Episode 009 takes us into the world of steak! My two big highlight of the week revolved around eating steak and meeting cattle ranchers, so it was only fair to bring that as the focus. We will get to those details shortly. 

The episode opens with a recent Seattle Times article "Is Seattle’s booming restaurant scene showing signs of slowing?" by Bethany Jean Clement and her data that shows how retail rents in Seattle have increased by over 30% in the last decade from around $21/sqft to $29/sqft and the impact that is having on the restaurant seen. We've also had an increase of 20% in the total number of food business opening which parallels the +20% increase in population density. All of these factors are adding a ton of pressure on retail and forcing many closures to well established brands. More included on the audio.

Now lets get into the meat of this episode (pun intended). My featured Business of the Week is Country Natural Beef. I met them a few months ago at an influencer event hosted by Whole Foods. The reason I took interest in their company was the fact they had an interesting business model as a Co-Op. CNB is a collection of 80 ranches across the west coast, and collectively they all sell to big retailers like Whole Foods, PCC, and New Seasons. The Co-Op creates a unique partnership between the different ranches in which the smaller producers are given the chance to market and sell to bigger retailers. And the part the ranchers like the most, is they get to keep their independence while being part of a larger organization. 

The cattle ranchers of the CNB are required to spend time at the stores to connect with customers and see their product in stores first hand. However, their experiences have revealed the changing landscape of retail, in which at least 1/4 of all store shoppers are personal shoppers, coming from Amazon or Uber to shop for other people's online orders. This changing dynamic makes in store marketing less effective. So they invited me to speak at their conference and make a video about how they can innovate to reach customers before they buy. Learn more about CNB on their website (LINK).

This week's featured Meal of the Week is from historic Downtown Seattle Metropolitan Grill. I ate their Chateaubriand from their Carved Table Side for Two portion of the menu. The 24oz steak includes classic cliff sauce, parmesan tomato crowns, mushroom caps with potatoes and asparagus with Bearnaise sauce. Check out their Meet at the Met promotion for an incredible buy 2, get 2 deal.