Raising Cane's: Todd Graves (REPEAT)

How I Built This with Guy Raz

Guy Raz | Wondery

Business

4.8 • 31.1K Ratings

🗓️ 6 January 2025

⏱️ 89 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

By his early 20s, Todd Graves knew exactly what he wanted to do—open a restaurant near Louisiana State University that would make four things better than anyone else: chicken fingers, crinkle-cut fries, Texas toast, and coleslaw. After he and his partner Craig Silvey got rejected from every bank in Baton Rouge, Todd set out to fund his dream by working two treacherous jobs; first at an oil refinery and then on an Alaskan fishing boat. With roughly $150,000, he remodeled an old bike shop and opened his first restaurant in 1996. As word spread, Todd began building more restaurants, fueling the expansion on a rickety system of loans, and dreaming of making Cane’s as ubiquitous as McDonald's. Over the years, he has retained ownership of the business and watched it grow to over 600 stores, with 3 billion dollars in sales projected this year.

This episode was produced by Liz Metzger, with music by Ramtin Arablouei.

Edited by Neva Grant, with research help from Claire Murashima.

You can follow HIBT on You can follow HIBT on X & Instagram, and email us at [email protected]. Sign up for Guy’s free newsletter at guyraz.com.

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to how I built this early and ad-free right now.
0:05.7	Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
0:10.6	You're a startup founder.
0:12.3	Finding product market fit is probably your number one priority.
0:16.5	But to land bigger customers, you also need security compliance.
0:21.1	And obtaining your SOC2 or ISO-27-001 certification can open those big doors.
0:28.0	But they take time and energy pulling you away from building and shipping.
0:33.0	That's where Vanta comes in.
0:35.3	Vanta is the all-in-one compliance solution helping startups like yours
0:39.8	get audit ready and build a strong security foundation quickly and painlessly. How? Vanta
0:46.9	automates the manual security tasks that slow you down, helping you streamline your audit. And the
0:53.5	platform connects you with trusted
0:55.1	VCOs to build your program, auditors to get you through audits quickly, and a marketplace
1:01.3	for essentials like pen testing. So whether you're closing your first deal or gearing up for growth,
1:07.5	Vanta makes compliance easy. Join over 8,000 companies, including many Y Combinator and
1:13.9	tech star startups who trust Vanta. Simplify compliance and get $1,000 off at vanta.com
1:20.5	slash built. That's V-A-N-T-A.com slash built for $1,000 off.
1:29.0	I feel like I'm missing out because everyone is either starting a side hustle or becoming
1:33.6	their own boss.
1:34.6	And you know what they're hearing a lot?
1:37.5	It's the sound of another sale on Shopify, the all-in-one commerce platform to start, run and
1:42.4	grow your business.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -38 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Guy Raz | Wondery, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Guy Raz | Wondery and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.