Logan Cockerham: Thomas, when people ask about your business, how do you describe what you do?
Thomas Brown: We’re a family pizza restaurant. And we brew our own beers. We are a full-service family restaurant that happens to serve high quality local beer.
Logan Cockerham: Okay. And how long you been in business?
Thomas Brown: The Craft House has been in business for a couple of years now.
Logan Cockerham: And how many employees do you have?
Thomas Brown: 185 employees now.
Logan Cockerham: Where do you plan to take your company long term?
Thomas Brown: We’ve got five locations now. We just opened on Westport Road at Hurstbourne Parkway recently and the plan is to open up 2-3 more stores, and eventually franchise the business model out.
Logan Cockerham: What did you want it to become when you started it?
Thomas Brown: It’s changed since we started brewing our beer. We were originally in the pizza business and have expanded to the craft beer segment.
Logan Cockerham: Do you have a plan to exit?
Thomas Brown: Do I have a plan to exit the business? Yep. Fortunately I have two sons. The oldest boy is currently working in the business. He works on the beer side right now. And then I have a younger son who’s just entering college. The older boy has his MBA already and he wants to stay in the business.
Logan Cockerham: Who is your target market? Is it families?
Thomas Brown: Yeah, it’s definitely families, and groups and baseball teams.
Logan Cockerham: What is your biggest learning from the pandemic and how has your thinking changed in your approach to business?
Thomas Brown: You just have to adapt. You have to be able to make decisions quickly and you have to be able to move the business quickly.
Logan Cockerham: What’s one mistake you’ve made or lesson you learned that other business owners can learn from?
Thomas Brown: Don’t open a brewery at the beginning of a pandemic. When you got everything ready to go, got a bunch of beer to sell and nowhere to sell it, that was a huge learning curve for us.
Logan Cockerham: So last question Thomas. All topics are wide open. What is most inspiring to you today?
Thomas Brown: When I decided to separate from my previous company, I had a core group of 6 people that decided to take the risk with me and they moved with me. Their willingness to take that risk has really inspired me to be better and make sure that the risk was worth it.