When Everything Comes Due at Once
Over the last few weeks, I’ve found myself waking up in the middle of the night thinking about cash flow… Not because anything is necessarily wrong. In fact, most of the things keeping me awake are actually good things. The problem is that they all seem to be happening at the same time.
For most of my career, growth has always been something that happened sequentially. You completed one project, stabilized it and then moved on to the next. One chapter ended before another began. My experience has repeatedly taught me that growth rarely works that way. More often, every decision you’ve made over the previous several years seems to converge at exactly the same moment. And that is certainly how this season feels.
At The 601 Group, we’re still integrating The Local Epicurean Grand Rapids into the business following our acquisition earlier this year. We’re continuing to invest in and grow The Local Epicurean East Lansing, which I remain convinced has tremendous potential despite growing more slowly than I originally hoped. We’re evaluating future opportunities for The Local Epicurean brand, while also developing plans for a new concept that will eventually occupy our current For Crêpe Sake in East Lansing.
And perhaps most visibly, we’re preparing to relocate For Crêpe Sake to a new home at 601 East Grand River in East Lansing.
Individually, each of those initiatives makes sense. None of them feel reckless. Most have been discussed, debated, modeled and planned for months or years. The challenge is that the consequences of those decisions rarely arrive on the same schedule as the decisions themselves.
The decision to acquire The Local Epicurean Grand Rapids happened months before the responsibility of integrating it became real. The decision to pursue a new home for For Crêpe Sake happened long before the invoices started arriving. The decision to pursue a liquor license seemed straightforward enough until it introduced months of applications, hearings, legal reviews, approvals, revisions, and waiting… An extraordinary amount of waiting.
From January through June, much of our energy around the move was spent on work that nobody will ever see. Lease negotiations. Attorneys. Applications. Municipal approvals. State approvals. Conversations with regulators. Documents that generated more documents. By the time we received our final approvals from both the City of East Lansing and the Michigan Liquor Control Commission, we had already spent nearly half of our original budget without moving a single piece of equipment.
That isn’t a complaint. It is simply the reality of growth.
One of the things I’ve come to appreciate about entrepreneurship is how different it looks from the inside than it does from the outside. From the outside, a new location appears to be a visible sign of progress. People see momentum. They see confidence. They see expansion. But what they don’t see is the long stretch before that when progress feels almost entirely administrative. Before a wall is painted or a sign is installed, there are permits, contracts, approvals, financing decisions, spreadsheets and countless details that consume both time and money. The visible part of growth is often preceded by months of invisible work. And the invisible work can be surprisingly expensive.
There are moments when I look at everything we’ve committed to and wonder whether I’ve finally stretched us too far. The numbers still work. The plans still make sense. Yet entrepreneurship has a way of making even rational decisions feel questionable at 2am when you can’t sleep. Every business owner I know has lived through some version of that feeling. The irony is that the move itself is something I am genuinely excited about.
When Gina and I purchased For Crêpe Sake in 2018, we saw a business with a loyal following, a unique concept and tremendous potential. Over the years, we’ve been fortunate to watch that potential become reality. We’ve served first dates, celebrations, birthdays, graduations and ordinary Saturday mornings that became traditions for families and friends.
At the same time, we’ve watched the business slowly push against the limitations of its space. Guests regularly comment on the heat during busy periods in summer. Multiple crêpe makers operating simultaneously create ventilation challenges that are difficult to solve within the existing footprint. Seating capacity limits how many people we can comfortably serve, particularly during our busiest hours. For years, we attempted to solve those problems through better systems, better processes and incremental improvements. Eventually, however, it became clear that the next chapter of the business would require a different environment.
The new location at 601 East Grand River gives us that opportunity. The space is larger and more open. The ventilation is significantly better. We’ll be able to accommodate more guests comfortably and create experiences that simply weren’t possible before. If all goes according to plan, we’ll close our current location later this summer (an exciting replacement announced shortly after) and reopen at 601 East Grand River. The approval of our liquor license opens opportunities for wine service, mimosas, Bloody Marys and thoughtful beverage pairings that feel like a natural extension of the hospitality experience we want to create. When I walk through this space, I can already see what it might become. I can picture guests gathering around tables, lingering over conversations, celebrating milestones and creating the sorts of memories that ultimately define a restaurant.
What I find more difficult is living in the space between that vision and its realization. That space tends to be expensive. It demands capital before it generates revenue. It consumes time before it creates results. It requires confidence before there is much evidence that the confidence is warranted.
Perhaps that is why this season has occupied so much of my thinking. It isn’t any single project that feels daunting. It is the convergence of all of them. What has become increasingly apparent to me this year is that worthwhile opportunities have a tendency to arrive simultaneously. The challenge is not deciding whether they are good opportunities. The challenge is finding the resources to pursue them all responsibly.
Capital becomes constrained. Attention becomes constrained. Time becomes constrained. Before long, every decision begins competing with every other decision. Projects that make perfect sense independently suddenly find themselves drawing from the same pool of resources, forcing tradeoffs that weren’t obvious when the ideas first emerged.
And if I’m being completely honest, the timing can feel a little absurd. In a matter of weeks, we’ll be moving forward with construction and buildout plans for the new For Crêpe Sake location while continuing to operate our existing businesses, integrating Grand Rapids, planning for future growth and preparing for a long-planned family trip to Italy and Romania. A year ago, all of these initiatives existed only as ideas. Today, they all require focused attention and constrained resources.
For years, I wanted growth. I wanted more opportunities. I wanted to build a collection of hospitality businesses capable of creating meaningful experiences for more people in more places. The reality is that growth doesn’t arrive one idea at a time. It arrives when all of those ideas begin demanding resources simultaneously.
Which is where I find myself today. Some days that feels exciting. Some days it feels terrifying. Most days it’s both. Yet despite all of that, I remain optimistic. Not because the risks aren’t real. They are. Not because the stress isn’t real. It is. But because nearly every meaningful thing we’ve built began with a season that felt uncomfortable before it felt successful.
For Crêpe Sake began that way. The Local Epicurean East Lansing began that way. The acquisition of The Local Epicurean Grand Rapids certainly began that way. Looking back, the pattern is surprisingly consistent. The moments that felt most uncertain while we were living through them often became the moments that mattered most afterward.
Looking back, the pattern is surprisingly consistent. The moments that felt most uncertain while we were living through them often became the moments that mattered most afterward. So as I prepare to spend the next several weeks balancing construction schedules, budgets, operational challenges, travel plans and all of the other realities that accompany a growing business, I’m trying to remember that.
This season feels full because it is.
Everything seems to be happening at once because, in many ways, it is.
And perhaps that isn’t a sign that something is wrong.
Perhaps it is simply what growth looks like when it finally arrives.
- Mike