The founders of Sticky Fingers Corp. like to joke that they brought in industry veteran John Malone as president and chief executive last year because they were in need of adult supervision.
Malone started out in the kitchen at the original Chili’s Grill & Bar in Dallas and capped his 23-year career with parent Brinker International as president of Cozymel’s Coastal Grill. He left to run a private-membership campground organization. Recruited by headhunters, Malone returned to the restaurant business after tasting the food at Sticky Fingers, a 17-unit barbecue chain based in Mount Pleasant, S.C
Founders Jeff Goldstein, Todd Eischeid and Chad Walldorf sold a stake in the company last fall to private-equity firm Quad-C to start aggressively growing the 14-year-old company, now under Malone’s leadership.
Still, Malone doesn’t take things too seriously.
To reinforce the chain’s mission to stand out from the crowd, he recently dressed up as Paula Abdul of “American Idol” for a Sticky Fingers employee contest dubbed “Menu Idol.”
You were Paula?
Yes. My assistant found a long, pink dress for me.
What was the contest about?
We are testing in a couple of stores a 2-foot-tall menu shaped like one of our sauce bottles. We wanted to do something that was different from everyone else. It has larger print, and it’s easy to read. When the servers bring it to your table, they give a little presentation to take you through the entire menu. We had a contest for the most interesting presentation. We had a lot of fun with it. The winner won $500.
That had to be an employee morale booster.
It was such incredible fun. We gave them some structure, some recommendations, but it was up to them to make it their own. We want our food servers to interact with guests and be themselves and do something different than they would from working at other companies.
