52-year-old worked 90-hour weeks in an oil refinery to save money for his business—now he's worth $9.5 billion
www.cnbc.com
Todd Graves, the co-founder and co-CEO of Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers, is an unlikely billionaire. Here's how he built his business.

The 90-hour weeks part?
The fact that he was doing it for a fossil fuel company?
The fact that he’s worth fucking $9.5 billion?

Also, not in the headline, but-

The fact that he did it back in the 90s when you could actually successfully open a small business and make money from it as if it’s relevant today?

The business is a franchise called Raising Caine’s Chicken, which I’ve never had, but if you go by Yelp reviews, it’s either the best restaurant that has ever existed or pretty mediocre.

Also, Wikipedia says very little about his early life, but apparently his parents could afford to send him to a private catholic school, so he didn’t exactly grow up improverished.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todd_Graves_(entrepreneur)

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
      71·
      16 hours ago

      Yeah, I looked at the menu and it seemed surprisingly limited, especially for a fast food chain.

      Here it is:

      That’s their entire menu.

      Culver’s: We have all food ever created for sale right now on our 80-page menu. Have fun at our drive-through.

      Raising Cane’s: Fuck you, you have five options and all of them are chicken fingers.

      • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
        6·
        12 hours ago

        Cane’s is/was being smart here. One of the biggest issues that a startup restaurant can have is attempting to carry “everything.” Do one or two things really really well, and have some extras that require basically no prep. This also helps reduce cleanup later.

      • PlantJam@lemmy.world
        16·
        15 hours ago

        I’ll take small menu ordering every time. If we’re all getting the same thing and the choice is quantity, it’ll likely be fresh.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
          31·
          15 hours ago

          Yeah but it’s literally one thing. Chicken fingers. They better be damn good chicken fingers. And I find that hard to imagine.

          • GunValkyrie@lemmy.world
            9·
            15 hours ago

            Please remember it’s fast food. Are the chicken fingers amazing? No but they are good enough so that they are amazing with the sauce. Everything on the menu is just different textures for shoveling more sauce into your face.

              • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
                3·
                12 hours ago

                It’s a pretty good sauce. Here’s the recipe as close as I can tell.

                3/4 cup real mayonnaise

                3 Tablespoons ketchup

                5 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce* (1 Tablespoon + 2 teaspoons)

                1 Tablespoon hot sauce

                1 teaspoon garlic powder

                3/4 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

                Pinch celery salt

                It’s also good on burgers, sandwiches, and fried seafood.