. We're a restaurant that does burgers. Yeah. You know, it's the wings. They do. They're so. 01:52:01:05 - 01:52:04:07 Dan Pope Banging. Yeah, yeah. That's so good. The you know the. 01:52:04:07 - 01:52:05:15 Dan Pope Thing eat the. Yeah. 01:52:05:17 - 01:52:07:04 Tod The spring roll with the brisket. 01:52:07:09 - 01:52:07:18 Dan Pope That's so. 01:52:07:19 - 01:52:18:11 Dan Pope Good. But like I think there's a focus on that and that what's wild it's like is that restaurant just focuses on the sights and gets a michelin star. Or is this not as easy as that? But it's like focusing on those little things. 01:52:18:11 - 01:52:18:19 Tod Yeah. 01:52:18:19 - 01:52:19:12 Dan Pope And what were the. 01:52:19:12 - 01:52:21:20 Dan Pope Some of those sides then. So they were. 01:52:21:22 - 01:52:26:14 Tod For good question. What did they do? They were nice. 01:52:26:16 - 01:52:27:16 Dan Pope He did 01:52:29:01 - 01:52:35:03 Tod Long time for my, my my mouth to get blank. Ask a blank mind to go blank. God, how long have you done? 01:52:35:06 - 01:52:38:07 Dan Pope Yeah, yeah. Sorry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we finish up in this, He. 01:52:38:11 - 01:53:02:02 Tod So he did this creamed corn, which, I swear to God, like, didn't even look much. But the way that, like, he had this, like, salty cheese, creamy bite, which he then paired with, like a sausage. I was just like, blown away by. I just couldn't believe, like. And also, like a lot of them now kind of putting this, like Tex-Mex, like spin on some of their sides as well. 01:53:02:02 - 01:53:05:14 Tod So, you know, you get like that Mexican heat, that Mexican flavor. 01:53:05:14 - 01:53:07:20 Dan Pope It's oh, really delicious. 01:53:07:21 - 01:53:19:23 Dan Pope So quickly, just quickly taught me about to see about the game plan with him. Then it was you wanted to get away from having you having to solely be the revenue stream. Yeah. Because that's. 01:53:20:00 - 01:53:54:01 Tod Yeah. So so what I want to do a few minutes to kind of spend the festival the way that festivals are run on their heads, not I've got no experience in doing a festival. I just do my food page and I partner with, my business partner, Alex, who is run successful festivals for last ten years. So I was like, what happens and what the feedback I get from all these festivals, Trey is so unhappy because the they've gone out there and they've paid a lot of money to be at the festival and then at the festival, then they're still giving away like 20, 30, 40% of their own, and they come away in 01:53:54:01 - 01:53:59:13 Tod the light of the slogged, in Hyde Park for the whole of summer. And I've literally made no money. 01:53:59:15 - 01:54:01:12 Dan Pope So that way. So how does the business model work? 01:54:01:12 - 01:54:21:02 Tod They so it's a basically a festival like you know, we'll charging say five grand for traders to, to be at that festival and then they'll take another like 20 to 30%, maybe more of that trades as profit to, to to sell food to that festival. So yeah. So by the time like the, that restaurant still all that they've done that home. 01:54:21:02 - 01:54:31:15 Tod They've worked there for six weeks, two weeks a week and they've never actually made that much money. If any money, like every single trader that I spoke to is like, oh yeah, we barely broke, broke, even. 01:54:31:17 - 01:54:36:01 Dan Pope So it's more for them. It's kind of more of a marketing play just to like, yeah, be that okay. 01:54:36:03 - 01:54:54:04 Tod Yeah. So it's marked in place. So what I so so what I thought is how, what happens if we take that away like what happens if we, we don't be greedy. Like, what if there's a festival in the world that everyone, everyone wins. So we sell the tickets, the venue will get the barman the and the traders get. 01:54:54:06 - 01:55:13:13 Tod They get to trade at the festival for a small fee, but don't take any percentage. And also then we keep, we ask each trader to offer a 3 pound dish so that people can come to the festival. They can visit ten traders and only spend 30 pounds. So that way every single person in the equation is winning and everyone's having fun. 01:55:13:15 - 01:55:38:20 Tod And so we sat down. And then what I also said is that if we do a 3 pound dish, what annoys me when I go to a barbecue festival or any food festival, they always have these kind of like middle sized portions and they chop and and they're overpriced. So once if we do a 3 pound dish, 7 pound dish, but then do a 15 pound dish, which is that big rib that, you know, if you've had a couple of beers and you want shelving for the amount, yeah, you can go and do that. 01:55:38:22 - 01:55:41:14 Dan Pope So yes. Yes. So similarly. 01:55:41:14 - 01:55:43:04 Tod So that's where the food. 01:55:43:06 - 01:55:47:01 Dan Pope For everyone is usually about eight £9. And it's the same sort of size 01:55:47:01 - 01:56:00:08 Tod again what I've tried to do a few is just trying to cut through all that, like we cut through. So there's a few. Like, you wouldn't have to get the calves for that. We want people that eating meat want people enjoying, like, food and we want everyone smiling. 01:56:00:09 - 01:56:09:20 Tod We to trade this smiling cause and making money. We want the people smiling because it's not a rip off. And then like, yeah, we're, we're we're happy as well. So. 01:56:09:22 - 01:56:13:03 Dan Pope And where it's, where are you going to do it. You don't already, you don't want to Manchester. 01:56:13:03 - 01:56:23:06 Tod And so we did it in Peckham and it's sold out last year both of them sold out. And then we've now doubled in capacity in London. We've gone to Woolwich Works. 01:56:23:06 - 01:56:24:06 Dan Pope Where. 01:56:24:08 - 01:56:31:24 Tod Again now I think we've got 10,000 people there this year. And then we've also gone up to Manchester, which sold out in 24 hours, which is. 01:56:32:00 - 01:56:33:00 Dan Pope Warehouse in Manchester. 01:56:33:02 - 01:56:35:24 Tod I the progress Progress Center. 01:56:36:01 - 01:56:37:17 Dan Pope So yeah, it's. Yes. 01:56:37:19 - 01:56:48:07 Tod It's, it's just outside the city center. But yeah. To think like for that we literally posted within 24 hours it completely sold out. So now we're about to add another day which now. 01:56:48:07 - 01:56:49:07 Dan Pope Is so sick. 01:56:49:07 - 01:56:50:03 Tod 50% sold. 01:56:50:03 - 01:57:06:10 Dan Pope Out, so sick. And what were some of the key lessons you took from that first little one in Peckham about doing festivals? Because that thing I told you, I want to do this whole Rooney thing. Yeah. At some point, like be much later down the line this year I've got just focus. But like I still that's one thing I want to move into. 01:57:06:11 - 01:57:14:00 Dan Pope Like we do these small supper clubs live podcast which is sick. But yeah. What are some of this what's what's the art of putting on an amazing event, you think? 01:57:14:02 - 01:57:33:17 Tod I think like again, it goes back to enthusiasm. Like you need to you need to believe in the end product. It and like I said, for us it was very much we want to have great food. We wanted to support the traders willingness to support the people. And also, like I put a lot of people for, for, see Instagram and they think, oh God, like, Tod's been there, but like, God, it's expensive. 01:57:33:19 - 01:57:56:07 Tod If someone in Manchester wants to go down to London, then they've got to buy a train ticket, they've got to sleep overnight. They've got to them by their trade, barbecue food, then they've got to go all the way back again. And you've ended up spending 600 pounds to try this place. So with him I was like, why don't we just bring all these places that I'm visiting together for people, so then they can get into a into a festival, they can pay £25 for a ticket. 01:57:56:10 - 01:58:07:07 Tod Yeah. Then they can try it. Not just one, but they can try ten of these, these spots that I've picked for over the last what's in the last year. And then they, they can try a little bit from every single one of them. 01:58:07:09 - 01:58:09:00 Dan Pope What are some of the spots you've got. 01:58:09:02 - 01:58:26:07 Tod So this year we've got burnt which are the base in Shoreditch, amazing barbecue house. We've got Reuben. Yeah. So what's up Reuben. We've got here also we got Korean cowgirl which again goes, yeah, they've won that like for last few years. Best Buy these cherry ribs. Sorry. 01:58:26:07 - 01:58:32:04 Dan Pope That's not that. He's laughing and I know it sounds interesting. Yeah. 01:58:32:06 - 01:58:54:11 Tod But also like this year we're also speaking some guys in Texas, we've got someone confirmed from Paris, which is going to be extremely exciting. So we're really trying to, like, you know, fume for the next three years, like, we want, you know, to look at huge venues like we want this to be massive. We want to be the biggest barbecue competition, like literally in the world. 01:58:54:14 - 01:58:57:11 Dan Pope Is it a competition as well? Well, people are there like, yeah. 01:58:57:11 - 01:59:13:13 Tod So yeah, this will we will try to debate whether we should do it as a competition or not. But it's just fun, isn't it? Like you want traders to really put their, their effort into that 3 pound dish. Also, you want people to be able to go around and create that excitement. You know, I've got my sticker. 01:59:13:13 - 01:59:16:24 Tod Which 1 a.m. I going to put it on? Like I think it's fun goes. 01:59:16:24 - 01:59:37:24 Dan Pope Back to the storytelling. Yeah. But maybe this was what I've learned from you today, mate, is it's psyche behind all all of this. I just think there's this few things like this excitement, enchantment with food, as you see, called it Narnia or Disneyland. Like there is that energy of which you can only get through food. I think. And then once you get old, like there's not much to fucking do, especially in London outside now. 01:59:38:01 - 01:59:56:13 Dan Pope But food can give you a lot of color and happiness. But then also the the storytelling and the craft of telling stories and that that's in terms of getting attention, but also in terms of like actually helping people, whether it's a yeah, yeah, yeah, talk a thing. And then with perfume, you're always building your own fucking Narnia. 01:59:56:16 - 02:00:09:23 Tod Yeah. Well, that's to see. Yeah. To bring it all of those people to together and to a place. And like I said, like feed for the traders, like I'll go there, I'll do a video for them, they'll come to the festival. So like, you know, the marketing, everything around that, like. 02:00:09:23 - 02:00:10:20 Dan Pope Everyone's winning. 02:00:10:20 - 02:00:29:10 Tod Like everyone's winning. And that's so important that we build this family, this community, that we all work together. So the traders trust us, we trust the traders, we trust the venues that we work with. And we really just want to try and create this model which really like hasn't been done before. Oh, it has been done and it's got ruined because people have got greedy like that. 02:00:29:12 - 02:00:42:15 Tod Our main principle is not to get greedy not to. And it's always to, to really try and, you know, support the communities, the people. And through that, everyone's got to smile, right. They can't go wrong 100%. 02:00:42:17 - 02:00:49:19 Dan Pope Tony boy, thanks for coming on the podcast. I really appreciate that. It's been an absolute pleasure, mate. Thank you so much. That was sick. 02:00:49:19 - 02:00:49:20 02:00:49:20 - 02:01:25:12