Wedding Business Solutions

Anthony Lambatos, Footer's Catering - When Less is More!

• Alan Berg, CSP, FPSA, Global Speaking Fellow

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Is your business suffering from “mission creep”—trying to be everything to everyone? What would happen if you simplified your offerings and focused on doing one thing exceptionally well? In this episode, I explore how subtracting, not adding, can make your business and life better, and why aligning your work with joy and purpose leads to outstanding customer experiences.

Listen to this new episode for inspiration on simplifying your business, avoiding burnout, and creating exceptional experiences by focusing on what you love and doing it better every day.

About Anthony:
Anthony Lambatos believes heart-led leadership isn’t just good for people — it’s good for business.

Since purchasing Footers Catering from his father in 2010, Anthony and his wife April have quadrupled revenue, maintained retention 50% better than the industry average and opened an event center called Social Capitol. Footers has been recognized nationally for innovation in both catering and culture, earning “Best Places to Work” honors eight years running.

In response to industry demand, Anthony founded MIBE, a leadership development and culture-building organization that helps leaders grow people-first organizations. An award-winning speaker, Anthony inspires leaders to create workplaces where fulfilled employees fuel unstoppable results.


Contact: 

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/anthonylambatos

Instagram: @MibeLeadership

www.themibe.com (education company)

www.footerscatering.com (catering business)

www.socialcapitolevents.com (event center)


If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or visit my website Podcast.AlanBerg.com 

Please be sure to subscribe to this podcast and leave a review (thanks, it really does make a difference). If you want to get notifications of new episodes and upcoming workshops and webinars, you can sign up at www.ConnectWithAlanBerg.com  

View the full transcript on Alan’s site: https://alanberg.com/blog/


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I'm Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you'd like to suggest other topics for "The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast" please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks. 

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©2025 Wedding Business Solutions LLC & AlanBerg.com 

Is it time to simplify your life and your business? Listen to this episode, find out. Hi, it's Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions Podcast. I am so happy to have my friend Anthony Lombardozzo on from Footers Catering in Colorado. Anthony, welcome.

Ah, it's good to, good to be with you, Alan. Thank you for having me today.

Well, thank you for the post that you put on LinkedIn. And it was you and your family down in Huatulco, Mexico, where I have been. Beautiful, beautiful place. If you want to get away from the tourists, go to Huatulco. But you did a post there, so tell us the story.

Yeah, so I mean, it's a little bit off the beaten path, but it's a place we've come to love. And we had gone, we were going to one of our favorite places, and it was right before we were headed to the airport. And we get there and there's an hour wait, and we're like, we don't have time to wait for an hour. And so we start, you know, looking around for other places to eat. And, you know, we walk by and there's a just small taco place, unassuming. You barely tell it's a restaurant. There's a few plastic tables and, you know, there's a guy, he's making some tacos out on the street. And we kind of stopped and looked.

And this couple that was sitting in there said, if you're looking for a place to eat, this place is amazing. And so we're like, kind of like, okay, like, it doesn't look amazing, but like, you're here, like. And if we kind of start talking to him, turns out like they come there 3, 4 times a week. They're locals, they moved down there, they were from, they were actually from Canada and moved down there. And so, you know, we're getting at this point crunch for time and it's like, do you want this? Do you want this? And, you know, we got a group of 8 of us, so we're just in that spot where it's like, all right, let's just, let's just go for it. Let's lean in. And they have one thing on the menu, pork tacos. That's it.

Pork tacos.

Pork tacos. You could get different cuts. So there was the tongue, there was the head, there was the rib. You could get part of the pig you wanted, or there was a mix. But that was all they did, pork tacos. And so we're like, all right, we're having pork tacos. So they bring out these plates, and they get this beautiful little garnish to put on them. But it's just the fresh tortilla and the pork right there that they were cooking right out the house.

Outside and it was some of the most delicious food we'd had the whole time we'd been there. And the story in my post that I talked about is so many times we want to add, we want to overcomplicate things, we want to try to be everything to everyone. And sometimes the best thing you can do is just be really good at one thing. Just focus on simplifying. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to do it really well and really be known for that. And so that was kind of the moral and the lesson from that post.

Yeah, the mission creep that happens in our lives and in our businesses is really what it is, you know, the next shiny object. And it's hard to resist sometimes because depending upon where the voice is coming from, who's saying, Anthony, you should do this, Anthony, you should do that, right? Like you're in a world and you're, you know, you're performing at a high level and, you know, a lot of people performing at high levels and, you know, it's like, oh, look what they're doing. Oh, look what they're doing. Oh, look what they're doing. Right. And it's hard sometimes, right?

And it's, it's actually been proven. It's human nature. There was a study, I think it was done by the Journal of Experimental Psychology. And what they did is they had these participants come and it was like, I think, a bridge that was like made of Legos. And they said, improve this bridge. And 95%, something like that, 95% of people added bricks to the bridge to improve it. And only 5% took a brick away. And taking a brick away was actually the best way to improve the bridge that they had.

But we are prone to think that if we want to improve something, we have to add. And get yourself in the mindset of like, what if I improved by subtracting, taking something away? And I know for me personally, this has been a big aha. I tend to be a yes person. I like to do a lot of things. You get commitments. I'll be on this board. I'll do this. I'll have this.

I'm going to have family. I'm going to, you know, all the things that you keep adding and you don't subtract. And I've been very mindful recently of like, you know what, taking something away is actually going to make everything else better in my life. And it's something that I keep leaning into because I think, so, you know, as a leader, we forget this, that some of the most powerful things we can do to improve is to notice the weight of everything we're carrying and remove something being the best way forward.

Yeah, and also doing the things that you're not only good at but you enjoy doing, because sometimes you could be, you could be good at something but you don't enjoy it. And that happened to me when I, when I left the Knot in 2011. You know, I'm starting a business, right? Just starting a business. I'm doing all kinds of things, and I realized very quickly that I'm good at helping you reword a website, but I hate sitting by myself and rewording your website. I'll do it with you. I would spend hours with somebody doing it, just the look on your face and getting input and whatever. But writing reports and things, I mean, when I got out of the corporate world, I'm like, oh, thank goodness, right? I don't have a meeting every 5 minutes, and I don't, all these kind of things. And people were, oh, Alan, but I'll pay you this.

It's like, it's not that, right? And I also realized it's not the money that makes you want to love it. Somebody approached me one time and they said, you know, I have an idea that'll make you a lot of money. I said, I'm not interested. They said, what? I said, tell me you have an idea that's going to make my life better, it's going to make me happier, that's going to bring value to my family and my clients and whatever. And if it brings me money, that's great, but let's start with that. And I was a guest on a podcast, and people listening probably heard me say this already, but somebody asked me, why do you do what you do? And I said, something clicked and I said, it does two things. It brings you value and it brings me joy.

Yeah. Right? Love that.

And it's got to do both of those. Yeah.

Yeah. I couldn't agree more. It's something we talk about a lot with our sister company, Mibe, which we focus on leadership development, is burnout doesn't come from the number of hours you're working on something. We've all had those experiences where you'll work for like 8 hours on a project and at the end of it be fired up. Like, you're excited. You're motivated. You're like, look at what I built, look at what I accomplished, look how much I did. This was awesome.

And then you have the experience where you work for like an hour on a project and you want to pull your eyeballs out. Like, you're like, this was miserable. And so we talk a lot about burnout is about the work you're doing. And when you're doing work that aligns with your strengths and that you enjoy, that's the magic. That's what is one of our pillars of creating a great place to work is you got to have people doing jobs that they really love and they're really good at.

Yeah. And it is, you know, who is it? Oh, Clint Pulver, who's been on the podcast. He's a speaker friend of mine, an amazing drummer. And he received a great honor. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame, the Speaker Hall of Fame. And part of his speech was, now he's in, there's a room with 1,000 professional speakers in the room, right? And he said, we work 80 hours a week so we don't have to work 40. Just love that quote because when you love the 80 hours, it's not work, right?

And, you know, somebody asked me, you know, what is, what do you think about retirement? Like, what, what does that look like? I said, well, my uncle who was a life coach till he died at 93, okay, like the day before he died, he was still a life coach, right? Wow. My dad was an accountant and I kind of forced him to retire at 77 only 'cause he was self-employed and I needed him to be able to sell the practice while he was alive and healthy.

Or whatever. But then he became president of the Homeowners Association until he was 90 or something like that, you know. So those kind of things. So that's what our family does, is we find something we love, and it's not work, right? It's not work. And it's funny, I tell people, you know, my, my Instagram life and Facebook life and LinkedIn life is exciting, right? But, but the travel delays and sleeping in a different bed, and I was just in a hotel where they had to give me 2 electric heaters because it was so darn cold, and right, that's not, you don't put that on, right? We don't put that up online there.

But the simplifying, part of that is like niching. So I niched into the wedding and event industry consciously in 2013. And a lot of people think, oh, it's gonna limit me. But it's just the opposite, right? It's just the opposite. When you're the one that's so good at something, those are the people that get sought out.

Right? Yeah. 100%. That's why most of our focus at Mob Simulator is for hospitality, right? Like leadership development, culture, applies to anybody. But when we can, I'm like, no, there's unique things about the hospitality industry.

And, you know, I mean, I know we're drifted away, but just like, for so long our industry has been about serve the guests, serve the guests, serve the guests. And our focus is, no, serve your people and then they'll serve the guests.

Yeah, that's Danny Meyer setting the table, right? That's what it is. Take care of your people.

If your people, when I was at The Knot and I was VP of sales, I used to say, you know, if there was an image, if I had my people and there was a flag to be carried, I would be the one carrying the flag in front of everybody. I'd be the one taking the first shot because I'm here to protect you. I'm here to support you. 'Cause if I support you well, you're gonna take care of our people, right? You're gonna take care of our customers. If you're, 'cause we know it. I mean, again, you're in hospitality, you walk in and you can tell from the server, right? You can tell by their attitude what's going on.

And when I hear servers complaining in earshot of guests, I'm like, oh, this is not good.

I have told this story before, but April, my wife, and I, we go to this restaurant and, you know, it was a new restaurant. We were excited to try it. It was opened by a group that we liked their other restaurants. So we were like, oh, this is going to be great. Go. Food was good. Service was good. Atmosphere was good. Everything was good. Prices were fair.

And April looked at me and said, what did you think? And I channeled Gabrielle Union in 10 Things I Hate About You when she says, I know you can be underwhelmed, and I know you can be overwhelmed, but can you ever just be whelmed? And I was like, it was whelming. And April goes, yeah, I agree. I don't think we ever need to come back. And I started to think about this because I think it's the most dangerous thing for a business is to be whelming. You did everything you were supposed to do. You delivered on your promise, but you never did anything to stand out.

And the customer never comes back and you never know why because you never did anything wrong. And as I thought about this more, it was to your point of, you know, have you ever had an experience with somebody that was underwhelming, much less whelming? You know, the terrible server, the hotel person that like doesn't want to check you in, that's just sitting there content staring at their computer like, are you seeing that there's people waiting here. Right. Have you ever thought to yourself in that moment, wow, like, I bet that person really loves their job? It doesn't happen. And so it, like, was this epiphany for me that these underwhelming and whelming experiences often come from underwhelming and whelming company culture. And so focus on being overwhelmingly awesome with your culture, you're going to create overwhelmingly awesome experiences for guests.

So yeah, we were just at the Atlantis in the Bahamas and—

Yes.

I wasn't expecting amazing service because, you know, it's a big place. And no particular offense intended, but my wife said, this kind of feels like a Carnival cruise. You know, we're in a building, but it kind of feels like a Carnival cruise. And it was busy, and there were a lot of little kids because school was in and stuff like that. And I have to say, the staff was amazing. The people, everybody had a smile, everybody looked you in the eye. We had a young lady checking us in who had trainee on, so I give her a little bit of slack on that. I could hear her reading the script, you know, and it didn't have the feeling yet because she didn't know.

But I get it, I get it. Listen, she was trying and all that stuff. But everybody that we saw, you know, security people, everybody, everybody's smile and a hello, whatever, is like, yeah, yeah, that was, that was very nice, right? And the food in the restaurants and stuff was good. You know, would I go back? Probably not, only because we're not into these big, you know, thousands of people things. That's why we don't do big cruises, we do river cruises now, you know, 180, 200 people. No kids, nothing personal, but no kids. You'll get there, you'll get there, you'll get to where you're like, you know what, let's do— because you do family vacations, right? We do, we do vacation now. That's different.

Vacation is no kids.

My kids are 9 and 10, so yeah, yeah, yeah.

We either do just the two of us or we do multi-generation. Like, we have four generations. We have great-grandma and grandchildren, right? So we have that, and that's fun, but that, but that's different, right? You're there for the kids and stuff. But let's get, getting back to this, you know, you, you do one thing, you do it well, and you can tell.

I don't know if I've told this story in a while. When we were selling a house a while back, you know how the carpeting sometimes gets a little loose, you need to have it stretched, right? So we're selling the house, we want to get it stretched, and I asked the neighbor, I said, you know, do you know a carpet? She's like, oh, I have a guy, he's great. I'm thinking, well, okay, that's, well, sure. So we get her guy, right? And her guy comes, and I was working, you know, in the house, and I'm working, and I walk him by the room that he's stretching, this living room, dining room.

And the care that he was taking and the attention to detail, he was stretching carpeting, but the care and attention to detail made me literally sit on the steps and just watch him. And when he's got his face on the carpet and he's touching down, and I was like, wow, looks good. And he started over because it wasn't right.

Wow.

And you have to appreciate just his attention to detail and him like, no, my, this is me, this is my name here, right? I'm not signing this, but I am. It's my job. I was like, wow, he could have stopped. He could have stopped it. It would look fine to sell. But he started over. And I've remembered that. And every time I'm thinking, you know, there's sometimes where good enough is good enough, and there's sometimes where no, no, no, no, no, no. That's not right.

And, you know, sometimes when you're doing something and you mess up and you have to do it again and you're like, oh, you know, because it has to be right, right? So I have to do it now. But that comes from inside, right?

Oh, for sure. I couldn't agree more. There's a, yeah, you know, there's got to be some pride that you're taking in the work you're doing. And when you care and you see the purpose behind it, that's, that's one of the things that we care about. Like, why does this matter? Right? Like, if that guy's there just to stretch carpet, he's there just to stretch carpet. But if he's there to help you sell your house for the maximum amount of money and have his name on something that is going to potentially be a referral, especially in a small business like that, you know, there's bigger purpose for him to do a good job as opposed to just good enough. And right. Right.

And he was, he was referred to me. Right. And, and we have the same thing. We have a painter we've now used 2 or 3 times, was referred by neighbors. Same reason. Right. It's those things. So in hospitality, you know, you have servers, you're like, you're bringing servers in, there's 200 guests. How do you instill in them the purpose?

Yeah. So we're constantly talking about what we, what we do. And our mission is a 3-bullet mission statement. I'm not a fan of long scripty, you know, we strive to be the best, blah, blah, blah, perfectly managed. Like, it's love what you do, make it better every day, create exceptional experiences. Those are the 3.

Say it again, say it slow.

Love what you do, make it better every day, and create exceptional experiences. That's, that's our focus. We want to enjoy it. We don't want to do the same thing. You know, we're a second-generation family business. We bought it from my dad 15 years ago. We don't want to do the same thing he did. You know, when he started in 1981.

We want to evolve. And the third part is we have to understand we are part of some of the most special days in people's lives, right? What we get to do is an honor. And so talking about that, right? So that starts in our kitchen. Years ago, I went into the kitchen. Two guys are doing the exact same thing. I say, hey, guys, how you doing? What are you doing today? First guy, chopping lettuce, boss, just chopping lettuce. And sure enough, that's what he was doing, chopping lettuce. I turned to the next guy, I said, hey, but you know, what are you doing today? He's doing the same thing.

He says, I'm making the most beautiful salads in the world, boss. Like, two guys doing the exact same thing. One thinks he's making beautiful salads, one thinks he's chopping lettuce. It's our responsibility to talk about that. So even our people in the prep kitchen, when they're prepping a menu, they'll talk about who that menu is for, who's gonna, you know, they'll never see that event. They're gonna, they're gonna prep all the food and go home. But if we talk about it's John and Susie's wedding, and this is why they chose this hors d'oeuvre, and this is why they want this menu. All of a sudden, when they're crafting that, when they're putting their heart into it, they know this is what this is translating, not just I'm making salad for people to eat.

And the same thing happens on site. Now, another similar experience where, you know, we're doing this wedding and it's hotter than you know what, and this young busboy, because, you know, he's coming back, all these people, they just, they just keep, I fill their water glasses and they just keep drinking the water. I clearly, we've missed an opportunity. We, this guy thinks his job is to fill water glasses.

No, right?

Your job is to create a great experience for people. And so when we talk about why we're here in that pre-shift meeting, whether it's a nonprofit event and what are we raising money for, why are they having this event, how do we help them, how do we play a role in that, so that when they come they're not just a server at that event. And we train and hire all of our staff in-house, so we're not using temp staff. These are people that know what we're doing and care about the Pooters brand, but also are invested in what, what event they're, they're doing. We, when we have this thing, it's called our service moment of the year that we give at our core value awards. And so we, these amazing examples, but one of my favorites was one of our chefs, this couple is getting married and there's an ice cream truck that starts driving down the road and playing the, you know, obnoxious loud music that's great for kids, not great for weddings. And our chef takes off down the street and catches the ice cream truck and asks him to turn down the music while the couple's getting married, right? Like, that's not our job as a caterer. That's not our job as a chef.

But if we're thinking about the experience as a whole, it is our job. And so that's a big thing that we pride ourselves on. And it's fun to hear those stories.

Is that, have your people read Unreasonable Hospitality?

Oh yeah.

Yeah, of course, right? I'm sure. So you use the word, you use the word honor. I use the word privilege, right? Anytime somebody hires you, it means they've said no to everybody else.

Oh yeah, right.

You think about that, right? It has to, right? They hired you. They didn't hire anybody else for this event. And one of my clients, a rental company, he taught me that they always ask 3 questions. They're not necessarily ask them to the clients, but answering 3 questions. What's the occasion? Who's coming and what does success look like?

Yep.

Right? So, that's what you described there. It's like, what's the occasion? It's a wedding, right? Who's coming? Friends, family, all great stuff. What does success look like? Success looks like people walking away saying, this was the best time I've ever had. This was an amazing event. We're so happy for them. And when I go and do sales training on site with people, I always say, we don't get credit for getting it right. But we lose points for getting it wrong. And when you talk about the chopping lettuce, right, one guy understood that, like, every salad's going to be beautiful, every salad's going to be perfect.

The other guy's like, I have to get through these heads of lettuce, right? Success for him was finishing chopping lettuce. Success for the other person is every salad is perfect when it goes out, right? Because, you know, one light bulb is out and we all were looking around for every light bulb that's out, right? Chip paint, spider webs, things. This is what I look for when I come on site. One of my clients, every Monday at his venue, somebody went around with a can of paint touching up everything that got chipped over the weekend, right? Because again, it's going to happen, right? You're going to bang into something, you're going to, somebody's going to bang some, a cart or whatever. Touch, touch, touch, touch, touch, because it's going to be perfect for the next one because we don't get credit for getting it right. And again, when we're talking to people, that's, if I was talking to those two chefs, that would be the explanation. It's like does every salad have to be perfect? Yes. Okay, why? Because they're, well, they're not going to notice if it's perfect.

It's going to be beautiful. There it is. But if mine looks different than yours, ooh, wait a second, what's going on here, right? And we noticed that, right? Well, of course we're in hospitality, so we noticed that. But, you know, you sit at a table, people get different dishes. Like, you got more fries than me? Wait a minute, why did you get more fries than me, right? So, but it, it's being good. So I, I love and again, I, I would have guessed that this is what you're doing, but I love that you articulating what you're doing with your people and them understanding that. Because when we're training people, they have to understand the why, right? They have to understand the why. And again, you said honor, I say privilege, but it's the same thing.

You know, it's a privilege for me to have you here because you're not doing anything else right now. You're, you're doing this with me, right?

Right.

Yeah. So that's just looking at the world, but you know, it's fuzzy on the camera over here, but you said something. What was the second part of your mission?

Make it better every day.

Yeah. It says, I don't ever want to be the best I can ever be. I just want to be the best I've ever been every time.

Oh, love it.

Yep. Right. Which is the same thing. Be better every time. Can I chop lettuce better today than yesterday? Can I make these, can I get these plates out just a little faster than I did before? Can I make it easier for the people around me, right? And again, you're a boss. I always said when I was the boss, if I was putting out fires, that was my fault. And if it looked like I was doing nothing, it meant I trained the right people, put them in the right seats. And if I did, if I'm doing my job really well, it should look like I'm doing absolutely nothing.

Yeah, yeah, that's what it is.

That's what it is. So, so circling back to pork tacos, what cut of pork, pork did you have?

We did the tongue, we did the head, and we did the mix of all of them.

All the carnitas. All the carnitas. Okay. And your favorite?

My favorite was actually the mix. The carnitas was the best. Okay.

Yeah. Well, if you were in catering, I don't know if I'd go for the head or the tongue. I don't know if I would.

Lengua and cabeza.

Well, you know what's funny? Last quick story, it was a Mexico story. I'm at this event and they have a, like, an experimental kitchen and they're doing all kinds of things and like ants and crickets and whatever. And I said to the chef, don't tell me what's in it, let me try it first. And he proceeds to tell me that there's ants in this dish. I was like, no, no, don't tell me, right? But they were cooked and ground up, it looked like black pepper, right? So you didn't even taste anything, right? Then the next one, and I said, okay, don't tell me. And he start just telling me that there's crickets in this. I was like, I said don't tell me what's, I don't want to know what's in here. And again, I didn't, I didn't taste anything there.

But the third one was a cupcake with a cricket on top of it. Like, there was no hiding this. It wasn't ground up or anything like that. But it was just funny. I was like, let me try it first. Like, like, if you let me try the head or the tongue and then tell me what it is, I liked it or I didn't like it. But once you say, okay, it's the head, I don't know if I want to, the brains are, I don't know if I want that, right? But, but this is labels, right? Like I eat gluten-free and, you know, if you tell someone, okay, well, oh, vegan, this is a vegan salad. Oh no, no, I don't want that.

You eat vegan salads all the time, right?

Yeah. Right.

You do. Just don't put a label on it. Put a label on it. So, well, Anthony, thank you so much, for joining me. You, you mentioned something else besides footers. What is that other thing you were talking about?

Yeah. MIB is, is actually the acronym for Make It Better of Your Day. I, I have to give our team credit for that cuz I came into the kitchen one day and they're like, hey, did you see the MIB that happened? I'm like, MIB, what do you mean? What are you talking about? Like, you know, we're making it better every day. Like, and now it is part of the vernacular at Footers. You come in and it's like, hey, how can this be MIB'd? That was a good MIB over there and this person MIB'd this. And so as we branched off and now we have a separate company where we help companies with leadership development and intentional culture building, it was fitting that we would call it MIB.

And so that's, that's what we do with MIB. We have conferences, workshops, and a monthly training program where, like I said, we're not teaching catering. We're not teaching how to serve guests. We're teaching you how to bring your team closer together, be better leaders, because we believe that if we help people become better leaders, they're going to create better places to work. And when they do, the people that work in those organizations will find more fulfillment, not just at work, but in their lives as a whole.

Fantastic. Well, make sure you send me information about that as well. I can put that into the show notes if anybody wants to find out more about that. Maybe. Read the show notes if you want to find out more about Anthony. Thank you, Anthony, for joining me. Thanks, everybody, for listening and tune in for the next episode.

Thanks for having me on.

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Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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