Dan Simpson, CEO of Taziki’s Mediterranean Cafe, joins Zack Oates for a thoughtful conversation on leadership, fear, and how guest experience is built through people, not platitudes. With a background in technology and entrepreneurship, Dan brings a unique perspective to hospitality, one rooted in empathy, consistency, and removing friction so teams can focus on human connection.

Fear Is a Signal, Not a Stop (06:41)

Dan reflects on a pivotal moment when a major fundraising effort fell short and forced him to step away from the company he founded. Instead of seeing fear as something to avoid, he reframes it as useful information. Fear becomes a clue that points to gaps in preparation, knowledge, or support. For restaurant leaders, this mindset shift allows fear to guide smarter decisions rather than stall progress.

Why Technology Should Get Out of the Way (03:38)

Drawing from his tech background, Dan explains that technology works best when it quietly removes friction. In hospitality, software should help teams listen better, respond faster, and stay focused on guests. The goal is not to be tech forward for its own sake, but to make it easier for people to deliver genuine care.

Consistency Is the New Luxury (09:51)

Dan shares a simple story about a small restaurant where the food was not extraordinary, but the experience was. The same server, the same order, the same rhythm every visit. That predictability built trust. For guests today, knowing what to expect is often more valuable than novelty.

Listening at Scale Without Losing the Human Touch (12:45)

At Taziki’s, feedback is treated as a conversation, not a scorecard. Dan describes the importance of asking every guest, listening to every response, and replying every time. Technology enables this at scale, but the intent stays human. Guests want to be heard, especially when something goes wrong.

Fix Processes, Not People (15:01)

Instead of focusing on individual mistakes, Dan emphasizes looking for patterns. Trends in feedback reveal broken systems, not bad employees. By addressing root causes, teams can improve experiences consistently and sustainably..

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-simpson-8aa1bb3/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/taziki’s-mediterranean-cafe/

https://www.tazikis.com/

Transcript

00:00:00:06 – 00:00:25:12

Zack Oates

Welcome to another edition of Give Innovation the Restaurant Guest Experience podcast. I’m your host, Zack Oats, and each week I get to chat with an industry expert to uncover their strategies and tactics to help you create a five star guest experience. This podcast is powered by ovation, the feedback and operations platform built for multi-unit restaurants. Learn what’s actually happening in your restaurants and exactly how to improve while driving revenue.

00:00:25:13 – 00:00:48:00

Zack Oates

Learn more@ovation.com. And today, we have someone who has become a friend because I just have so much immense respect for this individual, but someone who’s leading an incredible company. He’s the CEO of Taziki’s Mediterranean Cafe. He’s been in hospitality for a while, but he’s actually formerly a tech guy. Not too many restaurant CEOs who were former tech guy, so he knows his tech.

00:00:48:02 – 00:01:11:06

Zack Oates

It’s incredible to see the brand that he’s building and the following that he has and the love that people have for his brand and the people that work with him just say incredible things about him. I’ve heard him on stage, I’ve had private conversations with him. He is just a good guy through and through. You won’t find him Sunday night on Fox, but he is Dan Simpson.

00:01:11:08 – 00:01:13:18

Zack Oates

Dan, welcome to the podcast.

00:01:13:20 – 00:01:31:08

Dan Simpson

Thanks, Zach. It’s great. Man, from the first time I met you with your vibrant enthusiasm. Like, who is this guy? I think we could be friends too. Then learning about a platform that it quickly went from someone trying to sell me, and then me trying to sell to the whole organization. Because I really love what aviation is all about.

00:01:31:10 – 00:01:53:20

Dan Simpson

And it’s not just the ideas call, but the execution of the platform is really good and we have just like gone all in. So we drank the Kool-Aid. It solved the problem for us, which is, I think all good technology should only ever do that. Not be a hammer looking for now. And in this case, it’s really helped us center on our guests and how we serve them, love them, adjust for their needs, make it right when we get it wrong, etc., etc. so I’m glad to be part of the family.

00:01:53:22 – 00:02:10:10

Zack Oates

You guys are really part of our story as well, because there are large chunks of our platform that we built in tandem with you. I mean, you all came to us and said, hey, this is what we’re looking for. And we said, yeah, I think that’s a really good idea. We could build that. Do you want to help us?

00:02:10:10 – 00:02:36:20

Zack Oates

And so you not only were the guinea pigs to test out pieces of our platform that are now core to what we do, but instrumental in developing that. So thank you. And I think that goes really far to talk about who you are and the type of tech forward person that you are. So talk to us about that journey to go from technology to hospitality, because you’re one of the co-founders of To Go Technologies.

00:02:36:22 – 00:02:46:06

Zack Oates

It’s not just like you had a foray into tech. You ran, you started a tech company, you were the CEO. So talk to us about that transition.

00:02:46:08 – 00:03:03:20

Dan Simpson

Yeah, it’s always fun to look backwards on our resumes and our journeys. And often only by looking back can you make sense of them. See the common threads. And so for me, my mom was a nurse and she gave me this big heart for people. My grandfather was a chef and families on both sides. We’ve always had gardens and I always cooked in our homes.

00:03:03:23 – 00:03:21:24

Dan Simpson

And so food and culinary and people at the center has always been what it’s about. And big family gatherings was always a hallmark of my experiences. And now my 25, almost 26 years of marriage my wife and I have, we do one thing well it’s host parties, and we love to gather friends and strangers together and eat, drink and have a great time.

00:03:21:24 – 00:03:38:22

Dan Simpson

So yeah, in the middle of all that, I found out, like, if you’re involved in any company in the modern era, there’s the easy way in hard things to do things. And there in order to stay people centered in order in this case also to stay like real culinary centered, then you need to create efficiencies around the edges and in the center.

00:03:38:24 – 00:03:58:02

Dan Simpson

And then technology is a way to do that. Right. You want to find the easiest ways to create human experience by removing friction along the way, particularly in this day and age when so much of the world is fast moving, digital, and one step removed from like immediate face to face communication. So you need software in order to listen.

00:03:58:04 – 00:04:30:13

Dan Simpson

You need software in order to communicate. You need software to emulate the interactions that are anchored in empathy and listening. And the same thing that the whole world was analog LP records and everything was dine in, right? Maybe would need all this technology, but that’s just not the way it is. So to go, technology was an outpouring from a few other companies I was a part of, and more and more, I started to recognize technology as a way to not be cool and not be tech savvy, but just solve problems, remove friction, and let us be more people centered in whatever company we’re in.

00:04:30:15 – 00:04:53:14

Dan Simpson

Yeah, so raise capital. You make a lot of right turns and wrong turns. When you’re an entrepreneur and starting up a company, you’re just surviving. A lot of it is. And then we found our way more and more into the restaurant business, in partnership with Mike Bodner in French hospitality. And that was my goal for them to say, I see what you’re doing in like, the way you think and you think like an engineer, but still people centered when you come join fresh hospitality and then maybe help lead one of our brands.

00:04:53:16 – 00:05:05:04

Dan Simpson

So that was never my plan. It was never my vision. But that’s the way life goes, right? You. We fall in love with moments and with people, and we end up in careers that are the unplanned and unexpected, and it goes exactly the way it’s supposed to go.

00:05:05:06 – 00:05:12:09

Zack Oates

Yeah. That’s amazing. And was that a tough decision when you were like, okay, I’m going to step away from to Go Technologies?

00:05:12:11 – 00:05:32:07

Dan Simpson

No, it wasn’t because the funny story is so the boners and I actually took a trip to Silicon Valley. We had already raised the first rounds of capital. We were past a few beta stages and growing the company, but we had this big opportunity to go all in and for a really big kind of international play that required us to go raise about $22 million in Silicon Valley.

00:05:32:07 – 00:05:49:00

Dan Simpson

And during that time, I had to put all of my attention towards that deal making and re appointed other people to run the business for about nine months while I did that. And so it was just like a Hail Mary. It was a swing for the fences move, and if it worked out, we would had this big catapult to be a much bigger brand.

00:05:49:02 – 00:06:05:22

Dan Simpson

If it didn’t, I knew going in that I had to make some hard choices. So we went. We almost succeeded, but we failed. Still amazing experience and I came back and like, right around Christmas time, essentially fired myself. I met with the board and said, Loca can’t afford me and the team. And we kind of went all in on this.

00:06:05:22 – 00:06:18:24

Dan Simpson

And so the fresh hospitality team, I already said, like, lo and actually what they said was when you can just do some temporary work with us, you’d be a great fit with what we’re doing. You can help us with kind of Shark Tank, finding new brands, developing new brands. That was actually my so was actually it came from failing.

00:06:18:24 – 00:06:30:18

Dan Simpson

And to go technologies. We’re successful company and still are today. But it was actually a big swing and a miss that led me to opening a window that pushed me further into the hospitality space.

00:06:30:20 – 00:06:41:18

Zack Oates

Wow. And then when you got that email or that when you finally get that notice, like, hey, this didn’t work going to Silicon Valley, how did you feel and how did you keep going?

00:06:41:20 – 00:06:48:23

Dan Simpson

Yeah, I mean, two things. One, I think I’ve always looked at life is a great adventure. I think one of the advantages, a great book by Angela Duckworth called grit.

00:06:49:00 – 00:06:51:05

Zack Oates

Oh, I just read that last year, Super Girl.

00:06:51:05 – 00:07:12:04

Dan Simpson

Right, sir. But and many other entrepreneurs have said, I think maybe I don’t remember if it was Bill Gates or Elon Musk or Steve Jobs and more of those guys talk about basically, and I think echoed by Barack Obama was talking about basically that any great leader is probably either trying to overcome the demons they had from their father, or trying to reach to achieve the greatness of their father.

00:07:12:06 – 00:07:31:05

Dan Simpson

Well, put me right in the former of those situations. And so I think I had a burning desire to be more than where I came from. I therefore had high tolerance for risk for was always going to be better than backwards. And so I in one end just saw it as a great adventure. And I had a general trust in the arc of the plots of our lives that it was going to work out.

00:07:31:05 – 00:07:53:02

Dan Simpson

And I just stubbornly believe that. I’ll also say that in that time period was the first time I really ever connected with the idea that I also had something else called fear. And until that time, I really did not have a good awareness of social or really more emotional intelligence and the full spectrum of emotions. And I thought some are good and some are bad.

00:07:53:04 – 00:08:08:06

Dan Simpson

It was really helpful once I really could hone in and say, that grinding thing in my gut when I got that email. And along the way, when I was realized I was responsible for people’s paychecks, that thing is called fear. And fear can kill you, but fear can also really can be a.

00:08:08:06 – 00:08:09:00

Zack Oates

Clue.

00:08:09:02 – 00:08:26:06

Dan Simpson

To motivate you to what don’t I know that I fill that gap? What relationships I need to lean into, what is coming up next, and I’ve never done before and I should prepare more for so it’s a clue. It shouldn’t cripple you, it should empower you. And I had to learn to face it, hold it, name it, and lean into it.

00:08:26:12 – 00:08:32:01

Dan Simpson

And fear actually became another something that not only made friends with, but really has helped me in my career.

00:08:32:03 – 00:09:01:13

Zack Oates

I think that is so interesting because oftentimes fears debilitating, right? That’s what we talked about. It’s crippling because you’re like, I don’t want to take the next step. And it’s like, those are the moments, you know, when I talk to friends who and, you know, having been in those situations and all of us in the hospitality industry, having survived through Covid, it’s like there those moments where you’re like, I can’t even take a break because just knowing that there’s going to be more after the break, it’s scary.

00:09:01:15 – 00:09:21:21

Zack Oates

That’s so interesting to think about. That is fear being a clue. And there’s this survival mechanism that we have as humans. And so it’s like instead of just looking at it and not doing something with it, looking at that and seeing, what does this want me to do? What is it telling me that I don’t know, I think that’s beautiful, really powerful way to look at things.

00:09:21:21 – 00:09:42:24

Zack Oates

And behind me, and again, in my background, I have unreasonable hospitality and love. And we were talking about that right before, because I feel like that’s really what it’s all about. And I keep those behind me. So I remember it’s about hospitality and it’s about love. And at the middle of all of it, it’s building value and helping our corner of the world just be a little bit better.

00:09:43:04 – 00:10:13:08

Zack Oates

It’s not saving the world. It’s just helping someone’s day get better. And if you look at it in those bite sized chunks, like the big fear of it, the fear of failure, it’s really not that bad at the moment. I’m sure it was really scary to go through that failure, but like, look at what you’re doing now and look at the brain that you’re building and the hundreds and thousands of people that you get to affect because of that, which obviously you never know where you’re at your own story arc, right?

00:10:13:10 – 00:10:39:00

Dan Simpson

That’s right, that’s right. Yeah. I mean, I’ve heard some people say that there’s only two things that motivate people fear and greed. And I think those are very powerful motivators for sure, for good or for bad. But yeah, it’s definitely missing the third obvious one, which is love. Right? There is charity. There is genuine intention to take anybody’s best moment and join them in that celebration, rejoicing with those who are rejoicing.

00:10:39:00 – 00:10:51:17

Dan Simpson

And it’s also taking somebody’s worst moment. And we all have them sometimes little papercut, worst moments, and sometimes really devastating moments and adding comfort, adding empathy and adding comfort and doing what we can.

00:10:51:17 – 00:11:01:21

Zack Oates

And sometimes, by the way, right. Like the empathy, sometimes it’s just mourning with those that mourn, right? It’s just being sad with them, not necessarily trying to fix it or make it better.

00:11:01:23 – 00:11:21:21

Dan Simpson

I think in the hospitality space, which again, is obviously can be food, it can be hotels, it can be, you know, so entertainment of so many, so many times. But I also love the fact if you go back millennia, you can see where people in tribes would gather and negotiate. And in lieu of war, they would break bread and find a way to keep the peace.

00:11:21:23 – 00:11:42:21

Dan Simpson

And I think in a modern era when that’s kind of a lost virtue, it’s like, man, we had this experience through Covid, we had this experience through protests that we’re having and like, what do we do as a restaurant? I was like, I tell you what we do. We open our doors, we reserve a table, we pay for the meal to bring the two sides that are seeing each other as enemies and see if they can see each other as neighbors.

00:11:42:21 – 00:12:08:14

Dan Simpson

Like this is the magic of food and all over and also central to the Mediterranean. Not just diet, but to the ethic of all across the Mediterranean. This is true not just Greek, but also from Persian and Iran and Turkey and all across that whole region. There is amazing history around literally baking and breaking bread together in order to celebrate, mourn and work through our problems.

00:12:08:16 – 00:12:23:04

Dan Simpson

So I think food has this an amazing currency that can do that, that is, you know, anchored in the love that’s behind you, which, by the way, I love that I was born of Philly. So a little bit of Motown, Philly love there. My ego is so great in the playoffs that put that aside, but anchored in love.

00:12:23:04 – 00:12:28:00

Dan Simpson

And then really this idea of unreasonable hospitality, such a great ethic.

00:12:28:02 – 00:12:45:07

Zack Oates

The whole reason I started ovation was to enable and facilitate that love through technology and that unreasonable hospitality. And I think your brand and your team has done such a good job again of of like going full on in and I’d love to hear like has it been helpful to to Ziggy’s.

00:12:45:09 – 00:13:00:07

Dan Simpson

Yeah, it’s been great. I mean I think the first thing was like really practical, right? Which was like centralizing all the different ways our guests were trying to talk to us. We always start analog and then we go digital. So we’re always like trying to make sure that, like in the four walls of anyone, we’re proactively checking on people too.

00:13:00:07 – 00:13:16:14

Dan Simpson

And I call it Netherland eavesdropping. Right. So you’re in the line, you’re in the dining room, you’re listening for delighting people, or we got something wrong and we want to them proactively before they have to ask us. We’d love to be able to anticipate that and get it right. Delight them. So I love how ovation does a great job.

00:13:16:16 – 00:13:35:13

Dan Simpson

Like, okay, let’s make the first gesture to ask them for feedback and then it centralizes because there’s so many fragmented omnichannel ways that that could happen and get lost. One of our sometimes our managers, I would have the heart to listen to guests and respond to them. But they’re like, I can’t manage all these different channels. So centralizing that streamlining, it’s really helpful.

00:13:35:15 – 00:13:53:17

Dan Simpson

And then some of my favorite things are, you know, I guess after that is the ethic of responding to every guess, you know, said differently, like what guest doesn’t there in front of us does not deserve to get an audience and a response. So therefore this idea of like we will listen to we’ll ask every guest, we’ll listen to every guest, we respond to every guest.

00:13:53:19 – 00:14:14:19

Dan Simpson

And I think even some of the smart AI tools just make that easier. But then we can have the right adjustment between what is AI informed by us and guardrail by us, but then also with the human heart and touch across the whole thing. And then then the last thing I’ll mention is that’s great. So either have really we have mostly really happy guests, and people tell us they wonderfully tell us all the time.

00:14:14:19 – 00:14:33:20

Dan Simpson

You work for Disney. We love designees and never hear like always hear love. And that’s our greatest ambition is we’re not trying to be the biggest Greek Mediterranean brand. What we weren’t the first and we’re not trying to be the biggest. So what’s left is the best. But as defined by our staff and our guests, the most beloved Mediterranean beta for your brand, that is our highest aspiration.

00:14:33:20 – 00:15:01:19

Dan Simpson

And so listening to the guests tell us and they do right now, they tell us, by and large, we get it right most of the time, and they’re thrilled most of the time. But in the areas where we get it wrong, ovation is incredibly helpful. We just hired a new head of restaurant excellence, and one of the things he’s going to be focusing on is ovation, because you go back all the way from our kitchen set up to our four walls, the whole design for the restaurant experience and even the digital experience is listening through ovation to where do we get it wrong and how does that point out?

00:15:01:19 – 00:15:20:10

Dan Simpson

Not a one off mistake, but a trend. So the insights page innovation is where I spend most of my time looking. We want to look at those patterns, those trends where we got it right, the top three things we got to rank and to celebrate. Our team is post up on our wall and give our team an ovation, passing on from the guests to the team.

00:15:20:10 – 00:15:45:03

Dan Simpson

And we want to take the top three things that we’re in. Pattern getting wrong. We’re not pointing a finger at a person pointing a finger process. There’s something broken in a process. So ovation clarifies for us. Okay guys, by store, by market, these are the areas where there’s something broken in the process that needs to be optimized. And then as you kind of alluded to earlier, even inside of that, there might be an overwhelming number of 10 or 12 different things.

00:15:45:03 – 00:16:03:05

Dan Simpson

So the new goals feature that we have partially rolled out one of our goals this year, one of our goals is to make this be ubiquitous across the entire system. Is it then teases out, okay, what is the single top? The tentative trend that if you could eliminate something, start here. And so, you know, I kind of call it the fix of the week.

00:16:03:05 – 00:16:22:12

Dan Simpson

Let’s focus on one thing. We have 52 chances to get it right. Make it right. So the combination of like listening to the guests, responding to the guests all the time, everyone, and then taking the trends that rise to the surface through insights and goals and trying to prevent the problems go upstream and prevent the problems. That’s a really an amazing software.

00:16:22:12 – 00:16:24:00

Dan Simpson

We’re really grateful for it.

00:16:24:02 – 00:16:41:02

Zack Oates

Well, Dan, it is humbling to think about where I was in 2016 when I sat down and mapped out, hey, here are the things I want to do with ovation. And if I could have played that clip to myself and it would have been like, keep going, Zach, it’s all going to be worth it because it’s really cool to hear it.

00:16:41:04 – 00:17:02:11

Zack Oates

Like genuinely is humbling to hear someone explain something that you created better than you can. And so I appreciate you, Dan. Appreciate your brand, your philosophy and what you’re doing in the world. And I know that this podcast is kind of taking a few different angles that we didn’t even get to talk specifically about the guest experience, but didn’t we talk entirely about the guest experience?

00:17:02:11 – 00:17:10:03

Zack Oates

Really? So, Dan, thanks for coming on the podcast. Is there anyone that you feel deserves an ovation that we should celebrate today?

00:17:10:05 – 00:17:31:06

Dan Simpson

That’s really great, man. Put me on the spot here. I would like to celebrate Armando and Ezell Perez. There are Nashville market leaders and just not that many months ago they completed their journey of immigrating to the United States and being welcomed by the US. I mean, welcome back to Ziggy’s. And they went through a multi-year process and just became US citizens.

00:17:31:07 – 00:17:38:02

Dan Simpson

And they’re also part owners now into the and so we’re really excited about their journey. So I would give them an ovation.

00:17:38:04 – 00:17:47:22

Zack Oates

That’s amazing. Super cool. Well Dan for helping us remember that fear doesn’t cripple but it’s a clue. Today’s ovation goes to you. Thank you for joining us and give an ovation.

00:17:47:24 – 00:17:49:04

Dan Simpson

Thank you.

00:17:49:06 – 00:18:11:19

Zack Oates

Thanks for joining us today. If you like this episode, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or your favorite place to listen. We’re all about feedback here. Again, this episode was sponsored by ovation, a two question, SMS based, actionable guest feedback platform built for multi-unit restaurants. If you’d like to learn how we can help you measure and create a better guest experience, visit us at ovation Ofcom.