Joe Cocker Quotes

Growing up as a young kid, I was in a restaurant. So, you know, I always had a very good understanding of the nuances. And in a way, that was a bad thing. Because it kind of programmed me to believe that if you're going have a restaurant, this is what you need to do, and this is the way it's going to be run.

When I set up my first restaurant, I was so inspired by Wolfgang Puck, who is also based in L.A. and is now a good friend of mine, and the way he would engage with his customers and greet them personally.

I used to sell furniture for a living. The trouble was, it was my own.

I saw these new kinds of stores: the Body Shop, the Sock Shop, and I thought to myself, 'I can do that.'

I think it'd be great to own a fun concept store with my friends and just sell books and records.

I always worked in institutions, I never had a restaurant of my own before, but I have opened over 30 hotels, restaurants and casinos. I understand what it takes to keep them running.

The restaurant business is something that you have to treat like a baby. You have to constantly be there. You can't trust it to anybody else, because no one's going to love it like you do.

I've been an employee all my life. Would I wish, if I could rewind it, to have gone down a different route? Possibly, but I've had a great time. Anyway I'm not ruling it out; I could still buy a business.

Well, darling, you can have your tearoom now.

I'm very interested in my new kitchen equipment shop. I've started it with two friends.

I don't like department stores. I had a chain of department stores back in 1994 which was Lewis's and Owen Owen, only for a short time, and I found department stores personally difficult.

When I'm not longer rapping, I want to open up an ice cream parlor and call myself Scoop Dogg.

I part-own a bookshop for some strange coincidence of reasons, and it is one of the best things I part-own in my life, or own in my life. I do not know, it just feels great.

My first job was working for my dad. He was a used-car dealer, and I used to wash the cars down, clean them out, and so on. I would do stuff for him pretty much every day. It was quite a good job, to be honest.

We buy and sell goods. We buy low and sell higher - that's what we all do to make a profit. But I consider a merchant someone who has a certain intuition and instinct, and - very important - knows how to run a business, knows the numbers.

The C student starts a restaurant. The A student writes restaurant reviews.

From the first day we opened Wynkoop, my brewpub in Denver, I knew I'd be ten times better running a restaurant than I was a geologist.

When you're finished, bars are not inherently profitable. You got to work at them to make them profitable.

I think of entrepreneurship as a way of creating value.

I've always wanted to buy a bookstore. You know, sell some of those muffins and a little coffee. I don't care if we make any money. I don't want to lose a lot of money, but we could visit with people and get books.

As an outsider to and observer of the restaurant business, one of the things I most admire about it is the risks people are willing to take.

My father built a small manufacturing business. I worked alongside him and saw firsthand the challenges that business owners face.

I got two stores, two streetwear stores, at home. Have to tend to those. Play Cloths. Have to tend to that business.

It's okay to work for someone else; not everyone is cut out to own a business, and even so, working for someone else is a chance to learn how to both be an employee and an employer.

My friends decided to open a pub and asked me to be part of it. The day-to-day running is something I know little about. Luckily, I'm the demented figurehead, a kind of mascot. I get all the good stuff - like free pork scratchings - without any of the bad stuff.