Undercover Boss - S08E07 - Taco Bueno - 卧底老板

Tonight on Undercover Boss, Mike Roper, CEO of Taco Bueno, goes undercover in his own company. You look weird. Coach, Tom Dawkins. Hi, sorry for the wait. This is Tom. How may I help you today? You sound like you're actually happy to be here. Be energized. This taco titan will discover that sometimes the kitchen is hotter than the salsa. That's a lot. Eight bean burritos, holy cow. Fast, fast, fast. And not everything in the restaurant is bueno. It's pretty dangerous. So I just pop it open a little bit enough to get the chilies out. You got rips in your seat cushions. Yeah, we're trying to get those fixed. What will happen when he meets an employee who has a major beef with management? We have potholes in the parking lot that haven't been fixed. Corporate's never listened. You feel like you're wasting your breath. Find out next on Undercover Boss. Founded in 1967 in Abilene, Texas, Taco Bueno is a Tex-Mex quick service restaurant chain on the rise. With 178 locations in seven states, 3,500 employees, and an annual revenue of more than $200 million, Taco Bueno serves high quality food to a hungry public. Thank you. Making sure this company's future stays bueno is one man. My name's Mike Roper. I'm the president and CEO of Taco Bueno. I would say Taco Bueno is almost like a secret indulgence. It's Tex-Mex. It's higher quality because our food is fresh. It's never frozen. Earlier this year, we got named America's favorite Mexican chain. We beat the big guys. We beat Taco Bell. We beat Chipotle, Qdoba, Del Taco. We beat all of them. And that was a really huge accomplishment. I grew up in a suburb on the south side of Chicago called Lansing, right on the Indiana border. My mom, she was a stay-at-home mom. My dad was working for Amoco. It was Standard Oil at the time. My dad got laid off in the 70s with all the oil crisis going on and all that. But I never knew. You know, as a kid, I really didn't quite understand. All I knew is that my dad was around more, you know, which was cool because I liked my dad. And so it was fun. They never let me know that there was some real problems that were happening. And I can remember a lot of times I would be like, you know, hey, I want a bike. You know, like every kid does or whatever. And my dad would be like, heck no. And then invariably, you know, two weeks later, boop, there'd be a bike. My father passed away a few years ago. Anyway, this is my dad. Mm. I think I learned from my parents, you know, living paycheck to paycheck. And that's what kind of made, you know, you know, me, I think, growing up, you know, in that atmosphere of kind of what I am today. I got a really crazy career. I've sold greeting cards online. I've had a bridal business. I've had fishing lure companies. I've done things in the technology world. And then I ended up owning four Quiznos. I had some of the highest sales volume stores in the entire country. Worked my way all the way up to chief operating officer of Quiznos Worldwide. And then next thing you know, three years later, I sat down at one of the local restaurants here, and I had a sour cream chicken gelato platter. And that thing was fantastic. I instantaneously knew that I got to get into this restaurant chain. I recognize it's a competitive advantage from the quality of the food. Then in 2013, I was able to join the company, work my way up, and I've been CEO for about a year now. Morning, Tabitha. I'm not your typical CEO. You know, I don't really spend any time in my office. I describe my management style, I call it MBWA, management by walking around. Hey, Anthony, it's really important to make sure we have consistency between the social media campaign and the drive-thru panels. All right, you got it. All right, man, appreciate it. I'm constantly trying to push people, you know, to just keep performing, keep getting better, and keep moving. What do we got? The big freakin' tachos. That's awesome. Love tater tots. I like to have fun with people. There's also the serious side of the equation. Like, you gotta make sure that, you know, you're performing the way we should be performing. Yeah, that thing actually could probably use some jalapenos. Yep. And when you're not, I'll let you know. It's almost breakfast. Girls, come on over. Holly and I have been married 26 years. Gettin' ready. We have two daughters. Sam, I'm makin' yours over hard. Oh, good. So you gettin' excited about the show? Little nervous. I think you'll have a lot of fun. Yeah. You've always been all work, so. Yep, I'm a workaholic. I always have been, I always will be. Every single night, I am on Facebook talking with the customers, and so I'm kinda like the voice of Taco Bueno. Also, in my shower, I have waterproof paper and a pencil, and so as I'm coming up with ideas, I'll be writing, so don't forget. I just live it. I love it, it's exciting, but you do make sacrifices. My 25th wedding anniversary, I wasn't there. I was grand opening a store. Love family, they're great, and I'm a big family guy, but really, truly, you know, love all the stuff that's happening here. It's just part of who I am. How are you? Good. So what are we thinking? What are you thinking for today? So I'm thinking like a color first, maybe, and then we'll see what happens. Go from there? Yeah. Our top competition is probably Taco Bell, and you know, they're the big guy. We're this little engine who could, basically, that's sitting here in the Southwest. You know, I really wanna see the brand grow. I have a goal for Taco Bueno, and we're gonna basically double the size of the chain over the next four to five years. It's gonna look like when we look really old. Going undercover is the best way for me to understand what's working and not working inside the restaurants, and make whatever changes we need to do to make sure we're successful moving forward to hit that goal. This is it. It's the lunch lady look. I told you. You're like the coolest lunch lady ever. I'll be going undercover as Tom, the coach at a small high school in Western Michigan. My employees will think they're on a different reality show. They'll have no idea it's actually Undercover Boss. I love it. It's fantastic. Yeah, it's great. I'm glad you like it. What do you think? Oh my God. No, I didn't even recognize you. Isn't that awesome? You look weird. Look at, how about this too? Coach, Tom Dawkins. Damn glad to meet you. Today I'm in Owasso, Oklahoma, one of our highest volume stores, and I'm gonna be working with one of our assistant general managers. This store specifically does about 40 or 50% more sales than our average location, so really excited to see how they do it. Hi, Rebecca. Hi. Hi, I'm Tom. I'm Rebecca. What we're gonna be doing today is kind of working on the line, but you know, I'm an assistant manager here, so I kind of know how to do just about everything. Right now, I probably need to just get you in your uniform. Okay, and those are pretty hot, so you'll be sweating a little bit today. I'll be back out. Rebecca talked about the uniforms being hot, and I gotta tell you, I'm wearing one of those manager shirts, and it's hot. It's very hot, you know, so I'm all pitted out now, I think. Better? All right. Now we're gonna do the checklist, and what it is is we just have to go around and take temperatures of all the foods, certain foods, to make sure they're at temp. After that, you know, we'll check the lobby area just to make sure the floors are clean, everything's ready to go, and then we'll jump online and just start making food. All right. So we're gonna go over here to the line. Taco meat. Yep, and then just stick it right in there. Just stick it in there here? Yeah. Now what happens if it's not hot enough? Would you just leave it? You're supposed to pull it off the line, and either we can put it in the microwave, or we'll have to throw it out. Throw it out? Really? Yeah. Don't wanna make people sick, so. I'm really impressed with Rebecca on the food safety. That's something that we don't take lightly. Food safety is number one. Make sure people don't get sick, and it's washing your hands, and taking all the temperatures. That's exactly what's supposed to be going on. Okay, and then the next one is, any table that you see that's dirty, just wipe it down like this one. Just do the table next to it, too, because it's pretty gross. This one? Yeah. You got rips in your seat cushions. Yeah, we're trying to get those fixed. That's one of the things that we need done. Virtually every other seat cushion has a rip in it. So I'm very shocked seeing all the seat cushions that were torn. Okay, and then the restrooms. Oh, wow. Yeah, this piece is broken. Also, we had a broken toilet paper dispenser in the women's restroom. That is unacceptable, and as fast as we can, we should be fixing these things. We'll start working online a little bit. We'll go ahead and put some headsets on, so we can hear the orders. So tacos are the easiest thing to probably do. Okay. You just take the pie knife, gets 1.5 ounces of meat, .75 ounces of lettuce, .5 ounces of cheese, and about five tomatoes. And you wrap it up. And that's done. Okay. This is our timer. This tells us how long they've been at the window. And it's at 52. We want it to be at 45 for lunch. That's for the whole drive? Yes. Ooh, first order. How do you know? You're watching the screens. Yep, yep, there's the screen right there for you. And then hand that over to her and just say, order up. Order up. It's starting on the next order, which is 10 crispy tacos. 10 crispy tacos. Yeah, so go ahead and start putting. It's easier if you use both hands. Oh, grab lettuce and cheese at the same time. That way you can stuff both tacos. And then you want to start wrapping, yep. Hopefully I don't break them, right? I mean, oh, I just cracked one, I heard it. Welcome to Taco Bueno. You can order when you're ready. I want to get a party burrito. Hold on, she's adding another party burrito, so we're going to go ahead and make that. That's a lot, that's a lot. Fast, fast, fast, because you still got to make the six party tacos. Ugh, look at that. That's no good. So right now we got like a line around the building, so we just got to pick up the pace. Next order. Three bean burritos. There you go, I'm so sorry about the wait. You have a great day. Right now they've already been sitting in the dressing for two minutes at the window. They want them there for 45 seconds. 45? Yep. Okay. Two hands, there you go. And the lettuce and the cheese. Right now, Tom could not do what I do. No way. He has got to pick it up. Eight bean burritos, holy cow. Right now they've already been sitting in the dressing for two minutes at the window. They want them there for 45 seconds. 45? Yep. Okay. We're going to go fast, fast, fast. She keeps telling me to go quicker, quicker. One scoop of beans, one scoop of meat, one scoop of chili, one scoop of queso. Put on more meat, don't put as much meat. Spread it out, fold it this way. I'm a little slow. Have a good one, hun. You're welcome. Sometimes, you know, like if you're experienced and you're the only one on the line, you know, do what works best for you. What's going to make you fastest? Rebecca's fantastic. She's fast. She's telling me what to do. She's not just throwing me at it. Yeah, really make sure the queso gets all over. Great attitude. She just does a great job. So do you have kids or? Yeah, I got two daughters. How about you? Do you have any kids? No, I can't have kids. You can't have kids? Yeah, at the beginning of this year, I found out that I had ovarian cancer. And so I had to have a full hysterectomy and. Really? Yeah, so there's other options, you know, I can adopt, but I can't have my own. I look at it like, you know, a blessing because, you know, I'm still alive. Wow. Were you still working through all that? Or were you, I mean. I worked up until about a week before my surgery. It was hard at first, you know, trying to struggle with bills and getting back to work because I hadn't worked in so long. So I hadn't had a paycheck. Well, that had to be a big strain. I'm assuming it still is a big strain. Yeah, it is. It's very big. Can I ask, is it a lot, a lot? I mean, is it? It's about, I think about 20,000. Really? Yeah. Not having insurance or anything like that. So, and I can only pay like maybe a hundred a month, but you know, I'm trying to just keep my head up, stay working as long as I got a job and got money coming in, you know, I'll be okay. Yeah. I never would have imagined that she's struggling with all this stuff in her personal life and still can come into work every day and still, you know, just do this. It's impressive. You're pretty special. Don't cry. You're gonna make me cry. No, I'm not. No. You're gonna make me cry. Don't even know what I'm doing now. See, okay, bean burritos. We'll go into that. I think the reason this store does so well is people like Rebecca. The energy she has and her, you know, great outlook on life and everything. It just, it's amazing. Six. Next order. Today, I'm back in Owasso, Oklahoma. I learned a lot working with Rebecca on the line yesterday, but today I wanna work a job with more direct customer interaction. So I'm gonna be working the drive-thru window. I'm looking for Tim. It's extremely important to the growth of our company that we give great customer service every time. And I'm hoping to see that today. Hi, are you Tim? Yes, sir. Hi, Tim, I'm Tom. Nice to meet you, Tom. I'm the go-to guy around here. I'm gonna be showing you everything. In this bag is everything that you're gonna need today. Your uniform and the headset. Okay. Tom wasn't really ready for a job. I'm sorry. His shorts. It's like, dude, if you come walking back here looking like that in my store, there better be a good reason. All right. Well, today I'm gonna be showing you drive-thru. Okay. Get your headset on. All right, so. I do speak a little bit fast. You know, I like to get the customers in and out. Welcome to Taco Bueno in Owasso. My name is Tim. How are you doing today? All right, one beef gelato platter. Is there anything else I can get for you today? All right, well, that one will be $8.91 at the window. Thank you very much and have a great day. All right, so I've got a black bean burrito with a chicken taco salad with a side of jalapeno ranch. I think Tim has a great demeanor of, you know, talking quickly enough to get the orders out, but not, you know, being rude about anything. All right, you said you wanted a potato burrito. Well, we have beef and chicken. Which one would you like? He's got a lot of energy. I don't know if I can keep up with him. I'm gonna let you take their order. Hi, welcome to Taco Bueno. My name's Tom. Can I take your order? Two party burritos and a mac and chips and chips. Your total will be $2.59. Appreciate it. Thank you. That's all you do. Okay. Hi, welcome to Taco Bueno. This is Tom. How may I help you? Two chips and quesos. Let me, hold on with me one second here. Do they have chip and queso anywhere? I can't find chips and queso. Tom needs to pick up things a little bit faster. Being in drive-thru, it's about hustle, it's about movement, it's about time. It's about getting everything in, getting everybody out. I see that you're actually a little slow. Yeah. You can actually speed that up. Hi, sorry for the wait. This is Tom. How may I help you today? Be energetic about it. Okay. Hi, welcome to Taco Bueno. This is Tom. How may I help you? You need to have more energy. Yeah. Welcome to Taco Bueno in Oahu. My name is Tim. How can I help you today? Hi, welcome to Taco Bueno. This is Tom. How may I help you today? Make it sound like you're actually happy to be here. Like, be energized. He kept trying to say get more energetic and I was trying and I obviously couldn't keep up with Tim. All right, let's go. I got this, I got this. All right, all right, we'll get going, right? Hi, welcome to Taco Bueno. This is Tom. How may I help you today? Tom was really nervous holding up the drive-thru line. I'm gonna have to step in. If I was the manager, I would not hire him. You're not ready, I'm sorry. I want you to watch how I do this, all right? Okay. All right, so I've got three macs of chips with no guacamole, with extra cheese, with two crispy beef tacos and a medium Mountain Dew. Is there anything else I can get for you today? No, thank you. You got lots of energy, man. You can't train energy and excitement like that. I've got two combo burritos with a beef munchako, no tomato, with two large chicken quesos with a beef crispy taco, no tomato. If I had a whole store of Tim's, boy, it'd be pretty crazy. But he's just got a great personality to handle that drive-thru. It's like NASCAR. Think of it like NASCAR. You see how they take the wheels off and they fix the engine real fast and they're in and out? Yeah. A Formula One racer takes about 15 seconds. You sound like you're into racing, man. Oh, I'm very big into racing. I'm into motorcycles and cars. Well, let's go over here and do a little straining of the taco meat. I'll show you how to do this. I'm looking for my scoop. A scoop for the meat? Yes, sir. Yeah. Why don't you just have like five of these or something? Our manager's actually trying to get more, but they don't ever listen to the employees. They never listen to the employees? Never. They never listen to the employees because they say the customers are more important than the employees. Okay. We have potholes in the parking lot and the drive-thru that haven't been fixed. But he's reported that and they don't fix it? Nope. Corporate's never listened. It gets to the point to where you feel like you're wasting your breath. It's frustrating. I know we're back in the office and we think that we have the managers and the field personnel that are making sure that all this stuff is happening. But as he said, you know, we keep telling corporate and they're not listening and that's not good. I can't believe you do this all day long. And I do it with a hurt wrist. What happened to your wrist? I was on a motorcycle. I was first starting to learn how to ride. It's almost two years ago. The night that it happened. Want me to do that? If you want. I gotta learn. Go ahead. I was coming home. The back tire of the motorcycle I was riding broke loose. The motorcycle caught this foot, rolled me. I've got a scar right here on my knee. But I went to the hospital. They checked out my knee. Everything was fine, but they never took my wrist. A couple of weeks ago, it started hurting me. Yeah. I said, I'm gonna go to the hospital to get it checked out. They said, well, I've got damaged nerves and it's caused a ganglion cyst. I don't have the money for a $10,000 surgery. Now I've got $18,000 in medical bills that I still haven't paid. So I'm just kind of hoping that my paychecks come together. And I wanna be a manager of somewhere. So what about being a manager here? I haven't completed a Bueno University. There's a Bueno University? Okay. Yeah. Bueno University is our management training program. All of our management personnel have to go through Bueno University. He's got all the ingredients to be a good one. And he seems to have the knowledge. It's just kind of harnessing that. I wanna become a manager because I wanna show my son, you know, this is what it's like to be successful. You have a kid? Sorry. Yeah. He's about to be 10 months old. Awesome, congratulations. I want my son to know what it's like to be in a better home, better environment. Tim's got a lot of heart. He cares. He's trying his best. And it's just, you know, he's got pride and he wants to do really well by his son and make his son proud. Everything looks good around here. Let's see what any other customers need. All right, perfect. Never drove a forklift before. Never? No. Coming up. Tom crashes and burns. Watch your sides. And later. Right now our drive screens are down. They're gonna have to give you a call. They might not call you back for a week. A week? The boss finds a restaurant in dire straits. We had a nice, fancy electric can opener. This can broke it. It's pretty dangerous. You can break that knife blade. Today I'm in Carrollton, Texas at our tortilla manufacturer and I'll be working with a first shift leader. This vendor makes, packages, and distributes all the tortillas for Taco Bueno. I saw some issues in my first two jobs that we need to take care of if we're going to grow this company. Today I'm hoping to see things running smoothly and that our product is in good hands. Hi, excuse me. Yes sir. You're looking for JJ? I'm JJ. Hi JJ, I'm Tom. I'm JJ. Nice to meet you. Today my job is to train you how to drive a forklift, put an order, and load the truck. Today my schedule is 52 orders. All right. It's like driving taco trucks or something. Yes sir. Never drove a forklift before. Never? No. You're gonna learn today. Your first step here is to learn how to drive a forklift. It's your steering wheel. Okay. And you're gonna drive with this one. And this is your reverse, forward, side to side. Let me show you one time. Okay. All of my speed. So go ahead and get on. Our goal today is to load the truck and you have two hours. Got a big order for Taco Bueno. They don't like damaged products so we have to be fast and careful at the same time. Go ahead and pull back a little bit. Pull back. Okay. And you're going. It's not hard, man. It's easy. Now turn. Turn the other way. There you go. No, the other way. It's okay. You can see everybody in front of you. You'll hit a speed bump. Speed bump. I'm afraid I'm gonna hit something. No, no. Don't be afraid. Where am I going? Down this way? Let's go get that pallet real quick. Watch your sides. I'm gonna break their billion dollar forklift. How do you get it to go slower? No, it don't go slower. I think Tom is a little bit scared and intimidated by the forklift. Don't be scared. Ain't nobody in there. Everything that we do, it's a fast pace. Now go get the next one. Holy crap. Somebody as slow as him won't cut it here. It's just intimidating. I can't get the wheel. It's not as easy as people might think. I'm not coordinated enough to handle this, I think. I'm gonna let you stand right here. Yeah. I'm gonna show you how I do it. Record times. JJ talked about they had to load 52 trucks today. I don't know how they could do it. It would take me literally 52 hours to load a half a truck. He's not only fast, but he's very careful to make sure that he doesn't damage the product. Having as many people that are great throughout the whole supply chain is perfect to make us a wonderful brand. So how long do you, like a typical day for you is what? I work from five to 4.30 every day. Wow, so 11 and a half hours. Yes. Okay. Once we finish our order and our day's coming to an end, we like to sweep up. Start at the end, you know, pick up all that brick trash, get rid of all this stuff off the floor. This all goes in the baler? Yeah. Just grab all this stuff? Yeah, it's, you know, we do push a lot of tortillas out here. Shump the stuff in there. Tortillas and everything. Yeah. You mentioned earlier Taco Bueno. Every day you'll get probably like four or five trucks from them. They go through a lot, it sounds like. Yes, they do. They want it fresh. I gotta try this stuff. You never eat Taco Bueno? Well, no, I'm from Michigan. Do you go there all the time? I do. I like it, you know. What's your favorite thing there? I'm gonna go try it. I'm gonna try it later and see what I got. So what did you do before this then? I worked at a place that moved to North Carolina. Okay. And I made the decision to stay because of my grandkids and my family. Well, family is everything to me. I got nine grandchildren. We just see each other every weekend as much as we can. Yeah. We don't go far. Yeah. So it sounds like you got a pretty close family. Oh yeah, it's a blessing. You sound like a family guy. Yes, I am. I am, I'm real close to my family. Yeah. You know, my dad passed away about 12 years now and it's hard, you know. Yeah, I lost my father a few years ago too. Oh, did you? How did your father die? He had a stroke. They told him that he was gonna live three months and he lasted 27 years. Wow, well that's pretty impressive that he was able to do that. That's why I have this motivation in me now. Yeah. I mean, if he could do it, sick, I could do it. It's great that he takes pride in what he's doing. I think it's great that he's a family guy. I think it's great that, you know, he's getting strength from his father. Sounds like grandpa's got the whole thing under control. Yes, he has to. My dad was a great guy. I am, you know, I'm talking to him all the time. I miss him every day. And I just hope, I hope I make him proud. Just think about him every day. Every day. Every day you wake up. Get your inspiration from him. I am here in beautiful Colorado Springs, Colorado, one of our newest markets for our chain. And I'm gonna be working with a general manager named Erica today. Do one of you boys wanna wash some dishes? Taco Bueno is a regional company and moving out from our own core markets is really important to grow the brand. Colorado Springs is outside of our core markets today. So I'd be really interested to see how the training programs have been working up here as we do back in our core markets. I'm looking for Erica. Hi, I'm Erica. I'm the GM here. Hi, Tom, how you doing? Good, I'm just gonna show you what I do here from day to day. Okay. I'm gonna show you how to keep the customers happy and keep your food costs down. Number one thing you need to do. All right. We're gonna get started because we have a lot to do. So when we take orders, it pops up on here. Okay. Right now our drive screens are down. So you can't take any orders now? We can take orders, but we just can't see them. The system is down. Is it gonna get fixed? Yes. We're calling the help desk. They are who we call when we have any computer issues and they know us well. They go down often? Yes. They hired Texas builders and this is Colorado. So some things were built wrong. So our computers are constantly going down, freezing, just, you know, computer issues, technology. This is Andrew. How can I help you today? Our order screens, they are not showing up. I have reset them and they still are blank. One of our analysts is gonna help you out, but they're gonna have to give you a call back. They might not call you back for a week. A week? We're so used to having everything close to us that emergency happens, we can be there within a couple hours. So we gotta make sure that we're treating Colorado Springs as if they're part of that core and actually give them a little bit extra because they are out farther and understand a lot of our systems and processes may need to change. So while we're waiting on them to call back, we're gonna prepare some salsa verde. Salsa verde. Yes. This is gonna be the recipe for it. Okay. We have a nice, fancy electric can opener and this can broke it. All we need to do is get one side and I'll show you what you do after that, okay? I'm already sweating. I only turned four times, so you gotta put some work in there. So you just fight with that every day? That seems silly. Have you asked anybody to get one or told them about it? Yes. This is a state-of-the-art restaurant. It's really nice. And this is what you get for state-of-the-art? Okay. That's what you get. I have no idea why we don't have a working can opener. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard of. Every restaurant should have one. I don't know why we don't. And this one doesn't even turn. You want to try it? Sure, let me try it. Let me see what happens. I don't even know if it's getting it. Oh, I guess. Maybe I should have had these open for you, huh? I don't think I'm getting it, am I? Nope. You gotta go back to the open spot. It's a workout. How do you do it? Muscles. I think that's pretty much as good as we're gonna probably get on it. We might have to use a knife. A knife? It's pretty dangerous. It is very dangerous. So I just pop it open a little bit, enough to get the chilies out. If it works. Sometimes it doesn't work. They're using knives to open things. That is unacceptable. We can't be doing that kind of stuff at all. Just get a can opener that's gonna work. As you see. You can break that knife blade. This is basically a brand new store. We shouldn't be having these problems. So let's make this salsa. I'm gonna have you do it. I'm gonna read it to you as we go, okay? Okay. So I'm just pouring this in? Yes, please don't cut yourself, okay? You're gonna do 27 ounces of hatch. Feel a rip. All right, and then we're going to add one cup of diced onions. Make sure it's all cleaned all the way out. Then we need six cups of cold water, okay? Tom was measuring to the T. I love that. And some people might put it in there and it'd be over just a little bit. That just a little bit every day equals a lot at the end of the week. We're gonna set this on the floor. Okay. Okay, are you ready to drill? Now push this button. Now take your finger off of the, oh. Oh, didn't do it right. Yeah, it'll stay on for you, watch. That mixer, it's hard. Finger off of the, oh. It cut off on him a couple times, but I think he got the hang of it. Woo-wee. That's very hot. Hot. Have a seat. What am I doing? All right. Okay, this is one of the rare times I get to sit. We have Bueno Connect. It shows all our recipes. It has every way to make everything. Any question you can have is on our Bueno Connect. But not right now, because this is Bueno Connect. Okay, not getting a lot of information. You will not get a lot of information because it won't come up. We as a company have made an investment in Bueno Connect. I mean, that's kind of our Bible, our manuals, all that stuff. What you need to do is in Bueno Connect. And if that's not working, that's something we've gotta correct fast. So I made this lovely book right here. My employees don't have to feel uneasy about running this ship. So everything on there you've got in here? Yes, it's the computer and the book. She's taken it upon herself to basically take all the courses and put them in her own book. That's a great attribute that she has. I know we've spent a lot of resources and time here, but I'm not sure we're fully understanding what they're facing. And that's where I think we actually have let her down. So have you always lived in Colorado Springs? I'm from Farrell, Pennsylvania. How'd you get out here then? My mom lives up here. And I have one sister here and my little nephew. I spoiled him a lot. Me and my sister and my mom, we're a unit. So you try to help them with your sister's son and all that, yeah. I try to do all the things with him that if his dad was around, he would do with him. Do you have any kids? No, I don't have any kids. I'm trying to work on that. Trying to work on it? Well, I had a health scare and my husband's in the Army. So my option is, is the Army could try to fix me or I need to go ahead and have a full hysterectomy. The problem is in six weeks, no pay, out of work. If they can fix me, then I would love to have a kid. Is it medication that helps do that? I was taking hormones and I had to stop that. You can't get your hormone treatment and then come stand up all day at work. Is it like you have to take a day off or something? Or is it more than that? You need to relax. You need to go home and sleep. But why are you working so many hours then? I'm a salaried employee. So I work 50 plus hours. And I would have been making more money as an assistant. Because as an assistant, you're getting paid hourly. Oh, I see what you're saying. So because you get overtime if you end up working 70 or something. Exactly. I got it. So right now, I have employees make more money than me. That doesn't make any sense. Erica's still keeping her positive attitude, even though the corporate office has kind of been letting her down. Erica's extremely vital in a new market like this, because things aren't going to go as smoothly as if you're back in one of your core markets. It's now our job to come in as a corporation and help her to get over that finish line so she can be a great general manager. Let's go check on the grill and see if it's ready, okay? I learned several things this week. I focus on the customers a lot. But I realized that I need to listen a lot more to the employees. There's just a lot of stuff that we can do as a company, and there's a lot of things that I can do as an individual to make things better. What I wasn't expecting was the personal side of the equation. I spent a lot of time this week talking about my father. I spent a lot of time talking about my family. I just want to be a good CEO, but also be a good dad to my kids. And we're all human, and I just need to do it right. Coming up. Hi. I wasn't sure, you kind of look familiar. Wow. The boss will reveal his true identity. I'm actually Mike Roper. I'm the president and CEO at Taco Bolleo. How will his employees react? So my week undercover has ended, and now it's time to get back to running Taco Bolleo. I'm back. I am extremely proud about the people that work for our company. I can't wait to make this place better. Hi. Tell me a little about Tom. Tom was a very different. He just seemed to take it at his own pace. You're Tom. Hi, Tom. Hi. I'm actually Mike Roper. I'm the president and CEO at Taco Bolleo. Wow. We are on undercover. Mind blown. It's nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Rebecca, one of the things I noticed about you that I was really impressed with is that you multitasked, something that you said I couldn't do. Believe me, I was trying as hard as I could. It's a pretty difficult job. I was trying. One scoop of beans, one scoop of meat, one scoop of chili, one scoop of queso. We're gonna go fast, fast, fast. Hopefully I don't break them, right? I just cracked one. I heard it. You talked to me a little bit as well about the uniforms. Yeah, they are so hot. We're gonna take a look at them and try to figure out if we can get new uniforms in. And I'd love to get your opinion on it when we get some new ones, okay? Okay, I feel important. One thing that we were talking through was about how you had to go through cancer. Yeah, I've stayed strong, though. One of the things I wanted to do for you is I'm gonna give you 10 grand to go on vacation. You're too good of a person to deal with some of the stuff you've gone through. Thank you so much. That's amazing. So you also told me you had some debt. Oh, my hospital debt. I'm pretty sure it's not more than $20,000, but I don't know for sure. We're gonna go ahead and take care of your hospital debt for you. Thank you so much. That's amazing. Now, I'm gonna do something else. We're gonna actually promote you from your assistant manager spot. You're gonna be a regional training manager. It comes with a 70% increase in your pay. It comes with a 10% bonus. It has car allowance. It has paid internet, paid cell phone, the whole nine yards. This is amazing. I never thought anything like this could happen to me. I need to give you a hug. I feel like I can breathe and that everything's gonna be okay. Thank you so much. You deserve it. I owe him so much. It has changed my whole life. I don't know, I believe again. JJ, you impressed me a lot. You've taken pride in what you're doing with our product. This customer, they're very picky on their stuff. They don't like damaged products, so we have to be very careful. We have to be fast and careful at the same time. So you mentioned Taco Bueno when I was there and that you eat at Taco Bueno. Yes, I do. How often do you go? I try to go like three times out of a week. Three times a week? Mm-hmm. You know, knowing that you're a Taco Bueno fan, we're gonna give you a gift card worth $2,500. Wow. It's Taco Bueno. Appreciate it. I will use it. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you very much. You're welcome. JJ, tell me a little bit more about your family. Four beautiful kids, nine grandkids. They come first, and then my job. So it sounds like you're really a big family guy. Yes. You have to be, because that's your backbone. I'm a family guy. So one of the things I'd also like to do for you is give you $5,000 towards a family reunion. Call. You gotta be kidding me. Appreciate it. This experience has changed my life. Today I got two great gifts, and I've got a new friend that's the CEO of Taco Bueno. You know, I'm the bottom of the tunnel pole, you know, but now I'm just, I'm flying high right now, and it feels great. So Tim, one thing that you had told me when we were working together, you had said that the company doesn't listen to the employees, they only listen to customers. We have potholes in the parking lot and the drive-thru that haven't been fixed. But he's reported that and they don't fix it? No. Corporate's never listened. Well, I've got teams that are on their way out to fix the potholes and some of the other stuff that we had discovered while we were out there together. So we're gonna take care of that from a, you know, from a business perspective. Thank you. So you'd mentioned at one point in time, too, that you wanted to be a, you know, move up in the company. I do. I would like to be your mentor. I'll work with you on trying to get you into the shift supervisor classes, and you get paid to take the classes, and then that'll be, you know, a pay raise and all that stuff as well. I'm about to cry. You're gonna make me cry. I'm sorry. Don't be sorry. And this shift supervisor, I'm gonna pass it. Oh, I have confidence in you. I've got a ton of respect for you. I mean, a ton. And so when you pass the shift supervisor class, then what I'd like to do is give you an all-expense paid trip, you know, for you and another person to, you know, to any type of NASCAR racing event, whatever it is and wherever it is. I don't wanna say that. Thank you. So, Tim, you had mentioned to me that you had, I think you said it was $18,000 in medical debt? Almost $18,000. So, Tim, I'd like to take care of that for you, and we're gonna pay off that hospital debt. We're gonna go up to $20,000, so you don't have to worry about, you know, staying up at night anymore and figuring out, you know, how you're gonna make the ends meet. I don't wanna say that. All I can say is thank you. I'm moving forward in the right direction is all I can say, and I can't thank him enough. Just, I'm honored. I mean, it's like something that was missing has been filled. Take it easy, dude. You as well. I've been blessed. Can't say any more on it. This has changed my life. Erica, you're a great manager. You got a great attitude. I love the fact that you took ownership in your store. Are you ready to drill? Push this button. Just pouring this in? Please don't cut yourself, all right? That's very hot. Woo-wee! Well, one thing, we're gonna get you the can opener. Oh, you rock. And because of what I saw with you and how I experienced Bueno Connect, we're gonna spend $350,000, and we're gonna upgrade the entire chain. Everybody works so hard, and they try hard, and I got people that come when they're sick, and they're right there with me. You mentioned to me the pay rates and all that aren't equal to other competitors that are out there in the market. And so, effective immediately, we're gonna give you a 20% raise, so that goes into account right away to try to get you up to where you need to be. Oh, thank you, Mike. So, a couple other things we talked about just in general. One was, you know, family time. My day's off or not, my day's off. At all. When do you take care of Erica? If I knew what that was, I would tell you, but that doesn't exist in my world. And I wanna make sure that you have plenty of time to go have fun. So what we're also gonna do for you is we're gonna give you $10,000. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, sir. Now, one other thing, you know, that I heard you talk about. You have some medical issues, you know, that you're trying to take care of. When you go to the doctor, we're gonna give you 30 days off with pay. Oh, my God. I don't even know what to do with myself. It's so hard. You don't even understand. It's so hard. You don't even know how much that just changed my life. Just to be able to just rest. I feel like doing a happy dance, but I know I can't make it very far in these shoes. Do a happy dance if you wanna do a happy dance. It's okay. Here we are. I'm so happy. He's like my knight in shining armor. You are the man. I got makeup all over you. I'll be fine. I'll be fine. Thank you so much. Thank you. I'm gonna keep on learning and getting better, and I'm gonna try to make sure I'm healthy and maybe have me some little kids.