From its limited menu to the employee dress code, founder Todd Graves is charting his own path in a competitive industry. Now, one of the world’s richest men is pointing to his chicken finger empire as a prime example of the power of entrepreneurship.
In a recent Fox News interview, Jeff Bezos pushed back on the notion that building a successful business and becoming a billionaire made someone a villain.
Instead, he pointed to entrepreneurs who expanded their companies and created thousands of jobs. For the Amazon founder, Graves is a prime example of that.
“There’s nothing wrong with making unbelievably good chicken that people love,” he said. “And it doesn’t make him a bad person.”
However, although Graves and Bezos are both billionaires, the former followed a different playbook than the latter.
In 1996, Graves, who was 24, opened the first Raising Cane’s in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He used loans from friends, family, and the Small Business Administration, as well as savings from his jobs as a boilermaker and an Alaskan salmon fisherman.
Three decades later, the ethos of the fast-food chain remains the same: a simple menu centered on chicken fingers, fries, coleslaw, Texas toast, and Cane’s Sauce.
Even now, the smallest change, such as the addition of a sandwich combo, can create anxiety and stress.
“To tell you the truth, man, I kind of wish we didn’t even have it on the menu. It’s like 3 or 4 percent of sales. And it slows us down,” Graves previously told Inc.
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