Photography by Kevin A. Roberts
Since Dave and Kara Bailey have created 10 different restaurant concepts over the last 15 years, perhaps it’s time that someone creates an appropriate term for them, like “restrapreneurs.” The prolific husband and wife team recently opened Knockout BBQ, their first barbecue restaurant. Next up is the conversion of an old filling station into another Bailey’s Range, and they’re hungry to do more.
How many more concepts do you have in your head and how many will become a reality?
Dave: (laughs) The number’s dwindling. There are only a few left that that we haven’t already done.
Is there a magic number of restaurants you want to own?
Kara: (looks at Dave) That’s an animal we’re still trying to tame.
Your restaurants have all been located within the city limits? Why not branch out?
Dave: We’re not against going east or west, it’s just that our company has grown slowly and into spaces that made the most sense to us. We opened Rooster South Grand because we lived nearby and wanted a restaurant connection to that neighborhood, for example, but going somewhere besides the city is not off the table.
When did the two of you meet?
Dave: We met at Sasha’s on DeMun when I was taking care of a party of women who were friends with Kara. They found out I was single, she gets a call, unbeknownst to me, and shows up. Total set up.
When did you get into restaurant ownership?
Dave: I was managing full time at Sasha’s, and also at Pomme, and working at a local Radisson—like 14 shifts a week—when I decided to open my own place. I signed the lease for Baileys’ Chocolate Bar a year after Kara and I met.
What’s your takeaway from a few of your current restaurants?
Chocolate Bar—Kara: I love that people who had their first date there, end up getting married, and keep coming back for anniversaries, celebrations, brownies, and chocolate martinis. We hope having POP located downstairs will start its own series of traditions.
Rooster—Dave: It started as 21 seats for breakfast and lunch on weekdays. When we added weekend brunch, business took off, and then it became the thing we were known for. That location has 190 seats now.
Bridge—Dave: That one’s named for my late brother and his passion—the violin—so it’s especially sentimental for me. It’s tall and narrow but doesn’t feel confined because of how we developed the mezzanine. When we opened 10 years ago, every one of our craft beers was from somewhere else, except for Schlafly, which at the time was the only small brewer in town.
Range—Kara: I definitely remember that one. We were having our first child which coincided perfectly with Range’s orientation and opening.
Small Batch—Dave: We’d wanted to do a vegetarian restaurant for years, but the time and place wasn’t right until we found the space on Locust. When people ask why pair veggies with whiskey?, I tell them they totally go together when you provide hearty, like they are at Small Batch. And we admit that part of the hook was to attract both non-vegetarians as well as fans of whiskey.
Why did you introduce POP the way you did? In retrospect, would you do it the same way again?
Kara: The idea of closing a restaurant [L’Acadiane] and opening another [POP] in the same place on the same night was crazy. It came from Justin Austermann, our director of operations. It took me a minute to realize that we could actually do it without screwing it up. D: Justin compared it to theater, so we scripted every change down to the minute for the various teams—culinary, front of house, and décor—then we rehearsed it, cue sheets and all. Our guests totally got into the drama and excitement.
Would you do it again?
Kara: Probably not. That’s the kind of thing you do once and we already did it.
Talk about Hugo’s Pizzeria, how it came and went, and are there plans to revive it?
Dave: When a guy offered us more for our building than we paid for it, we took him up on it. It’s a concept we’d like to bring back for sure, we’re just not sure exactly where.
Do you still stockpile restaurant equipment? You used to have a warehouse full.
Dave: (laughs) There used to be a lot more—I’m using a lot of it now—but I could still have a decent-sized auction.
What caused you to get into the catering business and how successful has it been?
Dave: We’d been doing events in our restaurants for years, so we thought we could leverage our reputation into doing more specialized events, so we opened two venues [Willow and Slate] geared just for them. That’s a part of the company we’d like to grow.
Is today’s restaurant customer getting harder to deal with?
Kara: No, they’re just more vocal about their opinions. We please like 7000 people every weekend but there’s always one or two that have something negative to say. D: Some, for whatever reason, don’t even eat, but file a one-star review anyway, and that wears on an owner. You get a few five-star reviews then a single one star, and you net three and a half, which hurts. People see restaurants as things, not businesses that are owned by a person or a family. People who mistreat restaurants and bars would play it differently had they worked in one.
What do you do about it?
Kara: You spend a lot of time investigating, then intervening and attempting to rectify a situation, but you rarely hear back even after they know that a human is listening and responding.
What’s the hardest part of the restaurant industry?
Dave: It changes over time. Today, it’s recruiting and retaining. Across all our restaurants, we offer enough internal advancement where some of them, thankfully, stick around. What amazes me is how many people call for an interview and either never show or do show up and totally ghost us after that.
What’s the most rewarding part of the business?
Dave: To see people from our company start their own place and do well. By having several places and promoting from within, we can give a person with little or no experience the opportunity to make this business their career.
Do you visit all your restaurants every day?
Dave: I visit as many places as a I can, going to where I’m needed. Yesterday, I literally put out a fire. A warming cabinet got turned up too high for too long and fried some of the electronics. It didn’t burst into flames, but when we hauled it outside, it was almost there.
Is it a good time to get into the business?
Dave: It can be. I’m glad a place like Elmwood opened, for example. Would have it been better if it opened a year or two? Maybe or maybe not. People in the industry who want and deserve to have their own shop shouldn’t hold back. If you have a solid concept, good food, and put it in the right place, you should be fine.
What factors have changed from when you started in the business?
Dave: Work environments are a lot better—a lot less toxic—than 15 years ago, which was one reason I wanted my own place. I wanted to treat people better than I got treated, so we try to create places that are safe and accepting. When people are free to be who they are, they’re more likely to excel, and as long as people can adhere to certain respect and service standards, we all benefit. Restaurants should represent the diversity of where they’re located and we live in a very diverse town. (laughs) As long as you’re not violent or a jerk, we’ll hire you.
What’s the one piece of advice you’d give to a person wanting to get into the business?
Dave: Get a job as a prep cook for some period of time. You need to spend time in the trenches and be prepared to do it later, because it will happen. It’s crucial for an owner to see exactly how hard the staff works.
Speaking of growing, your urban farm has mushroomed.
Kara: What started in the backyard behind our office expanded to half an acre, thanks to a church and school nearby. Farmer Will [Erker] gets the kids involved in the experience, first planting and eventually tasting. We’re now in our fifth growing season.
Talk about the Baileys’ Range on Shaw and why it’s taken so long.
Dave: The design process went quickly but the historic tax credit approval took two years. You can’t really stick a shovel in the ground until all that gets worked out. That board sometimes asks for changes, so it isn’t wise to try to shortcut the system and start construction early. It will take another nine to 12 months to complete, which is a long time to be sitting on a piece of property.
Why are you opening a BBQ place (or possibly two) now?
Dave: We first talked about doing a barbecue place five years ago, in a building that we own downtown, then we got involved in other projects. Now, we have the opportunity to start on a smaller scale first. The Rooster South Grand space had some extra space and we had a working smoker there already that serviced the other restaurants. We called it Knockout because of the positive food connotations.
How would you describe the décor at Knockout?
Kara: The building is mid-century modern and like at Rooster, we wanted to respect that, so it doesn’t have your typical old wood and rustic vibe. We’ll use the space for Rooster for weekend brunch, so the spaces really have to complement one another or there’d be a disconnect.
Why provide table service when almost all other barbecue places do something less labor-intensive?
Kara: Part of what I like about restaurants is taking care of someone and being taken care of. Not that we won’t ever do a fast casual place, but standing in line, paying in line, and bussing your own table runs counter to that. That’s the vibe that we like. Plus, Rooster is already set up that way, so we feel it would complicate rather than simplify, service there.
You say that a likely signature item is the smoked half chicken. What makes it special?
Dave: The right brine, the right rub, and the right level of smoke…so juicy, no sauce is required. Our pork will be notable as well. My gripe with a lot of pulled pork is the lack of flavor: there’s too little smoke flavor and bark. Kara: There’ll be vegetarian and vegan items on the menu, too, with a smoker just for them. It’s past time for that to happen.
Isn’t the barbecue niche in St. Louis becoming saturated?
Dave: I don’t see that many more places than I saw 10 years ago. What I do see are better and more vocal players in the game. The barbecue bar is continuously being raised in St. Louis and I want to do my part.
