E193 Tyler MacLellan

This week's guest is Tyler McLellan, who joins us from Chicago, Illinois. Tyler is currently one of the managers at three dots in the dash in Chicago, a tropical themed speakeasy. Originally born in San Jose, California, Tyler moved to Appleton, Wisconsin at a young age, and spent his formative years in that town. While living in Appleton, Tyler eventually landed a job at a local Italian restaurant and worked in all the positions before moving into management.

From there, Tyler eventually moved on to numerous other spots where he oversaw and organized various beverage programs. Tyler subsequently moved on to Bigger Cities and eventually made the move to Chicago, where he remains to this day. We had a terrific time talking with Tyler, and you'll definitely appreciate it too. Enjoy the show.

We're back with another episode of the industry podcast on Kip. This is Dan. Hey, that's me. What is going on?

Too much is hanging out. Yeah, you know, start the day off. Lots of work. It's usually for the week.

You saw him getting over. I was just still still. Hey, you were angrily yelling into your phone. You know how they couldn't hear you because it was an email?

Yeah, very tired. I can't do it for that. Good. So yeah, things are going normal.

No change from the regular bullshit yourself. It's great to hear. Yeah, same bullshit on my end too, you know. Like, I would just like to send a massive congratulation out to the Boston Bruins who are finally eliminating the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Because this means if you have a bar in Ontario, Canada that does not have a television, you get business again. So, Adios, Maple Leafs, we love it. It was in a rough couple of weekends. They had to stretch it to seven games on the seventh game.

Had to go into overtime. So I killed another Saturday night in, I mean, I'm sure there's many bars in town that were very pleased because they have televisions, but mine don't. So, yeah, so fuck the Leafs. All right.

Well, you're placing a burn down the ground. I'm trying to survive that. Yeah, these bars that I'm talking about, if you're in the Kitchen and Waterloo area, the Sugar Run is the bar in downtown Kitchener at Sugar Run bar, no television there, but lots of good times. And in Uptown Waterloo, it's Babylon Sisters at Babylon Sisters bar on Instagram, also no televisions, also good times.

So check both of those places out if you're in the area. If you like them, what we do here on the old podcast, you should subscribe, follow, rate, review, all of that stuff helps, and it's very easy to do when you're in. Yeah. That's what the algorithms are here.

Yeah, that's true. It drives more people to the show. Yes, that's what we want to do here. Drive people to the show.

We're talking to a lot of cool people from all over the world all the time, including one today, that we will get to in just a minute. What else should we tell you about? If you'd like to be a guest on the show, if you're one of these cool people from all around the world, it's info at the Industry Podcast.club to email us directly, or you can DM us at the Industry Podcast on Instagram, where you will find amazing artwork by Zac Hanna at Zac Hanna.co. He does all the artwork for our Instagram page, and we are greatly appreciative, as always.

Fantastic stuff from Zac O'Connor. Yeah, he's got something good going on. Yeah, dip into the archives to check out some of the old shows. We just had Leah Kala last week from Paris, France.

Lindsay Johnson was before that. That's right. The founder of Camperana Muk, which is and Lush Life Productions. Yeah, I can't see my notes.

Okay, that's good. Well, we had James Franco's on. Yeah, that's right. Keep dipping into the archives.

Lots of great people from all over the globe have come on the show, and we are always appreciative of that. And if we have nothing else to... Yeah, Marcelo Hernandez Gonzalez was on just between James and Lindsay. That's right, from Toronto.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, enough about all of those people.

It's like to the person who's coming on tonight, and that is Tyler McClellan from Chicago, Illinois. How are you, Tyler? Well, gentlemen, how are yourselves? Well, doing well.

Doing well. Thanks very much for coming on the show. I appreciate it. Yeah.

I'm excited to hear. So as a Minnesota Viking fan, I noticed that you are from Wisconsin originally, which, at first, it was just me, because I thought I was just talking to a cool dude from Chicago, but... Yeah, Wisconsin boy, so I was born in California. Oh, okay.

All right. Also, some California teams, Wisconsin race, I do get down with some bike-the-box, not a packers guy. Okay, fair enough. Fair enough.

Yeah. So you were born in California? Yeah. So how did you end up in Wisconsin?

Family move? The movement I was young, so I moved in San Francisco. And I don't really recall how it came about, just time to move elsewhere, get out of where we were in California, and they wanted to move somewhere that was... Maybe a little more affordable, a little safer, self-emics sister, and just me and my dad and my mom.

It was just the forest. But my whole mother's side of my family moved. I just like all decided that we'd all go and post up in Hamilton, Wisconsin. So how did this happen?

We've never really talked about it. We just got all excited up there. What did you do there, Steve? Well, my mother's been a dance teacher for a short period of time.

She's like my superhero. And my father's in sales. Oh, so I guess for your mother, you can do that job pretty much anywhere. Yeah, no, no.

Yeah. So, Appleton was constant. What a weird spot to pick. I don't know anything about it, but it's not much going on, but it's fun.

It's fun for a weekend. It's a nice getaway, unfortunately. You were stuck there. That's funny.

Okay, so well, talk to us a little bit about Appleton, Wisconsin, because that's where you started your career in the industry. So tell us a little bit about just tell us a little bit about Appleton in general, and then tell us about how you got started in the service industry. It's a small place. We'd have to actually like pull up the exact population.

It's one of the larger places in Wisconsin, but it's not quite like Madison or Milwaukee. And then obviously the other noteworthy place in Wisconsin is like Green Bay, right? So everyone also thinks of Milwaukee because the Bucks, Madison because of the Badgers College, right? Apple.

And then Green Bay, because of Packers. But Appleton is the other bigger area in Wisconsin that people go and live in. We've got a lot of people moving in, because we have companies that are based. They have a lot of traveling for conventions and things like that.

So it's a cool little city, right? But again, we kind of joke saying that it's just like bowling alleys and dive bars. There's really not much else going on, but there's a cool food scene, food and beverage scene. It's nothing like Milwaukee, Chicago, or any of these larger places, larger markets.

But there's a lot of really cool towns and people that are trying to make an interesting scene there. They're doing a great job. It's just not a heavily populated area. But like I said, it's a fun place to go visit.

You can pop around. You can make quite the little food tour. And the downtown is interesting. It is, I think, still currently marked as the drunkest city in America.

That's the sixth still stands. But there's a lot of bars on College Avenue. That's our downtown. Maybe like five blocks, six blocks.

And there are plenty of bars on either side of the street. So you've got lots of options if you're out on the bottom. It's fucking friendly people in Wisconsin too. I only bent to Milwaukee.

But I had a good time there. And the people were just on like, we're Canadians that we're known for being friendly, but like people in Milwaukee were fucking friendly, man. How long did you just go to Milwaukee? Do you want anywhere else?

Well, I just talked about Milwaukee. We went to go to some Brewers games. And yeah, it was just a random trip. It was like, you know where we haven't been to go watch sports?

No, Milwaukee. So yeah, we just went for the weekend. But it's super fun city. The bar scene was lacking a little bit.

We went to this one bar called Safe Bar. That was like a speakeasy type thing that was pretty cool. But the ballpark was cool. And the people, like I said, were just so nice.

Yeah, anywhere you go in Wisconsin, everyone's very kind. Milwaukee, Madison, very much so. But in Appleton, especially in a small community, everyone knows each other. It's kind of one of those places.

It's like big enough that you can kind of walk around like a stranger, but small enough that you will definitely see someone wherever you walk into, which is comforting. Just check it out online there. I see a population where it's 75,000. And you guys have it.

I'm going to say, but I wasn't sure. Yeah, River runs right through downtown too. Yes, sir. That's pretty nice.

That's always a cool advantage when you get to see that through some cities. It's nice to see places backing up on the river and you can walk around. Cool. I got that.

It's fun. It's a cute little getaway for a weekend. And then especially if you take advantage of Milwaukee, it's not too far. There's plenty of parks and hiking and things like that.

You have to drive to a little bit. So if you have access to a car, but I think Wisconsin is a great little getaway for a hot second. And the good thing about having a river coming right through the city is it's perfect for bars, right? Like when bars and restaurants along the river bag is like, awesome.

People love that shit. So tell me, how did you end up starting your career in the service industry? I got a job at an Italian restaurant in town that still exists today. It's called Carmel's Italian Bistro.

It's been open for, I think, probably now, probably 15 years. I could be wrong on that, but it's been open for a while. And I had a friend at work there. I was in high school, like my sophomore, junior year, and I worked at the YMCA.

And I didn't want to do that anymore. So I was looking for anything else. My work at the YMCA was cool. So I went and interviewed and I had a couple of people recommend me.

And I stayed there for about five years. And then went on to other places where I started to spend some tables, bringing people bread and water and learning the ropes. And so we've had a bunch of people on the show who started that way. I would say almost most people started the way we've had people lucked out and got a job that was a little bit above their head before they got it.

But when you start at the bottom, busing tables and watching dishes or whatever it is, what we discovered talking to people is that's almost the best way to get into the service industry. Because you kind of learn the whole game from the ground up. Yeah, I would agree. Because it gives you a great appreciation of the people that do those jobs as you grow out of those positions.

Even if you're not a lifer or really in the industry that much, it's just a paycheck. There's still a progression. You won't be doing that position forever. Eventually you'll move into a different thing or move to a different place so you can pursue, if you want with tables or if you want to bartend.

You won't bust tables forever unless you want to. I think it's a great job. But you just get a greater appreciation of the people that work in those positions when you've done it for an extended period of time. I did it for five years in that one building.

I went off to do other things. But especially now in a management position, just have such more of an admiration for the people that work hard in those roles. You can say you have a lifer now? Yeah, once upon a time was very much not.

Especially coming up, I had, you know, I wanted to go to school and was really into graphic design. Even though I'm like a terrible artist. I can't draw at all, but I also like graphic design. I think it's very, I just like what other people do it.

I'm looking back and like, man, what was I trying to do that? I'm not going to do that. But that was a different path for me at a different time. I wanted to pursue school and I was trying to figure out what it was.

I ended up landing into business and marketing. And then I fell into a position of a general manager at a new restaurant that was opening up. And then from there, that's when I started taking it serious. So that was at 21, like Fresh 21, where I decided to drop out school and just lean into restaurants.

And then in the last eight, seven, eight years of my life, I've been very much focused on hospitality and all that. So yes, now I would consider myself a lifer. But yeah, for a little bit there, I was looking for other ways to do other things. Well, it's hard, man.

So one of these jobs, it took me forever to realize that I was a lifer. And I was obviously clearly already one before I admitted it to myself. You know what I mean? Because a lot of us are still under this stigma that it's not a real career.

Yeah, I would agree. And I think especially back home, where there aren't a ton of restaurants that cocktail scene is nearly nonexistent. There are a couple of cocktail bars, one by some friends of mine now, and some restaurants with cool beverage programs and things like that. But nobody's really leaning into that role of like, this is my job, right?

I mean, don't view it that way. Like you're just a bartender if you're behind the bar regardless if you have any other roles and responsibilities and all of these things like that. It started to get better now. But then you come to market, like even when I spent my time in Milwaukee, but now to be in Chicago, you know, it's much more respected in these larger markets.

And especially just now in 2024, I think people are really getting on the same page that yes, it's a career path and you can make the living doing this thing. And it's one of the best jobs in the world. Yeah, and it's an admirable profession as well. It's like, you don't have to feel embarrassed because we sing drinks for a living, right?

Like, it's like you're creating art. It's an artistic job. It's also a very difficult job. And it takes an unbelievably specific skillset to do it properly.

And I think finally the whole industry is getting behind that, which is great. But definitely I'm a lot older than you, but definitely when I was coming up, it was like people constantly be asking me like, so what do you want to do when you grow up? I would say probably until I landed in that management position at 21, I would get that question. Like everyone assumed I was in school.

I'm sure I was for a little bit at their right high school. And I say I went to college, but I mean, I was there for like a year. And I was like, yeah, this is not for me. So I didn't get to college, right?

But even then that everyone's like, so then what's next? And I was like, I don't know. I'm just doing this. You know, and I always talked about moving away, but you know, stayed in Allison for a long time and did well for myself.

So I enjoyed it. But now it's, or once I just got into those management roles, everyone stopped asking that question about like, well, what's next? They're like, right. Yeah.

And now you're like, oh, because you're a manager and it's a difference. But really the whole job is a career. And also who are they to ask us who says I want to grow up? Yeah.

On the flip side of it, I don't ask the guests to say, well, so like, what do you want to? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So I want to talk about the whole MOOC Chicago and how that'll happen because obviously Chicago is one of the great bar cities in the world. Just to focus on, it was not a little bit longer. When you're, you just mentioned there wasn't a whole lot of cocktail programs there. So what kind of bars are in Appleton and then in Milwaukee?

Because again, when I was in Milwaukee, I didn't see a whole lot of awesome cocktail bars there either. And that's a bigger city. So talk just a little bit about the scene there and how it's maybe changing. Yeah.

In Appleton, it's a lot of, they're not all dives because now also living in Chicago, I've realized that like people's definition of die bars are very different. Yeah. I'm talking about the big metropolis, metropolis metropolitan city. Sorry.

I'm angled that word pretty good. It's easy for me to say. The idea of a quote unquote, die bar there is like, oh, someone built a bar to try and make it look like a die bar. Yeah.

Not an actual die bar. Yeah. So it's a lot, I wouldn't consider them dives, but I wouldn't, they're just kind of to me just regular bars. No cocktail program, things like that.

That's kind of it. And then outside of that, the real beverage programs are in the restaurants that we had around. And there's not a crazy amount of restaurants, some just do beer in line. But the handful that I worked in as I came up, especially once I kind of had five bartending later on.

It's kind of the places I was working out. We were just sort of paving the way in a sense. Or just with the people around us, it's like really getting cocktail programs and beverage out there. Whereas Milwaukee, for an example, was kind of like already established.

So in Wisconsin scene in general, it's like Milwaukee and Madison are kind of the only places that are doing it. And we were able to very much trying hard to make sure that we could kind of be on a similar level. So when did you get your sort of first taste of bartending and sort of mixology? So I lied once I was working on a big baseball stadium and I was serving and something happened where they needed a bartender.

And they kind of floated it by me and I was like, yeah, I'll do it. And they're like, well, you know how to bartending. I was like, yeah, I know how to bartending. Absolutely no clue.

But we made it work and I actually ended up doing that for a couple of seasons of our tent there, which was a blast. One of my favorite jobs I think of our hat is, you know, what's more fun than is just hang on a baseball stadium. But it really didn't get serious until that first management position that I keep mentioning. I just fell into that.

No, just beer in line. And I think within the first month, we got a full license. So then it was just starting off with rail mixers, things of that nature. We had no cocktail program.

Everyone was always asking for like, what do you guys do? What's the menu? What's the deal? And we had no one on the team to do that.

So I just bought a bunch of books and, you know, dug up things on the internet and just started to piece it together. So I kind of taught myself in that venue for nine months, because the restaurant only lasted nine months. It ended up burning down in a fire. Oh, but for that, I'm over it.

And just taught myself as much as I could and then kind of just kept taking it on to the next place. So that was the first real taste of like this is a very cool thing. And this guy's the limit if I want to take it from here. So what book story bank?

At that time, it was kind of whatever I could find at the low, like the half price books, you know, like the used book store. And I could not tell you I'm looking at all my books right now. I couldn't tell which ones I bought first. I honestly can't remember.

But it was mostly like, you know, none of the ones that we see now that we probably recommend to bartenders that we have coming up like what's a funny example like you'd make for a house party. Like that's a book, right? A couple of those and then a lot of reading up on the internet and figuring it out. It's funny because like when I was coming up, there was like the books that you would buy or read about making cocktails where like, oh, the fucking Boston bartender's guy or whatever, right?

Yeah, which is actually quite a valuable tool. But like now it's like you go to a bookstore and it's funny because I was going to see a movie the other day and having to be close to like a bookstore, like a physical bookstore, which I was early, but you never see a physical bookstore anymore. And just to check out what the fuck was going on there. And there's like now a whole entire section of like quote unquote, mixology books, right?

Whereas like when I was coming up in the business, like nothing like that in a lot of them are just trash like like soccer mom's guide to margaritas or whatever. I was reading initially because I was like, I can't go here. That's funny. And then like you start getting into like the books that actually matter like the death and go and look at intelligence and all the stuff that like become the Bibles of the next generation of mixologist, which is great.

And so you've got to dig a little deeper to find those ones, I guess. Anyone necessarily around me that was like really that interested in this thing. A couple people, but they weren't in within my circle, right? I'm having anyone to say like, I read this book, right?

I'm going from there. So it was tricky because I didn't have any mentorship until I moved to Chicago. I want to get into that. Before we started talking about that, we should mention that if you are someone who's looking to maybe you don't want to read all these books and you want somebody who's already done it for you, the people at Civil Liberties have come up with a new project called Civil Pores.

Oh, do tell. I'll tell you all about it. Yeah. Well, you got nothing to do with sitting here and listen to it.

Civil Pores is a project now in a distillery that was developed by the great people at Civil Liberties, a Byron Toronto, which actually just got voted in the best 50 bars and the number one bar in Canada on that list. So congratulations to the number of that. But yeah, it's a sustainable production that eliminates and reduce waste and how they do it is they bottle and keg cocktails that they have pre made by the amazing bartending team at Civil Liberties. What kind of size are they?

They have 20 liter kegs? We have options. 50 mill bottles. Oh, that's perfect for you, gasoline and your house.

That's correct. I have a nice big barbecue. Now that some of the season is here. Right.

And by yourself. Yeah. I think that's the most half of a cow and I'm done. Yeah, there you go.

But no, the cocktails are the programs amazing. The cocktails themselves are actually amazing. They have a special martini. They have old fashioned.

They have a New York sour. They just came up with a cosmopolitan, but Margarita. They have a jalapeno spicy margarita. But basically these are just cocktails that you can pour from the keg or from the bottle into a mixer or or shaker, depending on what the cocktail is, give it a quick stir or a shake and pour it right into a glass for your guests and they are priced so that you can mark them up at the bar and still make a profit.

It works out great. If you are a cocktail bar that does a lot of guests that are all coming in for tons of cocktails. It's perfect. It's a perfect situation with that.

We're using it at Babylon sisters right now. The espresso martini is amazing for that. It's a great way to speed up the service. We got a high volume client's occupancy, right?

If it's a high volume, if you're working in a high volume bar like my bars are that are actually people coming in for cocktails back in the day people just come in and they just want vodka, so that gin and tonic. Now people want the cocktails, classics and they want them in high volume. We're 3D at the bar and somebody orders an espresso martini. This is the perfect solution for that.

Civil Pores is doing it and if you are a high volume cocktail bar and you're not using civil pores and you're losing that. Nice. How about I get in contact with this place? Well, you're going to want to reach out to sales at civilpores.com.

That's sales at civilpores.com. Again, I can't recommend these products, this product enough, all the products, all of their cocktails in a bottle or in a keg. Reach out to sales at civilpores.com. Or, like I said, if you just are having a party at your house and you don't feel like you don't know shit about bartending.

That's why you're hiring me a couple times. I ruin the business at your place. If you don't know shit about bartending and you're hosting a party, what's cooler? We can always get a keg of fucking coars on original.

You got a keg of spicy margarita from civil pores. Or if you're hosting a special event, that's a special occasion permit for an anniversary baby shower, wedding engagement party. Easy way to provide a little bit of cocktails if you're renting a venue and you don't have to worry about hiring up some bartends. That's right.

There's a million ways that makes sense. It's also super sustainable. They reuse products from all over avocado pits, orange peels. They're reusing the stuff to put into the cocktails so that it's a sustainable program as well.

They're running a lot of stuff from the landfill because a lot of commercial properties don't have composting available. At least not where we are. It sounds like we're really kissing their ass here. But the reason is because it actually works.

What they're doing is amazing. It's a great tool for the bartending industry. Reach out to sales at civilpores.com if you are looking for unbelievable pre-made cocktails in a keg or in a bottle. One more time.

How do you get a hold of them? Sales at civilpores.com. Perfect. I'll put links to that in the show notes for everyone.

Okay, Tyler, let's go back to you here. We were talking about your move from Wisconsin to Chicago. Obviously, that's close by. The way you described it in the bio that I read was that did someone in Chicago reach out to you?

It was a little bit of a comedy. It was more our beverage director, Kevin Berry, who put on his social media that they were looking for someone to fill a management role at 3DOTs. I reached out to that asking a couple questions about what that would look like, the job entailed because I would imagine there was a management team and a couple different people. I was like, how did I work out?

What did you be doing? He responded very quickly with the details and I first brushed it off because I was running a restaurant in Nina, Wisconsin. And then also had opened up with a friend of mine in Milwaukee. I was commuting between those two jobs.

I had no time. It was seven days a week. It wasn't even thinking about moving. Kevin responded with, hey, that's great, but I think he should come interview.

I took that and I went on a Monday, had my interview and got the job offered by Friday and had a make some decision. So I took it as my opportunity to just move to Chicago and work in a place that I always wanted to work with some guys that I wanted to learn from and just jumped at it. So, quit both my jobs, pack up all my things, move to an apartment I'd never seen. Here we are.

It's a big move. How old are you then? I've been here for almost two years. I'm 28 now.

So, yeah, I'm with tier 26. So that's when you make these kind of decisions. You know, that age for sure. It's a lot easier.

You don't have as much shit to wrap up or worry about. I see, but you're still in the fight in a shell. So, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. When you have a single dude at the time. Yeah. So that makes it easier too.

Right? So it's like, what the fuck? Why not give it a shot in Chicago? Again, one of the great bar cities in the world, certainly in North America.

Tell me a little bit about the adjustment of moving from these smaller bars in Wisconsin to like a big, well-known bar, like three dots in a dash in Chicago. Yeah. It was certainly a transition, much larger staff, obviously massive venue. Just guests alone that we see a day is really shot up through what I was seeing back home.

It was nice that I had the transitional period to be in the locker for a little bit and have kind of like a step into what a larger market looks like, especially having opened a newer bar on the rooftop of a downtown hotel like that was quite busy for a summer. So I was there for about like nine niche months. So to kind of work at the restaurant and, you know, work on our systems and how we kind of ran things there. Then be in the locker handle like a higher guest count and also just like opening a new place and letting those skills.

It was made in an easier transition to jump straight to Chicago, whereas if I went just from the restaurant, which was nine tables in 10 bar seats, very, very tiny, you know what I mean? By seeing, you know, upwards of a thousand people, especially on the weekends would have been pretty jarring. But thankfully I had that little time and we'll kind of make that transition easier, but yeah, it was certainly an adjustment for a little bit in terms of schedule and volume and all those types of things. And three thousand a dash is a ticky bar, right?

Yeah. Yeah. So had you had any experience working with those kind of cocktails before? Yeah.

So that was an area of cocktails that I really enjoyed to do back home in my programs, wherever I was, whether it was just like one or two drinks that we threw on there. And then I had a couple of like, you can hardly call them guests, just but they were. But at a bar back home where we did like all tropical menu, whatever it was. And then in Milwaukee, the bar I assisted my friend opening was called Pufferfish, which is another tropical cocktail bar.

So that started out as like a residency pop up on the rooftop of the hotel and now it is a permanent hotel bar. So in Milwaukee, they're operating and have renovated it and the whole thing. So yeah, I'm certainly familiar with the genre before making that jump. Yeah.

So now that you're in more of a management role there, are you also involved in like cocktail creation at the bar? Yeah. More so now definitely started out with being purely like operations focused and just like day to day things with scheduling and inventories and stuff like that. And then as time went on and I got more familiar with my management team, we kind of all started really learning more about our skill sets and whatnot.

So I got more into the fold of the, you know, the changing of menus and at least like the R&D sessions and things like that. And then now fast forward even more so involved. So which is cool because it might jump very much out of operations and then now it's kind of like a cool combination of both because I do enjoy the day to day stuff. But obviously still the creativity and the things we get to do on the beverage side.

Yeah, it's tough transition for all of us when we start moving along in our career and you're like, and we talked a lot of chefs who do this as well. They started on the line and they move into an executive chef role and all of a sudden it's a lot of fucking paperwork and dealing with schedules and things like that they do. And then dealing with schedules and you know, spreadsheets, etc. It's certainly my job.

I'm completely out of the creative aspect of it. Like once the bar is open, that's the end of my creativity. You know, and it's like, I do miss a little bit of that. Do you find or did you find when you moved so drastically from like, you know, like you had experience opening the place in Milwaukee, but you were also, you know, bartending serving as well.

Right. And did you find like a drastic adjustment period when you moved more to the GM type role where it's more like scheduling dealing with people less of the creative aspect of it. Yeah, 100% was like a big shift because my whole management career, which was at a handful of restaurants because of places, you know, burning down, closing things like that. I truly did get like a fast track to just learn a lot and a bunch of different venues, which was great.

I would do it again. But yeah, going from always managing while also behind the bar and then shifting to just purely managing, still being involved in a bar. I mean, we do what we do. We have food and we have massive staff.

There's like plenty of other things to focus on, but we're still in an area that I enjoy, but certainly not like guest facing like before, right? So that was an adjustment at first, but the management team we have is great and it kind of helps me a lot with that transition. And we also made one of our parleeds was on track to be a management for a while. He had gotten promoted shortly after I got there.

So like having him also going through that transition, we kind of did it together. And we still have like, at the end of the day, we're still in the bar. We're still seeing all the guests. If we do go travel and do any events, we'll go and do those things.

If we have any events, after we're right there with our guest bartenders and still like there, you know, so we're still very much immersed in it. It's just not standing in a well for 12 hours a day. Right. You're pretty fucking young to have made that transition out of that area standing behind the well for 12 hours and as well.

So congratulations for that, because that is hard on your body and shit too. You don't even know yet. You're probably not even old enough to have it be hard on your body. I keep it around because I got some stuff for sure.

I got some stuff for sure. I got some stuff for sure. Yeah. But you know what I mean?

You're still somebody young man to have made this transition, which is cool. It's almost like you got like a massive fast track through this shit though, right? Like, yeah. But working hard.

Like I'm not saying, I don't know how to phrase this properly, but I don't mean like you got it before you were ready for it. It's just me like for someone who's young, you did a lot of shit really quick. Yeah. Like I said, that period of time, it was about maybe two years early on.

So that first management gig that restaurant burns down maybe like a week off went to a different restaurant to kind of help like consult and rebrand someone because they needed to kind of switch concepts. So help with staffing and when some other skills there that place ended up closing a few months later. Just the investor pulled out just called it. I went to a different place.

That was a crazy story. It ended up being like a drug front gash shut down. That was like a gnarly story. But all these places I was there for a little bit.

I got to like bone in on one thing, whether it was like operations. I'm just really going to focus on the beverage menu until I finally got two stable places where I ended up staying. It was that one restaurant for two years, went to a different restaurant for another two years before being in Milwaukee and then now Chicago. So had like a lot of instability that just helps further a lot of different skills and then really helped when I was at a stable place where I could really focus on that one venue, really helped me like heighten all those things and I think truly did get me to where I am now.

That's really interesting actually because it's like a legit dictionary definition of a craft course in like in this industry, right? Like yeah, so that's kind of cool. And having to pick up all those little skills at all these different places that were like opening closing, opening closing onto the next spot and you're just kind of rolling through it. And the next thing you know, you get to a stable spot and you already have this skill set.

You probably didn't realize that you were learning at the time. Exactly. And that time was awful. Right?

It was just like, it truly was not fun. But yeah, then when I did get to a place where I could really lean into and be like sites to be there and it was stable and comfortable and I was able to just like relax almost a little bit. And then I could take those things. All right.

Well, I know I did this venue and this seemed to work. Maybe we could make it better here and like, you know, piece of the thing that you do, you just take experiences and that's what makes you at your job. So I was very, very fortunate to have that. Yeah, it's kind of like you don't even realize that you've learned all the lessons and now you're using them all at the same time.

Just moving so fast. But now you must just be fucking bored. I'm just kidding. It's just like moving from a situation where it's everything's in flux all the time.

Do you find the type of person who thrives off that sort of chaos or are you now pleased to be more stable? I mean, just before we get to that, anyone in this business has to thrive on chaos a little bit. Sure. Yeah.

And I would say I was actually just talking to someone about this the other day because even before Chicago, you know, being at the restaurant, what my week looked like was I'd be at the restaurant either three to four days out of my week. And then the other three or four days, depending on how I split it, because I had to be three or four at one of the other, right? So depending on how I split it, the other part of my week I'd be in Milwaukee. So how 45 minute drive, I'd go crash in Milwaukee for the weekend, run the bar, and then I'd pack up and go home.

So it's seven days a week. And if I did take a day, it was usually like taken out by R&D or, you know, I'd like to, I'd really like to put myself to work all the time. So I was like, guess if I could schedule them or things like that, like, you know, never had time. And then I got to Chicago and thought like, oh, great, I'll just be in one spot.

And then I kind of just hit the ground running when I got here too. Like the schedule was packed. And then three dots is active in a lot of events and things. And I was fortunate enough to kind of get put on that travel team quickly last year.

So got to go and travel on, you know, I'd fill them on my days off and things like that. So I was just like, go, go, go. So I do very much enjoy that. There is always a limit.

You know, you do get tired and it's just that's just natural in how it goes. But I do prefer to go constantly. I don't really like to sit still. Yeah, sounds like it.

Talk to us a little bit about the Chicago scene these days. I was there last summer. I hadn't been in a while. Love it.

What are the great bars and restaurants that people need to check out when they're there? I'll be completely honest with you. I'm still boring. And I feel like an old man, because I know that I'm not, but I don't go anywhere.

Well, it's not the work of the fucking art maybe. I do like it that way. But when I do get out, we like to try and hit up some new spots if we can. We're recently have done, I think I went for good dinners recently.

Rosemary is a really fun one. Beautiful restaurants. Joe Flam does an excellent job. Dinner's fantastic.

Bar-wise, I'm always a big fan of Sparrow and Gold Toast. Beautiful Rumbar. The Grasshopper is amazing. They just recently opened up their sister bar.

It's called Bisu. It's in the West Loop in the full market district. And it's like a where Sparrow is like rum and kind of Cuban vibe. Bisu is very, like a French cafe cocktail lounge type thing.

So that's a great little bar and they have a cool program. So I like to go there. Outside of that, I mean, I really am just like a Wisconsin, you know, shot in a beer kind of guy. Yeah.

But there's lots of two-cogomers like that. That's a place called the Pausis. That's right around the corner from 3Dots. And that's a real dive bar right there.

Yeah. But that's like all of my whole life is about all of us as bartenders. When you're done work, that's all you want. You want to shot in a fucking beer, right?

Actually, sometimes I'm not even mad. I'm like, man, I just want to go to sleep for my four or five hours. Yeah. It's true.

But if you are going out, it's certainly not like, let's check out the hottest high-end cocktail joint. It's just like, what's the closest dive bar? PBR. Exactly.

I like it all day. With the way that my schedule is, my days are off for Tuesdays and Wednesdays, which I love. I prefer to, like, my day starts on Thursday and I just power through the weekend and then my Sundays and Mondays I get to kind of work on some admin stuff. So I enjoy it.

But some places have interesting hours where they aren't maybe open on those days and then also, there are some places that maybe close a little earlier during the week, right? So it is sometimes you get to get out and get this past that you want to hit depending on that if you don't have that weekend availability. Well, you are in one of the great cities in the world, let alone North America for just hanging out, period, but also for cocktails, for bars, for restaurants, the whole gig. And pretty impressive job, man.

Like going from where you started to now managing an awesome Tiki bar in Chicago that lots of people know about. So you're doing something right. And it sounds like you just like to fucking work, so maybe that's it. Work very hard.

Quickly, but the Tiki bar, we're looking at pictures earlier online of the bar and stuff. A lot of super awesome Tiki glasses. How many of those get stolen all the time? Is it a problem?

Yes, I know. We have a good amount of security and we're also all vigilant. We know we're sneaky, right? And they've had a couple drinks and they think they're pulling fast.

But we like to see you the whole time. We do catch a lot of people that are trying to walk with them. We appreciate that they love them enough that they like to take them home. But there are some people that are actually are sneaky.

They're some of them have a branded as well, which is a great way to advertise the bar too. If someone gets one out, you know, hey, good on you. You got it and please enjoy it. We lose just as many to them getting broken or whatever it is.

So I'm showing them off at work too. Actually, some of those glasses. They're all very impressed. And the Tiki glasses are, I know we ran a Tiki and I did one of my older bars and they're not cheap.

The Tiki glassware is not cheap. You want to get it like branded and custom and all that stuff? Yeah. And you want it to look legit, right?

You can't have the cheap knockoff bullshit. Yeah. We like to have the next one. So, I'm going to talk about the other great talk in D-Man.

It's been a super fun conversation. You're clearly a hard worker and a credit to the industry. And thanks for coming on the show, man. We really appreciate it.

Thank you very much for having us. Pleasure to talk. Before you go, one last question. If someone wants to get a hold of you or check something online, what's the best way to find you?

You can find me at 3.2. You can find me anytime. Otherwise, Instagram, I buy a trader tie, trader underscore tie. You can hit me up on there.

That's the best way to get a hold of what we're responding. Well, some of you guys are in the collaborations. They should pop up stuff as well. It's good to get that out there.

But yeah, 3.2. Super cool looking bar. Next time I'm in Chicago, I'm definitely coming out there. Thanks again for taking the time, Tyler.

You're obviously busy as fuck, so we appreciate you taking a little time. Thank you, gentlemen. It's a lot of fun. Thank you.