OFF TO A SMOKIN’ START FOR 2023!!

HeLLO, TEAM City BBQ!

I hope you enjoyed the holidays and were able to spend quality time with friends and family. The new year is upon us, and I am sure you will find it no surprise that we have another action-packed year ahead of us. As we enter 2023, we have the opportunity to assess where we are and set new goals for the future.
When we set New Year's resolutions, we are utilizing a concept called self-efficacy. This means that by virtue of aspiring to a goal and following through on it, we have a sense of control over what happens in our lives. I am a big believer that one can accomplish anything they want if they set a goal, make a simple decision to go for it, lay out a roadmap for success, and then have the discipline to stay true to that plan.
The City BBQ equivalent of a New Year’s resolution is our annual goal and initiative setting process. During this year’s annual leadership team strategy session, we established our 2023 annual initiatives as always. For the first time, we discussed the need to define our BHAG: our big, hairy, audacious goal for the next 20–25 years. As we discussed how the next 20–25 years will look for Team City BBQ, we realized we can go anywhere, compete, and own the BBQ lane.

Our BHAG:
To scale our brand across borders, without boundaries, to serve and create happiness for all who experience our craft.

Achieving our BHAG will not just happen. It is something this team must work towards, everyone in unison each day. It requires every team member to understand the destination and, more importantly, their role in getting us there. The City BBQ brand is as powerful as any out there and we will serve and create happiness far and wide—and I can state that confidently because of the power of this team.
In 2023, I ask you to remain steadfast to our purpose of serving and creating happiness for your colleagues and our guests. I ask you to stay true to your individual initiatives, as you each play a role in achieving our BHAG. We have included our 2023 Company Initiatives in this edition of Smoke Signals (see below). My hope is you already have reviewed them and are well down the road of establishing your own initiatives for 2023. This is how we ensure we have alignment and can move in unison in 2023, to deliver on our annual commitments to each other and stay on the course to achieving our BHAG.
I hope 2023 proves to be your best year yet - a year that serves and creates happiness for you, your family, your friends, and, of course, colleagues. I encourage you to establish stretch goals for yourself, both personally and professionally. And most importantly, that you go for it!

Happy New Year to you and yours!
~ Mike Muldoon

Four Pillars

TEAM

City BBQ Grows! What a way to start off the year, by opening in High Point and re-opening to the delight of our beloved Reynoldsburg guests!

New Joint Openings (NJO’s) are a perfect example of our teammate-driven experience. Hiring Managers must build a team from the ground up, so that takes trust and connection to the community. Essentially, we are selling the idea of working at City Barbeque as the Joint is being built. 

Our best-in-class engagement starts from the time they apply: Hiring Managers are able to reach multiple candidates instantly through our texting tool, Text Request. Hiring Managers also are able to set up interviews, which integrate with Outlook through our interview tool, Calendly.

Our Hiring Managers are passionate about their NJO and this shows in the talent pipeline! NJO’s receive the most applicants, even without the smokers on. This is a testament to our operators, as we are able to hire full staffs out of trailer, hotel, and/or even at a fast-casual competitor across the street. Simply put, our hiring managers are finding our future leaders!

~ Joe Vitullo, Senior HR Generalist

Guest

A new year is always a great time, as we turn the calendar and bring forward fresh thinking and new perspectives. This is certainly true for us here in the City Barbeque Marketing department, as we turn our attention to 2023 initiatives around our Guests. While we have many new and exciting things on the horizon, we also are taking time to update our approach to some of our existing tools as well, making sure we are delivering maximum value to the organization. One of our biggest Marketing focuses this year will be on our loyalty program, centered around the company initiative to “develop a loyalty strategy to optimize guests long term value.” With that said, you will be hearing us beat the loyalty drum all year, as we all work together to achieve our program goals. These include the following:

• Growth – adding more members to the program
• Increased participation rate – our goal is to have 20% of our checks be from guests in the program
• Moving those who check in once to a second check in and making it happen quicker

There are other loftier goals we have within Marketing for the program, but this gives you an idea of some of the metrics we will be reporting. And if you ever find yourself wondering why we think this is so important, remind yourself – the average loyalty member visits City Barbeque almost twice as many times as a non-loyalty member within a year. The traffic driving potential of this is huge, so please consider making your 2023 mindset one of “how can I help this program grow and thrive?” Here’s to great success in 2023!
Best,

~ Annica Conrad, Chief Branding Officer

Process

Happy New Year City BBQ! We are so excited to enhance our company processes this year and we are starting off quickly! In January, we will be rolling out Meez to all Joints. This new recipe system has been a huge hit with our test market. Next, we will roll out our new labor model to all Joints. This labor model is an upgrade from our outdated model and will allow Joints to see recommended hours, based on forecasted sales and Guest counts. It’s similar to how we’ve been scheduling, with several added benefits. Lastly, we will roll out Monkey Media integration with Aloha. This will send Catering orders thru our POS system, so you don’t have to ring Catering orders in manually. Columbus will get this update in January, followed quickly by the rest of the company. We also are currently testing fry oil filtering machines, and a new way to store and rotate the fries we hold in water before blanching. More to come on those innovations.

~ Dave Skerl, Director of Strategic Implementation

Financial

In 2022, there were many challenges from which we definitely learned. Accounting and Finance will be spending time wrapping up 2022 with closing out the year-end books, the audit, tax returns, W-2’s, and compliance filings before we can jump 100% into 2023. But, we are excited to transition to 2023! We are cascading our objectives and have a focus on providing Data Analytics to support the company. We do an excellent job of reporting the numbers, but now we need to support all the different departments
with answers as to WHY the results are what they are. Once we determine the “why,” we can forge ahead to help change and improve on what the numbers are showing. Providing those decision-making tools to those we support aligns our department with the success of City Barbeque. I find this to be genuinely exciting; to watch people learn new things, excel in their careers, and accomplish their personal goals. This allows everyone to see how they are contributing to the future of the company. We look forward to working alongside each of you as we continue on our Barbeque journey!

~ Diane Reed, Chief Financial Officer

OPENING SHOTS - HIGH POINT

RDO REFLECTIONS

A WORD FROM YOUR NEW RDO, KEVIN BENNETT

Happy 2023 Team!  What an exciting time to be a part of City BBQ.  I had the privilege to spend this first week of 2023 with the Leadership Team in Columbus.  We did miss not having Greg with us in person.  You probably wouldn’t guess this, but Greg is in the middle of another opening.  Good luck Greg and I look forward to spending time with you soon in person.  Our focus this week was really looking at our systems and processes to see what can be improved upon.  A true sign of great leadership as we try to improve each day.  I am thankful to be a part of a growing and dynamic company whose biggest asset is its people.  I can’t thank those of you enough that assisted me in my training.  You took time out of running your Joint or Market to share information with me.  None of you held back and you truly made me feel part of the City BBQ family.  For that, I will be eternally thankful.  Here are a few thoughts on that experience.

1. Carey & Chris and the Team at Polaris: The attention to Competition level execution in Pits was more than I could have imagined.  The level of pride in what you do and for City BBQ made a big impression on me.  Thank you!

2. Trevor & Sally and the Team at Centerville: I believe the Saturday before Father’s Day, we had several weddings and watching and helping the team prepare for this really showed me that the behavior of “failure is not an option” was alive and well in Centerville.  It was an amazing time there and it showed me the “Art of the Possible.” Thank you!

3. Rieley and the Team at Avon: What a great example to see of “treat others with integrity, fairness and respect”. Avon has had the lowest turnover numbers on the last couple of reports I’ve seen, no surprise there.  The attitude there was to treat your people even better than the guest and they will follow that example with the guest.  Thank you!

4. David Steiger: You welcomed me and showed me your unique style.  I’m not sure anything shakes you up!  You’re a calming influence for your team and you seem to know every hourly teammate well.  Great example to see. Thank you!

5. David Skerl: You also shared so much with me while you already had so much on your plate.  Since then and in your new role, you have been so helpful to me.  I feel like I have a partner as I’ve worked through this transition process.  Thank you!

6. Juan Lopez: Watching you with your team was amazing.  When people cheer when you walk in, you’re doing something right!  Even the folks at your hotel seemed to know everything about you and you knew them.  Your genuine friendliness put’s people at ease and they want to follow you.  Thank you!

7. Aletha: You are simply best in class!  You are a pleasure to work and partner with.  Mike said at our last ML meeting that there is only one Aletha.  He was right!  Thank you!

8. Jennifer Grywalski: thank you for all the support you gave me in travel arrangements and making sure I was in good accommodations through training.  You are money Jen, and I appreciate you.  Thank you!

9. Justin Lance: Thank you for your support and partnership.  You made day one orientation very special and what a great example for me to follow.  Setting the example for others to follow and creating unequal outcomes is not something you just say, you live and breathe it.  Thank you for everything!

 I could keep going in highlighting the great team we have here at City BBQ, but I don’t want to be the guy that pushes this document to 200+ pages. I appreciate all of you who had a direct hand in my training.  I will never forget it.  I’ll leave you with this.  Ability is what you’re capable of doing.  Motivation determines what you do.  Attitude determines how well you do it.  Attitude will be so important as we stretch ourselves to open a record number of Joints in 2023.  If any team can do it, it’s this team.  Thank you for allowing me to join in on your success!

~ Kevin Bennett - Regional Director of Operations

CATERING CHATTER

LEVEL UP! NEWS FROM EACH CATERING REGION BY RCD

South: Atlanta, Raleigh, Greensboro, Charlotte, Louisville, and Lexington

I want to say CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE SCENES! From our accountants, HR, Training, IT, Purchasing, and all the people in our Joints and operations teams, YOU make it possible. Our people unite our company by showing up and supporting our Goal, Serving Competition Quality Food while Creating Happiness.

I want to express my gratitude to our Catering sales & operations managers, field operators, and wedding event specialists for ensuring that we exceed all Catering client’s expectations while breaking sales records. Together we continue setting the standard for others to follow!

I am THANKFUL to be part of this team, a family with a fantastic group of people, who dedicate a TON to achieving our goals as a company, and I am looking forward to 2023 as we lift off for a fun year ahead and "Rise Above!"

Stay True,

~ Edwin Sanchez, RCD

CENTRAL/WEST: Dayton, Indianapolis, Lafayette, Columbus, Chicago, and Madison

Wow! What an incredible and record-breaking year! I must start by celebrating Columbus Catering. No Catering market has hit four million for the year, and our Columbus Catering team passed right by four million, right by five million, and hit a whopping six million in sales! Congratulations to the entire management team; John Burton, Randy Arehart, Danielle Maloney, Tori Fleming, Allison Walker, Carmen Sanson, Ken Hunt, and Christina Orenuga.

I would also like to recognize our Indy Catering team for hitting their milestone of $3.3M sales.

This year we achieved incredible individual Sales Manager results. Randy Arehart in Columbus Catering was the first ever to hit $3M. Temple Rice in Indy Catering hit $1.6M. Ashlee Silva in Indy Catering was the first Wedding Event Specialist to achieve $1M+ in wedding sales.

I am immensely proud of our InMoment guest satisfaction performance. The top market in the region was Kentucky Catering, with an impressive 95% for the year, remarkable job! Second place was Dayton at 93% and Indy Catering at 91% in third place. The Chicago Catering Team improved this year, achieving 90% resulting in a fantastic improvement.

Thank you all for an incredible 2022, and here is to us leveling up in 2023!

Stay True,

~ Jeremiah Ruxer, RCD

NORTH: Cincinnati, N Kentucky, Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Findlay, Troy, and Grand Rapids

I congratulate both the joints and Catering on a record-breaking year. Seeing what is possible when we dream big and work together with one goal is fantastic!

A special shoutout to our exceptionally talented people I have the joy of working with, who make work fun and are still able to perform at the highest level. Team Northeast Ohio broke over $2M in Catering sales for the first time. Our wedding coordinator Abbey Jackson came so close that we will round her to $1M in wedding sales! Congratulations to our Cincinnati Catering team for breaking their record and achieving $3M.

One Joint stands out for me this year on what they have accomplished: Toledo! Coming in at number two on overall bulk Catering sales and holding four of the company’s ten busiest Catering day records for 2022 shows the culture and dedication they live every day! I could go on and on, and so many team members contributed to the “Best of” list of 2022. Please know that I am thankful to collaborate with the best people in the industry here at City Barbeque, and I look forward to leveling up another record-breaking 2023.

Stay True,

~ Tony Ramos, RCD

RECIPE FROM OUR PIT MASTERS COMPETITION - FALL 2022

We promised that each issue over the next few quarters would include one of the winning recipes from the Pit Master Competition. This quarter, we have Matt Ferguson’s Korean Style Ribs - it was the 1st Prize winner in the Ribs category!

QUEMMUNITY

WE CARE! FAITH MISSION VOLUNTEERS

It was our privilege to serve and create happiness with the Faith Mission community this week. Thanks to the compassion of our late co-founder Frank Pizzo, City BBQ has continued to serve Columbus, OH, families in need, with a special holiday City BBQ dinner for over 200 people. Thank you to our partners Reinhart Foodservice, Cooper Farms, Phil Griesinger, Graffiti Foods, Seneca Foods Corporation, AmerCareRoyal, Clemens Foodservice, and Midwest Consolidated Supply for making this special event happen. Additionally, thank you to Mike Muldoon, Samantha Shaffer, Jillian Armstrong, Rachel DeMers, Justin Lance, Kevin Bennett, and Jordan Fugate for serving (although you may have trouble determining who’s who in the photo gallery below!). We appreciate our partnership with Faith Mission, and the vital role they have in our community to provide hope for homeless and hungry individuals. #thankyou #people #community #citybbq

BE A POSITIVE MEMBER OF THE COMMUNITY!

If you have participated in any community or charity event/drive, or volunteered for any cause, either as a team or individually, at work, home, church, etc., please send your information and any photos you can provide to hr@citybbq.com, with Quemmunity in the subject line. We’d love to publish them in a future newsletter under this feature! We want to “share the wealth in a sustainable fashion!”

RAVING FANS

CARMEL

Gisele at the Carmel, IN south range line road location is amazing, hard working and committed to exemplary customer service! She is one of your best team members!

DEERFIELD

Adam who makes the cole slaw - it's great! & Adam at the register who helped me make the right choices for my order & tells great rib jokes with a big friendly smile. I'll be back for great food and great service :-)

JOHNS CREEK

I placed a large order for a family gathering yesterday and had a world class customer experience at the John's Creek location. Lindsey was patient, thorough and friendly. She ensured the order was exactly what we needed. Great service is difficult to come by these days. This was a very pleasant surprise. Thanks!

KENTWOOD

Eric was excellent and exhibited unbelievably GREAT customer service!!!

LAFAYETTE

Love Love City BBQ. Tom likes the Ribs and I like the Corn Pudding and Baked Beans. We have eaten there 3 times. We like the covered porch since we travel with out dog. Every time we have been in your cashiers (?) have been very pleasant. Yesterday it was Jen that helped. She couldn't have been nicer. Thanks

WESTERVILLE

Just got back from Vancouver, BC and Houston. Starving! Couldn't wait to get back to City! And, of course, walk in the door and there's all the friendly faces: Drew, Dejuan, Trina, Joris and Miss Tiffany. They've got it goin' on and, yes, I do know what I'm talkin' about. Please keep it up. Good, healthy food that makes Cameron Mitchell scratch his head!

ALETHA’S CORNER

Hello All and Happy 2023!!

 I like to look at each new year as a fresh start, a fresh start to everything - relationships, finances, body goals, career goals, and so much more. It’s literally a new chapter in your life waiting to be written. A time for new questions to be asked, embraced, and loved. Answers to be discovered and then lived in this transformative year of delight and self-discovery.

 Thinking about what the year holds is exciting because you get to create the path. There will be goals set with you for many different things, but setting your own goals for your life and year is totally up to you. Ask yourself this question to get you started: What do you want for yourself in this new year?  Below are some tips on how to answer that question and stick to your plan for a great 2023.

Lots of people set New Year's resolutions. The popular ones include:

• Taking on more responsibility

• Improving my work-life balance

• Getting promoted

• Changing career direction

• Getting a raise

• Being more organized

Only 8% of people who make a New Year’s resolution achieve their planned result. As most people create their goals in January and quit by February, I am sure you can see how this is a problem. Here are a few reasons this happens. People:

• Set unrealistic goals

• Set "other people's goals"

• Don't review their progress

• Set negative goals

• Do too many things at once

So how will 2023 be different for you? First, it starts with a way of thinking - your mindset. What do you really believe about yourself and about change? With an open, mind follow these five golden goal-setting rules:

 1. Set resolutions that motivate you. Try a motivating value statement, such as I WILL GET PROMOTED THIS YEAR! or I Will BUY A NEW CAR!

2. Set SMART goals (S-Specific M-Measurable A-Attainable R-Relevant T-Time-bound)

3. Put resolutions in writing

4. Make an action plan

5. Stick with it- Don’t give up on yourself

Now carve out a quiet interlude for yourself in which to dream, pen in hand, today, to get started on what could be your best year yet! Only dreams give birth to change.