Happy to have your aboard here for the
really big barbecue show. Boy.
We cook because we have to and we
grill because we want to.
Me. Fine. I just want.
You have a great shot over can.
Boy So what what what seems to be
the problem here This man looks like you
dead and we in the in the crackle.
Sean
succulent finished what?
Piece for wheeler.
So is Liberty
beef.
Down shit likes dog shit peach leaves.
We have all and working on it right
now.
Welcome to the second hour of the show.
It's the Barbecue Central show where we talk
about an important barbecue and grilling items that
you didn't even know were important.
I meant to do this in the first
hour.
Boing.
I deal with that.
Hit me
Standby.
There it is.
Yep.
Hello?
Could remember where I put that.
Wanna thank Medic correspondent from Tennessee,
Matt Os
for
this birthday gift. Don't know if you're familiar
with this
particular
rub or not, but it's called
mommy.
And there's is a picture of, I guess,
she... That a witch?
I don't know.
All purpose
all flavor. And then as we turn it
around on the back,
made with only
the freshest
Florida grown, shit take mushrooms.
Umami rub is a bold and savory,
flavor explosion
that will amplify any meal from scramble eggs,
to competition barbecue,
sure to fire up the taste buds. Oh
mommy.
Can be used as a stand alone seasoning
as a finish
when your food needs that extra punch or
layered with other fine seasonings.
I put it on eggs
this morning, and I can tell you
delicious.
I'm not sure exactly where you get this,
but the
Instagram is
Umami Rub, all 1 word.
Double 0HMAMIRUB,
or mommy Rub.
So thank you to Matt. For doing that
med also pitched in on some premium hand
rolled cigars.
I certainly appreciate, but then came all by
his lone on the Obama. So I have
that 1 that I'm showing you on unopened
and then there's 1 upstairs
that I have been
using over the top of things that I
think might need an umami kick.
Still come in the show. This evening. Our
pal, Joe Martinez
from Smoking and Joe's pit barbecue. We say
good evening to those of you watching tonight
through 1 of our video streaming platforms.
You can go to Facebook dot com
slash bb central show or twitter dot com
slash bbq q central show. You can also
watch via the Youtube, which is Youtube dot
com slash
at Bbq Central show, update on the Youtube
poll question of the week this week. The
grid market will remain a hot 1 for
consumers
for the balance of 20 24 and currently
76
percent of you are saying yes,
you believe it is.
We'll check that through the rest of the
show here. This evening. We'll get smoking and
Joe's pit
barbecue
insights on that in just a few short
moments coming up. The best moments of Barbecue
Central show and 10 minutes or less is
coming Friday. We take you back to June
20 ninth of 20 10.
This week,
we feature what was supposed to be a
segment with Derek Riches, but instead,
we got a colon
from barbecue legend barbecue hall of Fame Melissa
Cooks.
I don't know why Derek missed the show.
That was a long time ago, 15 years
ago, more than 15 years ago now.
But
Bliss was listening to the show that evening.
She lives a call to the show to
fill the gap, but not only that.
We talk about everyone's favorite live fire host,
a guy who I nicknamed Dude Douche.
Kevin Roberts was talked about after his disastrous
today show appearance
where he talked about par boiling ribs.
I know it's crazy,
but he actually did it. And he did
it very
staunch, very convicted.
Almost ind,
and it was days away before I think
what ended up being season 2. So this
would have been the first year that Barbecue
pit masters went from
the
reality show of following teams around to the
games
show
that it morph into and remained as.
So here he is on the today show.
Mustard is a binder, blah bye, and then
talking about
par boiling ribs.
It blew up the Internet.
Everybody's like.
Who's this? Well,
it blew up the barbecue
Internet. How can this guy be the host?
He's talking about
power boiling ribs, No self respecting barbecue order.
You're boiling out the flavor and this and
that.
No doubt.
I asked John Mark is how could you
possibly have a host
that's talking such a nonsense man.
He took issue
Kevin Robert took issue.
Started blasting back, and that's when he earned
the nickname Do Douche, which she now
wears.
To this day, I'm the show whether he
knows it or not. Probably doesn't even remember
being a guest on the show. Now, to
his credit, he came on the show, I
immediately asked him about it, really pinned them
down. And he said, yeah. I was still.
But I I said that. I shouldn't have
said.
You know, I looked back on the show,
and after hearing this particular segment because I
preview everything.
That John put together. I'm here to tell
you. It was a different show back then.
In many ways, in many respects, different sound,
different hosting ability, We had live phone calls.
Way more
attentive to covering
competition barbecue. It was different than. I'm not
saying it was better than.
Not saying it was bad then. I'm just
saying it was different. The show has evolved
and it's hearing shows like that.
Where I'm like, man, we should reinstall the
phone line just in case, and then I
think better that. You can subscribe to the
show by visiting the barbecue central show dot
com slash
subscribe.
And if you wanna hear a guest or
segment on the show that has been lost
in the archives email John and let them
know what you would like to hear. In
fact, email, John and tell him you would
like to have him find the do douche
segment.
Really put him the task.
See if he can possibly bring something up.
The famous Days All star Barbecue series rolled
into Hermit attached, Tennessee this past weekend,
and winning the event.
Texas
moons sw good for you.
And coming in reserve grand champion,
little team, maybe heard of them, red bone
barbecue.
Hey everybody can't trouble you for.
Good job, Red bone.
Both
Texas moons whine and red bone barbecue
have now qualified for the 20 24 world
food championships in the barbecue
division that will take place in November, and
that will take place in the greatest city
aside from Cleveland known as Indianapolis, Indiana,
The next famous day All star Barbecue series
event is this coming Saturday, July twentieth
and 1 of my favorite dust the nations
across the nation Louisville, Kentucky, and as of
this past Sunday night, and I didn't check
it today.
You might wanna check me here. But as
of this past Sunday night, the event opened
up one's spot for availability
if you can believe it,
if you're gonna be around the greater louisville
area and you wanna take part in this
famous Dave's, all star Barbecue series challenge, there
might be a spot left.
By the way, the Columbia Maryland event on
August 20 fourth still showing is having 1
spot left, but that other 1 in El
Paso has
filled up. So right now, 1 left for
this coming weekend and 1 left at the
end of the whole series on August 20
fourth. You can find past results in the
remaining schedule of future events by visiting
world food championships dot com slash all stars.
And
now we're all caught up.
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The p is a fuel mis.
But you gotta check it out for yourself
p grill dot com.
We're back with Joe Martinez.
Right after this stick around I'll be right
that? You're listening to the barbecue hughes Central
show.
Right
Howard stern, jim Rome, 10 pet and Greg
Ramsey.
The mountain Rushmore of talk show entertainment.
Now, let's get back to the barb Q
Central show.
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there?
Joining me in the second hour is the
guy who was our pa
subject back in 20 23, we followed him.
As he launched his food truck in El
paso, Texas garnered Rave reviews from customers.
Got some pub from Texas monthly barbecue editor
Daniel Vaughn, then in March, he closed.
But then he opened again a few weeks
later and then 4 months later, he's closed
for good.
Confused as I am, of course.
So let's t through the past handful of
months and see what has brought us to
the stage as we Welcome back our pal
and the, I guess, former owner of smoking
and Joe's pit barbecue.
Joe Martinez, Joe before we jump into the
Shenanigans and Tom Fu
of what's going on with you. We have
a most important Youtube poll question of the
week that we're asking everybody, which is this,
you think the grid market will remain a
hot 1 for consumers, the balance of 20
24, yes or no.
Part of the 27 percent, I'm gonna say
no. No
Yeah. 27
percent saying no, 73 percent saying yes.
And we'll see how that plays out here
through the rest of the evening.
Alright, Joe. So here we are.
June sixteenth of 20 24, and it seems
like only a year ago. We were talking
about what the
next handful of months was like a smoking
Joe's pit barbecue was probably
really hitting its stride at this point. For
the folks who don't recall, you had been
launched out. Before we started in January, you
had been doing, it was it for, like,
4 or 5 or 6 months or something
like that. So it wasn't a true track
of real time, but we were able to
get everything kinda caught up within those first
couple interviews to be able to end more
in real time reporting. So,
let's look back before we talk,
never mind that. We'll do that here in
a second.
Joe, what happened?
You made a post,
closed for good.
A, are we really closed for good? And
if so,
why are we really closed for good this
time around?
Yeah. So the first part of your question,
yeah, I'm I'm closed for good.
There's no going back. You know,
I I reopen it, try to,
you know, revamp it see if it gets
some energy and traction and it just never
happened.
So definitely not not gonna open up. And,
again,
you know, even though it it hurts me,
you know, to to say that, It's just
it's the best thing for my business. You
know, it just wasn't generating the revenue that
I need you know, to to survive and
and,
you know, weigh my options and and where
I was at before. It's just better to
to close it down and and move on
and, you know, learn from from your mistakes
if you will.
Allow me to be Johnny critical man as
I interview you.
It would seem to me... And nobody who
knows this better than you. You were a,
sales guy for
many, many years at O'reilly in the management,
of course.
Could I tell you Joe, you wanna make
more revenue, open more days out of the
week? I think you were open. Like, a
Thursday, Friday, Saturday, maybe? I think it was
Friday, Saturday. Also,
why not go to 5 days a week
and see if you can make a run
at?
Yeah. That's a great question. I think that's
a question that a lot of folks have.
You know, the the thing that that a
lot of people don't understand. Yes. I'm in
Texas. Okay? But I'm in far West Texas.
So
when you think about Texas and and Barbecue,
I mean, you about Texas, Barbecue is the
second thing you think about.
It is popular, but not here in El
Paso. Mh. And, you know, part of me
opening up was to change that. You know,
we're not Austin. We're not Dallas. We're not
Houston. We're not
any of those big cities. We're a big
city.
El, paso is a really big city.
But when it comes to to Barbecue, it's
just not something that
that people are accustomed to... And and not
everybody, you know, I do wanna say that
that,
you know, I had we had our loyal
customers. You know, our customers that didn't care
about the price of barbecue.
You know, they've come over 2, 3 pounds
at a time and and not say anything
about the price, you know.
But El paso is is
you know, it's good Mexican food is not
text Me food, like you find down in
San Antonio and the rest of Texas, you
know,
we have really good Mexican food, and that's
what people out here
are accustomed to. You know, just good, solid
Mexican food. And and, again, we tried we
tried twice to make this thing work and
it just wasn't working.
When I look at your
postings,
and maybe this is my fo.
When I look at social media.
To me, the outsider looking in, Joe Martinez
killing it it was a cash cow
sold out again.
Everybody reviewing it saying best thing ever. I
mean, hell, you got Daniel Vaughan to poke
12 hours away from Dallas to come out
and see and El Paso and he puts
you on the the shooting stars list last
year. So
there appeared to be everything
going right to end up leading into really,
very
I don't know outrageous success, But at least
something that you could hang your hat on
and continue to grow, stay at if you
wanted to, but wasn't gonna be, like, oh,
I think I'm really gonna have to close
down. You could work it for the next
10:15 years and ago, okay. I'm just done
working. Maybe I'll sell it. Mh.
Is this the
the fo that a lot of people fall
into when we're following you? We think it's
just
cash hand fist, and it's really not?
Yeah. I think I think that's that's,
you know, accurate statement. So When we first
opened up, you know, I went, you know,
full blown barbecue. Full blown Texas barbecue. I
mean, I had every meat that you could
pass... We think of when you think Barbecue,
burnt ends, park belly burnt ends,
you know, 7 different sides, you know, homemade
cornbread bread, I had it all. I had
everything.
Banana pudding everything. Mh. And things were going
really good. We're making money.
You know, I was excited to open up,
and and, you know, we had
you know, the first day, we cooked a
bunch of brisket that we opened anyway, bunch
of brisket, bunch of pork butts and we
sold out and probably 3 hours and that.
That was like, wow. That's... This is this
is really gonna hit. And after that, you
know, we stayed pretty busy.
But then, you know, as I mentioned in
the last podcast that I was on, you
know, business slowed, and that's what led to
me closing down the first time.
It slowed down, then we had, you know,
some personal stuff happened with an inter our
in our family that we talked about.
So that was a easy decision for me
to shut it down then. You know, we
weren't making as much money.
We had some personal stuff happen with our
family.
And so I just shut it down. Now,
I'll take you guys back a little bit.
When we reopen the second time,
on March first,
you know, I had a a much smaller
menu. Mh. And
things were going great you know, that's when
we had the, I think it's a second
interview that we had or third of you.
I don't remember exactly how many. But things
were going really good. You know, we were
selling out every day.
The new menu,
I thought was working, you know, because we
were selling out, and and
we were a lot more profitable. We had
less waste at the end of the day.
Things were going great.
And then
I don't know. It it just, you know,
customers would show up, Greg, and
they'd say, hey,
can I get some smoke mac and cheese?
Oh, we don't have smoke mac and cheese
anymore Because, you know, I I can... I
reduced the menu down
And so I didn't have...
I think the only side I had was
beans, but because beans was something that went
in our
loaded potato and and
our loaded fries. So we were selling beans
as a, you know, they're Texas cowboy beans.
So we were selling that. But people would
show up and say, hey, can I get
ribs? Well, we weren't doing ribs every day
either. You know, we were doing ribs only
on Fridays,
And we were selling out, You know, we
were selling out of ribs, and I thought
it was working.
But, you know, when we cook 10 racks
of ribs, it got to the point where
we're cooking 10 racks of ribs,
And at closing time, we'd still have 4
in the smoker and I'm, like, holy cow.
What's going down? What's going on here?
You know, brisket, we were smoking a lot
of brisket
here towards the end, Greg, we were
we were probably cooking
3 brisket a day, and
that's just not gonna generate the revenue. Yeah.
It's not gonna generate the revenue that we
need to survive. And and, yes, you know,
we can blame all sorts of things. I'm
not a guy that's know, gonna make excuses
about things. But,
you know, that this was a a big
learning curve for me.
And if if I had to do it,
all over we're gonna be way different. But,
you know, if it's to the point where
we cook 3 biscuits a day and and
we'd still have
you know, sometimes we'd have a brisket left
over a half a biscuit left over. It's
like, man, what's going on here? You know?
But so let's roll all the way back.
And play post mortem,
second guess,
20 20, Arm share quarterback, whatever you wanna
call.
When you look at the initial stages of
opening. And when we talked about it, you
appeared to have
a lot of things well thought out. You
gotten the right buy in from your wife.
You had made all the right financial
decisions. We talked in up about all of
that. You weren't going in,
leveraged with a whole bunch of debt or
anything like that. You would use the money
that you had made save bubble blah really
fund this thing and get it off the
ground. Within that
first 6 months of opening,
Is there anything in that span of time
where you would go back and say, I
would change this and this would put us
in a different spot either now
or would have set us up to be
in a better position moving forward.
So
there is, but at the same at the
same time, you know,
because... And I'll talk about what the changes
that I'd make,
the the the change that I would make.
Let me around that just for us I
Joke. Because I I think this is important
people to listen to because if you're thinking
about doing something like this.
My goal in asking Joe the hard questions
is for him to give us the answers
and really the straight information on what he
has went through
to help The next person
make sure they're seeing all the different sides
of this potential. Because I think it's very
sexy.
People think they can do it. People think
they're great cooks and then there's a lot
more things that are involved in what actually
makes you a success or does it make
you a success. So start I'd to interrupt,
but, go ahead from there.
Yeah. So the the thing that I would
change is not have so many proteins.
You know, there was there was meats that
I had that I could have done without.
And then the number of sides that I
had, I could have done... If I would've
have just done half of the meats and
half of the sides I think that we
would have been okay. But
on the same...
In the same conversation, Greg,
because of all the sides and because of
all the meats that I had,
people were coming. You know, Daniel Vaughan showed
up because he would see my, the pictures
of my platter on Instagram or Facebook or
you know, wherever he was seeing these, and
we made some beautiful platter, you know, we
were really proud
of everything that we're were making, we had,
2 different flavor sausages.
You know, we had ribs every day. We
had beef ribs every day,
pork belly burnt ends. We had turkey. We
had half chickens,
So, yeah. So because of that, Greg,
because of the platter pictures that I was
posting.
You know, that got the attention of a
lot of people, not just Daniel Von, Daniel
Wan obviously
an important part of Texas barbecue.
But there's a lot of barbecue people that
will travel for good barbecue. So people were
coming from Canada, you know, and and we
became good friends, people from California. All over
the all over the the the country they
were coming in to try my barbecue because
I had finally opened up a barbecue place.
You know, they were watching my Youtube videos
and saying, man, I wish I wish you
would sell your food. I wish I could
order sausages from you.
Etcetera. Well, once once I opened up, you
know, there will... They'd be there'd be truck
drivers that we're driving through that aren't from
Texas,
they would message me and say, hey, Can
I get some of your sausages?
I'll just pull in the parking lot, and
I just, you know, get 12 or whatever.
Yeah. I'll I'll have them ready for you.
So, you know, things were going really good.
If it wasn't for the the size of
my menu,
I don't think that I would have gotten
as much attention as I as I did,
But at the same token, you know, it
was it was it was a double edged
sword that hurt me in the long run
because of the waste, You know, the waste
that we started having
in in the beginning, we had very little
ways we were selling out. But when things
start slowing down, and and there's a lot
of factors of a why business will slow
down. You know, whether being number 1 we're
in the food truck park. And I think
that's important for people to know.
We're in a food truck park. I'm in
a food truck, 8 and half by 20
food truck,
had it been in a a brick and
mortar. I think things would be different. And
and that's 1 of the things
if I had to do this all over
again.
I don't think I would start in the
food truck. It's it's a lot of work,
very demanding. Barbecue by itself is a lot
of work. Imagine doing it, in a portable
kitchen. It just... It... It's difficult. You know?
So those are just some of the changes
that I make now. There there have been
a few people that have reached out You
know, I did some,
consulting for a few people that opened up
barbecue places that opened up food trucks. They
would come and spend
3 days with me, and I still do
that for for people. You know, I'd tell
them, you know, especially now that I close
a second time for good. A lot of
people are reaching out, saying, hey, Joe, what
happened and tell me walk me through so
that I don't make these same mistakes, you
know, help me out here.
And and I'm honest with them. You know,
because I don't want them to fail. I
don't want anybody
out there that's listening to this podcast that's
thinking about opening up a food truck.
To hear this and say, okay, I'm not
gonna open up a food truck. I'm just
not gonna do it.
You know, reach out to me and I'll
help you to, you know, and I'm I'm
Greg's is asking all the questions here and
and I'm I'm hoping that we answer all
of them.
But in a lot of things I'm gonna
share with you because I don't want you
to fail. I want everybody's succeed, and everybody's
situation is different.
I think in my area because Barbecue isn't
as popular as the rest of Texas.
That may have hurt me being in a
food truck park hurt me. And, you know,
there's things that I can't control the weather
and stuff like that that that will slow
the business down. But, again, I'm not making
excuses on on the any of that stuff
because there's things that I could have done
to change things right out of the out
of gate.
When we look at
those next 6 months or even up to
a year past.
Were there any other things that you did
that you would change
that you think could have saved the business
or help you stretch out a little long?
Yeah. I think that what I should have
done, So when I when I opened up
again,
the second time,
you know, I Had mentioned that I reduced
my menu.
I think I reduced it to the point
where it hurt my business because people would...
As I mentioned earlier, would would walk up
and say, hey, let me get some
Let me get half a rack of ribs.
Let me get
a pound of turkey. Let me get some
mac and cheese, and I didn't have any
of those. Are they just ordering? Like, Are
they just coming up and telling you hoping
you have it? Like, isn't there a menu
posted somewhere that they can read?
There's a menu right next to the window
and it's like, oh, you know, we'd have
to remind them or our menus right there
Are updated menus right there. And
And, you know, the the most, Greg was
when people would walk up and say that,
and we didn't have any of it, and
they'd turn around a walk away.
And and that was, like, wow, man. That
that hurts, You know, because
that's what they went for. They they were
loyal customers and
you know, they're back again, and they're wanting
that same same food, same sides that they
were getting before, cornbread.
I have any of that, and we don't
have it and and we had several customers
walk away. So.
You know, 1 thing that I started doing,
Greg was I brought back the mac and
cheese.
I brought it back, you know, against my
better judgment, I brought it back, and it
started to sell. People... You know, I posted
it, hey, our Mac and cheese is back.
And,
you know, people were coming back for that,
we brought back our our banana pudding. So
I think that by removing or taking all
the sides off pretty much
that kinda hurt our business, so a lot
of the loyal customers that were coming because
of the sides. And again, everything was made
from scratch.
Okay? We weren't using Val vid and our
cheese. Everything was made from scratch our cheese
sauces made from scratch everything. So it's good
food.
But because of that, I think that I
hurt myself doing that, and and we lost
a lot of customers
that, you know, that really loved our sides
and really love the beef ribs in Turkey,
but we didn't have anymore.
Joe, and I push you on hold here
for a second. We'll pick it up here
in a couple minutes?
Absolutely. Lawrence. Standby stand by, Joe martinez is
talking with us about
Finally,
calling it a
food truck career.
Ask some more questions here after we get
back before we do that.
Let's talk about the backyard
version of the famed pits built by Aaron
Franklin for his renowned barbecue restaurant Austin, Texas
of the Franklin barbecue pit,
a deeply sought out refined version of the
old propane style cooker that Aaron uses at
his restaurant franklin barbecue.
Stylist,
it reflects the kind of bare bones industrial
handmade aesthetic that he loves including the Pat
and the way the build allows you see
the weld in the a craftsmanship.
Now the schematics of the Texas style off
offset pit.
Relatively simple even if the thing's happening inside
the cooking chamber are
complicated dynamics of physics and chemistry, very few
moving parts here. Numerous, to mass difference divide
this franklin pit.
And the average barbecue smoker sold at the
big box stores.
For 1, much of the challenge of building
and shipping these pits
comes with a thick and he of the
materials, but also much of the value cheap
smokers are made with thin metal.
Not only does thin metal material
tend to warp and crack when sustaining these
kinds of heat,
which are required to make great brisket in
barbecue, especially on cold days, the thin of
the metal just sheds the heat and you
struggle to maintain consistent temperatures.
Franklin barbecue pits primarily made with quarter inch
American makes steel, anything that sees heat engineered
to be incredibly solid should last for a
century or more of cared for properly.
The thickness of that steel guarantees profession grade
heat retention a critical component making great barbecue.
If you are a fan of franklin and
barbecue and you are listening to the show
and you own a Barbecue supply store and
you wish to become a certified franklin dealer.
Visit at franklin pitch dot com. And sorry
that's Franklin bbq pitch dot com and fill
out of dealer form if you're a listener
to the show. You wanna own a Franklin
Barbecue pit, but you don't live by a
dealer
You can buy 1 online, Franklin bbq pits
dot com That's franklin bb pits dot com.
You can purchase a pit, Franklin pits will
ship a franklin pit right to your driveway.
Hurry now.
Did you see the deal
that text
grilled text
Texas star Grill shop was running on Franklin
pit couple weeks ago.
Hopefully you got it on that.
Super cheap. I think it was like free
grants.
Way way discount.
Alright. We're back with Mow with more smoke
and Joe's pit barbecue right after this stick
around. Be Listening to that barbecue hughes Central
show.
Whole packers
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of their premium hand rolled cigars and we
are joined by Joe Martinez once again. Joe,
we talk about menu in menu selection. It's
always a conversation. I love to have with
folks when they're getting ready to open or
they have just open as we get to
learn the nuts and bolts of them, getting
from start to open. Right?
And
the refrain is always.
Your ego says make everything
because you need to show off to people
that you are the pit master.
But the business says,
really keep it tight
and
focus on a few things and do them
spectacularly.
Easy for me to say or
easier to fall into the... I wanna show
everybody what I can do.
Well, I I think that, you know, both
of the both of the... Your statements, you
know,
play a factor in in any business. You
know, you wanna you wanna start a business,
but, like you said, Greg, it... It's better
to
to just do a few things, a handful
of things and be great at them, You
know, and you can get a lot of
people's attention, and then
maybe down the road when you open if
and when you open up a brick and
mortar. I mean, and then spread your wings
and and
and bring in,
all these extra proteins and sides, etcetera.
But I think both of your statements. I
mean, they they pay they play a factor,
you in in any business, you know, you
wanna open up and and, you know, put
your best foot forward and hey, look at
me. This is what I can do.
And and, again, I I don't have any
regrets of it anything that happened. I mean,
I accomplished a lot. I wasn't expecting to
be on Texas Monthly top 25 barbecue joints,
and that's something that we accomplished.
And I'm very proud of that. You know,
I have not...
I haven't lost my passion for Barbecue.
And, you know, earlier, you made a statement
that, hey, on the outside looking in, everything
looked great. Mh. And as an owner of
a business, Greg, I don't wanna be that
guy that I want people to feel sorry
for me because I'm slow, etcetera. You know,
I could have put... I could have put
out a sympathy post.
You know, And I'm and I'm sure it
would have rejuvenate the business for a little
while.
But I I just didn't want that. You
know, I didn't want to be that that
business that is out there crying for for
help and it... You know, I just wanted
it to come naturally
But
again, you know, things happen for a reason,
and and
if if I had to do it all
over again, you know, obviously, things would be
different, But I don't plan on doing this
again, you know, and and I know I
mentioned earlier that I wouldn't start in the
food truck. But you take a look at
you know, some of your top barbecue places
in Texas, you know
That recently shut down. You know, they started
in the food truck.
Every mae barbecue in Lu, Texas,
they started in a food truck, franklin barbecue,
you know, started in the food truck.
A trailer
I could probably fit Franklin's
original trailer,
2 of them inside my current trailer. And...
But I don't think he was doing
all the sides and all the meats that
I was doing. Yeah, met he did what
you mentioned earlier, just, you know, go in
there with a handful of items and be
good at it.
When you
if you moved,
smoking and Joe's pit barbecue not even moved
it, but if you lived and
1 of the more well known barbecue cities.
Do you think that you are just as
successful as you were
in El Paso, but you would have had
consistency at being successful?
Yes. Then then I would have been able
to open up more days, Greg, You know,
we tried opening more days
tried opening up Sundays, you know, try to
do Barb on Sunday, Small Bar,
which are beef cheeks for those of you
guys that don't know.
You know, it's a very popular food El
paso. You know, Barb is something that you
eat on Sundays here in Paso. It's not
smoked. The way we would make it, but,
you know, I wanted to bring that into
Paso
And and again, it it was
okay, but not great. Mh.
You know, and and you know, not everybody.
I didn't wanna, again, have people, you know,
feel sorry for me, but there were people
that were noticing that they could tell it
that I was struggling.
And 1 1 friend that, you know, he's
just a social media friend, like, a lot
of our friends are these days. Right?
He's a millionaire runs a successful trucking company.
He reached out to me and send me
a message joe. He's like, hey, man. If
you wanna talk, I'll I'll know, I'd love
to talk to you and help you out
as much as I possibly can.
So we got the talk and and,
you know, we talked for a good hour
and he says, Joe, you know, talk to
me about your financials,
were you at, you know, what we... You
know, how was your financials before you started
were you at now?
He's like, Joe,
why did you open up your food truck?
He he flat out told me why did
you open up your food truck if you're
were doing so well?
You know, just doing Youtube alone. And I
don't mind sharing numbers with anybody, Greg. I
I think that I'm pretty open an open
book with you. You know, I was I
was making upwards of 15000 dollars a month
on Youtube alone.
Just Youtube. Okay? And and I had a
corporate job
So... But it got to the point where
I was making more money on Youtube than
I was at my corporate job.
So I left my corporate job to do
Youtube.
But I also left it to open up
a food truck. And
because the food truck was taking so much
of my time,
you know, Youtube kinda took the back burner
a little bit. And,
you know, still making money on Youtube By
I still am making money today. It's just
not like it was before.
So, you know, when when this gentleman that
that was helping me out.
Told me that I really got... You know,
I really got to think thinking and he's,
like, why? Am I doing? Why am I
killing myself? You know, all, these long hours
of cooking and barbecue?
Why am I doing this? You know, Am
And I think I'm just passionate about it.
You know, that's why I wanted to do
it. That's the answer. I was just passionate
about it. Or let's dig into that answer
a little bit more. I'm no doctor Phil.
Are you saying
you're passionate about it
and you were busting your ass because you
really didn't wanna fail
or
in reality, did you not wanna tell people
you are going to fail?
No. I didn't... At failure was not an
option for me going in. I was really
passionate and I wanted to make it work.
You know, it's it's the analogy, Greg, that
I I think that can best described this
is when you have a 15 year old
dog at home. And he's limp, he can
barely walk. He's not eating. You know, he's
barely drinking any water. You know that it's
time. You know that it's time to, hey,
man. We gotta take a trip to the
old vet and
say, say our goodbye.
But you love that dog so much that
it hurts you to even think about that.
Right?
But then it's... It it it comes to
the time point in time where it's like,
hey man, we're going to the vet getting
the car. It... It's done. We're done it.
It's time to say goodbye. And and it
hurts, man. It hurts so bad. People don't
understand.
But it's the best thing that you could
possibly do for
for your animal and in my case for
my business.
Let's talk about the Youtube first a Second
since you brought it up.
You mentioned...
At the height, you're doing
15 k on Youtube a month.
Of no mathematician, but that's, like, 50000000000 dollars
a year.
Is 15 k,
what you're clearing off or I know there's,
like, a percentages that Youtube takes and stuff
like that. So for the folks, that always
hear the term Youtube money, but have no
idea what Youtube money really is. What are
the real figures that make up Youtube money?
No. That's take home money. That's that's
being deposited to your account every month.
It's tax free.
So you have to be careful and and
set aside 35 percent. Don't know that. Not
tag free Sam. It's like, you have to
pay tax on that. Not tax Not free.
Thanks. Yeah. That doesn't include they... They're not
taking out taxes. Let me rephrase that. So...
You know, you do have to set aside
35
percent of that that you're gonna pay in
taxes.
You know. So you find a way not
not to cheat the sis them, but, you
know, you've gotta spend money so that you
don't have to pay so much back. You
know? So, you know, I start buying really
nice lighting, really nice cameras.
You know, mike's, etcetera, you know, to help
offset that because, you know, they'll they'll get
you on taxes.
So was the real...
Is the... What we call top line revenue
number on that? Is it 30 grand a
month, and they're taking half? For what what
kind of a percentage does Youtube take from
a creator these days? Oh, yeah. It's it's
it's it's close to that if not even
more than that.
You know, the way the way youtubers get
paid is through running ads on your videos,
You know, we get to select
where we want the ads you know, I'll
I'll usually put 4 ads in my videos,
1 in the beginning 1 at the end
and 2 in the middle somewhere. And those
companies that are advertising, you know, the Barbecue
Central Show to wanna an add on Youtube.
Well, you know, you're paying a certain amount
while I get a certain percentage of that.
It's a small percentage, but it adds up
when wants And that's why it's important to
to have a good following. You know, I'm
I'm almost at 280000,
I think
subscribers on Youtube, and and it's important because
once you build
that that fan base, you know, and you
put out a video, you know, it can
really pay off for you, you know, pretty
good.
Is it likes? Is it
views? What's
what's getting into the money? It's views.
It's views. Yeah. Subscribers either
not subscribers. No. Because you can have a
ton of subscribers, and, you know, before I
let... Before I stepped away from Youtube, to
run my my food truck, you know, I
was getting views like crazy.
And now, you know, I release AAA video
and I'll get 15000 views, and I've got
280000
of subscribers. I'm not getting 288000 views. Yeah.
And sometimes, you know, those videos will go
viral and you'll you'll get a million views,
but that hasn't happened in a while and
know, now that, obviously, I've got a lot
more time in my hand. That's what I'm
gonna do is revamp my Youtube channel. If
you're going back to Youtube full time.
You Yep. That. And, you know, I've got
my hands and other things too. You know,
I'm I'm I'm an ambassador for a few
companies, and I'm also
manufacture rep for a pellet
brand that's out there,
pretty neat to the market, but we're pretty
excited about it and and you know, the
owner of the company believes in me, and
and we've done a pretty good job of
selling pellets to in
large quantities to online companies or if you
own a barbecue store, you know, that's that's
my customer, you, you know that I'm gonna
go after. So that's what I'm gonna be
doing
that in the Youtube and, you know, little
fishing here and there too.
Why not
keep the corporate jo.
Never have opened the food truck.
Keep the corporate job, get that money
and do the Youtube and continue to blow
that out.
I understand that you were making more on
Youtube than your corporate job, but big deal.
Were you all though was it cutting into
your corporate job life as well?
Yeah. It it was, you know, my corporate
job was pretty demanding. You know, we we
traveled a lot. I traveled a lot. You
know, Was that a town, pretty much the
whole week, You know, come back in a
town and you know, obviously they wanna spend
time with my family, but I also have
to film some youtube videos. So it makes
it a little bit more difficult.
And at that point, you know, when I
left my corporate job if if I didn't
open up the food truck, I think I
would have been okay, You know, because I
would... I probably would have doubled the subscribers
I have right now because the more you
feed
Youtube and the algorithm, the more your channel's
gonna grow, just like anything.
But had I not opened food truck. I
think that I'd in better position. But, again,
I don't regret not opening up the food
truck It was an experience and something that
I would, you know, I could, you know,
put on my resume 1 day, you know?
Could you have somehow leverage shooting content
via the...
Barbecue truck and put it on Youtube and
continued to foster both.
That was the plan. I was doing
I I did several videos from my food
truck, you know, a day in the life
of a food truck, you know, the ins
and outs of what happens and, you know,
how we prep and And, you know, how
we make our sausages to supply the food
truck, etcetera. You know, so Got a few
of those videos on my Youtube channel.
And, you know, the plan was to do
that, but because it got so slow
towards the end, it was just my brother
and myself running the food truck. We didn't
have any more employees. It was just us
too.
And I couldn't hire anybody because the business
just wasn't there. You know, so
I was cashier and and doing a lot
of the prep and and my brother was
pretty much the meat slice, and he'd cook
anything that went on the grill, he'd cook
it, but he also had to learn
the register.
You know, so it it made us, you
know, a lot more universal
because we had to do more things, but,
you know, that's what we had to do
in order to, you know, keep the food
truck open.
You gonna cater for people that call and
say, hey, Joe. Could you do a a
little cater for me? Because you got that
big ass pit?
Yeah. I had 2 pits Greg. I had
got 2000 gallon. Right.
So Any going up for sale?
1 of them, I just sold it off
to a gentleman up and up in
he's up in Washington. Heartache.
Yeah. So I had opened up, I had
ordered another pit, you know, with the anticipation
of having a brick and mortar.
But since I ordered it, you know, these
pits take months to to build. Well, you
know, the pitch ready and it's like, okay,
I'm not gonna open up the restaurant after
all, but it still shows up while, I
gotta pay the guy. Right? I ordered it.
So I put it up for sale, and,
you know, I sold it for exactly what
I paid for it.
And they're come... They're gonna come pick it
up.
The other pit that I have
so this is kind of a news flash.
You're the first to hear this. Oh, yeah.
I have not released it. Yep. A barbecue
central show.
Exclusive news update.
Greg record reporters from the breaking news stuff
here in Cleveland,
Ohio, the city that breaks the most live
breaking news across the country
They, the globe, and we go to El
Paso, Texas where Joe Martinez files this report.
Yeah. So hopefully here within the next couple
of weeks,
if we can get the point of sale
up and everything. Mh, my brother will be
opening up the food truck
and he'll be running the exact same menu
that I was running before.
He's gonna give it... Yep.
He's gonna use
seconds. Yep. Wait a second.
So you're not shutting down after all.
Oh my choices. You give me 50 minutes
to tell me your back open again?
No, No. I... Gonna do with it.
I smell something is a foot here. You
think you can hug me, Joe. This is
outlandish.
Can't wait until the amount correspondence get on
next month. This is the lead question.
Unbelievable.
No. It's 100 percent on him,
different name,
you know, he might change the menu up
a little bit, but he's gonna run some
of the same recipes that I was running.
It's gonna be sensitive way. That's the name
of it. Is the doing this at failed.
You've proven it out, M paso. Does want
barbecue. What is the doing?
I wish he's he's he's full of Piss
vinegar right now, so he's gonna run with
it and see what he can. Piston Vinegar
and no brains.
Did he watch you? Are you gonna are
you gonna are you gonna be his pit
boss now instead of him being your pit
boss?
No. Oh my gosh this is mind blowing.
I can't believe you should have never said
this. I can't... This is this is yeah.
This is taken the show into a whole
different turn.
Does he know that he show still right?
Yep. Yep.
Yeah. You'll have him on hold told him.
Yeah.
So my brother is 48.
Yeah. How you. So
I'm 51.
Alright? So few years younger, you know? So
he's he's you know, he was my pit
master greg, and and,
you know, he he knows how to trim
brisket. He knows how to cook them from
start to finish ribs, everything. He knows how
to do it all by himself.
So I I think... And I don't think
that he needs the revenue that I needed
to survive.
So... He's gotta sell more than 2 brisket,
Joe.
Yeah. He's he's going to. He's got to.
So,
you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna help him
along the way you'll see. You'll see some
of my post.
Trying to help him out, but Yep. That's
the plan. That's when he wants to... Did
you say, hey. Go. What's his name?
Martin. You say, hey, Martin.
Did you watch your older brother already go
through this? And, you know, what are we
doing here?
Wow. This is unbelievable. I can't believe this.
Yep. Yeah. You you've may... You better make
sure you get
Martin my contact them info because we gotta
half it out before. When when is he
supposed to open?
As soon as the point of sale system
is up, you know, we're we're on the
phone with toast, and we have an an
appointment with them tomorrow, and everything hopefully gets
set up by tomorrow and maybe in a
week or so. Good news. I have an
open segment next week. We're gonna have Martin
on Martin Martinez. I mean, how of crazy
is that,
maybe We gotta have him on. We gotta
talk him out of this. This is this
man. This is like does he marry? Does
he have kids?
What none of them. Single guy He's
single guy. No you know, side piece somewhere
he's gotta contend with or anything like this.
Illegitimate running around that are gonna show up.
Nothing like that? Nope.
None of that. Wow.
So...
Wow. Well, I mean, I thought I got
a good breaking new story from Rash Phillips
a couple weeks ago, but this 1 takes
the kick.
Anything else, Joe, before
I cut you loose tonight?
No. You know, I just wanna to, you
know, take the opportunity to thank my customers
that supported me for for those 2 years
that we were open, and, again, no regrets
here, and And again, if anybody has any
questions on, you know, things to do and
not to do, obviously, when it comes to
to a barbecue food truck get a hold
of me. You know, I'll definitely help you
out. I certainly appreciate all the inside, all
the can, all the honesty. You've never held
back figures
or
points of thought or anything like that. So
from a host perspective, I certainly appreciate it,
wish it would be ending in a different
way,
certainly didn't wanna see this.
I don't know if I expected it or
not, but I... I'm certainly sad to see
it. But if this makes the best sense
for you then it makes the best sense
for me, and I fully support it. So
we'll be looking for the revamped to Youtube
and make sure you get me Martin's number,
As p, so we can divert it as,
avert a disaster,
as it might be coming down the pike,
in blazing fashion. Joe, always appreciate the time.
Thanks so much for doing it.
Thank you, Greg. Appreciate it. You got it?
Joe Martinez
right there.
And hopefully, Martin Martinez is next week.
Martin you gotta listen to me.
Pull the rip card, pull it.
Wow. I can't believe it.
Let's get back. Okay. Look, I mean, let's
get back. Alright. Pal.
I'm so worked up. I'm gonna lat over
here.
You know, we almost made it
through the show.
Without any type of con controversy.
And then Joe Martinez
the grenade throw
shows up
There's not enough business. El paso H, Texas
barbecue.
I'm selling 2 brisket today.
I had to quit.
Not viable,
weather sucks, food truck sucks.
By the way, my brother's is gonna take
over the business.
Martin
stop now.
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Guy the cooking they weighing it. Joe's real
name is Martin.
Yeah.
Of course, it is.
Joe Martin Martinez.
Of course, it is.
The mayor of el pastor.
Wow.
Lance, I gotta tell you the last f
7 minutes of the show.
If you're just tuning in right now or
gonna blow your mind. I say I never
say this. F when the second hour of
this show post,
jump immediately
to like,
45 minutes in. To the part where you
think we're ending the interview and then I
play the breaking news.
Because remember, Smoking and Joe's Pit barbecue was
closed.
Now get to the breaking news part
and watch the Hindenburg reign night in a
re enactment of a
We're back to wrap up whatever's is left
of this. Think around will be right back.
Let's get back to a guy who has
more experience giving you his opinion
than he actually has cooking.
Once again, here's your host,
Greg rent.
We welcome you back. We thank Joe Martinez
for joining us last segment.
Last 2 segments actually talking about the
Unfortunate closing of smoke and Joe's pit barbecue
But as they say,
when 1 smoking and Joe's pit barbecue
closes,
another 1 opens,
Hey, everybody. Can't Trouble you for?
Yeah.
That's sound drop is the best.
Wow.
I don't even know where to go.
So I guess we're gonna call it an
evening.
I could just sit here and silence for
the next hour and just think.
I could, but I'm not.
I'll let you go.
All the way back in the first hour,
Ted Conrad was on the show. We talked
about the new fire pulse, which is our
new wireless
thermometer offering into the marketplace.
You might see it
available for sale in August. Remember this is
an
invitation old the event at start.
So if you are a longtime time
fire board customer,
sure to check your emails regularly
and your family regularly because it's invite only
to start as I just mentioned.
Fire more dot com slash pulse for more
info.
Then we talked with West wright from Cook
out news dot com. Got his take on
wireless thermometer ring. Also talked about green mountain
grill.
Continued
reliance and allegiance with building out brick and
mortar,
dealer group,
Zac hour Joe Martinez.
How about that?
Joe Mark peanut.
Smoke Joe's pig barbecue closed in El paso,
Texas?
Or is it?
Big show plan for you next week.
Deck an hour the embedded correspondence, but as
I told Joe as we were closing.
You damn well might be Martin Martinez
for the first time ever on the show
sitting exactly where Joe Martinez sits.
For all I know, they could be oh,
they're not twins. But they could look exactly
alike to the point where you couldn't even
tell the difference.
There's just nobody by think.
Alright. Stay on test.
And any event is gonna be a great
show.
So how do I always leave?
09/11/2001,
I will never forget.
At until next Tuesday at 9PM Eastern.
Your program host to proud you us American
greg Rem saying,
Hey. What's up? This is J host of
the celebrity Grill podcast on itunes,
and you're listening to the Barbecue Central radio
network. This all barbecue and grilling, all the
time.