Mike Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg, congratulated restaurateur Danny Meyer at a Bloomberg Philanthropies event, recalling when Shake Shack was just a small cart in Madison Square Park, which has now expanded to multiple cities worldwide, attributing its growth to Meyer’s vision, persistence, and burger recipe.

Shake Shack originated from a hot dog cart in Chicago in 2001, part of a park art installation, managed by Union Square Hospitality Group's off-season coat check staff. It lost about $7,500 and $5,000 in its first two years, only making about $7,500 in its third year. The Park Conservancy then invited them to open a permanent kiosk, where Meyer sketched a contemporary roadside burger stand on a napkin, leading to the opening of the permanent kiosk in 2004.

Meyer opened his first restaurant, Union Square Cafe, at the age of 27 in 1985. His group also includes Gramercy Tavern, The Modern, and Maialino. Shake Shack went public in 2015, with its stock price more than doubling on the first day. It now has annual sales exceeding $1.45 billion and operates 703 locations in over 20 countries, with Meyer still serving as chairman.

A new book titled "What Could Possibly Go Right?" was published by Random House on September 29, priced at $32 for 336 pages, marking the 20th anniversary of his bestseller "Setting the Table" from 2006. The book discusses mistakes made while scaling up, including an ill-timed cold-pressed juice bar in Equinox gyms, the unprofitable Tabla, the Roman pizza restaurant Martina that prioritized scale over soul, and the departure of waitstaff after eliminating tips and raising menu prices by 20% to 25%.

Delta Air Lines and Marriott International pay to learn service methods from him. The 68-year-old Meyer stepped down as CEO of USHG in 2022 but remains founder and executive chairman. The book includes slogans like Don’t F’ing Settle, Change Your Grip, Think Like a Winemaker, as well as Hospitality Quotient, Rule of Two, and Four Gears of Leadership.

In market mechanics, buyers include hotel and airline groups paying for cultural lessons, and publishers and charity gala circles promoting the new book. Sellers are USHG and Shake Shack, which turned park concessions into global burger stocks. The event is driven by the book launch week, with funds flowing from the losses of the park hot dog cart to the replication and training consulting fees of the post-IPO stores, benefiting founders and public companies that can sell "hospitality culture" as a scalable product, while single-store soul projects that are shut down or altered by the same cultural experiment are under pressure.

Source: Public Information