0:00) Welcome to the BLTNT podcast. I’m your host, Matt Loria, serving up real stories of business, (0:05) life, technology, and transformations. You’ll hear from interesting people about big changes from (0:10) career shifts to life-altering decisions and the innovations that help make it all happen.

(0:14) It’s about sharing those lightbulb moments, pivot points, challenges overcome, and the journeys (0:19) that inspire us to think differently. If you’re on the lookout for insights to propel you forward, (0:23) stories that resonate, or just a bit of inspiration on your next BLTNT move,(0:27) you’re in the right place. Let’s dig in.

Well, welcome to another episode of the BLTNT podcast. (0:41) For the first time, we have in our studio, Mr. Paul Glantz. (0:46) Pleasure to be here.

Thanks for having me. (0:47) Thank you for being here. So this guest turned $125,000 of debt originally into a luxury cinema (0:56) empire.

And I would say he did it quietly, did it boldly, but never getting too comfortable either. (1:08) It’s the best 30-year overnight success story you’ll ever see. (1:12) Well, welcome.

We’re going to talk a lot about the trials and tribulations, but certainly the (1:19) risk-taking and the other elements that have gone into what you have become to today. (1:27) Well, there’s been a lot of water under the bridge over the years, but still swimming, (1:33) so that’s a good thing, right? (1:34) Great. Yep.

For those of you who don’t know, Paul is the… I’m going to have to read some of this (1:39) because Paul is the co-founder and chairman of Imagine Entertainment, which is one of the(1:46) nation’s most respected forward-thinking movie theater chains. I think you told me (1:51) 10th largest privately owned group? (1:53) 10th largest exhibitor in North America. (1:55) Exhibitor, regardless of ownership.

(1:58) Oh, amazing. Okay. So they’re headquartered here in Troy, Michigan, (2:04) operating how many theaters now? (2:06) We operate 28 theaters, 16 of which I’m personally responsible for, and we have (2:11) another 12 that are licensees of Imagine.

(2:15) Great, great. And how many states? (2:17) We’re in Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and our licensee is largely in Minnesota. (2:23) Great, great.

So also you’ve been a kind of a pioneer in the biggest and best in terms of (2:31) biggest screens. What was it, the Dolby Atmos? You were one of the first to… (2:39) We were very early adopters of Dolby Atmos, which is an immersive sound system. (2:43) It’s as many as 72 channels of sound, (2:47) and little known is we were the first in the world to convert to all digital projection.

(2:53) So pioneering in the way. (2:55) Yeah. Well, technology, I think, is really a common element of businesses that have succeeded (3:01) over time.

And we’ve oftentimes been on the bleeding edge, but it’s served us well. (3:07) Good, good. Well, let’s kind of kick off now that everybody knows who we are.

(3:14) Paul’s also a good friend of mine, was one of our early customers in this company. (3:19) And with a very trust forward attitude, I would say. So I really appreciated (3:25) the faith that you put in us early on.

So thank you for that. And thank you for your friendship. (3:30) Of course.

(3:30) You were the first boat ride for my boys. First movie experience for my boys. So you’ve(3:38) been an impact to the family as well.

(3:40) Oh, good. So we’ve got first there as well. (3:42) That’s right.

Although they’ve been a little bit extra spoiled because the first movie my (3:47) boys ever went to was a grand opening with a dance floor, a piano, free food of all kinds. (3:55) I think a magician, you know, so they didn’t just think it was reclining seats. They thought (4:01) it was like a full circus type of production.

So they’ve never really experienced that same (4:09) level since. (4:10) Oh, well, we’ll try to replicate that again. Try to open some more theaters.

(4:15) Perfect. We can’t spoil them too much. But speaking about family, (4:22) let’s let’s talk about family.

Let’s talk about upbringing for you, because I think a lot of (4:25) people are interested in learning kind of where you came from and what some of those (4:31) foundational blocks have been for you. (4:33) Yeah, well, I came from pretty modest roots. My mom worked before most moms worked outside (4:38) the home.

I had a mom who was very industrious and she worked outside the home. The afternoon (4:45) shift, my dad worked as a truck driver, drove a Transamex truck. And we lived a very middle(4:52) class existence with both of them contributing to the household income.

We grew up in a 950 (4:59) square foot bungalow. And I was the only child and of course, remain an only child. (5:06) And I recommend it highly.

It was a good gig, but it was a good gig because I’ve got lots of (5:11) cousins and I grew up very close to them as well. And, you know, when it came time to go to (5:18) college, honestly, I did not know that I had a choice but to pursue higher education. (5:23) From the time I was I could remember little Polly was going to go to college.

And of course, (5:29) when I graduated from high school, we didn’t have a trust fund set aside for me to go to college. (5:34) But I got this lovely letter the summer I graduated from high school from Wayne State (5:39) University offering me a full paid scholarship. And they didn’t have to ask twice.

Like, OK, (5:45) I’m in. Perfect. And it was not certainly certainly not based on my athletic prowess (5:50) because I have none.

But I’d gotten good grades in high school. And it was a saving grace because (5:55) I wasn’t exactly a model citizen in high school. But but for some reason, you know, school came (6:01) pretty easily to me.

And it was a saving grace because I think my father would have killed me (6:08) otherwise and it would have been justifiable homicide. But what made you think you didn’t (6:13) have a choice? It was just my upbringing. You know, neither of my folks had graduated from (6:18) college.

My dad went to Henry Ford Trade School. My mom had several years in Wayne State but didn’t(6:23) get a bachelor’s degree. But I was brought up with the perception that there were no(6:28) options, that you didn’t just go to work at, you know, the Ford plant when you graduated from high (6:33) school, you went to college.

Or at least that was going to be my future. And so I really genuinely (6:38) did not know that I had an option but to go to college. So you never argued it then? No, (6:43) never argued it.

This is how it’s going to work. OK. That worked out OK.

It did. And it certainly (6:48) has worked out well for Wayne State because I know you’ve given back quite well to them and (6:54) have been quite the proponent of them and their growth over the years. Yeah, you know, they helped (7:00) us.

And my wife, Mary, too, was a scholarship recipient, was then known as the Merritt (7:05) Scholarship to the Presidential Scholarship. Both of us enjoyed free college education from(7:10) Wayne State. And so we’ve endeavored to give back since.

And so among other things, we’ve (7:15) created an endowed scholarship for students that are studying accounting. And when we’re dead, (7:21) both of us are gone, there will be over a million bucks to fund those scholarships in perpetuity. (7:27) Great.

Great. Let me understand this, the piece about your mother, you know, the difference in (7:36) your household versus other households where mom worked. And you said that was at a time(7:42) when that was not traditionally the typical household.

Yeah, in the 1960s, it was not (7:49) typical, 60s and 70s. And, you know, it was a great experience for me. I’ll tell you why.

(7:56) I went to spend afternoons with folks across the street who would look after me until my dad got (8:03) home. And it was a fascinating experience for a kid to be residing in a household,(8:13) part time, where he was both valued by the mom and dad because he represented an income stream (8:20) for the household, but resented terribly by the children who actually were the offspring of the (8:26) people who resided there. And George in Virginia thought I was a terrific kid.

And again, maybe (8:33) it was because my mom wrote him a check every week. But it was a tale of two cities. And it was a (8:41) fascinating contrast for a kid.

And let me tell you why. George had grown up as a son of a Serbian (8:50) immigrant, just like my mom was the daughter of a Serbian immigrant. But for some reason, my (8:57) grandfather, Mitar, knew love.

And he loved his nine children. And so in turn, they learned how (9:05) to demonstrate love. And in contrast, in George’s family, all they knew was subsistence, like just (9:14) survival.

And George’s dad ended up in the Upper Peninsula as a copper miner. And when George (9:21) turned 16, the tale goes that his dad said, come on, now you’re going to the mine. And George worked (9:27) one day in the mine, and he escaped, basically ran away to Detroit, where he worked at the Dodge (9:35) main plant in Amtramac.

And for some reason, and this is the tale of the two families, (9:44) George never learned love from his father. And so George, unfortunately, told his children that (9:52) they were good for nothing. They never amount to anything.

And they were worthless. (9:57) In those words? (9:59) Literally in those words. And I’m exposed to this, observing this.

(10:03) While you’re coming from this loving family across the street, staying over there to be babysat, (10:09) essentially. (10:09) Yeah. And while they’re doting over me, because I’m a source of revenue for them, George is basically (10:15) perpetrating mental abuse on his kids.

Well, guess what? It turned out to be a self-fulfilling (10:20) prophecy, because each of George’s four children ended up spending time in a Michigan penitentiary. (10:26) Whoa. (10:27) And fortunately, I’ve not, you know, ended up in that restraint yet, but (10:32) yet being the operative term, but… (10:34) I’ve seen you drive, so… (10:36) Yeah, this is inevitable.

(10:37) It could happen. (10:38) Yeah, I get it. (10:40) Wow.

(10:41) So, you know what, I think being exposed to lots of different (10:48) things in your life, and things that really were quite adverse. To think about, you’re in a (10:54) household where these other kids all resent you, because they don’t tell me I’m worthless, right? (10:59) Yeah.(11:00) It was really a great experience to be thrust into that as a child.

(11:07) Yeah, almost to see how others, I mean, you were, otherwise, you would have never seen how other (11:12) people, you know, have adversity even, but then also, how do they even deal with it? (11:18) Absolutely. And so when I do public speaking, I oftentimes start out by saying,(11:23) the reason I’m here today is because I was loved as a child. (11:27) Wow.

(11:28) And I was loved as a child by my folks, and they instilled in me self-confidence and a(11:34) belief that I could achieve anything I aspire to in life. (11:38) Wow. (11:38) I think they’d be proud of me today.

(11:39) I would think so. And you’ve done the same with Jack and Jim, I mean, with your boys.(11:45) Hope so.

Yeah, they’re on their way. They’re bright guys, and we love them dearly, of course. (11:52) I mean, they know that part, right? (11:54) They certainly know that part.

If they don’t, I failed miserably. (12:00) And you’re married. (12:02) Yes.

(12:02) To Mary. (12:03) In fact, on June 1st, it’ll be 40 years. (12:07) Great.

(12:08) Yeah. (12:09) Congratulations. (12:10) Thank you.

(12:10) If you make it. (12:11) To make it to next Sunday. (12:13) She doesn’t take you out before that.

(12:15) Yeah, if I make it before this Sunday, it’ll be 40 years. (12:18) Great. What’s that quote? I don’t know.

It says something about your success in life is also (12:28) majorly determined by the spouse that you choose. (12:31) Oh, I’m sure that’s true. I don’t know that saying, but a supportive wife, I think, (12:35) is critically important to anybody who’s successful in business.

(12:39) And you’ve had that all along? (12:41) I have. (12:42) Did Mary work at a time as well?(12:45) Yeah, Mary has an MBA from Michigan State. She worked in real estate and leasing.

(12:51) She was very successful in her own career. And then when our boys came along, (12:55) she continued to work. We had a nanny for a while, and Sherry was a wonderful nanny.

(13:01) She loved our kids as much as we did. And we’re still friends with Sherry today, (13:07) some 25, 30 years later. But when the boys got to be a certain age, Mary thought that the most(13:15) important role in her life was to look after these children.

And so she chose to become a home (13:22) educator. And so our boys were both home educated all the way through high school. And people look (13:29) at me and go, well, were they properly socialized? Actually, they had lots of different friends (13:34) from the whole homeschooling community.

And I could never fire Mary as the principal of the (13:39) school because Jack turned out to be a national merit finalist, and Jim was admitted to the (13:45) University of Michigan. So apparently, we didn’t fail them in their primary and secondary education. (13:52) That’s great.

That’s great. When we’ve talked over the years, work and life blend very (14:04) symbiotically for you, right? You’re kind of never not working. (14:09) I work a lot.

(14:09) But you’re never kind of not living the family life either. (14:12) True. (14:12) Can you talk about how you’ve made that work out? (14:16) Well, I like to believe that my kids know that they were loved and that I would make (14:24) time for them and so forth.

But I have a strong work ethic and a propensity to work. So I might (14:30) come home, have dinner, see the kids, play with them, put them to bed, and then go back to the (14:35) office. And what most people don’t know about me, Matt, you do, but up until eight years ago, (14:40) I had a day job.

And so I was building my entrepreneurial business. I called it my (14:45) avocation while I had a full-time gig. And that was my vocation as an insurance peddler.

(14:52) Yeah, that’s always been kind of a wild thing for people to realize, right? You were actually (14:58) the president or CEO, I believe, of Procter Financial. (15:03) Yes, that’s correct.(15:04) And that’s not a half-time job.

(15:09) No, there’s a lot of responsibility. In fact, when I departed, we had over 300 teammates.(15:16) And there was a time when the government was trying to put us out of business.

And so (15:20) Mr. Glantz goes to Washington to try to save those 325 jobs. It was all-encompassing at times. (15:28) There’s no question about that.

But I’ve always found time to smell the roses and to be a father (15:36) and a family man and so forth. (15:37) You never seem to be rushed, is kind of what I’ve always noticed. You’re very present, (15:42) even when you had the two jobs, right? You never appear to be rushed.

There’s always a calm (15:52) to you. (15:53) Well, that’s good because I think folks respond better to calm leadership than they do to folks (15:58) who are frenetic, like our current president, for example. And by the way, I voted for him, (16:05) so blame me.

(16:07) Well, there’s no politics allowed here today. (16:09) That’s fine. (16:10) That was actually one of your rules.

I actually asked you for some advice. (16:12) Well, it is a bad idea for me to talk about politics.(16:16) You’ve been in trouble before.

You know, when I – I think it’s probably been 10 years or so (16:24) since we’ve known each other or thereabout, maybe more. And you were running the other (16:32) organization. You had built a pretty substantial organization in Imagine as well, even at that time.

(16:39) My hobby was out of control, wasn’t it? (16:41) It was a little, yeah. People are going to have an intervention for you there eventually. But (16:48) you know, how did you pull together that initial team to, you know, to be able to trust them (16:55) while, you know, essentially during waking hours, you’re doing something else, (16:59) and they were helping you build, you know, build Imagine? (17:02) You know, I’ve never considered myself to have a lot of operating prowess per se.

(17:07) So I’ve largely surrounded myself with folks who do know how to operate and execute on a day-to-day (17:15) basis. But maybe what gave me comfort is because of my background as a CPA, I’ve always understood (17:21) the numbers. And so I could see where the business was going without physically being there all the (17:26) time.

And now, of course, we have cameras everywhere, so I could tune in and watch what’s (17:31) going on in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, or, you know, Batavia, Illinois from Troy, Michigan, if I’m so(17:38) inclined. But you make a good point. It’s always been about trying to surround myself with people (17:46) who have complementary skills and people who can excel where I don’t necessarily have strength.

(17:52) What’s been the attitude? I explain to people that your attitude this way, and I could be(17:58) totally off base with this, but is that you kind of give almost everybody an opportunity(18:04) that you trust first, go ahead and screw me, right? You kind of only have one chance to screw you (18:11) type of attitude. And that has served you really well, right? In terms of that trust first. (18:19) Yeah, I mean, don’t get me wrong.

I’ve been taken advantage of once again. But the reality is that (18:26) most people that are good want to be given the authority that goes along with their (18:33) responsibility. And I’m a terrible micromanager.

I have an inclination to say, here are your (18:39) responsibilities, here are your tasks, make it happen. And I think people who are smart and people (18:45) who are driven gravitate to that type of leadership. And so I’ve tried to, I guess the (18:54) term would be, I’ve tried to work hand in glove with those kind of folks to ensure that other (19:00) parts of the business operate effectively.

How do you know, like, what’s the trigger point (19:07) for you to know if somebody is one of those people or is not, right? Because we’ve all made (19:12) mistakes in hiring, right? Where we go, oh, I guess I thought that was the right person and (19:18) it’s not, or thought this was the right role for that person and it’s not. What are some of (19:24) the triggers that you know, and how do you know quickly? This episode of the BLTNT podcast is (19:37) sponsored by Oxium, business IT and cybersecurity designed to outsmart chaos. Empowered by Juniper (19:43) Networks, automate your network with Juniper Networks and the Mist AI platform.

The world’s (19:48) first AI-driven wired and wireless network. It’s the numbers, you know, and I’m a big believer (20:02) that each of us is responsible for creating value greater than our own cost. And, and folks could (20:08) say… Are you the person I stole that from? I hope so.

Yeah. I’ve been saying that a lot. Yeah.

(20:12) And because the reality is that if you’re not allowing your employer to actually drive some (20:17) value greater than what you’re being, what you’re earning, there’s not a viable business (20:21) to continue your employment. And so I’ve long advocated for creating value in excess of cost (20:28) and knowing the numbers, I can try to figure out pretty quickly whether someone is (20:32) in fact meeting that expectation. Outside of just a sales role too.

Yes, absolutely. You know, (20:42) and I’ll give you a great example. When we opened Imagine Loyal Oak, we added a lot of moving parts.

(20:48) We had a banquet center, a full service restaurant. We had 16 lanes of bowling. We’re(20:53) down to four lanes of bowling there today.

And, you know, the business was floundering. It was (20:59) not doing well. Of course, I’m ultimately responsible for this, but I went to our then (21:06) vice president of operations and said, you know, this, this building is not performing.

What’s (21:13) said, no one could run this business. Oops. Yeah.

That was the wrong thing to say to me, (21:20) because candidly at that point, I thought, well, there’s the MGM casino in downtown Detroit that (21:27) seems to be somewhat of a larger operation that we’re running here in Royal Oak. And if, you know, (21:34) if the gentleman who was tasked with running it, isn’t up to it, well, maybe there’s someone who (21:38) is. And so, yeah, telling me that no one could run a particular business was, (21:45) didn’t resonate very favorably with me.

Well, the only thing never to do is speak in absolutes. (21:50) I’ve, I’ve learned. Yes, that’s right.

Because the world’s shades of gray, right? Sure. (21:57) Well, that, and, and when you, if somebody gives me that glimpse into their vision of the world (22:04) or their vision of the problem, there’s always a solution to a problem. Might not be the answer (22:08) that we want, but to say that no one could do that, that was, you’re looking right into his (22:13) soul, right? Because he’s essentially saying, I can’t do it.

Nobody can do it. Just with it. And (22:18) that’s not the answer.

And, you know, my, I’ve always been responsible to investors and I’ve (22:23) been responsible to meet bank covenants. And so telling me I can’t, or I won’t just never fit, (22:31) sit, sat well with me. In fact, you know, one of my favorite stories goes back to when we (22:34) opened imagine Novi and subsequently imagined Canton.

And we didn’t have access to all the (22:39) feature films because my competitor had a, had a means of actually precluding us from accessing (22:45) the films. And, and this is where I also had the adage, the worst thing in life is when you don’t (22:50) know what you don’t know. Well, little did I know that my competitor could stand in my way of my (22:54) film buying.

And I had a film buyer at the time, very fine man. I still adore him. His name is (23:00) Steve.

And Steve looked at me and said, there’s nothing you can do about it. And to which I said,(23:07) well, you may be right. And, and by the way, it was reasonably bleak because there weren’t a lot (23:12) of independent exhibitors who could overcome this particular problem.

But I said, you know, (23:17) I’ve been entrusted with the hard earned capital of my investors and I, and we’ll never achieve (23:23) our financial goals if we don’t fix this film buying problem. And so lo and behold, had to get (23:29) a new film buyer. I had to play a good little good cop, bad cop.

And as a story in and of itself (23:35) right there, but we ultimately overcame this problem. And that’s when our financial performance (23:41) took off. And without having resolved that issue, I can tell you that no one else would have ever (23:48) contributed capital to the business.

And, you know, of course, my former partner told me after (23:54) we’d built three theaters that we might as well just F the investors. We’re probably going to do (24:00) any more deals with them anyway. And that’s when I decided he had to go.

Interesting. Because again, (24:06) they entrusted their capital to me. I raised all the money.

And so I’m not going to be the one (24:11) who goes to him and says, you know, we’re not going to do any more deals. It doesn’t really (24:15) matter if you get paid or not. We’re never going to see these though.

We’re never going to see (24:18) these people again. And think of the irony. That was when we had three theaters.

Yeah. (24:22) Today I’m responsible for 16. So apparently Carl was wrong.

Wow. Wow. Interesting.

(24:30) You know, it’s funny when you, when you brought up the investors, I actually had a note that I (24:35) wanted to make sure that we talked about this because we’ve spent so much personal time together. (24:39) You know, I, I know how you talk on a camera. I know how you talk off a camera on a stage, (24:43) off a stage and behind the closed doors.

And it’s always the same, which is, which is a wonderful (24:49) thing, right? Is your consistency. And I think that’s something that people look for and why (24:54) people appreciate your, you know, your mentorship, your friendship and, you know, to work for you(24:59) too. Well, I think, I think people want honesty.

I don’t think they want to be told tales. I, I, (25:05) I think I owe transparency to my investors. I owe responsibility in my investors.

I’m a big believer (25:12) that we all have to have a boss. You know, I used to work for a gentleman who didn’t believe he had (25:16) a boss. Well, I’ve got a board of managers that imagine these things and I report to them (25:21) realistically, they could fire me.

They’d have a hard time firing me. (25:29) But but I’m a big believer that when you take on responsibility, you have to fulfill that (25:33) responsibility. Well, and what my, my point is, and too, and bringing that up is that (25:39) you’re, you’re always talking about somebody other than yourself.

You’re, you’re talking (25:43) about your guests, you’re talking about your investors. And so anytime I’ve ever brought (25:47) something up to you or your teammates, right, who, who helped make this all happen as well. (25:53) It’s, it’s never, well, I want this.

I never hear that type of talk coming from you. And (25:59) the magic of that, that I continue to see is, is that when you take that outward focus, (26:05) all the other things come, come to you eventually, right? Whether you’re, whether you’re even trying (26:09) for them or not. You know, sometimes I, I, I laugh when I’m, when I’m thinking about some (26:14) of our conversations is this guy’s all into the numbers, but I don’t ever think he’s really (26:19) thinking about the money.

No, that comes naturally. You’re thinking about the responsibility (26:24) to the stakeholders and then the good stuff comes as a by-product almost. Yeah.

I’m a big believer (26:31) that all success in, in business is born out of serving one’s customer, in our case guest, (26:37) and that the returns will flow from that. And so we’ve been very fortunate that we’ve had an (26:44) intense focus and we maintain an intense focus on our guest experience. You know, so for example, (26:49) this year we’re spending a million and a half dollars just refurbishing chairs.

Why? Because (26:54) it’s the, it is the most guest facing thing you could imagine because everybody’s going to sit (26:58) in one, right? And so those chairs have to be maintained. They can’t be ready and the vinyl (27:04) can’t be worn out. The mechanisms have to work.

And so what are we doing? We’re going to, we’re, (27:09) we’re going through the entire fleet of thousands of chairs and, and making sure that each and every (27:15) one of them is in top condition. Why? Because again, that’s what guests expect. I mean, (27:20) we live in this, you know, hyper competitive world.

And if we’re not giving our guests a (27:25) great experience, I know competitors who might be pleased to do so. Sure. I, I used to work on (27:31) boats when I was younger and there was, there were certain people, you know, that they took (27:36) care of that boat, like better than their, better than their children.

Right. Meticulous on every (27:42) little piece. And then there was other people who, the last thing they did to that boat was bought it.

(27:47) Right. They didn’t do anything to it. And how, how that boat could last, you know, that investment (27:53) could last.

You could see a 20 year old boat that looks like it rolled off the showroom floor. You (27:58) could see a two year old boat that looks like, and smells like, and feels like, like, I don’t want(28:03) to be on this thing. Yeah.

I’m into meticulously maintaining things. And, and it even goes so far (28:12) as my, my, like my front lawn, my back lawn. I’ve got this, what most people would say a beautiful (28:17) lawn at my home.

And I’m in the process of spring with Roundup because it’s got some invasive (28:22) species in it. Oh, geez. And I want to get rid of the invasive species.

So we’ve got to kill the (28:27) grass first and then we’ll put in all new sod. Start all over. But, but it’s because I paid a lot (28:32) of money for this house.

It’s a good lifestyle decision. We love it, you know, where we live (28:37) and so forth. Sure.

But, but I want to maintain it impeccably. I want it to be pristine and, and, (28:42) and I want my business to be that way too. You even, you even hired sheep, I think at one point (28:47) in time to, to graze on the side of your.

Goats. Goats. Okay.

That’s right. Couldn’t cut the lawn on (28:53) the hill. Right.

But the goats did really well. Maybe they brought in the invasive. It’s possible.

(29:04) You’re, you’re, you’re calm and your resolve, I would say, you know, (29:14) has, has led to some interesting thinking even in tough times, right. In, in the COVID time, (29:21) you kind of pushed all the chips in the middle of the table. Whereas not everybody was willing to, (29:27) to do that.

Can you talk about that kind of that, the confidence that you had to, (29:33) to push the chips in? Well, I was asked about this the other day and, and here’s how I explained it. (29:40) I was already all in. I, at the time I was personally guaranteeing $55 million worth of debt.

(29:47) And, and so you either believe the industry was coming back, in which case you might as well grow (29:54) now because there are no, no buyers to compete with you for those venues. Or you think you’re (29:59) going bankrupt. Well, if, if you, if you’re essentially throwing up your hands, if you’re (30:04) curling up in the fetal position, you’re given up.

Well, go ahead. But I wasn’t ready to do that, (30:10) particularly at that stage of my life. And so I, I believed that the industry would come back.

(30:17) I think we saw it this past weekend, I shared with you off camera that we had the second(30:21) highest attendance day in the history of our company. So for, for those, because this,(30:25) this won’t post for maybe a, for a week or two. Yeah, Memorial Day weekend.

Memorial Day weekend (30:29) 2025. Second highest attendance day in the history of the company. And the first was (30:34) November of 24 when Wicked came out.

Okay. And so, and the other thing that most people (30:41) generally wouldn’t necessarily know, but we’re, we’re going to have our third (30:45) consecutive year record earnings at Imagine this year. And, and again, it’s, it’s rooted in an (30:51) intense focus on serving our guests.

And if, and if we serve our guests well, they will reward us (30:57) with their continued patronage and the returns will come from the invested capital. And where (31:02) are you seeing, is the profile of a guest changing? Is it staying the same? What does (31:09) it look like? And what are they, what are they consuming? You know, young people are still (31:12) our prime demographic, but I’m always happy to see films like Mission Impossible and Tom Cruise’s (31:19) other genre, the Top Gun, because I want films that appeal to every demographic. And that’s(31:26) really the single best thing can happen to us is have films that appeal to a wide swath of(31:31) demographics.

And that was true Memorial Day weekend, because we had Lilo and Stitch, which (31:37) is a kid’s film, appeals to kids and grandparents and parents who bring their children. And then(31:42) we had Mission Impossible, which would skew to an older demographic. So when you’ve got 10, (31:49) nine, 10, up to 18 screens, you need lots of different product that appeals to different (31:54) demographics.

And so I think the, while the frequency is down in terms of movie going (31:59) compared to where it was pre-COVID, we’ve garnered more market share from those who have (32:05) paid less attention to their guest experience. I was smiling there for a half a second because (32:10) I wanted to see Mission Impossible, and then you’re telling me that it’s geared towards an (32:13) older crowd. So I guess I’m no longer the- Sorry, Matt.

Okay. Thanks. Thanks for that.

(32:19) I’m just talking about adult crowd. I appreciate that. (32:25) You had used a phrase though, at one point when we were talking, it was, and you said, (32:32) I have all this, I have all this money already guaranteed.

So if it all fails, (32:37) do you remember what it was? It was around bankruptcy. (32:39) Oh, if you were to go out with a bank, go out with a bigger bank. And that was the premise.

I mean, (32:44) you know, my banks absolutely hated it that I was expanding during COVID, you know. And so (32:49) we had to put those assets in a separate legal entity and, you know, and the parent company (32:55) couldn’t guarantee those indebtedness and those leases. But, you know, ultimately they came around (33:01) and now those additional feeders contribute a third of our company’s EBITDA.

So the reason that we’re (33:08) having record profits is because we expanded when everybody else was back on their heels. (33:14) Yeah. Yeah.

And you can only go bankrupt once. (33:16) Correct. That was my promise.

(33:17) So go out with a bang. (33:18) Go out with a bang. And what’s the difference? Go out with a big bang or a small bang.

It was (33:22) going to be a bang either way. But again, I believed it would come back. I think that (33:27) folks want to leave their home to be entertained.

Now, can it be a mediocre experience when they (33:32) come? No, it can’t be. It’s got to be a great experience. (33:35) Right.

Yeah. Because it has to be something that motivates the action of getting up off (33:38) their couch, which is, which just breaking that static is, you know, it has to have a pull. (33:45) Correct.

And it always helps when Hollywood is dealing me a good hand. (33:49) Yeah. That’s an interesting, you know, piece of your business, right, is that you don’t (33:55) drive the content.

I mean, except for those wonderful intros where you’re on the screen. (34:01) Yeah. Our policy trailers.

Yeah. It’s hard to get people to come out just for those alone and (34:05) buy popcorn. But yeah, when Hollywood is a good partner, that’s certainly when the sun shines for (34:10) us.

Good. And how has that been as of late? Let’s say over the last three years, the content (34:16) that’s coming out from them, are you feeling like they’re finding stride again? (34:20) Well, I think they’re finding stride again. But I’ll tell you, we thought that the low point (34:25) after COVID and after the writers and actors work stoppage in 23 was going to be in Q1 of 24.

(34:33) And we told our lenders and so forth, this is going to be our worst quarter. (34:37) And then lo and behold, it turns out the Q1 of 25 turns out to be even worse. (34:42) Oh, really? Yeah.

It was horrible. But guess what? April (34:45) of 25 came along and it was well beyond expectations. And now on a year to date (34:52) basis, we’re ahead of plan.

Yeah. But if I would have asked you in (34:57) early March, you would have… I would have told you the lineup’s terrible. (35:03) You know, I know entrepreneurs aren’t fearless, but we operate with a different level of management (35:12) of the fear.

You know, where does that, does that all come back to that kind of rooting and love? (35:22) Like, I’m good enough, like none of this matters in some way. Like, where does it come from for(35:27) you, do you think? I think having a strong mind and having confidence, which is what my parents (35:36) helped instill in me, I think is integral to being successful as an entrepreneur, because you have to (35:42) believe in order to overcome obstacles. And the business, every business is in the business of (35:49) solving problems, right? We’re finding ways to better serve our customers or to solve a problem (35:55) for them.

And that’s exactly what you do in your business. You solve problems for your clients. (36:01) It’s right outsmart chaos, actually, with our tagline.

(36:05) Yes. And so I think that it requires a hardened mindset. Like, yeah, you’re going to overcome (36:14) stuff.

And if I’m not, I’m going to die trying. Because, I mean, it would have been real easy for (36:20) me to say, you’re right, no one could break film clearance or allocation, which is what it was(36:25) called back in 2002 when we opened Imagine Novi. And every small exhibitor in the country was being (36:32) put there, were under the thumb of larger competitors.

And it could have said, yeah, (36:38) there’s nothing we can do about this. Well, you better keep trying, right? And maybe it’s the- (36:45) Because if you believe if there’s nothing you can do, you’re right. (36:48) Right.

And then what? Then I’m going to go to my investors and go, yeah, it just didn’t work out.(36:53) Yeah. (36:53) That’s nonsense.

I wasn’t prepared to do that. I’m not prepared to do that today. (37:01) How do you go through and evaluate, like, worst case scenarios? I mean, obviously, I know what (37:08) you said during COVID, but use even the example here of you couldn’t get sold a film, right? (37:17) Do you look through that and say, OK, hey, I’m going to look at, here’s the worst that can (37:22) happen.

Here’s the best that can happen. And- (37:24) If you can handle the worst case scenario, then you go forward and do the deal. Yeah.

But those (37:30) were challenging times, no question about it. To have no money coming in whatsoever and having (37:34) most of your fixed costs continuing. Yeah.

I mean, that was certainly a test. Honestly, (37:41) and most people wouldn’t realize this, but I never worked harder than I did during COVID. (37:44) Sure.

(37:45) Just trying to save the business. And then we were trying to grow the business because we saw a (37:49) opportunity. Again, if you believed, if you didn’t believe in the business, (37:54) then you might as well be out of it anyway.

(37:56) Yeah. Yeah. You have said a lot of things to me over the years that are very psychological (38:04) in nature, right? I remember you telling me a story of somebody telling me that (38:09) they were overwhelmed.

And it’s just like, you kind of almost blew a gasket over this (38:17) because of the mindset piece. (38:18) I have no tolerance for that. Because if you believe you’re overwhelmed, (38:22) then indeed you are overwhelmed.

So again, that gets to the strength of mind. You have to have (38:27) a strong mind to be able to overcome challenges and problems. And again, business is all about (38:33) problem solving.

And so I’m not overwhelmed. I’m never overwhelmed. Because you know what? (38:40) I won’t allow myself to be overwhelmed.

It’s just nonsense. (38:44) Do you find that you operate within a certain tolerance? Because I would also (38:47) argue that you don’t get overly excited. When you did your deals on the additional theaters, (38:57) you were happy.

But it feels like maybe happy for a moment and then back to business as usual, (39:05) trying to climb the next mountain. Is that kind of how you operate in that tolerance? I don’t get too(39:09) crazy happy. I don’t get too crazy overwhelmed or sad.

I’m working. And I’m working in this range. (39:15) Well, I tell people that to be in my business and particularly given what Hollywood does, (39:20) I go through manic and depressive stages.

But yeah, as a practical matter, I think it’s (39:28) remain calm, right? Remain calm and maintain an even keel. I try not to (39:35) operate irrationally. And so I think to be rational, you have to maintain sort of an even (39:40) keel.

And I think folks that work with you value that because I don’t know that they want to be (39:49) whipsawed around or bosses having a bad day. That’s not something that you should perpetrate (39:57) on other people. Yeah.

No, I think, I mean, when you think about when you go back to parenting, (40:01) right? And you think about we don’t have that luxury as parents. I mean, you could exercise (40:09) that luxury if you would like to, right? Of the high highs, low lows, and the kids never (40:15) knowing what to expect. And that obviously doesn’t prove out to be a good thing.

(40:22) No, then you get schizophrenic children too. And so, yeah, I mean, I think that there is a(40:28) perpetuation of what parents can do to children, you know, and think about George and his family, (40:34) you know, I don’t know if those, I don’t know if they, if their children never had their own (40:40) children, but certainly, you know, if you’re not raised with love, how do you learn how to show (40:47) love? No, I mean, the generational trauma is a real thing. Yeah.

It’s very hard to get out of. (40:52) And it’s a perpetuation in many cases, you know, that it’s perpetual. How do you, (40:56) how do you get out of that circle, out of that swirling toilet?(41:01) Well, and like you said, I mean, you said your grandfather, you know, your grandfather was a (41:06) very loving person.

I wonder if he had that same thing or if he saw adversity and said, you know (41:13) what, I’m, or saw the opposite of that and said, it stops here. I’m going to, I’m going to change (41:19) this. Right.

Do you know generationally back? Well, I can tell you this. I mean, my grandmother (41:24) died in 1932 of pneumonia. This is before the advent of antibiotics.

And so here’s Mitar. He’s (41:31) got nine children and he’s a single father in the do-gooders back then felt like Mitar, a single, (41:38) single guy was not capable of raising nine children. They wanted him to put his children (41:43) up for adoption and to basically scatter them among different families.

And, and Mitar loved (41:50) his children and he wanted to keep them together. And, and so it was, that was adversity in of (41:55) itself, but he worked at the Ford Rouge steel mill. I mean, his entire career, once he came (42:00) to Detroit, this is after being a coal miner and, you know, he did everything immigrants, (42:04) you know, were known to do back then, hard physical labor.

But, but yeah, he faced a lot (42:12) of adversity being laid off during the depression with nine children. That’s lost his wife, lost (42:18) security at that time. No, there was no government safety net whatsoever in the 1930s.

Yeah. I mean, (42:26) they lived, you know, through the kindness of their church and, and kind and philanthropic (42:33) gifts and so forth. Wow.

Yeah. There was no safety net back then. Well, so, so resolve is in your, (42:40) is in your DNA.

Well, certainly on my mom’s side, that’s for sure. And yeah. And I think, (42:46) I think resolve is important in life.

Yeah. How have you handled over the years of, (42:56) as the ebbs and flows or the growth of, of Imagine just grappling with the, the, some of the people (43:05) that you started with are some of the people you still continue with, but others, you know, (43:10) some of the people that, that got you to a certain point, weren’t the people to get you to the next (43:14) point. I know at, at, I don’t know how many years ago, but you had brought in a CEO.

Talk about (43:22) the evolution of people in the organization and how you’ve created value for them and they’ve (43:28) created value for you, whether they’ve, whether they’ve stayed or whether they’ve went on to (43:32) other things. Yeah. Some of the people that were leaders of the business early on are no longer (43:37) with us.

Cause as you point out, sometimes the folks that get you to a certain point are not (43:41) those who are well suited to take you to the next level. And one of them was the gentleman who told(43:45) me no one could run Royal Oak. Okay.

Well, you basically just shared with me that you’re not up (43:51) to it. And, and, and by the way, I’m a big believer that when you let somebody go, you have to do so (43:56) with allowing them to maintain with grace and dignity. I don’t, I think that, you know, that’s (44:02) critically important.

I don’t think you should allow folks to, to be begrudge their time with (44:09) you or feel like they were mistreated. In fact, I even was sharing with my, my, my old, one of my (44:18) old accounting professors the other day that we’d let a young man go and he’d been with us for about (44:26) oh, 15 years. He started as an assistant manager in Novi and we let him go just before COVID.

(44:33) And I didn’t think honestly, the folks that allowed him to move on had really fulfilled my(44:41) expectation in that regard. They hadn’t been particularly sensitive to Gary’s years of(44:46) contribution. And so I didn’t have the economic means, but earlier this year, (44:55) I wrote Gary a thank you letter and I enclosed a check for 10,000 bucks.

(45:02) And not as taxable income, just Gary want to, I never got an opportunity to properly(45:07) thank you for your contributions to imagine. And I just felt like, you know, maybe better late (45:14) than never. And I had to make it right with him.

That’s amazing. Well, you know, I couldn’t do it (45:21) for a long time because, you know, things were still tight up until recently. And, but, but it (45:26) was just the right thing to do because Gary had given us a lot of good years.

And, and I thought (45:32) it was the least I could do would be to, you know, express my gratitude to him for his years of (45:37) service. How long was that eating you up or that was on your mind? Five years. Five years.

Great. (45:45) Wow. There, you know, I mean, you said the times were tight for a while, obviously, but (45:49) also you’ve, you kind of kept things very humble.

I mean, no one would know the, the humility side (45:57) because they see the, the high end guest experience, right? So you see the reclining chairs, (46:02) you see the higher end food, you see the things that make imagine, imagine, but you didn’t have (46:07) a corporate office for quite some time. I don’t remember what, what was the sales figures that (46:13) you had scaled to before you even had offices? Yeah, we probably had seven or eight theaters (46:20) before we had a corporate office. You know, our controller for many years, Jill worked out of her (46:25) library at home.

And honestly, I remain a big believer in holding down corporate overhead (46:35) because efficient businesses have a greater chance of succeeding in the long run. And so I, (46:41) I’ve always wanted to maintain tight cost controls. In fact, even recently we revamped (46:48) our compensation plan for our general managers and assistant managers with the goal of trying(46:56) to align their economic interests with that of the owners.

And so and so a big portion of our (47:02) general manager’s compensation now and our corporate office team and so forth (47:07) is predicated upon the performance of the business. Because again, I want everyone’s (47:12) economic interests aligned. And I want our general managers and their assistant managers (47:18) to think like owners.

They have to think about the interaction they’re having with guests. (47:24) I say that to be a good imagine teammate, you have to put yourself in the place of the guest. (47:30) And, and how would you want to be treated if you were on the other side of that counter? (47:34) And so I want them that to be in the forefront of their mind.

I want every day, every moment, (47:39) I want them to think about how would I want to be treated? And so I think by giving them a direct (47:46) economic incentive in the performance of the company overall, and their building more specifically, (47:51) they get to operate like entrepreneurs. And I want them to think like entrepreneurs. I want (47:56) them to think like me.

I want to clone myself. It’s the only way you scale, right? If you can get (48:02) the, you know, a piece of the culture that you’ve instilled in all of those people, (48:07) in all these different states and all these different theaters, it’s the only way to (48:11) truly scale with that with, with the, with some level of same mindset together. (48:18) I’ve been hearing a lot lately about the knock.

When an employee knocks on your office door and (48:22) says, got a minute, and you immediately know it’s some sort of it incident, but Oxium IT can help (48:28) whether you’re having a problem, need consulting, an upgrade, or a managed IT approach. (48:32) They focus on preventing cyber attacks and proactive solutions that deliver results. My (48:38) friend, Matt Loria, and everyone at Oxium are ready to help before or after you get the knock.

(48:45) Visit Oxium.com and let Oxium IT help you outsmart chaos. (48:50) Yes, I strongly believe that. And so the alignment of interest economic plan or compensation plan (48:57) is something that’s near and dear to my heart.

And I don’t mind telling you, (49:00) we have increased the compensation for our GMs and assistant general managers and supervisors, (49:06) pretty markedly with the idea of retaining the talent. We want to keep our best people. And I (49:12) want those folks, if the, if the store is successful, I want them to benefit economically from (49:18) running a successful store.

Sure. What are some of the levers that, that a store manager, general (49:24) manager of a, of a, of an individual location can, can pull? You know, how do they, how do they (49:30) drive it different? Cause you have these factors of, you know, you can, you’re in some ways, (49:35) you’re only as good as the product that Hollywood puts out, but once you get the person in,(49:40) in the house, right. Or is there a way that those people can actually bring (49:45) more people into the house? Like what are the levers? (49:47) Well, I think, I think if you run a really nice clean theater, I think more, you know, (49:51) you’ll, word will get out and people go, yeah, I want to go there.

Cause that’s a great theater. (49:54) And I, they treat me well when I go there. But I’ll give you a good example.

A lot of the (50:00) success in what running one of our theaters is to lose less money when it’s slow. So that means (50:07) that you have to carefully manage your labor cost, your labor deployment, the number of people who (50:13) are literally working at any one point in time. And, and the point is that what you want to do (50:19) is you want to have the exactly the right number of people in positions to give guests great, (50:26) great customer service, but you don’t want them standing around.

So if I’ve got five extra 16 (50:32) year olds standing around talking to each other or playing with their phones, that’s going to (50:37) cost us money. And so labor cost control is one of the factors, but, but we’re not so foolish as to (50:44) say labor cost is the only, is the only factor. One of the major factors is, is customer feedback.

(50:50) So we do surveys and we talk to our guests and we want to know how do they rate the theater? (50:57) And if they get poor ratings, that can really ruin your bonus. So the answer is you got to (51:04) choose the right amount of labor at the right time. And you’ve got to make sure your guests (51:09) are happy because if guests aren’t happy, then it doesn’t matter what you’re doing otherwise.

(51:15) And I, and I learned, you know, of course you learn all these things the hard way. So for example, (51:19) you know, imagine Canton is in a, is in a great location. It’s always been a very successful (51:24) theater.

And for the longest time I thought it was the GM. It was mostly the market in that case (51:30) because looking back on, on those early days as a growth area, it just, you know, it blossomed at (51:37) the right time. But now it’s, it’s, it’s predicated on growing attendance.

It’s predicated on EBITDA (51:42) production. And, and one of the things we did, for example, is we had to equate the EBITDA (51:47) of owned theaters to lease theaters, because of course you have more expense, operating expense (51:52) when you have leased theaters. And so we have a term called EBITDA.

It’s EBITDA before rent. (51:59) And that way you can equate theaters that are leased versus owned. And so everybody’s being (52:05) judged on this, on an even playing field.

Love it. Where did that, did that come up through (52:12) some arguments, you know, where, where theater GMs were saying, Hey, this isn’t fair. Or did (52:17) you recognize that? How did you recognize? No, I, I was, you know I’d learned this at Proctor, (52:24) you know, Tom Proctor came to me at one point in time and said I want you to help me develop (52:30) an executive compensation plan.

And I looked back at him and said, I’ll gladly do that. (52:36) But what I want to do, Tom, is I want to have a bonus plan that, that where we’re all swimming (52:41) in the same direction. We’re all rolling in the same direction.

And probably one of my most proud (52:47) moments with, with Tom was that he said to me, I never started making any money until I started (52:54) sharing with others. I remember you telling me that. And and so we grew our profits dramatically (53:01) once we got out a little siloed bonus plans and everybody’s new, the, the, the goal was to make (53:07) more money.

We’re all rolling in the same direction and it proved to be, it proved to be the (53:12) base upon which we, we sold the company for a lot of money. And I had the privilege of being a (53:17) minority shareholder when we sold. But but I’d learned that at Proctor, if you can get everybody(53:22) rolling in the same direction, it’s very powerful.

And, and so I just simply adapted that from, from (53:29) my Proctor days and said, we have to make sure that the economic interests are all aligned. (53:34) And, and honestly, I want it down to the concessionaire or the box office attendant. (53:40) And, and so what we’ve done is we’ve created discretionary bonus pools now for the GM to (53:45) sprinkle additional cash on his or her lieutenants with the idea being you’re running the building, (53:51) you’ve got this pool of money.

Now you give it to the people that are, that have earned it and (53:55) have helped propel your success. And isn’t it interesting too, that based on the incentivization, (54:03) right. And the, and then the, the shared mindset, I’ve even seen people, their behaviors and their, (54:10) their way that they can talk to people actually changes, right.

When you’re thinking about the (54:15) fact that, you know, let’s say you’re somebody who’s walking up to buy popcorn, right. And they (54:20) may not know about the premium types of popcorn that you have, which, which I don’t know if they (54:25) make more margin or not, but, but it’s all marginal sales. So that being the case, then, you know, (54:32) there’s a, there’s a right way and a wrong way to ask if you can interest the person in the next (54:36) level up, right.

Cause there’s one way that sounds, you know, manipulative, right. Or contrived. (54:44) And then there’s another way that, that is way more smooth, right.

And so you start to incentivize (54:52) the behavior that actually works. And then that starts to catch on like wildfire. (54:57) Well, and we have contests for cotton candy sales and real butter sales and things of that nature.

(55:03) And so we have some good natured competition between our locations and we handicap it based (55:11) on attendance. So Lake Geneva, which is a relatively small theater, you know, is handicapped (55:17) against Canton, which is a high volume theater, for example. But, but yeah, I, I would tell you (55:24) with all due respect, I don’t know that we have that down pat, you know, but it is a critical (55:28) element.

And, you know, the job of our general manager is a field general. I want them looking, (55:35) observing, and talking to guests. I don’t want them hiding in the office.

Okay. They don’t need (55:39) to be looking at the internet while they’re at the office. And one of the things that, that (55:44) Anthony accomplished, which was really of great value to us, was that while during his leadership (55:49) tenure, we greatly reduced the amount of work that the, that the general managers have to do in the (55:56) back office.

We’ve, you know, and, and that’s the job of our corporate office is to ensure the success (56:01) of our GMs and their teams by reducing burden on them. So they can spend more time being(56:08) guest facing, talking to guests, interacting with them. And, and this is, and I’m bringing(56:13) something back right now that I, that I started a while back and I’m very fond of it.

And that is, (56:21) I want to, to the extent possible, personalize the business. That’s why I’m the face of the (56:26) business. Okay.

But, but moreover, there was a time I could discern that we were doing relatively (56:33) worse with children’s films compared to films that would skew toward adults. (56:39) And it occurred to me that folks think of, imagine for date night, like, Oh yeah, we’re going to go. (56:46) Yeah.

I’m going to take my wife or my girlfriend out for Friday night, Saturday night date. (56:50) But when it came to the kids, I don’t know why, but they, maybe they would go to a competing(56:54) theater. And so I could see that if you looked at our relative performance on G and PG 13, (57:01) it wasn’t good.

So one of the things I want to bring back, and we sort of lost it for a (57:05) while, but we’re going to bring it back, is I want to offer a small gift to children (57:11) when they come with their family. So if we’re showing a G rated or PG rated film, (57:15) I want a general manager and assistant manager or a supervisor to stand at the doorway of the (57:21) auditorium as the guests are departing. And we’re going to give the child a small token of our (57:27) appreciation.

It might be a toy, some kind of a candy, but the purpose is not to give a gift. (57:36) The purpose is for my general managers to interact and express their gratitude to the customer for (57:44) bringing their family. And I think that that’s a differentiating factor.

The other thing I’m (57:49) doing this week is that we found all the folks who spend their, you know, spend an inordinate (57:54) amount of money at Imagine, and I’m going to write them personal thank you letters this week. (57:57) Oh, great. Great.

(57:59) Yeah, because I’ll tell you what, I guarantee you could go spend a million dollars at AMC(58:04) and Adam Aaron is not going to send you a personal thank you note. (58:08) Did you purposefully, or I guess let me ask a different way, how did you become the face of (58:15) Imagine with being in the trailers? Was that your idea to deliver that message in the (58:24) you know, in the, it’s called the trailer, the beginning. (58:27) Yeah, policy trailer.

(58:28) Policy trailer at the beginning. How did that idea come about? Because you really became (58:34) also quite well known, especially in the Rochester area, but in others as well. I mean, (58:39) I think somebody invited you to prom at one point in time or something, didn’t they, or homecoming? (58:45) Yes.

I actually, I filmed a trailer one time for a young lady who wanted to ask (58:52) the, her boyfriend to a prom. And so I did a special film for that. (59:00) And so I’ve had a lot of fun like that.

But to your question, I was in the lobby of one (59:06) of our theaters. It might’ve been Nova or Canton, one of our big theaters. And I’m (59:10) talking to a guest and the guest obviously has no idea who I am.

And they said something along (59:16) lines of, this place must be almost like some giant media conglomerate. And I’m thinking to (59:25) myself, no, it’s owned by Paul and about 12 of the investors. And I’m guaranteeing (59:31) seven and a half million dollars here.

So this is kind of my business. And I thought at that (59:39) point in time, if we could personalize the business, folks might feel a little warmer (59:45) connection. And it’s challenging because ultimately, you know, the way moviegoing has (59:51) traditionally worked is that you’ll go find the, you’ll decide what film you want to go see.

(59:55) Then you would look on the internet and figure out who’s got it at seven 30 or eight o’clock, (59:59) whichever time is most convenient to you. And my goal was to just at the margin, (1:00:05) try to shave off a few guests who might say, well, why don’t we just look at Imagine first? (1:00:12) Cause he seems like an okay guy. And, and so personalizing the business came about, (1:00:17) I want to say about 15 plus years ago now, but I think it was a very good move on our part.

(1:00:22) And it was really from inspired by that interaction with that person who (1:00:27) you wanted to dispel the idea that this was just some nameless faceless. (1:00:31) Yeah. Some giant corporation owned Imagine.

I don’t know. It’s Paul and his 20 of his best (1:00:37) friends. That’s great.

Yeah. I mean, you think about it, think about how our own behavior is, (1:00:43) right. If there’s a restaurant that we, that we go to, right.

When, when we get together and (1:00:49) I, you know, I would imagine if, if we had a bad experience one time, we both liked the owner, (1:00:55) right. She’s a nice lady. We’d probably go, oh yeah, you know, she got, she, she made a bad hire, (1:01:00) right.

We would just, we would, we wouldn’t, we wouldn’t blame it on the whole place and (1:01:04) we’re never coming here ever again. We think about our relationship with that person, (1:01:09) give her some grace to go, ah, you know, we all make a bad hire here and there, (1:01:13) right. Or somebody had a bad day.

We’d, we’d let that go. We let that go when we have the (1:01:17) relationship. Yeah.

And, and, you know, folks find me, even though I have no social media presence (1:01:22) on purpose anymore, as you know people know how to find me and they do. And if they have a bad(1:01:27) experience, I want them to tell me because, because my job is to make it right. And, and I (1:01:32) can’t fix, it goes back to you.

I don’t know what I don’t know. That’s, I have to know that. (1:01:36) Yes, exactly.

And, but, but, you know, at the end of the day, if you’ve had a bad experience, (1:01:41) and so I’ll tell you, I think it’s critically important. If you’ve had a bad experience, (1:01:45) it’s because I put the wrong people in place. If you’ve had a good experience, (1:01:49) it’s because those folks served you well.

And it gets back to responsibility. I am responsible. (1:01:55) I’m responsible ultimately for every guest experience.

I’m responsible for ultimately (1:02:00) everything, right? You bet. And so, and I accept that responsibility willingly. And if a guest writes (1:02:05) to me or calls me and says, you know, I was mistreated.

I had a bad experience. My job is to (1:02:10) make it right. And I can’t, I can’t fix what’s transpired, but I can certainly try to make it (1:02:16) right.

Correct. And, and, and if it entails giving them their money back or giving them money back(1:02:21) plus passes, plus popcorn, whatever it takes, I want them to feel like they were treated fairly. (1:02:25) Yeah.

Yeah. Because they’re going to, they’re going to spread that word, (1:02:29) you know, positive or negative. And most, more often than not, they spread the negative more (1:02:34) than the positive.

Yeah, negative spreads faster than good. You have to, you have to squash that (1:02:37) flame. Right.

You had, you had told me many times about, you know, running an efficient business. (1:02:44) And then that gives you the ability to, to be able to move, you know, stick and move when the,(1:02:49) when the time’s right. The old Warren Buffett, you know, be greedy when others are fearful and (1:02:53) when others are greedy.

But being efficient yourself and, you know, having some money in (1:02:58) the coffers is definitely part of your, your playbook. Yeah. I mean, we’ve, we’ve always (1:03:05) managed the businesses as effectively as we can.

And, and I’m, I’m a big believer that you have (1:03:13) to have adequate working capital because like, you know, cash is the lifeblood of business. (1:03:17) Yep. And we were fortunate.

We weren’t overly leveraged when we went into COVID. (1:03:20) We’re not overly leveraged today, thankfully. But, you know, leverage is great as long as you (1:03:26) got positive cashflow greater than your debt service.

Sure. Well, it’s a, it’s a real problem (1:03:30) when it goes the other way. But you’ve also, you’ve also shared with me leveraging technology (1:03:38) for those efficiencies.

And sometimes those technologies, you know, they, they can look, (1:03:43) they can look opulent. Right. But, but so like you’ve, you’ve leveraged technologies on, (1:03:48) on the side of bigger screens, better sound, things like that, which don’t necessarily drive (1:03:54) efficiency per se, but have you, have you leveraged any other technologies for efficiency, (1:03:59) or are you looking at those for efficiencies? Yeah.

I mean, if you’re not looking every day, (1:04:05) you’re making a mistake. In my opinion, you have to constantly look for innovations and (1:04:08) opportunities to, to do things better, faster, cheaper. And so, yeah, I mean, one of the things (1:04:14) that goes on today, Matt, is that more than half our ticket sales are online.

So you don’t need as (1:04:21) many box office attendants because folks are doing self-serve ticketing and they like it. (1:04:25) And, you know, I’ll tell you another element of, of guest experience that I think has really (1:04:29) changed and improved over time is one’s ability to choose their own seat in advance. Because (1:04:35) honestly, I think that that has done more to enhance the guest experience than almost anything (1:04:39) else.

And here’s why you can arrive early and relax and stop at the bar, the concession stand,(1:04:46) or you can get there after the trailers and you know, your seat is still there. (1:04:49) So the whole idea behind movie going, in my opinion, is it’s a couple hours of escapism. (1:04:54) I want you to arrive in an unhurried fashion.

I want you to relax. I want you to enjoy that (1:05:00) escapism. And so if you can do so knowing your seat, where you bought it is preserved for you, (1:05:06) then it’s a lot easier to, to have an easy night out.

(1:05:10) Yeah. Yeah, it sure is. I mean, I’m even thinking of, you know, if we show up at five minutes till (1:05:14) the show starting, we still have time to go in the line because we know we’ve got a spot.

We’ve (1:05:19) got a spot for all of the family to sit together too, right? It’s not like, oh, we’re rushing in (1:05:24) and we’ll pepper us all around, you know, to wherever there’s an empty seat.(1:05:28) And, you know, we’ve tried to make that, you know, put an exclamation point on that. And here’s why.

(1:05:33) So for example, if you order a pizza or some nachos, something we didn’t need to make in (1:05:37) the oven, for example, we’ll deliver it right to your chair because we know where you’re sitting. (1:05:41) Yeah. And, and, and I think that’s an element of service that just, why not? (1:05:46) Yeah.

Right. (1:05:47) I’ve got young people who would otherwise perhaps be standing around.(1:05:50) Right.

They’ve got. (1:05:51) Almost a no cost for you. I mean, I mean, because you have the, you have the labor there, right? (1:05:55) Because the person collecting your ticket isn’t maybe, maybe if there’s not another show that (1:06:00) they’re taking tickets at or checking, you know, checking phones at they have downtime.

(1:06:07) Yes. (1:06:07) Or redeployable time. (1:06:08) Right.

And so we’ve used a lot of technology in the back shop of, you know, of, of scheduling (1:06:15) labor and, you know, and ordering a proper park, park quantities for food and so forth to know(1:06:21) how many popcorn tubs you need on, you know, on Memorial Day weekend, right?(1:06:26) Last thing you want to do is run out of popcorn by the same token. You don’t want to have popcorn (1:06:30) going rancid because you’ve had overabundance of it. And so we’ve used a lot of technology to (1:06:35) help manage our costs and to manage our inventory.

(1:06:38) Do you see, do you see the automation piece coming in? You know, like, I know we’ve seen (1:06:44) restaurants where there’s, you know, a robot flipping a fryer and things like that. Do you (1:06:50) see any of that in your. (1:06:52) I mean, I think, I think in the future we will look at things like automated fryers and so forth, (1:06:56) because it knows when to lift up the basket, right? You’re not relying on, on humans to, (1:07:02) to time the amount of, you know, it’s in the oil.

(1:07:05) Sure. (1:07:06) And so I could see us using automation in the kitchen operation itself. But, but the, (1:07:11) but I think another differentiating factor for us is we do display cooking,(1:07:16) meaning that we want, even though we’re not selling what I consider gourmet food,(1:07:20) it’s high end bar food, but I want folks to know that it’s the highest quality.

(1:07:24) And so one of the things we did along the way was that we saw Blaze pizza, you know,(1:07:30) where you pick your own toppings and it’s being made right in front of you. (1:07:33) And I thought we should do that in our theaters. And in fact, all of our theaters now have a brick(1:07:38) oven and we make nachos and we make a pizza in there, but it’s, it’s freshly made.

There’s (1:07:44) no frozen pizzas. And imagine we, we, you know, you pick your toppings and we’ll deliver right (1:07:49) your chair. I think these are just, uh, there are, it’s a thousand details in our business (1:07:55) and you know, we’re not going to hit on all thousand, a hundred percent, but if we can (1:08:01) make it just incrementally better than the guy down the street, then, then I think there’ll (1:08:06) continue to be a role for us in the chain of commerce.

(1:08:08) The better and better every day sort of theory. And like you said, doing a thousand things, (1:08:13) right. You know, and doing just, just that much better than the other guy is.

(1:08:17) There’s no resting on your laurels in business. (1:08:19) Every day is a new day. (1:08:21) And there’s always somebody, you know.

(1:08:22) Somebody wants your cheese. (1:08:24) Yep. Somebody younger, hungry or whatever wants to come up and eat your lunch.

Yeah. (1:08:29) And that’s the guy raising canes. (1:08:31) Yeah.

(1:08:32) He doesn’t want to franchise because he wants to control every aspect of, (1:08:36) and I greatly admire him because he’s doing a great job because he cares. (1:08:42) Yeah. That’s right.

(1:08:43) You got to care. That’s the number one characteristic. You got to care.

(1:08:46) I would agree with that. 100%. 100%.

(1:08:51) Thinking about legacy, thinking about what’s next for you. I know you’re, you’re not a,(1:08:56) you’re, you’re not looking to retire. It doesn’t seem to be one of those things.

(1:09:01) It’s in your, one of the life moves that’s in your cards. (1:09:06) What’s still, what’s still driving you and what do you want to do next? What do you think? (1:09:10) Well, I think I’ve shared with you, I want to be productive (1:09:13) till the day I die. I want, I want to contribute value greater than my cost.

(1:09:18) I don’t want to be a drag on society. I want to continue to produce value. (1:09:24) And whether it’s Imagine or some other business in the future, you know, I’d like to, (1:09:29) I’d like to have my sons involved in business at some point in time too.

Neither one of them (1:09:33) is involved in the business today, but I think that’s an opportunity for me in the future. (1:09:38) I’d also have, I’m also very happy to play a role of senior advisor to young people and to, (1:09:43) and to be a mentor. You know, I’ve got several mentees and I’ll give you an example.

Years ago, (1:09:50) when I was practicing public accounting, I had a automotive repair facility as a client in Roseville (1:09:58) and had been out of that business for a lot of years, but I got reconnected with their son, (1:10:02) Joe, who I knew Joe when he was a little kid. And, and Joe nominated me for an award at the (1:10:08) DAC and I had the privilege of speaking to the members there. And, and so I got reconnected (1:10:14) to Joe who had purchased his dad’s business.

Joe knows more about the business side of (1:10:20) automotive repair than probably anyone on earth. He’s really a bright young man. (1:10:27) And I’ve just had the time of my life helping Joe grow his business.

And, and what I’ve done (1:10:33) for him, and I think he would admit this, is that I, I’ve, I’ve helped him develop business plans, (1:10:40) cashflow projections. And, and so he’s grown his business from one location to Florida. (1:10:45) Wow.

(1:10:45) And it’s in the, in the sky’s the limit for Joe because he, it’s formulatic. He knows the(1:10:52) operations side of the business and I understand death service coverage and I understand how to (1:10:57) put together a loan proposal. I understand collateral.

And so we work on things like (1:11:03) he’s expanding his facility in Sterling Heights right now. He bought that one several years ago. (1:11:07) Now he’s going to build onto it and, and service trucks as well as automotives, automobiles.

(1:11:14) What’s the name of the company? Can we say? (1:11:15) Yeah, it’s called Gordy’s, uh, tire and, uh, auto and grout was Gordy’s auto and tire. (1:11:22) Okay. (1:11:22) Or tire and auto.

It’s what, you know, but it’s, but Gordy, Gordy is. (1:11:26) We’ll give a plug to that too. (1:11:26) Yeah.

Oh yeah. (1:11:27) Anybody who needs, uh. (1:11:29) Joe Hanson, um, is, and it’s, it’s paying homage to his father’s, his father’s Gordy (1:11:33) Hanson.

And it was called Gordy’s garage. And so now, um, Joe is in the business of (1:11:39) doing automotive repair and selling tires. And so it’s, um, Gordy’s tire and auto.

(1:11:44) Fantastic. (1:11:45) And great young guy. And I got to tell you, if you need your car fixed, this is a plug (1:11:49) for, for Joe and he’s the guy.

He’s the guy. He’ll treat you fairly. And, um, uh, and he, (1:11:56) and he just, he’s got the mightiest touch when it comes to the business side of it.

Like, (1:12:01) like he goes and buys an automotive repair facility and in the first year grows the(1:12:05) revenue by 25%. (1:12:06) Wow. (1:12:07) Yeah.

Just he’s in it. And so. (1:12:10) And he cares, obviously.

(1:12:11) Oh, he obviously cares. And, and so what’s fun for me as an old man, uh, is I get to(1:12:16) like play mentor to a bright young guy who really knows his business. And I know a little(1:12:21) bit about finance.

(1:12:22) Yep. Yeah. And not everything.

I mean, and what you’re teaching him is, is the stuff (1:12:27) that’s not, not, we don’t teach, we don’t learn that in school. Uh, you learn it from (1:12:32) scrapes and scars and bruises. And, and so, you know, having that come from you is really (1:12:37) important.

(1:12:37) Yeah. I mean, you know, uh, one of the best things that ever happened to me when I, when (1:12:41) I graduated from college is I worked both in banking and public accounting. And so I (1:12:45) learned how I was exposed to a broader range, array of businesses.

And I learned how to (1:12:50) read a financial statements before I could put them together and, and understood what (1:12:55) they meant. And so, you know, being able to put together a loan package and to be able (1:12:59) to demonstrate to a prospective lender that you’ve got, you know, the means to, to repay (1:13:04) the loan over time and so forth. Those are, those are skills that are not necessarily (1:13:08) present in small and medium sized businesses.

(1:13:11) I would agree. I would agree for sure. And I, I mean, I don’t think not everyone has(1:13:16) that person to, you know, in their quiver, you know, they can say, well, I’ve got my(1:13:21) Paul Glantz.

I can call and, and ask for some assistance here. (1:13:25) Yeah. And Joe has other mentors as well, but I’ve just, I’ve just gotten the biggest (1:13:29) kick out of, uh, being, uh, of some value to Joe.

(1:13:32) That’s great. Well, I’m sure he appreciates it. Um, a couple of last, uh, last, uh, things(1:13:38) I want to ask you, um, um, you had given me a piece of advice.

Um, so I’m going to (1:13:44) ask you for your mentees, you know, some best pieces of advice you’ve given them. (1:13:48) You’ve given me a lot of different pieces of advice, uh, over the years, but, um, one (1:13:52) was I had called you regarding an investment opportunity at one point in time. And you (1:13:56) said, Matt, put your head down, focus on your business.

I promise that as success comes (1:14:00) to you, investment opportunities will continue to come to you just at a fine rate. (1:14:07) Yeah. I, in my personal case, I’ve had very mixed results with, uh, investing in outside (1:14:12) businesses, uh, by far imagine it’s my best investment.

And, um, some of, you know, and, (1:14:19) and at the end of the day, what we’re always doing is we’re betting on people, right. (1:14:22) We’re relying on people to help propel our, our own business, or we’re relying on people (1:14:28) to shepherd our investments and so forth. And, um, and it’s a mixed bag, you know, (1:14:34) nobody’s been in a thousand.

And, um, and so I think concentrating on growing your business (1:14:41) and making it optimally successful is probably the best way to concentrate, um, your and (1:14:49) grow your wealth at this point in time. What about, um, um, best piece of advice to (1:14:55) another mentee, uh, that you’ve, that you’ve maybe given some advice to lately? (1:15:00) Well, let’s think about it. Well, I’ve liked to get away from banks (1:15:06) and, you know, there was a huge, there’s huge growth in non-bank lending these.

(1:15:10) Yeah. (1:15:11) So a lot of businesses find that their success and paying a little bit more in the form of (1:15:16) interest, but get much better loan terms and so forth. And, and that type of flexible capital (1:15:22) is largely available because non-bank lenders are not nearly as, uh, highly regulated as banks are.

(1:15:29) I almost feel sorry for my bankers. You know, it’s so formulatic these days. They,(1:15:33) all the discretion has been taken out of lending.

And I think it’s a shame because back when I was (1:15:38) in banking and my early days of, of banking, uh, all that’s gone now. And I’ll give you a story, (1:15:45) like, for example, when we first, when we did our first new built theater, it opened on May 23, (1:15:51) 1997, it was called cinema Hollywood. And it, it didn’t do well initially.

We had opened very (1:15:56) slowly. Uh, in fact, I would even tell you that, uh, 1200 people gave up their lives so we could (1:16:02) survive financially because there was a little film called Titanic that came out in December of (1:16:08) that day, save the day, save my bacon. But, um, but back then we were relying on, you know, (1:16:18) angel capital and SBA loan, a bank loan.

And so the bank had made us a construction loan (1:16:23) and we weren’t hitting our projections. And so the SBA, which was supposed to come in and take out (1:16:28) a bunch of the bank debt, they said, well, you’re not hitting your projections. We’re not going to (1:16:32) And the bank said, well, startup business, we think it’ll come around.

So we’re just going to (1:16:39) let you go to interest only for a year. And then we’ll see how it goes. Well, within four or five (1:16:47) months, we were able to actually get the SBA to fund.

But if today, if, if, if you, the bank were (1:16:54) to say to me, we’re going to give you more favorable loan terms without a major concession, (1:17:00) meaning like a big principal pay down or something like that, they have to write the loan down to (1:17:05) zero. And, and it’s, it’s basically, it’s born out of the 2008, 2009 time period when, when (1:17:12) apparently banks would adjust loan terms to keep loans from going into default. But it was a matter (1:17:18) of discretion.

The bank could do it and they didn’t have to put in the non-accrual column (1:17:23) because we were paying interest. But, but so, so I couldn’t start my business today and run (1:17:28) into those kinds of problems. Because the, the, the banks just don’t have any latitude.

They (1:17:36) would say, we have no choice. We have to write your loan off. In fact, at one point imagine Royal (1:17:42) Oak was in the workout department of the bank.

And it was kind of ironic because I didn’t even (1:17:48) know at that point in time what had transpired. And it’s like, Hey, we’ve made every loan payment (1:17:52) on time. Yeah.

The covenants are kind of tight, but, but we’ve never missed a payment. And they (1:17:57) said, well you know, you were, you’re, you’re not hitting your covenant. So you’re on default.

(1:18:04) And it’s like, well, how do we get out of purgatory? And it was like, we need to pay down (1:18:08) the loan. Well, we had a couple million bucks in cash and we paid down the loan. Oh, now we’re (1:18:13) okay.

But the bank didn’t tell me that if they told me that I would have been out of, I would (1:18:17) not have been on the workout department a year earlier. Right. Right.

Which just cost them money (1:18:21) to bring in the workout. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

And what were they going to do anyway? They’re (1:18:25) going to take it back. You think you can run it better than I can go ahead. Sure.

Sure. And was (1:18:30) that all because of regulation? Yeah. Bureaucracy.

Well, in some cases bureaucracy. Yeah. Okay.

So (1:18:37) the piece of advice is, is, is look for alternative methods. I think it’s, it’s be creative with your (1:18:43) financing and don’t be undercapitalized, whatever you do, because it cashes the lifeblood of (1:18:48) business. No matter what you think something’s going to cost, it’s going to cost more and it’s (1:18:52) going to take longer than you think it is to get to where you want to be.

And so make sure you’ve (1:18:57) got cushion in your projections. That would be the, that would be the advice I would give young (1:19:01) people starting out in business. Yeah.

I, uh, we, we have a speaker in the Vistage group that was (1:19:06) the largest, uh, franchisee of, of Krispy Kreme donuts, uh, in California for, for quite some time. (1:19:14) And that was his biggest piece of advice is if you remember nothing, it’s, it’s, if you’re, (1:19:19) if you’re going to ask for money, ask for more than you think, because it will take twice as (1:19:23) long or not twice. It will take longer.

Uh, it will take longer and it will cost more than you (1:19:29) ever expected with your initial projection. That’s absolutely true. That’s a true, that’s no (1:19:34) truer words were ever spoken.

Yeah. It’s always going to take longer and cost more than you think (1:19:38) it will. And if you’ve ever built a house, you know that for sure.

I made that mistake once, (1:19:43) once only not going to do that again. What’s, um, uh, uh, two, two questions for you. So, (1:19:51) so, and then we can, we can wrap it up.

Um, what is a bold move that you wish you had made sooner? (1:19:59) Um, to quit Procter. Oh, to have actually left, uh, left before you had. Yeah.

I think if I (1:20:05) had concentrated all my efforts on imagine, I think it would be bigger today than this. (1:20:10) No kidding. Yeah.

That was not what I was expecting, but I don’t live with regrets. (1:20:15) You know, I, I think we should all live without regrets and I do, I have no regrets, but I think (1:20:20) if, if, you know, if you said with the benefit of hindsight, what would you have done differently? (1:20:24) It would have been, maybe I’ll just concentrate all my efforts on this entrepreneurial business. (1:20:29) Yeah.

Well, and then, um, um, I actually, you know what you already answered this one. I said, (1:20:35) what’s given you energy now? And that’s, that’s helping, helping, helping grow other, (1:20:39) grow younger leaders. Yeah.

I think I get the biggest kick out of that. (1:20:43) I love it. Well, I think you’re giving back in excess of the, of the cost, uh, of yourself.

(1:20:49) Well, thank you. I’m trying every day, right? Every day we got to produce value greater than (1:20:53) our cost. Love it.

Well, this has been awesome. Uh, I think we’ve all learned a lot from you and (1:20:58) I think we’re all going to continue to learn a lot from you. So thanks for being here and (1:21:01) thanks for doing an episode of, uh, of the podcast.

Pleasure to be with you. (1:21:05) Thanks so much for having me.