This kinda sums up how I feel about what the internet has done to ya. Life just feels sort of grey now. If someone recommends a restaurant or book that used to have value. If you sought out their recommendation and felt the same way it was kind of part of our shared experience. Now people are googling a book before I can even finish the title, they are checking the stars on yelp as I tell them about a great restaurant I discovered.
By making all these experiences easy to discover all the magic was instantly removed. It’s like turning on a cheat code that shows you where all the treasures in a video game are located, sure you can gather them all with ease, but you lost the whole point of playing.
I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
361–370 of 410 posts
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#362It's a "dead dove do not eat" feeling, but I kind of hoped I'd open the HN comments on this one and _not_ see a bunch of engineering solutions. They all miss the point of the story, which is crushingly relevant to startups: If you build a company with people you like and love, and circumstances outside of your control force it to scale in a hurry, those people you like and love are going to get hurt in the process. T…
Yup. I have a startup that was full of people who expected it to stay the way it always was before it grew to millions of annual revenue, and that ended up hurting them when it turned out that I was running a business. It bothered me some, but I always knew this was potentially in my future. They didn't. This will happen to everyone who runs a startup that has family or close friends involved, especially if they are…
i heared this phrase:
"make friends in business, don't make business with friends"
that seems to apply here. in the face it sounds like dry advice, but it hints that the changes in business can hurt friendships. it's a sad reality for those that face it unprepared.
greetings, eMBee.
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#363This kinda sums up how I feel about what the internet has done to ya. Life just feels sort of grey now. If someone recommends a restaurant or book that used to have value. If you sought out their recommendation and felt the same way it was kind of part of our shared experience. Now people are googling a book before I can even finish the title, they are checking the stars on yelp as I tell them about a great restauran…
I really like the way you phrased that - following someone's recommendation and it becoming part of your shared experience with that person.
I've felt this in the past, but hadn't heard it put into words like that.
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#364Some restaurants just can't handle the hype. I just read about a family who returned their michelin star [1] for the sake of their own relationships and ultimately their business.
> “It got to the stage where it was difficult juggling family life with working five nights a week later in the evening and also doing breakfast for residents, doing all the prep work, keeping on top of the paperwork and admin,” said Kathryn.
I admire folks like this who have their priorities straight. If they were to scale up, they'd most likely loose the charm that earned them the star to begin with. Charm seems to be exclusive to smaller establishments, in this context.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/food/2018/nov/16/checkers-restau...
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#365Earlier quoted context omitted.
> He has a finely-tuned metric for what a good burger is This is one way to put it. Lets pretend that every burger isn't different, every cook isn't different, ingredients aren't the same from day to day, etc... Then it all becomes having the right combination on the day you get there. And this ignores how the reviewer is feeling, and what they ate and drank already that day and the day before.
You raise some very relevant biases of critics, I wonder how this is accounted for?
Normally critics will visit a restaurant three times before writing a review. Obviously tough to do in this situation, though.
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#366Let's hear from a local about what really happened to Stanich's: https://www.metafilter.com/177718/Sometimes-its-better-not-t... "Anecdotally, I went to Stanich's a few weeks before the shutdown. They certainly weren't getting overrun with customers at that point. The place was maybe a quarter full on a Friday night, and it was filthy. Dust everywhere, dishes left on tables, stains on the floor, the crust on the ketc…
Nobody thinks too much business is what hurt Stanich's. Rather, it was too much attention. The pressure of a small-town short order cook all of a sudden having to live up to what Stanich's "could" and "should" be. One day, he's making the same burgers his dad was 70 years ago. The next, he's getting franchise offers and vitriolic reviews and personal issues. It seems he started cleaning and renovations, and just coul…
Oh man, the renovations I’m making without having any customers are damn awesome...
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#367This is why I tell no one of my favorite spots. My second favorite bars, restaurants, and nature spots are where I meet coworkers, dates from apps, and acquaintances. Only close friends/partners/family get to know my true favorites - keeps them healthy as long as possible. For example, I know of a cheap, quiet bar in the heart of a major west coast city. It's not perfect, but it's got wifi and cheap drafts and is rel…
How will you feel if it goes out of business from not enough patronage or if the owner closes it because it's not meeting his financial requirements for retirement? If the owner just wants a quiet cozy place that's certainly great but maybe the owner wants the place to be 3x as busy or maybe she want's to open a bigger place or 2nd place as soon as she gets enough people and funds.
>How will you feel if it goes out of business from not enough patronage or if the owner closes it because it's not meeting his financial requirements for retirement?
No place I've done this with has gone out of business yet. Keep in mind - I found it. Others will too.
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#368It's hard to blame Kevin Alexander for this, because Steve Stanich played ball with the review, like most restaurants would. If he wanted to, he could have asked not to be featured in the list, and Alexander probably would have complied; otherwise, he could have done other things to make it clear to his customers that he wasn't interested in fulfilling the role the ranking carved out for him. We see this effect in Ch…
> It definitely "ruins" the restaurant, in the sense that it becomes basically impossible to eat there anymore.
This just happened for me with a tiny little southern restaurant down the street from me. For about a year, I would go there occasionally and have a great meal with my SO. Never needed a reservation. Then it got a three star review from the new york times and it won the James Beard Best New Restaurant award, one of two won by the chef that night. I've basically written it off, as I'll never be able to compete with every seattlite and food tourist breaking down the doors to get in. It's sad for me, but I'm glad he's gotten the recognition he deserves.
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#369[deleted]
Re: I Found the Best Burger Place in America, Then I Killed It
#370Earlier quoted context omitted.
Au Cheval is easily the most overrated burger (and perhaps restaurant) in Chicago. Hey guess what, if you make a 12oz burger, put three slices of cheese on it, place it on a buttered roll, then put pork belly, a fried egg, and mayo on it, it will taste good. And it will also make you want to freakin die the moment you're done because you just consumed 25,000 calories. But people will wait literally 2.5 hours for this…
Grant Achatz is famously a fiend for Potbelly (a cheap chain that is like a notch up from Quiznos). I don't know that it's fair to ding him with Au Cheval. I hear good things about the rest of Au Cheval's menu!
Hey now. Potbelly's a solid two or three steps up from Quiznos. I'll house a Potbelly sandwich anytime--you won't catch me dead in a Quiznos.