Venture capital comes to Texas barbecue
Established restaurateurs taking pitmasters under their wing
Truth BBQ in Brenham, one of the most celebrated new barbecue joints in the state, recently announced it would open a second location in Houston.
Local food writers salivated over the news, and the general theme in coverage was that Truth would only add to the city’s embarrassment of barbecue riches. But for those of us who have reported on Texas barbecue over the past decade, the most intriguing aspect of the announcement was that restaurateur Johnny Carrabba would be an investor in the venture.
The fact that an established, deeppocketed restaurateur — previously unassociated with the barbecue business — would publicly invest in a small Texas barbecue joint is a relatively new phenomenon here. And, given the increasing popularity of Texas barbecue both nationally and internationally, I expect we might see more of it.
Why would a successful restaurateur want to invest in the notoriously difficult business of cooking and selling barbecue? There is, of course, the profit motive. The most successful Texas barbecue joints are, in fact, very profitable. But if a restaurateur is mainly concerned with profit, there are far easier cuisines with higher profit margins — burgers or Tex-Mex, for example.
There is a mentorship factor, too. Pitmasters often are classic entrepreneurs willing to throw caution to the wind. “If you build it, they will come” is the usual mantra. But the reality is that opening a restaurant takes a lot more than just cooking great barbecue.
Many pitmasters in Houston, with its frothy barbecue-startup scene, open on a shoestring with little business experience. I suspect established restaurateurs are taking notice and seeing an opportunity to offer their experience in exchange for an ownership stake.
Undoubtedly, there have always been silent investors in Texas barbecue joints. However, I think we will see more publicly announced, high-profile investments because owning a Texas barbecue joint is becoming a status symbol.
In the restaurant business, there is no cuisine more celebrated and mythologized than Texas barbecue. It is only natural that successful restaurateurs would want to add that feather to their caps.
High-profile venture capital investment in Texas barbecue is still new, and whether it will grow as a trend remains to be seen. Of course there will be inevitable cries about the “corporatization” of Texas barbecue. It’s a valid concern, and potential investors would be wise to take a “hands off” approach.
There is some precedent for this in Houston. Bill Floyd and Bryan Caswell (Reef, Little Bigs) partnered with pitmaster Greg Gatlin to open Jackson Street BBQ downtown. Though by all accounts Caswell and Floyd were emphatically “hands on” in the establishment of the restaurant, it does provide an example of nonbarbecue restaurateurs establishing a well-regarded Texas barbecue joint.
For his part, Carrabba already has professed a more hands-off mentorship approach in his investment with Truth BBQ and its celebrated pitmaster and owner, 29-year-old Leonard Botello IV.
“We’re just ready to sit back and let Leonard do his thing,” Carrabba said in the announcement.