Meet Ryan Campbell of Colada in Fort Lauderdale

Today we’d like to introduce you to Ryan Campbell.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Ryan. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
The idea for Colada started with my friend and business partner, Alex Recio. His father, after retiring from the Hollywood Police Department, became co-owner of Miramar Bakery. Miramar is a traditional Cuban bakery in the City of Hollywood established in 1983. Working there throughout high school and on breaks from college, he developed an idea to take some of the best aspects of a traditional Cuban bakery and create a more streamlined and modern concept with the traditional flavors as a base.

While living together during law school, Alex and his father approached me about helping them run financials and find a new location for Miramar Bakery. The State of Florida was using eminent domain to take the location they had resided in for almost 30 years and was thus forcing them to start over from scratch. At that time I was working during law school as a financial analyst for a large real estate development and brokerage company.

In assisting them to put together financial projections and look for a new location, Alex shared his vision for Colada with me. Since we are both Cuban American’s his vision resonated with me and we started to brainstorm a lot of ideas as to how we would do it and what we’d want a theoretical Colada to look and feel like. As we put more work into the planning and feasibility of doing a Colada location, Alex decided to drop out of law school to pursue the dream. Shortly thereafter I quit my job, didn’t take the bar exam after graduating to join him in pursuit of the dream.

In trying to get Colada off the ground (with no money, no real background or experience) Alex’s father and his business partner, Mario Cortes, asked us to buy a portion of Miramar Bakery and assist them in moving to a new location. Both were older and looking to take a step back from the work and wanted help starting over.

We viewed this as an opportunity to learn the business better and create a foundation for Colada, so we agreed to buy in slowly over time and take over all the operations of Miramar Bakery. We successfully moved Miramar Bakery to a new facility, doubled in size and increased revenue by 50%+ in our first 2 years. At that point we found, built and opened our first Colada location in the up and coming Flagler Village neighborhood in downtown Fort Lauderdale.

We went through dozens of potential locations before coming to terms in Flagler Village. The biggest reason we felt strongly about the opportunity despite negotiating a lease on essentially a dirt field at the time came from my work at my prior real estate analyst job.

Our company was actually one of the main players in getting the Brightline high-speed rail system to fruition and I was able to be a part of a lot of the long-term planning associated with the areas around the rail stations. Knowing the type of development slated to take place in the neighborhood, we decided to take the risk and be the first food concept in Flagler Village.

The pace of growth and migration to the area has thus far exceeded our wildest expectations and we could not be happier to one of the fixtures and primary meeting places for the entire neighborhood. We grew hand in hand with the neighborhood and are very excited to see where the continued growth and development takes it.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
There’s no business that ever has a perfectly smooth road to success. There have been all sorts of struggles and roadblocks along the way. One of the biggest things that we didn’t plan for was the amount of non compete clauses we’d be up against in finding locations.

What we quickly found out was that international brands like Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, Panera Bread, Einstein’s and others all have exclusivity clauses that prevent concepts like ours from occupying real estate near them. Whether it be not allowing coffee to be sold, baked goods, sandwiches, etc there are tons of exclusivity clauses by “the big guys” that have slowed our path for growth. Trying to find the quality real estate in a strip center or location that doesn’t already have one of the above businesses amongst others is extremely difficult.

Instead of letting it deter us, it motivated us. We took it as a challenge to be better at what we do than they are about what they do. The money, influence, and resources of those organizations is massive and we took the mantle of the little guy battling all of the firmly entrenched mega corporations. That mentality has shaped a lot of what we do in store and a lot of how we approach expansion. We look for neighborhoods and areas where people are inclined to reject all the big box generic chain stores and instead gravitate towards the family owned, unique, small businesses where what we do can be allowed to thrive.

Instead of trying to compete directly with resources we can’t match, we had to adapt and create our own niche that can be successful. As our area and our nation becomes more diverse and rejects the idea of the chain, we feel we’re now uniquely positioned to take advantage of the demographic and mentality shifts.

Colada – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Colada is all about fusing traditional Cuban cuisine with some modern day twists. We wanted to bring the food that Alex and I grew up on to a more diverse customer base in a way that was more approachable. Growing up and going to all the traditional Cuban restaurants and bakery’s in Miami on a regular basis, we can tell you first hand that they can often feel like visiting a 3rd world country.

When in law school at UM, my friends always wanted to eat Cuban food, but wouldn’t go without me because they either couldn’t or felt uncomfortable going places where they didn’t speak English, had to yell over people to get served and experience a host of other foreign practices just to get a good Cuban sandwich, empanada or cafecito.

We decided to make it our priority to eliminate all the barriers to people enjoying good Cuban food because it tastes too good to be a niche food served only in Miami and small pockets of the rest of the country. So, we took a lot of the traditional foods (Cuban sandwiches, media Noche’s, croquetas, cafecito, etc) and then added a bunch of other fusion type items (tres leches waffles for brunch, a Cuban Philly made with rope Vieja, bacon wrapped maduros, etc) to the menu. The goal being to introduce people to traditional Cuban flavors in new and interesting ways.

We then made the store equal parts sleek and modern combined with a traditional, homey feel. We proudly display black and white photos of our families from when they were still in Cuba, the last Cuban telephone directory printed prior to Fidel taking power and other items that show where we came from and how we arrived here.

What I am most proud of is actually 3 things. First, is that we’ve been able to share our culture and what we grew up on with so many new people. Cuban culture is a beautiful and unique thing and I’m proud we’ve been able to be purveyors of that culture to tens of thousands of people. The second is that we’ve been able to succeed in an industry with an extremely high rate of failure.

We’ve opened 2 stores and both have surpassed all of our projections and expectations; not bad for a couple of law school rejects. Lastly, Alex and I are constantly grateful of how many families we’ve been able to provide for by opening and expanding our stores. At any given time, 30-35 families depend on us as their primary source of income. Being able to build and create something that has that type of impact beyond our walls is extremely humbling and makes us feel very grateful that we’re able to do what we do.

What sets us apart from others is our unrelenting efforts to provide a guest experience that surpasses every guest’s expectation every time. From the way we curate our menu, our local-only craft beer tap list and develop our unique events; everything is done with the guest experience in mind. We want to create an enclave that allows each guest to get away from their daily lives/stresses, even if just for a few minutes and have a good experience.

Over time our guests become members of our extended family and become a part of what we do every day. Knowing how many other businesses operate, I would say that’s the largest thing that differentiates us from everyone else.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Our grand opening party at Colada would for sure be my proudest moment. Alex might have a different one because we’ve had so many, but our grand opening would be my proudest. The process leading up to us starting construction and then going through construction was riddled with obstacles and roadblocks.

For a 4-5 month period, I was working 16-20 hours per day, 7 days a week. We didn’t know when we were going to be able to open, get all of our licenses, find and train a staff, etc. We ended up getting the all clear to open on a Tuesday and then had our grand opening that Saturday. Given the extremely short notice, we were not anticipating having a big turnout or anything.

We just needed to get open because we were going to start paying rent and needing to start making money to pay the bills. I don’t think Alex or I slept for the 3 days leading up to the opening. In fact, I “slept” in the store the 2 nights leading up to the opening on a tiny loveseat. We had budgeted for the grand opening to lose $3000 and were intending it to take up a chunk of our marketing budget. We were anticipating 50-100 attendees and thought anything over that would be a runaway success.

When Saturday came around, we had over 350 attendees throughout our 4-hour event and we made over $7000 in profits. We ran out of every item of food we had purchased to get us through our whole first week, 8 kegs of beer, 4 kegs of sangria and mojitos and 7 cases of champagne. By any definition, it was a runaway success and validation of everything we were trying to do.

At the end of that day, when we were finishing cleaning and going through the accounting of anything my grandfather came up to me with tears in his eyes and gave me a hug. My grandfather is essentially a father to me and so much of what I have and how I am as a person comes from him, particularly my inspiration for wanting to do Colada with Alex.

Seeing and feeling how proud he was of me in that moment combined with the overwhelming success and support we received is something I will never forget and always be proud of.

Pricing:

• We offer bottomless select, local craft beer, homemade sangria, mojitos and mimosas every Saturday and Sunday for $15
• Everything on our menu is under $10

Contact Info:

• Address: 525 N Federal Highway, Suite 400
  Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301
• Website: www.coladahouse.com
• Phone: 954-368-4705
• Email: info@coladahouse.com
• Instagram: @coladahouse
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/coladahouse
• Twitter: @coladahouse
• Yelp: yelp.com/colada

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