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)

  • j4k3@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    I owned my own business with employees twice. I’ve faced decisions where I needed to screw over people to grow my business or make more money. “I owned my own business…”

    It is not hard to make a fortune. You just need to be a psychopath in a way that threads all the legal loopholes and only hurt people that are beneath your super secret caste rank we’re never supposed to admit is a thing.

    It starts by making your first million in reserve by becoming a slumlord. Then you can afford to use the legal system to bankrupt smaller fish while avoiding larger predators. From then on, you just need to continue to cannibalized as much as possible. Eating big fish is dangerous. Large filter feeders that kill hundreds of thousands of average people are the safest bet. Also, fund the right political party that maintains open loopholes that are easy to exploit and protect their biggest whales, and turn a blind eye to cannibal fish, while selling idiot krill whatever mysticism nonsense they are willing to buy. It is not hard. Just be a terrible human being. I failed when I tried, but my apprentice at the time still has his house to this day.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
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      2 months ago

      The fact that it pays to be an awful person shows that there is just something fundamentally wrong with our society. Possibly our species.

      • j4k3@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Terms of service are slavery contracts that presume all persons possess the means to process and competently understand the choices they make. The acceptance of these agreements is the legal forfeiture of citizenship and democracy. This is the simplified core issue of present Western society. Ultimately, people have proven that they will sell democracy and citizenship to anyone willing to create digital novelties. This has normalized and funded exploitation and the US party of open legislative loopholes for criminals.

        Seems like a stretch unless you fundamentally understand the implications against the third pillar of democracy—freedom of information required for an informed public. Informational determinism is a cornerstone of democracy. This cornerstone is missing and the house of cards is falling as a result. Most of our present issues boil down to this one problem either directly or indirectly.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
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      2 months 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.

      • PlantJam@lemmy.world
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        2 months 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
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          2 months 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
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            2 months 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
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                2 months 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.

      • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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        2 months 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.

          • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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            2 months ago

            No, but when they were a startup, that was certainly a consideration. As for now, well, why change a formula that clearly works?

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldOP
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              2 months ago

              Aren’t companies generally supposed to diversify in order to grow past a certain size? I mean obviously it worked out, but I thought that was the rule of thumb.

              • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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                2 months ago

                Diversification can be done on the back end of the business, doesn’t need to be customer facing. I’m certain that the founder has a healthy stock portfolio with his net worth.

  • ThrowawayInTheYear23@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    The fact that he was doing it for a fossil fuel company?

    Well the oil field is one of Louisiana major industries that pays well and depending on your job doesn’t require a college education to get into.

    The 90-hour weeks part?

    Sounds horrible if you aren’t used to the oil field but he was probably working a rotation like 2 weeks on/1weeks off or 2 on/2off, 4on/4off etc.

    The business is a franchise called Raising Cane’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.

    It’s pretty decent fried chicken, even though the chicken fingers have shrunk over the years and price increased. Fries and texas toast are okay, Cane’s sauce (basically crawfish dipping sauce) is what kicks it up a notch.

    • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      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

      Shit’s good on burgers and chicken sandwiches as well.

    • Raiderkev@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      Finally tried it last week on my trip to Vegas. I was underwhelmed to say the least. Chick fil A nuggets/ tenders are better.

  • athairmor@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    All catholic schools in the USA are private. That doesn’t meant the kids at them are privileged economically. There’s lots of working class families that scrounge and save to afford them and poor people that go tuition-free.

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    2 months ago

    Raising Caine’s chicken is like, OK I guess but I never go there because of a few things

    1. They literally just sell chicken tenders primarily, I’m not kidding
    2. They refuse to give you BBQ sauce, they only have “caines sauce” which I don’t enjoy.

    So I don’t go there even if I want chicken tenders.

    • CrabLord@lemmy.world
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      2 months ago

      I fully agree with you about the sauce. Super overrated. Give me BBQ sauce or ranch any day for my tenders