(rock music) - Welcome to A shot of Ag, I'm your host, Rob Sharkey.

I'm a farmer from just outside of Bradford, Illinois.

I started a podcast which led into an XM radio show, which led into national television show, which led into me being right here today.

But today, today is not about me, today its about Kavan Shay.

How you doing Kavan?

- Doing really well Rob.

- Good, that is your name, K-A-V-A-N?

- That's right.

- Kavan, how many times, besides like two minutes ago, have you been called different names?

- Tens of thousands, I would imagine.

- [Rob] It's an unusual name.

- It is, yes.

- Is there a story behind it?

- So my mom, I have one older brother, she wanted unique names for her sons, and he is older than I am.

And his name is Kyle.

- Okay.

- And so I don't know how that qualifies as a unique name.

So I never got that part, but the story, Kavan's an old Gaelic Irish name.

- Okay.

- And it's actually the predecessor to Kevin.

- Oh.

- So before Kevin was Kevin, it was Kavan, but my mom decided to dig it back up, and slap it on me.

- You know, if your name was Mike, I imagine, I mean, a lot of people have troubles with names.

It seems like when you have a different one, or something a little off about it, people remember your name.

- Once they get to know you, and are comfortable with the name, but you notice all the time, after I first say it, and then they're scared to say it again, you know, Hey, really nice to talk to you, (mumbles) and they kind of mumble over it.

So you always get them but it's true.

I mean, I think it's part of what makes me me, you know, I always, it's sometimes frustrating to have a name that's a little more difficult to introduce yourself to people as, but I think it's part of what, you know, makes you an individual, and you know, that's just, it's who I am.

And it's actually probably shaped a little bit of my experiences having to go through that process, but you're right, once people get to know it, it is, you know, I've never met another one, so.

- So you're the, the founder, the opener, the owner of the Blue Duck.

- All the above.

- All the above.

- Yes, yes.

It was my original concept, and I opened it.

It was my idea, and we opened in spring of 2015, so coming up on seven years now, but yes, I opened that then.

And the founder, and owner, and pit master of the Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern.

- And if people don't know it, it's down on the riverfront.

- It is.

- It's a great restaurant.

- Thank you.

- You know what's good?

You know what's good about that place?

- I'd love to hear.

- Is the poutine.

- Oh yeah.

- Not many places have poutine.

- It's true.

- I used to do social media tours up in Canada, and this was like, it wasn't that long ago, but nobody down here had poutine.

And I remember going to your restaurant.

It was the first place, now it's getting more common.

- It is, yeah.

- What was, was that your idea?

- It was, yeah.

So, I would say our version of poutine is an Americanized version, - It is, yeah.

- because we've got your choice of smoked meat, - U.S.A!

- bacon, pickled red onions, garlic aioli, you know, in its essence, poutine is fries, gravy, cheese curds.

- Yeah.

- And that's great.

But you know, that goes along with what I wanted to do with the Blue Duck.

The overarching theme is, I wanted to take things that you might be familiar with, or classic dish and turn them a little bit, and twist them a little bit, and deliver them in ways that you might not have had them before, or expect them.

And that's one example of that.

- I'm probably not a great host in talking about the Blue Duck, 'cause every time I go there, I get the poutine.

I get it as a meal every time.

- You're not the only one, it's a popular dish.

So you're not alone in that.

I would encourage you to branch out.

'Cause there's lots of other great things on it.

But if you wanna stick to the poutine, - I don't blame you.

- You know, if it's not broke, whatever they say, - That's right, yeah, don't fix it.

- Blue Duck.

Why call it that?

- So I'll start first by, So it's inspired by the movie Billy Madison, with Adam Sandler, which is, (both laughing) which is one of my favorite movies growing up.

- I don't remember seeing this in the notes, but please continue.

- I had to save that one, - Yes.

- you know, just for this, so I can get your reaction live.

So what we're trying to do obviously is barbecue.

The essence of what we're doing, it's called the Blue Duck Barbecue Tavern.

- Yeah.

- We're trying to do barbecue as well as we possibly can.

And feature those traditional sort of smoked meat dishes that you would expect in any barbecue joint.

But we're also trying to deliver those dishes and feature the meats and have the sides in ways you wouldn't expect.

We have, you know, our Asian tacos, our Korean Banh Mi sandwich.

We have some Mexican inspired dishes.

We have the poutine, we have soups.

We have different things that you don't see at every barbecue joint, and in Billy Madison, which I've seen hundreds of times, I grew up in that era, - Swan - Yes, exactly.

I don't know if there's a more quotable movie than Billy Madison.

Well, there's a scene, you know, where he has to go back to school, and he's in kindergarten, in one of the little tiny chairs in Miss Lippy's class.

And he's come coloring, when everybody else is out at recess, and he's coloring - Oh, - the blue duck.

- my gosh.

- And she comes up and says, what are you doing?

There's no such thing as a blue duck.

And he said, well, that's exactly right.

You see a duck every single day.

And frankly, I'd like to see a blue one for once.

And so it's, it's kind of a throwaway scene, but when you've seen it as many times, it kind of sticks with you.

And to me, that encapsulates what I was trying to do, which is something you're kind of familiar with, you see every day, but delivered a little bit differently.

And then Blue Duck Barbecue rolls off the tongue well, and so it just kind of came together that, you know, this, I think, it kind of pays homage to what we're doing.

One of my favorite movies growing up.

And it's a memorable name, you know, because there's, you know, Porky's barbecue, there's things that, that name already exists, that concept already exists.

You kind of have an idea in your head going into that place, what you're going to get.

And I wanted to have a name that I could create the brand for that you don't have any preconceived notions going in.

And we got to create the experience for that.

So you come in as a blank, what what's the Blue Duck about?

You know, what is that?

So we got to create that, and that was the inspiration for it.

- So if someone comes up to you and they say, hey Kavan, I want to open a restaurant.

I need to go to the bank.

Do you say, well, what you need to do is say, you're gonna base the name of the restaurant off of that movie.

- It's worked for me.

(both laughing) I don't know if it'll translate to, to every other restaurant, I don't, I would say be original, and have a concept that hasn't necessarily been done before.

And if you want to inspire it from your favorite movie, that's up to you.

- Let's go back.

You're a Peoria guy.

- I am, I was born and raised here.

I was born in Methodist Hospital, right up the street.

- Okay.

And went to high school where?

- At Richwoods.

- At Richwoods, - Richwoods High School.

- And then down to U of I.

- That's right, - Okay, - yeah, in Champagne.

- all right.

The real college?

- The mothership, as my family likes to call it.

- I went to Southern.

- Well, I'm sorry to hear that, but you turned out great, so.

- I'm feeling like it.

- Yeah.

So obviously they're doing something right down there in Carbondale.

- We drank a lot.

- Yeah.

- What, what'd you study down there?

- Finance.

- Okay, what was the plan you were in college?

What were you thinking you wanted to do?

- I don't know if I had a plan at that point, in terms of what exactly I wanted to do with the degree.

And I think that's not uncommon, but there is an expectation I remember in high school, people asking everybody, what do you wanna do?

You know, what are you gonna do?

What are you gonna study?

Okay, you're gonna study that.

What are you gonna do with that degree?

And I think that's far less important than, you know, your interests.

The college experience is clearly about the education and what you're learning, but I think maybe even more important, it's about learning to exist on your own for the first time, both within the context of education and social relationships, and sort of how you navigate the world.

And so I think there's too much pressure put on young people early to know exactly what you're going to do with your degree or your experiences.

And so for me, I knew that a business degree, specifically a finance degree, would be applicable to a lot of things I might want to do.

- So you're gonna get an overall, like an umbrella degree, basically.

- I mean, you know, you get a lot of general studies in that, but I knew that I'm good at math, I have a lot of those quant skills, - really?

You're one of those guys?

- I try to be, you know, I had an aptitude for it, despite my best efforts.

And I knew that it's something I could excel at, that I would be interested in.

And that would serve me well in terms of gathering some of those experiences and that education for after I graduated.

But I didn't, at that point, I didn't specifically know I wanted to go into X, and I wanted to work in that for a certain number of years.

And then I wanted to do this, you know, I think gone are the days, for better or worse, where you graduate, you work, you start at a company at a pretty low level, and that's your career.

And you're there for 35 years.

I think the, what happens is there's a lot more moving around these days.

And again, I'm not commenting on whether that's good or bad, it's just sort of what it is.

And so I think that you have a little more freedom when you're getting your education to know that, look, whatever you're doing in that moment, do the best to your possible ability and, and gather as much from you can from that experience as you can.

But it does, you know, if you're in a situation that is not fulfilling to you, it's not something you're stuck in anymore.

And you have a little bit more freedom to choose your individual path.

- I've interviewed well over 1,500 people, right?

And a lot of them very successful like yourself, right?

It's the majority of the time that people are not ending up doing what they went to school for, or not what they originally thought.

So the ability to pivot, I think, has a lot to do with success, but you almost didn't go to college.

You were thinking about culinary school.

- That's right, yeah.

So that was, yeah, that was a real pivotal moment in my life, is I've always had an interest in cooking.

I've always had an interest in the culinary arts.

It's always been fascinating to me.

You know, I can't paint, I can't sing, I can't draw, and so that was a little bit of my artistic outlet.

- Maybe we should try to sing.

- I don't think so.

I think you'd have viewers switch the channel pretty quickly if I started belting out a tune.

- Maybe if I started singing, you would join me.

- I don't know that I would.

I think you'd be on your own.

You can try, but I'm not, I'm not getting into that.

- It's all right.

♪ It's a whole new world ♪ - He's on his own.

- Nothing?

- Nothing.

- Okay.

- Not coming with you.

- Outta college, you went to Chicago.

- That's right.

- What were you doing up there?

- So right out of school, I got a job as an intellectual property consultant in the worlds of patents.

- Okay.

Oh, you were patent lawyer.

- I was not, I was not an attorney.

- Okay.

- So essentially, I worked for a company that, so if let's say a large company has a patent.

- Yeah.

- Another company makes a device, makes sales, and infringes upon that patent.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- There might be a lawsuit, in that case, attorneys are hired by both companies to represent their interests.

The company I worked for is hired by the attorneys to calculate the damages owed in the context of that litigation.

So what the marketplace might have looked like, had that infringement not occurred.

- [Rob] Mm, sounds exciting.

- Doesn't it?

(both laughing) It was long hours, I mean, there was a lot of fulfilling things about that.

- [Rob] In Chicago though, was that exciting?

- It was.

- A young guy, living up there?

- It was, you know, and that's sort of the thing.

When my group of friends, and me specifically, I never thought I'd come back to Peoria.

When I was in high school, it was, I'm going to college somewhere else.

I'm gonna graduate.

I'm gonna move to a big city.

I'm gonna live downtown, put on a suit, go to a glass office building.

And that's my life.

And that's what I should be doing.

- Like an '80s movie.

- Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, it's Wall Street.

- You're gonna be Michael J.

Fox or something.

- That's right, yes.

That's what you have in your head, you know, and to me at that point, it was feeling like, well, if I stayed in Peoria, it'd be somehow a failure, 'cause I didn't, I didn't get out of that.

And I think that that mindset probably still exists to a large part today, is that, - Oh yeah.

- you know, there's a big brain drain, Peoria, if you're successful, if you're driven, and you wanna achieve something, that's, for some reason you have to go do that somewhere else.

And it took leaving and it took experiencing something else to realize that I don't, I'm doing what I set out to do.

I'm doing what I should be enjoying.

And I am not enjoying it.

This isn't for me.

I don't like living in such a huge city.

I don't like going to the office building.

I don't like, I don't like my life.

You know, at that point there was, you know, plenty of reasons to be happy and enjoy myself.

It's not like I didn't have a good time, but I wasn't personally fulfilled in the way that I thought I would be.

And then I'm thinking, okay, why did I move here in the first place?

Is it because I felt like it's what I was supposed to do?

- Now you're starting to sound like a Hallmark movie.

- I don't mean to get cheesy on you.

- You have a dog, and an old truck?

- I have a truck, it's newer, I have two dogs.

So I think you're pegging me into a Hallmark movie.

- Tell me about that.

You were going there.

Tell me about the decision to come back in Peoria, and why.

- Sure, so, I wasn't in the culinary world at all.

I was in the finance world.

- Yeah.

- At that point, the most experience I had had in a restaurant was, you know, briefly bartending in college.

And that was more for the social aspect of it than to, to gain experience.

- What?

- To have fun, yeah.

Get to know people.

And so, but I had never given up on the idea that I wanted to own a restaurant.

I thought it was something I could do.

I thought was something that I would be very good at.

And I thought it would be something that would be very personally fulfilling.

And so when I was probably about 25, only a few years out of college in Chicago, I started concocting the idea of, okay, what would it look like if I actually did this, if I actually went for it, and opened a restaurant?

And at that point I was considering doing it in Chicago, and I was convinced that I was gonna do it there.

And then I got to thinking that more.

Well, why would I put it here?

You know, I don't love living in the city, and there's nothing, I love going to Chicago.

I just, you know, and it's, it's very individual, but it wasn't for me.

And there's a world class restaurant on every street corner in Chicago.

- [Rob] They do.

- I don't have the connections in Chicago that I do to Peoria, both literally the people you know, but also the personal and emotional connections.

And so I thought, well, if I can come up with a concept and execute that, that I think is going to really add value to a community, why not come back and open that in the community that I was raised in, and that was a big part of why I am who I am?

And so I got more of what would that look like?

And I made the decision.

I would much rather do this in Peoria.

- But you you're a smart guy.

I mean, business in Chicago, at this point, you're knowing that the majority, vast majority of restaurants fail within their first year.

- Absolutely.

- Why go into the restaurant business?

What was the draw?

- Well, you need the correct amount of crazy to get into the restaurant business, because it's a wild business.

You know, you need to, - You have that, huh?

- I suppose I do, 'cause I've been in it for seven years.

- No Billy Madison.

- That's right.

My brain works in weird ways, I guess.

And at that point, you know, not married, don't have kids, don't have a mortgage.

You kind of think of, if not now, when?

You know, at that point, I have a lot of tolerance for risk, even now.

But at that point, even more so, that if I fall on my face, it's myself to pick up.

I'm 25, 26 years old.

And if this is a failure, which chances, you know, statistics tell you, it will be, - [Rob] Yeah.

- There's plenty of time for me to go and have a career in whatever other field I choose.

But if I'm in a situation where I, you know, I've been in business for 15, 20 years or whatever it is, and I have a wife, and I have children, and I have all these responsibilities, and people relying on me and counting on me, would I have done that?

And I don't know the answer to that, but I knew I didn't wat to find out at that point.

And so it was a point in my life where, you know, you talk to a lot of people who have been through their entire careers and you say, you know, what kind of regrets did you have?

And there's a lot of people that say, I wish I would've gone for that idea that I had, at least tried it to see if I can make a go of it.

And I never did.

And I didn't want to be in that situation where I didn't at least try.

- Yeah, no, that's great.

You've owned it for seven years.

- That's right.

- By the time this views, you will have transitioned out of it.

- That's correct, yeah.

That will probably be news to a lot of people.

So we opened in April, 2015.

So coming up on the seven year anniversary and you know, it was my original concept and I was able to execute that vision, and make it a very successful business, which it still is.

And I think introduce a real asset to both downtown Peoria and the greater area as a whole.

And for me, I think I've, I've sort of scratched that itch and I'm ready to move on to the next phase, and next projects.

And so I brought somebody on who owns it now, will have owned it at that point.

I'm actually my last week right now, that we've been building towards this for about the last year to get this individual comfortable with what makes this a successful business and how to continue that, because it's not like I'm selling because it's not successful, or no longer profitable.

It still very much is.

- It's always full.

- Yeah.

- I always have to wait.

- I'm sorry about that.

It's a small restaurant, you know.

- Now when I go, yeah, I can't even drop your name and get in anymore.

- Well, I'll introduce you to the new owner.

- Sweet.

- You'll have just as much power at that point.

- Are you happy, or sad?

- There's mixed emotions with it.

I'd say overarching, I'm happy for myself that I've accomplished this, and I'm ready to move on to the next phase.

And I'm happy for the new owner as well, because this will be a tremendous opportunity for him to do something that he's passionate about.

It's another local Peorian.

He graduated from Richwoods as well, two years older than I am.

And we've known each other a long time.

I think he's going to be just as successful, if not more successful with it than I've been.

I think he's got some really good ideas, but you know.

- He's not gonna drop the poutine, is he?

- Never, that's never leaving the menu, so you don't have to worry about that.

- We have it on record.

- It's never going away.

I'll make sure after this, I'm gonna say, look, you have to keep the poutine on, but you know, there's, I'm sad about it because it was my original idea.

And I brought it from my head out into the world.

So in that sense, it's like your baby and you kind of, you know, I'm letting it go.

And so in that sense, it's sad, but I wouldn't be doing it if I didn't believe in what I was doing, you know, I'm happy to be moving on.

And I think those emotions are stronger than the ones that are, tied of saying, well, this is a sad moment, but I'm not a very sentimental guy, so I can move on.

- Well it had to be tough, I mean, you drug that thing through COVID.

- Yeah, yeah.

The last two years have by far been the most difficult period, but we're on the other side of it, the restaurant's in a very healthy position financially, and with the amount business that we still have, which we're super thankful for, but it wasn't easy.

I mean, there were days in the middle of winter where we're not allowed to have the dining room open, that it's 10 degrees outside and you know, we're not a takeout, we have takeout business, but the Blue Duck is much more about coming in and experiencing the atmosphere, the service, and the food.

And so we're sitting there doing 30% of the sales we normally do.

And I'm just thinking, what am I even doing?

You know, why am I doing this anymore?

You have to fight through those feelings, because I'm sure there were a lot of restaurateurs, I know there are, I've talked to them.

- Oh, there's a ton that are gone.

- And that's a very unfortunate thing.

But even ones that made it through were just in that same boat of like, why am I even doing this anymore?

Because it's a tough business.

It really is.

It's very fulfilling when you're successful, but it's a tough business.

And so, you know, I got to my head, if I ever stop enjoying it, or if it ever stopped making money, I just wouldn't do it anymore.

Because you have to have that gratification on the backend for all the work that goes into making it what it is.

And there were points in COVID that tested that, you know.

- What are you more proud of, opening it, or surviving COVID?

- That's a tough question.

I mean, I would say opening it was a bigger leap for me than having the determination to get through COVID.

- Yeah.

- Because it was, you know, I wasn't trained in the restaurant business.

I didn't have a lot of experience.

I had myriad people telling me, you know, you're ruining your career by opening this restaurant.

- [Rob] Really, people would tell you that?

- Absolutely.

You know, people, - Could you imagine telling someone that?

- It's rough, isn't it?

Even some of my friends said that.

- Well I mean, at least they should be the ones telling you that.

- Right, yeah, yeah.

But to do something like that takes a tremendous amount of confidence and self belief in what you're doing.

- Yeah.

- Because there's not, you know, people will encourage you, they will.

But there's a lot of people that say, what is Kavan doing?

You know, he's in finance.

He didn't go to culinary school.

He doesn't have a ton of restaurant experience.

Why?

Why take this risk?

And so to actually take that jump and go for it, and commit myself to opening it and making as much of a go at it as I could, I think I'm more proud of that leap.

I'm proud of making it through COVID, but at that point I was not, I was bound and determined I was not gonna let it go under, you know?

- Yeah.

- And there was no situation under which I would have given up on that.

And so, it wasn't even a question at that point.

- So my wife, the producer, she does a very good job at vetting, and getting stuff to talk about.

Doesn't say on here, what's next for you?

- Yeah, well, there are some multiple options of what's next.

I've worked for the past year very diligently on opening up other streams of income that are more passive, that I don't have to commit every single day to make sure that it's producing a little bit of money.

Like I said, a little bit ago, you have more risk tolerance before you're successful.

Because at that point it's like, well, what do I have to lose?

- [Rob] Exactly.

- When you get to a point where you've had a little bit of success, and you get a little more defensive at that point.

There's a lot of people that say that second business is harder than the first, because you're a little more defensive.

You're not as carefree.

And so I wanted to make sure that I was in a position where I had a lot of my bills covered, regardless of what I did.

And I was in a position that, for that next venture, I made sure, well, if this one falls flat, it's not the end of me.

You know, I still have, you can ask any of my friends or people that know me., I have an appetite for risk.

There's not a lot of fear in going for something, but, you don't wanna be stupid about it.

You don't wanna just say I'm gonna take a risk for the sake of taking a risk, you want to plan, and set yourself up for success.

- Yeah.

- So there are some ideas, I don't necessarily want to go into them now, because they're not exactly, - No exclusives today.

I was hoping for one.

- But I'm gonna stay in the area, - [Rob] Well, that's good.

- Yeah, I'm committed to Peoria, I'm from here, and I'm not going anywhere at all.

And, any next ventures I do that are visible will be here in Peoria.

I'm committed to making a difference to the community.

- Perfect.

- And being a part of it, so.

- Kavan Shay, congratulations on all your success.

And if we see a business pop up that's got a Billy Madison reference, I'll assume that you, - It's probably gonna be me.

- Kavan Shay, thank you very much, everybody else, we'll catch you next time.