You open a restaurant because you know how to make a steak, but you've got to feed the masses to eat with the classes. Feed the masses to eat with the classes. So you have to give. As a restaurant owner, you have to give the people what they want, not what you want to make. It's Wine Talks with Paul K. Hey, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul Kay. And we are in studio today about to have a great conversation with famed Peter Dill's food critic and wine critic as well. Introductions in just a
minute. Great day today here in Southern California, and I want to alert you to a new show that I'm starting, the new. The first episode comes out next week, and that is called Song of America, which is the title of a book written by George Mardiqui and famed restaurateur from San Francisco in the 50s, and he brought 250,000 refugees to America. And he wrote a book. It's incredible. I stole the name with the. With
at the pleasure of his son. So we're going to release stories of immigration to America that are successful, whether it's financial, social, political, or whatever. And the first one is about the Agogenian family and their racing history, including Indianapolis 500 and local racing, but not why we're here. Well, there's plenty of those guys still around. Yeah, it's a huge family. We talked about that. Every time I. Well, I'll run into somebody Agonian. Well, no, that's
the third cousin over. We did this, but, you know. Yeah, yeah. So welcome to the show, Peter. Thank you. This is host of Dining With Dill's. Yeah. Peter Dills and the podcast Peter Dills, which I'm gonna go right into that. Because, you know, growing up, your dad Elmer was one of the famed food critics, not only California, but the country. No. Yeah. Well, you know, I call him the OG the OG restaurant.
Restaurant critics in the 70s and 80s, when he was doing restaurant critics critiques, there was no. He was the only game in town. There was a woman named Lo Dwan. She wrote for the LA Times, went on to the New York Times. Very famous restaurant critic. There was hilly rose from KFI in the 70s and. But there was KFI. KFI 640. Hilly rose in the 70s, and then Lois Dwan, and then my dad, Elmer Dills. Merrill Schindler came around. Merrill Schindler. They were kind of.
Were they close? So Mer. Yeah. Meryl and my dad were friends. Adversaries at some times. But when my dad was on KBC radio Meryl would come and be the guest host. So basically when my dad was on vacation, Meryl got his start from doing that. From doing that. And you know what Meryl Schindler's claim to fame is? He was the writer for the Casey Kaysen Top 40. I did not know that. Yeah. Wow. That was one of my favorite shows with Casey
Kane. That's what Meryl did back in the 80s and 90s. He was actually a producer of Casey Kaysen's Top 40. You know, so let me this play with that a little bit because Jonathan Gold passed away a couple years ago and he was, you know, well known. LA Times, but more mostly digital. Is that part of food culture in America? An active part of the critic part? Do we still. Do we, do we still hang our hat on that? I know you do a lot of it. I just wonder what the
popularity. Because your dad was so popular and Meryl Schindler was well known and people sought that opinion. But I'm wondering what the digital world, if some of that's changed at all. It's a lot. There's probably a thousand people, ten thousand people out there with a phone and think they can just walk into a restaurant and be a critic just because they have a phone. It's interesting you brought that up. I was talking to a student at Cal State Fullerton this morning, the Titans over there
on 57 Freeway. And he's into journalism and wants to learn more. And he brought it up to me and he said, how do you, as a man my age, how do you relate to people my age? And I said, well, there's a lot of history involved. So at my age, Paul, if I go in and talk about a burrito at a certain restaurant, hopefully I can add a little flavor of the history of a burrito. Where did the burrito come from? What makes a burrito great or a steak or a Caesar
salad? So to answer your question, yeah, the digital age has definitely taken over and there's a lot of competition. But I think for me and people that are. We mentioned Merill. Merill's still around. He does a podcast. Oh, does he? I didn't know. Yeah. So I think that you just have to. I, I use the word og. I think you just have to be that guy that's an expert and not worry that there's a thousand other kids, you know, with
a phone saying, hey, this sucks. Or these fries are. Yeah, whatever. Do people recognize your name and still say, hey, you related to Elmer? Yeah, yeah, I am. When talked about the radio show, KRLA, Sundays at 5, they do a whole thing. A 30 second introduction of Peter Dills has taken over for. Well, I don't know if I taken over for Elmer Dills, but no, I don't go into a restaurant or a scene or some situation and say, hey, I'm Peter Dills. You know, you might
remember my dad, Elmer Dills. A lot of people do that. Hey, you might remember his dad. But it's not that I feel uncomfortable with that. I just don't. I don't know if I need to do that. I just keep the energy. I mean, look, there's. There's you and your dad, right? 75. Yeah. A little while ago. Well, we certainly as. As sort of descendants of, of the industries we're in. Can't ignore that. Right? I can't. You can. It's
impossible. Yeah. And I give a ton of credit to my father for even getting me involved with this sometimes and. But, you know, I consider that legacy an important part of our DNA when it comes to what we do. Yeah. I mean, sometimes people will say to me, boy, your dad must be looking down in heaven and very proud of you. And I'm like, well, I hope so. I'm just kind of trying to be me. But I think you brought it up before we even got
on. Just trying to make sure that we keep reinventing ourselves and realizing that the podcast and these videos and these cameras are the way of now, not the future. It's the way it is now, and. Who knows what the future is going to do. The reason I sold one of the month clubs in March of 2023 was I was not, after 35 years, prepared to regen it because I hadn't, you know, we were paying attention. We were prolific digital marketers, emailers, all that stuff.
33 million emails my last year. But. But something was going on in the industry that I couldn't figure out. It was post Covid. Covid was incredible. 30% up. You know, do no wrong during COVID And that's. That eroded very quickly post Covid. And so I wasn't prepar Jen at that point and we had already started the podcast. And I love this stuff, as you do. Yeah. And so it was time for us to do it. It's time to not slug it out in the trenches
anymore. So were you always going to be in the food side of things following your dad or not following your dad, but being part of the family? Well, what happened was, it's kind of a simple story. When I was Doing events, always doing things like chili cook offs, charity events. That's. That was my deal. And then when my dad, KABC radio in the heyday or. Right, right. When they actually left the Dodgers, he went to a station called KRLA K I E V, which was famous for a guy
named George Putnam. Oh, yeah, George Put. Yeah. Wow. Channel 13 news. And there is a guy named Bob Hastings was the general manager back then. And Bob's dad was in McHale's navy. He was the, the, the one of the. Come on. Bob Hastings, his dad was in McKill's navy and he was running this KRLA KIV station. And he said to me, and I was there very part time, he said, hey, you know, your dad's not going to be around forever. Why don't you, instead of Merrill or Steve Knight, why don't you
take over the show when your dad goes on vacation? Because your dad sure goes on vacation a lot. So they gave me an 11 o'clock time slot Saturday night when I don't know if anybody's listening, but that's what they gave me for a couple weeks just so I could practice being on the radio. Yeah. Wow, that's pretty interesting. Yeah. How long ago was that? That's at least 17, 20 years ago. Yeah. So I've been doing radio for. Was it intimidating? I think it still is. I. I sometimes get
nervous, even though I've been doing it for 20 years. Sometimes I'll get nervous like at 3:00 when I'm getting ready for the 5:00 show. Kara, Is anybody listening? Will I get phone calls? You know, and all you can do is just really do the best you can and people will follow. Yeah, that's right. You know, you were just talking about the podcast. My podcast, which is on. It's on everywhere. You put Peter Dills. Like Peter Dills. Just, just type in Peter
Dills. Subscribe. A friend of mine called me today. He goes, hey, I listened to your podcast with Musso and Frank Sunday. I think that was the best show you've done in three months. And I thought, really? Because I didn't like it. Yeah, no, that's interesting. I'm glad you said that. I don't like listening to myself necessarily. No, no. And I don't like watching myself necessarily. Yeah. But today I did a show Wednesday with Madeline Puckett of Wine Folly. And she's a
very engaging, brilliant young lady. So I knew there was no content issues to discuss nor pace issues. I knew I could keep the pace up But I was playing it back today, and I was with one of Bourdain's old producers. He was here, helped me with something, and he didn't want me to turn it off. And I thought to myself, this is a really good show. You know, I. I was engaged to it and I went through it. And it doesn't always feel that way. You don't always think that, you know,
you kind of go, gee, I don't know. I don't sound very good. I was asking the. The chef and the manager, general manager questions, and I didn't feel that they were telling a story. I want radio. Well, podcasts there. It's a. We're telling a story. Yeah, you know, we. You can ask me a little later about the wines and things like that, but for me, when I'm selling or talking about a bottle of wine, to sell, there has to be a story behind it in radio, too. So,
you know, if. If somebody comes on my show, I want you to tell a story. I don't want to sit there and ask you 15 questions. I want you two or three questions at the most. And I want you to. Well, because this is why we buy our stakes. Because we actually flew out to Chicago and we visited where the, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I want to hear a story. Sure, Franks. I mean, it's like
one. This is interesting. I'm going to ask you this question because you go to Europe, you go to France, and I have a book at home called the Great Chefs of France. And. And most of the restaurants in this book, and the book is from the 70s are still around, and there's still legacy restaurants. You know, food. The culture of food is so much different in Europe than it is in America in La Muso. And Frank's is one of the last surviving sort of restaurants like
that. I knew what you were going to ask me. Oh, he's going to say, why are Dan. Well, Dan Tan is still around. Why isn't chasing still around? Why isn't Larage still around? Why did all these restaurants go out? Because I think you know the answer. I think that we are such a casual society in Southern California that I remember going to the Parkway Grill one time after a football game and I was wearing shorts, and the general
manager said, peter, you know, hey, come on, what are you doing? I go, well, I just got. I'm just got through with the football game. Now. If you walked in with shorts, maybe not a tank top, if you walked in, they just want. They just want your business yeah, right. No, it's different. It's so different. Yeah. But. Yeah. Why did all those great restaurants from the 70s and the 80s go out of business when in Europe they're still there? I think it's a cultural shift in food, I think, you know,
profitability. There's no legacies to hand off, you know, Ferdinand Pont, you know, his wife, whatever. And they hand it off to their kids. And the TWA Grill Brothers. There's a. I think maybe the respect for cuisine, particularly regional cuisine, is just got history in Europe that we don't have here, and maybe that'll change. But we were responsible for those restaurants you just mentioned for some of the big shifts in food in America. Was it called. I remember Merrill
Schindler wrote for the Zagat Guide. He was the. He was one of the editors, and he had called that the Parkway Grill was the Spago of the East. I remember that line in the. In the Zagat guy. The Spago of the East. But maybe we just never had enough or don't have enough interest in those type of fine dining places anymore. Well, but that's interesting, though. Look, the Smith Brothers. Look what they've been through for the listeners. Smith Brothers are local restaurateurs who have
three. These stalwart restaurants in Southern California, but have had many more than that. That didn't survive. Yeah, that didn't do it. Yeah. I mean, even a guy like you been all these places, critiqued all these restaurants, talked to all the owners. Probably can't put a finger on, like, why some survive and some don't. I was talking to a restaurant tour just a couple of weeks ago, and I just crossed my fingers that he survives. It's a barbecue restaurant. And I was asking
him, I go, hey, I'm gonna write an article. I write for the Sierra Madre newspaper. And I said, hey, you know, there's no cost or anything. We don't charge you. It's a real restaurant review. Tell me what your favorite dishes are, your signature dishes. And he said, I like all my dishes. I go, I know that, but give me two or three dishes to try. He goes, well, I can't really do that. Cause I like everything on my menu. I go, well, look, you know, you have children, and obviously you
like three. You like all your children. But which. Which dishes? Which is your favorite? And he wouldn't give me an answer. And so to answer your question is that I think that if you own a restaurant and do it your way, that is fine. You want to, you know, you. You open A restaurant because you, you know how to make a steak, but you've got to feed the masses to eat with the classes. Feed the masses to eat with the classes. So you have to
give. As a restaurant owner, you have to give the people what they want, not what you want to make. It's not like, you know, that Soup Nazi thing, hey, here's my soup. This is the way it is. You know, I remember going out with my dad to a restaurant. It was in Glendale, I don't remember on brand. And my dad said, okay, make sure you get, you know, plenty of garlic. Really plenty of garlic. So the guy comes back and my dad says, I said, plenty of garlic. Guy comes back, a little bit of
garlic more. He goes, sir, I want my eyes to not like onions, but I want to cry that there's so much garlic. I want my wife to be mad at me when I get home because there's so much garlic. So I think that the problem with what I see with restaurants is they try to appease themselves, and they really are in the customer service business. It's hospitality. It's a hospitality business. Bruce Taylor. Bruce Taylor up in LA Canada has two restaurants, one on
8th street and the other one on Foothill. And he'll. He always says to me, I. I get together with him two or three times a year. And he always says, peter, I don't think we have the best steak in town, but I think it's pretty dang good and it's pretty reasonably priced. So I think that when a restaurant gets that balance, this Taylor Steakhouse, Taylor's Steakhouse. But I think the same thing for wine. There has to be a balance of the. The cost of the wine or the cost of what you're giving
somebody. Because if you're giving somebody an $85 steak and it's, eh. It's okay. Do you think let's move into that? Because there was a restaurant in Hermosa and we spent a lot of time there, and there's a guy down there, his name is Slay, is a chef. His restaurants, he keeps opening them, you know, while restaurant next door is closing, he's opening more, and he has a separate cuisine for each one, and each one has hospitality driven, you know,
energy. But there was a restaurant in Hermosa. It was. I forgot the name of it now. And it said on the menu, substitutions and changes. Politely declined. Now what? That. That is a pretty arrogant position to take when you're supposed to be in the hospitality business and taking care of your clients. And you go, no extra garlic allowed. Yeah, right. We're going to serve it the way we're going to serve it. It's going to be rare. And that's the way it is.
And that's. That's the way we serve it. So this is an interesting segue into the wine side because it's a very important subject. Years ago, I read an article about a guy saying, well, you know, the wine trade, they don't understand you've got to meet the customer where the customer wants you to meet. And I think in general, that's probably true. You vint wines, what are popular at the time? We had Bartles and James at one time, we had all
this stuff that used to come out. And there's different things today. But isn't it a true glass of wine? Exactly the opposite. That is what is given to you by the vineyard and by the vines and by the grapes. And you make the best you can from there, as opposed to stocking the shells with Josh and apothic red. And, you know, they're trying every year to make sure it tastes the same so the client comes back. And so this is a big argument that goes on, and
I'm very romantic about it, but I get it. I. I don't want to step into your knowledge because, you know, that's very. Kind of you to say. Thank you. No. But I have had this argument discussion with the wine buyers at Vons and Pavilions, Albertson, Safeway. I said, look, if you're just going to pull the stuff off the shelf that you feel is not selling. Now, it could be selling in Monrovia, but it's not selling
in Fullerton. And you're doing a schematic of, hey, well, we're only selling 10 cases of whatever, and you pull it on the shelf. Well, what, we're just going to become Stater Brothers? Yeah. Nothing wrong with Stater Brothers. No, no. You're talking about the wine selection. I'm just saying selection. So we're going to get to a point where we're just taking wines off the shelf because only two people. And all you need is two people to come into a
supermarket and. And keep buying a certain wine. That's right. You need that regular. Yeah, you just need that regular person to buy St. Francis cabernet twice a week. And you're good. You're golden. But, yeah. Oh, it's not selling in Fullerton, so we're going to take it off the shelf. Are they central buyers? Can you buy. Can you buy in Your individual shop as what
you. So that's kind of what I wanted to lead the show off with, is that when I got into this business five years ago, I thought somebody would come in and say, we want a bot. We want a case, not a bottle. We want a case of something fancy. That's hard to get. Tell me, tell me something that Luja, though, you know. Yeah, I can get it for you. I thought that's what business I was getting into. I thought I was getting into the I can get it for you business, but I'm not. I can get you some Chateau
Montelena Cabernet or Chardonnay. I can get that for you. But the hard to. Hard to find stuff like the Georges Latour of, you know. Yeah. BV. You know, $139 a bottle or whatever it is. $135 a bottle. Oh, but we want the 2011. Yeah, everybody wants the 2011. We can't get that. At least in our realm of. Of responsibility, of getting wines for customers. So you. So you went into this job thinking that you're going to be sort of the concierge of wine for that shop and
end up being what it. It's just the same thing that everybody else gets. Sure. Dow will invite you up to their winery to take a, you know, take a. A tour of it. But to me, you know, that's fine. I mean, I can drink. I can drink tattoo at home. Yeah, whatever. But, yeah, I. I don't know. I mean, like I said, I mean, you. You tried over all these wines and would. I mean, you're the host. I'm
asking you one question. But would people come in and say, hey, Paul, I'm looking for a case of Chateau Montelena, but it has to be 2007. Well, because the nature of my customer base was not like that, though I did, as every subscription club in America has tried, provide a service to people to call in and say, can you get me this? Can you get me that? Now, you know, and I know that most domestic wines are very hard to. I mean, the. The regular stuff that you have
on the shelf, you can find. But so many domestic wines are DBAs of DBAs, of DBAs. So just to give me a brand name is almost impossible sometimes to find them. Europe's different because they have an import statement. But no, I didn't do a lot of it. And oftentimes what they wanted, I couldn't find. You know, it was too hard to find. So it's just the interesting irony between your job out there is to answer the questions, if they have
a question. So how many people walk into the shop knowing what they want to buy? Percentage? Can I include liquor as well? Liquor and wine. Sure, why not? So a lot of these antique collections. What are they called? Antique. So they're looking for these special bourbons and yeah, I can get them. It's going to be a little bit of work. But I'm not just going to get them from somebody, buddy. Just walking into the shop, they've got to
be a regular customer if I'm going to go do that. Because then we just call them cherry pickers. Yeah, right. You know, yeah, they just had. Yeah, right. Yeah, they just happen to call in 10 different stores to see if they had a certain antique. And you want to cater to your regular buying clients. Somebody that's going to spend. Yeah, somebody that's going to spend two or three thousand. Four or five. And there are people like that. I mean, there are people
that are going to spend a lot of money on wine. I mean, but, you know, once their wine cabinets are filled, you might not see them for six months. Do you think that those, the apps, you know, the Vivinos and the wine Searcher apps have created sort of. Oh, I guess it's bargain hunting from people. Again, I'm going to. You probably know the answer better than me. But I, What I learned is quickly is that somebody will come in and say, peter, why is the Johnnie Walker Blue 179? I can get
it at Costco for 166. Well then go right ahead and go. Go down to Costco and get it for 166. Oh, that's a good answer. But they're out of it right now. Yeah, exactly. Oh, so they're out of it for 166 and I'm charging you 177. I have it. They don't. Bucks. Yeah, 11 bucks, 50 cents a shot. Yeah. So that's kind of. And then the apps. Well, we. I can get it. I can get it through an app. And then I looked at the apps and I'm like, well,
wait a minute. This company is out of Kentucky and I know. And you, you know that you call that wine store wine app. We don't have that, but I have this. Yeah, that's what even my customers admitted to me, that when they try to go on these wine apps and call them. Yeah, yeah, we have stags, we have Artemis 2007. And then when you say, okay, I'll take a case of Artemis 2007, well, we don't have 2007. We've got 2017. That's a bait and switch or not. No, that's what it is. That's really what it is.
And those apps, well, people would come to the shop and they would just point the gun and point their phone and they're very inaccurate. Vivino is probably the most inaccurate of all of them because they have an average price and there's people out there that are, that are baiting people into the store with a, you know, with, with that bait and switch price. You know, lost leader. They don't have just like car salesman. And then they move you to a different part of
the store. But it's such a competitive world right now that, that we have to be cognizant of these apps. But we can't compete with them because you have to hold your ground at what. Yeah. Margins are and what you're trying to do. And is it really available like you said? What about the car? Car is a great analogy. So you mean that they have a Porsche at Rusnick for 50,000? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I drive over to Rustic. Oh, we don't have any $50,000 Porsches. Yeah, but we got
$150,000. We'll just add a hundred thousand dollars to it. Yeah. What happened to the 50,000? Oh, we sold all that. We sold them all. We sold those two. They're gone. Have you seen. It's been five years. You've been on the floor. Have you seen a change in consumerism? Well, I know that with. I started the month of COVID and I at the beginning of COVID Beginning of COVID And we were selling a ton of high end stuff. Moet, Shandon, Hennessy
people. Because obviously they weren't going out to eat because they had to stay home and they were buying anything that was luxury. They were buying. Yeah. And that changed and that changed dramatically. I know at my store I was just in the cellar and there are eight, I'm not exaggerating. Eight cases of insignia. Eight cases of insignia. 2018. $330. Paul. A year and a half ago that was $200. Yeah, right. 220. So they've raised the price and it's not selling. It's sitting there.
Yeah, yeah. Five years ago it probably would have sold at 300 because people needed it. But it's, you know, I guess it's supply and demand. Well, you know, when, when, when I was, when the going concern, when the Wymuckle was running and just cruising along, I would Never hear from Silver Oak. I would never hear from Camus, another big brand company. They didn't need me. Yeah. And they're out. They're courting restaurants because that's the house.
Poor is where the money is. Right. And then Covid hits and they're banging on the door. And I look, I said, I'll buy some stuff and I'm sure I can sell it, but you can't forget me after this is over. Well, I wish they had forgotten me after it was over because. But the point was, I'm going to make was I was getting 1 liters of Camus and I'm selling them for 140. They're now $99. And back then, you couldn't even get Leaders retail. Now you can. The market's
changed so much. And to go back to your point about COVID whatever I said to the client, they'd buy if I put out anything. And you're right, the prices, what they're willing to pay went up a lot. I'm sitting on nine cases of Caymus 1 liters right now because the moment it was over, the day of those sales stopped. So the customers went back to the restaurants. They went back to buying their regular method, but they had no interest anymore in the elevation of their pallets. It was
really, I thought, quite interesting. And I wonder, that parallels the food world as you've been out on the streets tasting food and eating and courting restaurants. What have you seen when it comes to pricing? Has it been busier for these guys these days? What's happening? They rebounded. I didn't realize this, but when I was talking to the guys from Musso and Frank's, they said that even buying meat, steaks, beef is cyclical.
And I waited a second to find out what they were talking about. They said, well, January, February, we're paying more for the stakes. But then come April, May, prices start to level off and go down. And I thought, well, I didn't realize that prices would ever go down on anything. I mean, I realized that salmon would be seasonal because, you know, they're up in the river in Washington, so maybe. Or king crab legs or seafood. I get that. But I didn't realize that meat was so cyclical because I'm.
I'm thinking there's slaughter seasons. I don't know. But it's gone through the roof, though. Yeah. Even at. I know at pavilions, a $15 steak from two months ago is now $22. And ground beef. And, you know, if you see Ground beef for A$97. They're probably losing money. But you know, supermarkets and restaurants are two different dynamics. The supermarkets advertise. Their whole push is
they don't want you to go to a restaurant. I mean, you, if you grab your flyer in the, in the mail on Wednesdays, it's. It often says supermarket quality rest. You know, a restaurant quality supermarket price. Yes. You know, I don't know what that means. It means stay home, don't. You don't need to go out. But they're in competition. I mean, they talk about, you know, I just read this actually recently. They talk
about sushi grade fish. There's no, there's no definition for sushi grade fish. It's just. I don't know what they're trying to tell you. It is, but it doesn't exist, you. Know, I didn't know that. Well, there's. I don't know. I don't know. A and B and C. I don't know. You know, one day I was just, I just wrote this note down. We were talking about prices of wine. Remember cane sellers? Cane five days. They burned down in a fire. Yeah. So. Or they are. They
reopened. I don't know. I know I haven't seen the wine lately at all. And I, and I, and I don't remember what happened to the brand, but I'm talking about the late 80s, early 90s when I went into the vines over here. The time at Arcadia and the Cane five, which was their premium brand, like insignia for that winery was $2.99. Wow. $2. When? Oh, this is probably like 1990 O. It was $2.99. And I. Wait, what? Yeah. $2.99. Yeah. So I went outside and the guy's, the guy's name was
Kelly Stockton. And the wine, the, the, the wholesale house was called vintage something. I can't remember. Now they're gone. I had to go outside on my cell phone, which was back then was that big brick that was in your car, and call him and say, hey, Kelly. I said, Is cane 5 still like 95 a bottle wholesale? He goes, yeah. I go, thank you very much. I went there and I grabbed every bottle I could. I brought it to the thing and the
guy's checking me out and he's like, this is a pretty good deal, huh? I go, yeah, I'm not going to tell him no. I go, do you have any more in the back? He goes, I don't know, I'll check. And he went in back and there's Nothing more. So I got on, I called my dad. I go, dad, he won't believe this. I just got cane five for 299. Maybe it was 399. He goes, Jesus. He goes, what are you doing buying wine at a market? He goes, you have a warehouse flag. I don't care.
399. And so let me tell you a funny story. That was at least 2,000. It couldn't have been much past that. I went to a tasting at Beverly Hills recently. And I was walking around, I ran this old acquaintance. Not an old person, but just an old acquaintance of the trade. And I told her this story. She goes, that was me. She goes, I'm the one that marked it down. We were redoing the whole cellar and I had to get rid of everything. And I'm the one that made it 399. I go, I love you. Yeah, so that's.
That's insane. And that's. Have you ever returned a center wine back at a restaurant? Yeah, that's a great question. That sounds like something that was, like, set up, because I do have a story. So down in Newport beach, there's a place called Pelican Hills. Pelican Hills Resort. Oh, yeah, for sure. Yeah, I know. Overlooking. Overlooking a Bridge, beautiful 5 o'clock sunset, the whole deal. And I was being hosted by a vendor, not a wine vendor, somebody that I helped get their almonds and
cashews into pavilions. And as a thank you, they took me. Where do you want to go? They were based in Newport Beach. So we went to Pelican Hills. I ordered a glass of Tattinger. And this is seven, eight years ago, really. And the back then, it was $28 a glass. Wow. She. She brought it over and. And I looked at it and I got. I did my Elmer Dill's thing. I got the knife out and I did this. There's no bubbles at all. And she just rolled her eyes at me and I go, it's flat. And she. So she
comes back. Oh, my goodness. Well, she comes back, open a new bottle and said. And she had the biggest smile on her face and said, oh, I can see the difference. Well, that you taught her something. I mean, how about that? Yeah. She goes, I can see the difference. I go, yeah. So one thing I talk about on my radio show, Paul, is that. And I do this every time. I tell them, open a fresh bottle. And I have never had one person at a restaurant say, no, we have to give you what we
have opened already. I agree with that. They have never, never ever any restaurant has ever said to me, no. So you lead with that, or do you wait till they. If it's champagne, I certainly do. If it's cake bread, chardonnay, then, you know, I'm in a trust that it's selling pretty fast. So Santa and I were up in Monterey years ago, 2014. It was the Concord Elegance. Forgot why we went there, but anyway, we were sitting in a bar, I'm having a martini, and
the. The house pour was from classic. It was the Crane Lake crap. And. Right. And this is back when it actually. Crane Lake was actually vintage wine. Okay, well, then maybe it was. Okay, so it's. Apparently the barback thought this is a good idea to put it in big, giant black felt pin letters, numbers, put the date that they opened the bottle. I've seen them especially at Asia, Japanese restaurants. Yeah, I've seen.
Put it nicely, discreetly on the back. Not this big giant thing. Label. Right, right. And so the one that was looking at the pianoir, and it was at least 10 days, maybe 2 weeks old, it's been sitting there, you know, it's gone. Right. So the waitress came. I was next to the waitress station. She came up, she says, glass of pianoir. The guy didn't even look. So, hey, why did you put the data on if you're not going to look at it? Just pour it. And he poured it right in front of me. I
said, dude, I go, that's come back. He goes, what do you mean, sir? I said, look at the date of the bottle. He goes, oh, wow, man. Thanks a lot. I really appreciate that. Yeah. Because they may not come back. But if. If it doesn't come back, then that person's got a bad experience. They may never come back to the restaurant because the wine's so bad. But I did it just two nights ago at Parkway Grill. Send it back. Yeah. And why. He poured two healthy Bordeaux, the house Bordeaux, which is called
rute or roulet. And it was corked. And whoever. What. Whoever drunk it before me either sent it back or had a bad experience with it because it wasn't, you know, when corked wine is musty and two, there's no fruit. It's all gone. And he kind of rolled his eyes. You probably know Naz. I know Naz. I've known NAs for 35 years. Yeah, I like Nas. I love Nas. And so he looked at me and he. I go, smell the difference. Oh, yeah, yeah, I get
it. You know, but nobody had sent it back before that, so and it was very, very nice. Well, I wonder how many people actually know enough to send something back. I mean, probably with sparkling wine or champagne, it's a little easier for me at least to tell. But somebody with your palette would know, like right away that not only it's just funky. Well, you know, but that's funny, because my wife is way more sensitive than I am. And so she. She's the one who said, did you get that nose? I
said, and she's not. She. And by no means has followed the career here. She was the accountant here. She did not care about the rest of it. I go, yeah, I smelled it. But I was hoping it would blow off and just kind of keep going. But then when the. When the fruit was gone, I realized there was a problem with the wine. But I wonder how many people are intimidated, you know, to do that just because you expect that a house poor or even by the glass
is a curated wine. Right. One that there was a deliberate reason we put it on the list. Yeah. To make sure that it sells. Yeah. Fast enough by the glass. Right. And I'm sure the person that's going in there selling Parkway or what name, any restaurant would say, hey, put this by the glass. It will sell. You know, I shouldn't say this, but I'll say this anyway. I had a vendor come in. Maybe I shouldn't say this because I won't say the name of the vendor. And
he goes, peter, I need a side stack. I need a side stack. I need a side stack. So that would be about three cases of wine. And he has a sleeve that he'll put the wine in. And I like the guy. And I said, look, I'll put a side stack there, but in three weeks, whatever's left, you're gonna have to come in, or your boss is gonna have to come in and buy what's left. And he thought about it, and it's probably not right. So funny. Not right for me to say, but. No, no, but you know what? That's
a. I'm glad you brought that up for the listeners. The liquor business and the wine business is. It's not. No longer run by the mob. I was going to use the word. Yeah, yeah. No longer run by the mob. But yeah, certainly the influence of it and the business style has a lot of gleanings from those days. And I can't tell you how many times it probably happened to you. A thousand times on the 30th of the month or the 31st rep comes in and said, I need Some help. Yeah, I need you to make my number
for me. I need a side stack. Yeah. And you expect the, the, the favor in return one day. Yeah. Like in my case, I bought, I don't know, some strawberry flavored something or another and a bunch of little pieces, bottles here and there, some. But I expected access to Pappy Van Winkle after that from the same vendor. And, and I got it because you know, you know that in this business it's one hand washes the other in this career and it's, it's a controlled
industry. And yeah, we deal with the best we can in that regard. I was working at a restaurant in Pasadena, very part time, Robbins Wood Fire barbecue. Oh, I remember that. 395 north rose meat. I was not the manager, but I was the night manager. So basically, you know, put the money away, take the till, you know, put it in the, you know, managing at night. But I wasn't in charge. And the guy from Harold Lombos came in. Fred, his name was Fred. Called him Fast Freddy. Harold
Lamos was a beer distributor, right. And he said to me, peter, we're pushing Moosehead beer and if I can get 25 taps in the San Gabriel Valley, they're going to send me to Hawaii. I said, absolutely. I didn't ask him for anything in return. I said, absolutely. Bring it in. One keg. He goes, one keg? I go, yeah, bring it in. We'll go through it. Yeah. So what? I mean,
you know, we're in a relationship business. That's right. But it's, I think it's more than others because of the control of the liquor and that. Yeah. And, and the lucrativity. Lucrativity. Even a word of. Particularly liquor. But that's an interesting point. I, I think I have two or three espresso machines and my wife is going through her jewelry the other day and she goes, what's this? And it was this 5 troy ounces of silver, 0.999 from the US Assay Office. I go,
oh my God. A vendor gave that to me. I said, I haven't seen this thing probably for 25 years. I can't remember who it was, gave it to me, says, hey, if you do me a favor, I'll give you this thing. I got it as an award. Yeah. And I'm going to give it to you. I'm like, cool. The Thing's worth like 500 bucks. Yeah. But you said something I wanted to talk about. Oh, yeah. The, the one hand washes the other industry is such an Important part of
what we do. And I can tell you that when this one woman retired from RN, D.C. had a major impact on. On. On stuff for me. I mean, it's almost like you should. I should retire at the same time, which is what I did serendipitously. But that relationship was so deep, and I had helped her career so much along the way and she had helped my company along the way that it was. It was a true party of friends. You know, I haven't seen her since, but it was a true party of friends that did business
together for a long time. That's a valuable. Yeah. Lesson here. Yeah. Really, those type of things for you. You were running the show for me. You know, we have district managers and regional managers and buyers and, And. And. And people like that who. Who we have to lean on at our level to see if we can get that Pappy Van Winkle, which I couldn't even bother with because it's so. Hard to get, you know, so.
But I also have. I don't know, I probably still have 10 cases of eagle Rare that I had to get to get some of the Pappy I got. But that sold for a while. Yes. Yeah. And it slowed down. And then with Blanton's, you know, you could. That was dime a dozen. You know, you could get it anytime you wanted. Until it went to Harbor. Yeah. Harbor. Yeah. Sazerac has it and they went to harbor and now it's allocated.
Yeah. And I. And I had six. Six packs of it left over from R. DC And I was selling at the restaurants for considerably more than I paid for it. Yeah. I'm down to now a bottle, but. Yeah, you know, that's. That was. That was like contrived allocation. You could get it anytime you wanted to at some point. Well, that's like the insignia. Joseph Phelps. And that's what I was thinking. Like, what are we going to do with these eight cases of insignia at $330 a bottle? Yeah. I mean, it's just sitting
there. I mean, that seems awfully high. Well, okay, so my. Okay, my. Here's my thought. Is that the supermarket business? Name a supermarket. Ralph's, Kroger, Albertsons, Stater Brothers. They're working on pennies. They really are. They're working on pennies. That's an important comment to make. And if you're sitting on inventory of. That's just one store, they're sitting
on all that inventory. And then when the quarterly profits come in, I think about this, maybe I think too much, but they've got to do quarterly profits to their shareholders and say, hey, look, we lost this or we made this. Wouldn't it make sense for them, the Kroger's of the world, to pull back on their buying when they know that the quarterly results are coming in? Say, hey, Paul, we love you, but we're not going to buy any. Josh right now. Yeah. Or something more expensive.
We're not going to buy any of your BV or Insignia right now until the quarter's over and then we can buy it again. It's the same thing in my business. In your business, I'm always looking for sponsors for the show, for the radio show. Right. And this. I had a conversation today with somebody and he goes, oh, Peter, perfect timing. My budgets are coming back for the year now. The year. Do you see what I'm getting at? Like, I get it. Why, why, why are you buying
so much stuff? Why are you stocking those shelves when you, you know, it's just general management. Yeah. It's just, you know, and I, I had a friend that still. He's still a friend. The second busiest store in Pavilions is in Newport coast. Oh, I know that story. Yeah. Kobe used to shop there and everything. And he would tell me that. He goes, we just got a lot of 300, 400 wine that. That's not selling. Might be just like you said about the cane. 299. Yeah. He goes, we should just start all over
and get rid of the stuff that's not selling. It's. It's boutique or what. It's great to say that you have all these great wines, but if they're not selling, it's inventory. That's the, the bottom line. This is the part of the wine business that is not frustrating because it's always been driven by the consumer. You always have to have stuff that the people want. But then there's this wonderful romantic side of wine where this is value.
This. What's in the glass is such value to the human soul that you can have a drink and you can feel something from it. And so these are two opposing things, because those are the wines that are made like that. But not everybody can afford them. Nobody cares what. What's in the glass. They want a glass of wine and that. That's what you get. And it led me to this point that you jogged a memory with, which is. Guy goes, I'm going to go to Hawaii. I'm gonna go to Italy. If you buy
these 10 cases, I get to go to. I'll give you, the espresso machine. I win. After I get back from Italy, all this stuff that I got. Right, right. I mean, I got that all the time. This poor guy I had sitting in where you're sitting now. Wonderful couple. Made gorgeous wines out of Paso. Just started. And passionately approaching the wine trade. I'm gonna be part of this lifestyle. You know, they can't afford to send salespeople to Hawaii. They can't walk into a sales
meeting at Southern and go, hey, you guys, you know, 200 reps, we're gonna. If you sell the, you know, they can't do that. And so. Yeah, I don't know that that necessarily limits the placements that they get. Like at Pavilions. Sure it does. Or something. It does. How about the number of vendors that you're allowed to work with? Like, because Certainly the more POs that you generate as the buyer, you know, the harder it is for
corporate to deal with. Right. They got to write that many more checks and have that many more accounts. There's. I remember there's a woman, a young lady that came in and she had two SKUs. A skew. A skew is a product and it's called Nostotros Tequila. She had a Anejo and a blanco. She only had two. What, Nosotros is ours? Yeah, yeah, we are. And I wanted to help her. You know how sometimes you just want to help people? People come in your shop and sometimes you go, no, no, no, enough
today. And then sometimes you think, you know, I want to help this person. Yes. Because they don't know. They don't know what they're doing. Right. And she goes, what do I do? She goes, I have only two SKUs. I have to go to all these Ralphs and Vons and Pavilions, but I only have two tequilas. I go, well, come up with a necktie that you can put around the bottle and whatever. 100% agave or award winning or whatever it is.
And she did it. She actually did it. And to this day, I don't know if she's still working for the tequila company, but it's still on the shelf today. And that's my segue, is that just because you got your wine on the shelf doesn't mean nothing. Doesn't mean anything. Is it going to stay on the shelf? That's the whole thing. And then to your point of. Well,
I don't. I can't. I have this wonderful South American, South African wine that we've been able to get into a couple places, but we can't get it into Pavilions or Vons or Ralph's or whatever it is because you don't have the, you don't have somebody to come in and sell it to, to pitch the. The rule of thumb. I heard from two young men. One of them was descended the Trincheros, you know, which is Sutter Home. And the other was descent of one of the winemakers at Camus. And
they teamed up and they were making wine at Trincara. I forgot the name of the brand now. And they said we have to have 100 placements on our own as a supplier for the listeners. Supplier is the person that basically makes the wine that brings it in from. To overseas. The distributor is a person that takes that wine and sells it to the retailer, restaurants, then you buy it. So we have to have a hundred bonafide placements of this wine
before any distributor picks it up. And that's going back to your point, which is it's going to stay on the shelf unless somebody does what they're doing, going out and slapping the wines, doing the dinners, pouring them off, where they're going to pour it off. And I thought that, you know, I think branding in wine and liquor is probably one of the hardest products in the world to brand. You know, next to toothpaste and
salad dressing. You're not going to unseat Paul Newman and you're not going to unseat, you know, George Clooney's thing. But then they see things like Dow selling for a billion dollars, Clooney making a billion or 2 billion. And there's an intrigue to like getting into this and see if you can make it work. And the reason I brought that up is sitting where you're sitting. I've had a half a dozen at least pretty average ideas that people spend a lot of money on trying to get their brand
going. One was somebody thought that, that she was the first person with a 375, you know, and, and she called it. What do you mean? 3. I know what a 375 is. But she, she thought that selling wine in a 375 was this revolutionary idea and it was quality wines. It was not. Sorry, they weren't quality. And second, you know, they're, it's just marketing. And the point I'm getting is the intrigue of this industry is in this case, in these cases, the dollars like I can start a
375. I can start a can. There was another girl who insisted that Lafitte Rashid would be In a can one day and she sat where you're sitting. I'm like, are you nuts? That's never going to happen. There was another brand that came through here that was, you know, biodynamic organic wines. Oh, there was one that I tasted recently. Listen, this method Champenois in a can. Figure that out. How do you disgorge? And you didn't. All the leaves were in that
can. So that's the irony of this industry is that you get these people that have these grand ideas and they invest a lot of money. There's nothing to reinvent. There's really nothing to reinvent. Somebody asked me today, this morning, they have a major call with one of the biggest buyers in Southwest. They're looking for non alcoholic, non. Non alcoholic wines, which is what, 05, I guess. 05. And he, the buyer feels that the non alcoholic or low calorie, they
already have them on the shelves. And he asked me to, he goes, do people come in? I go, no, they do for whatever. Maybe dry January. But I don't see. And I could be wrong. I've been wrong. Do you have a shelf? Do you have a section? Yes. I don't see that expanding. How many are on that? Oh, you know, I'd say at least 18 or 20. But keep in mind that Sauvignon Blanc,
Chardonnay, Merlot, Cabernet. You know, I, but he asked me and he's, you know, he's, he's with a pretty reputable company and he goes, peter, do you see a focus or do you see any emerging market for this? I go, it's already here. It's not going to get much bigger. That's just my opinion. I think that's accurate. I've seen, first of all, they're unpalatable. And it doesn't taste good. It just doesn't taste good. I'm sorry. Beer, Heineken and Beck's
low calorie tastes fine. It's fine. It's good. You have a hamburger and a non alcoholic Heineken. It's fine. Yeah, but 0.05 alcohol, they call it alcohol removed. Yeah. So I was at Whole Foods not that long ago and they were pouring the non alk Corona. Yeah. But they still had the stanchions up and it had a sign saying, you must be 21. Well, yeah, yeah, no, yeah, I, I. Know it's not alcohol. I know. What's the point? It's just beverage.
But most of them are unpalatable. And I don't know if you know, the process for wine. But if, let's say a wine's 13 and a half percent alcohol, you have, first of all, I have to start with good wine. You gotta, you can't start with crap like, like they used to do with the barrel age stuff. Bourbon, barrel stuff. You, you, you take out that 14% alcohol, but you're also taking out another 16 to 18% of flavor. So you really lose 30
something percent of the total volume. Well, you can't, there's not a margin in wine to lose 30% of the margin once you've paid for picking it and fermenting it. So you add back water in some flavoring agents. That's why it tastes like crap. You've taken all the flavor out of it and you're going to add back what flavor. So I've never had one that I would sit and drink a glass of. And I think you're totally right. I don't, I think it's one of the blips in our industry that just kind of
is going to pass through. Do you carry Ariel A R I E L. That's been around, it's been around for 25 years. Yeah, I was gonna say that's one of the first ones. That was one of the, the only ones. When it was on the shelf, it was at the bottom and somebody would come in and say, do you have any non alcoholic wine? And I only got the aerial there. But it's not it I tasted not long ago. It tastes the same as the other ones. And I
talked, I think it's Rodney Strong, right? Is it big brands? And I said, I called him, I just, I wanted to ask. I said, you know, I used to stock this in my dad's shelf, you know, almost, almost my dad's shelf later in the career. And have you seen any change in sales? He goes, nah, it's only about 3% of our total gross sales and it's not changed. And I don't see the hullabaloo. I don't see the reason for it. Same with, with biodynamic
wines, you have an organic section. So people will come in and ask about that. There's one called Bontero. Yeah, I think I did a call with Dow and they're two or three years away from being certified. Yeah, organic, biologic, whatever they're doing. Yeah, whatever. But very rare, as many people that ask for non alcoholic wines will ask for organic. I don't even know what it means. I just tell them to go, I never do this. But when they Ask. I said, go to Whole
Foods. They might have something there for you. Because I don't really know what it is. Because if it's organic, the ground has to be taken out. The pesticides have to be three years and then the leaves and the vines and so I don't really get it. And then they come up with, well, if I don't, if it's not organic, I get a headache. And the sulfates, I'm like, no, that's not what it's from.
You know, it's. It's funny, most European wineries that are family owned and not big corporate America, corporate Europe would say, we try, we want as little as possible anyway, because my kids are playing in the vineyard. We don't go out to spray our fields because we want to spray them. We spray them to protect them. Yeah. If there's going to be a problem, whatever the reasons are. But it's. We try to keep it minimally
anyway. And so. And I just, I opened a bottle of organic Sangiovese the other day from Sardinia or one of those places, and it had totally failed on me. It shouldn't have failed. A regular wine in that, that same genre would have been fine, but it didn't last. And I think that's one of the problems with organic wines in general. But I had a woman in the club, I had an organic club. It was not very popular. And I sent the wine out. It did not have the little green
leaf on the back. Oh, yeah, well, that, that means it's demeter or whatever. I, Yeah, I don't know. But that certifies it. Okay. And I said. She goes, it's not organic. I said, yes, it is, ma'am. She goes, no, it's not. It doesn't have the green leaf. I said, well, these people have been farming organically long before the green leaf even existed, right? She said, I don't care. I want a green leaf. So I had to replace the bottle with a green leaf. So
it had nothing to do with being organic. It was strictly that it was labeled. That's. I'm going to guess and say that that type of buyer just wants it to be the way it is. And they're not going to fuss about maybe the taste or maybe hopefully they'll drink it and go, oh, this tastes like crap. Forget that. I'm just going to drink what I like. That's what it is. You know, coming in and, you know, buying. Do you have a organic Chardonnay? I'm like, well, I mean, no, I Don't
you? You know, we have unoaked, we have Tolosa, we've got blah, blah, blah, blah. But, you know, you're getting too specific. And I'm not even sure. And you would know better. I'm not sure that a liquor store or a wine shop is going to be able to help you. You know, I think what you see and what you're doing at that store, you're seeing a pretty good indication of the American palate at a supermarket and what they're really
buying. Leaving non alk low elk wines to the people that specialize in it and know who's buying it is a great, the right idea. Same with premium spirits. You know those, there's places where you can get those if you want those. You want biodynamic wines. And my first experience with biodynamic wines, we were in New York. My and my daughter Lisa, you know, she's. She's a French trained boulanger and she's, you know, into the food scene. She goes, dad,
we have to go to Brooklyn and go to this natural wine shop. I'm like, this is early on in this stupid. So it was all 100% natural wine. Yeah. Okay. And so we went to this little shop and she's, oh, let's get that Sicilian nerd out. I said, okay. I didn't even look at the price. Like an idiot, I grabbed the bottle, I put up and they were $75. I'm like, me, you know, I was paying three bucks, you know, for wine here. So I bought it, we took it back to the hotel and it was unpalatable
and I looked at my diet. Look, you can't. Wine is not to suffer through because you think it's a healthy beverage because it's organic. Right. That's not what it's about. So drop the consideration of that and pick the wines that make you feel good. Yeah. And don't drink a wine that doesn't taste good just because it's organic. Right. What are the laws in New York about bringing. Bringing wine back? Oh, it's shipping it. No,
no. So taking it back. Yeah. I don't think you can. Yeah. Okay. So that's the way California is. Yeah. Okay. You can't bring a bottle back. No. Not unless it's corked. And I. That's kind of on the sly. I'll tell some good customers, look, if I'm not here and you didn't like it, it. Don't tell them you didn't like it. Tell them that it was spoiled. I did not know that. Yeah. If you tell them I didn't like this. Well, that's all. We can't do anything about it. Yeah.
Hey, I had a funny smell. I don't think it's, you know, I'm not going to taste it to second guess them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So. Of course not. Yeah, so you can't. In California. You buy it, it's yours. It's funny. Naz put those two glasses up by the cash register by the bar for the manager to come and smell them, and she came over, smelled them, and then they dumped them. He'd already poured his fresh glasses. We're already happy, but
they, they had to validate. Did you know Mark Brown as well? Of course. So. So, Mark, we're already at an hour, so. But okay, this is a funny story. They did a food and cocktail pairing and Greg actually came to this Greg Smith, I don't know, a few years ago, and there were maybe 25 people in the room. And Mark's telling a story about a cocktail. Like you're talking about telling a story. He's making a cocktail. But you ended up with five full size cocktails from a five course meal,
which is a little, it's a little heavy duty. But in the middle of it, we, we had had this conversation prior because I want to stop and talk to you about something. He goes, see that guy over there? Wait a minute, Mark Brown said that? Yeah. Okay. He goes, see that guy over there? And he points at me. I was serving him drinks in 1980 at, at the Three Two Saloon at USC. I just want to introduce Paul K. I'm like, oh, crap. So he was working
SC at the 3:2 Saloon, which is on the second floor. Yeah. When I was there and I remembered him, I remembered a couple of things about him that, that, that happened, but it was a little embarrassing. He. He was a. A neighbor. I used to live up above Parkway. And I'd see him riding his bike down to Parkway. Great guy. I mean, he. I don't know why he left, but that's not. I think he had a back or foot issue. And I was cleaning the house out not too long ago, a few weeks ago, and I found
a handwritten note. He had been making the revolver, which is like a bourbon, orange peel, coffee thing. And I had written down my writing. His cell phone was on there and it said the revolver and it had the proportions for this drink. And I took a picture of it. I texted him, I said, hey, do you remember this? And he wrote back his whole thing. He goes, you know, I'm still suffering a little bit, but if you ever have a job and you want somebody to pour a little bit, I can probably pull it off.
And I. Cool. That'd be really fun because I like talking to him. He's a good guy. Anyway, we're at an hour. All right, well, thanks. This is an amazing conversation with my. Pretty quick. We can go. We can go buy. You and I could talk forever and all these subjects. Well, as long as it's just opinions and not fact, I'm okay. Yeah. Right. Well, I'm sure we'll see on the streets these days. We. Last time I saw you was at Parkway Grill having something. I mean, join
my podcast. Just. It's simple. It's love to do it. Purple icon on your phone and just. Yeah. Type in. Just put in Peter Dills. Yeah. And the show is Dining with Peter Dills. And that is what day? Sunday nights at 5pm Sunday nights, 5pm a.m. 8 70. It's a Glendale station, but anywhere in LA. Where is the 701? Well, I'm on Brand street in Glendale, so we do. Last time I saw you on the radio, it was down in La Brea or something. I was down in Orange County. This. This has a little bit more
oomph to it. Not that that wasn't bad, but that was more of a sports crowd. And I. I'm trying. Even before that, you were at La Cienega or the kvc. Yeah, kvc. Yeah, kvc. Which is gone now, too. So they come and they go. Amazing. Hey, great to have you. Cheers. Thank you, Paul.