Todd Graves
Founder and CEO of Raising Cane's
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Todd Graves is the founder and CEO of Raising Cane's, which he opened near LSU in 1996 on a chicken-finger-only menu that bankers, a professor and industry experts said would fail, and which now trails only Chick-fil-A in average unit volume. The lesson most worth taking from him is fanatical focus paired with founder control: one product done better than anyone, every restaurant owned by the company, and equity kept rather than sold.
Some people call it, like, a simple menu. I say, well, it's not simple. It's focused.
How Todd Graves Built Raising Cane's
Todd Graves: the story and the lessons
1How Todd Graves funded and built the first Raising Cane's
Graves grew up cooking and running small ventures before the restaurant. His mother taught him to cook gumbo, and as a kid he ran lemonade stands and haunted houses. He studied scriptwriting in college.
Cooking was an expression of love for him, and a restaurant gave immediate gratification. The concept's original name was Folly's Chicken Fingers, after a friend's nickname.
A professor and every bank said the concept would not work. His business plan got a B-minus because the professor said a single-product menu would fail. Bankers told him to work for Brinker for 10 years first and refused a 100% loan.
His plan was the most detailed in the class, down to apron costs and student wages. He pitched in a cheap suit with an Office Depot briefcase, arguing that people reorder the same pizza every time, so a craveable meal brings them back.
He treated each rejection as fuel to prove people wrong. Graves says the best thing an aspiring entrepreneur can hear is that the idea won't work. After 30 years of proof, he now answers doubters calmly.
"It's like entrepreneurial fuel. It's putting gasoline on a fire, because you have something to prove."
He swore a campfire oath with his partner never to quit. On a camping trip in North Carolina, Graves and his original partner pledged to see the business through or die trying.
Graves says the oath is what kept him going through two years of raising money. When David Senra compared it to Elon Musk's "retreat is not an option," Graves answered "burn the ships."
Graves worked 95-hour refinery weeks and fished salmon in Alaska to fund it. He took a boilermaker job on refinery turnaround shifts, then a coworker, Wild Bill Tolar, sent him to Naknek, Alaska, where he lived about a month in Tent City before a boat hired him.
He lived on credit cards at 18 to 22% interest and bartending tips in between. "I would have worked construction in Nebraska if that's what paid."
The money came from small layered sources and one broker's patience. He raised about $60,000 from shareholders, including boilermaker coworkers, and took a $90,000 SBA loan. Broker Red Reynolds convinced a 94-year-old landowner to hold the North Gate site for a year.
Nearly 30 years later Cane's has a 100-year lease there, and Graves buys the real estate wherever he can. Two years passed from business plan to opening day.
He rebuilt the first store with his own hands and used equipment. Graves learned plumbing and minor construction, bought used gear from Houston and Dallas supply houses and registers from Office Depot. The first month's net profit was $30, which he counted as a win.
Behind old paneling he found a mural advertising the bakery that supplied the first bread, and used its design for the logo. He napped in an apartment out back between the 3:30 AM close and opening, and the original furniture is still there for managers to see.
2Why Todd Graves bet Raising Cane's on one menu
In-N-Out's unchanged menu convinced him focus could outlast variety. Graves found In-N-Out while working refineries in Los Angeles. Its menu had not changed since 1948, yet it kept growing while rivals added items and marketing.
He used that track record to persuade the banks for his SBA loan. Rivals feared the "veto vote," where one person in the car rejects a restaurant, and locals expected Cajun and Creole plate lunches.
Graves calls the menu focused, not simple, because every ingredient must be right. He controls the bird's weight and species and how long meat rests after slaughter, and brines chicken for 24 hours. Fries have black sugar tips removed and tea leaves come from three countries.
A large culinary department, not R&D, checks every raw product. The menu has stayed essentially the same since 1996.
He refuses small cost cuts that would erase craveability. Past CFOs proposed trimming pennies in a business earning about 10 cents on a dollar. Graves rejects them because they compound into chains that are just a cheap calorie option.
In the Middle East he spent two years building a supply chain so the food tastes identical. "It's death by a thousand cuts. Then your food one day is not craveable."
A single cook-to-order line makes speed a sales lever. Drive-through and counter service average 2 minutes 35 seconds with no heat lamps or hold times. Graves treats every two seconds as about 1% of sales, roughly $60 million on $6 billion.
He set out for craveable food and found the speed advantage later. Extra items would slow the line, and heat lamps to compensate would cut quality.
Skipping limited-time offers frees managers to coach and watch customers. Rival LTOs need new training, delivery and sales targets. Cane's managers spend that time praising crew, talking to customers and checking cleanliness and music.
Graves says Cane's visit frequency matches any quick-service chain, disproving the variety theory. "The distracted don't beat the focused."
He holds the line on the sauce against outside pressure. Texas wanted cream gravy and barbecue sauce, and foreign partners suggest turning Cane's Sauce into a dipping sauce. Customers across the US came to love it as it is.
The only choice at Cane's is three, four or six chicken fingers. Graves wants Cane's to become the name for chicken fingers, the way Xerox did for copies.
3How Raising Cane's grew to 28 stores and survived Katrina
The second store proved Cane's was more than a college concept. Opened 18 months after the first, across campus, it drew office workers, parents, T-ball teams and church groups.
From it came his vision: craveable chicken fingers, a great crew, a cool culture and community involvement, with locations around the world.
Graves expanded fast on cheap sites and then burned out. Failing Fast Track burger sites came with equipment and cheap rent, and Cane's went from two to eight restaurants, opening five in five months.
Opening five at once wore him down, and he learned to set up leaders instead of putting out fires himself.
He paused growth a year to build a repeatable prototype in Lafayette. Outside architects, designers, marketers and trainers, called partners rather than consultants, built a full prototype including HR, marketing and training systems.
Lafayette was chosen because nobody knew the brand there. It produced faster drive-throughs, the ONE LOVE logo, combo meals and later a conventional loan. "No more growth. We're going to set up what the prototype is."
Graves financed growth with debt he later called a stupid way to do it. A $200,000 loan from Dr. Hill at 15% counted as equity to banks, letting a $1 million location be financed with no equity partner. New stores also deferred rent and vendor payments for 30 days.
He says he felt bulletproof at the time.
Katrina took 21 of 28 stores offline while banks still wanted payment. Graves rallied the team and reopened in about 30 days while others took 90, and Cane's was the only restaurant open in Metairie for weeks.
He gave three reasons: save the business, pay displaced crew, and feed returning residents. It meant passes from the governor's office, boil water rules and generators trucked in. First responders were fed first, and post-storm sales paid crew bonuses and community gifts.
After Katrina he set debt limits he will never cross. Proud of the team but disappointed in himself, he set a limit of roughly three times debt to equity, which took a couple of years to reach.
"I'll never, ever, ever put the company in a position that we're financially strapped."
The same improvising carried Cane's through COVID. Cane's taped off spacing, added shields and ran three drive-through lanes in parking lots, and Graves flew to every market to wave at crews from outside.
Sales rose and funded large crew and customer bonuses. "When it's personal to founders, you figure out a way."
4Why Todd Graves bought back every franchise
Graves franchised early mainly as a money play. He opened franchises in Ohio, Minnesota and Nevada with proven operators, some ex-CEOs of billion-dollar firms, planning to fund company growth with royalties.
Unlike a factory, every new restaurant needs fresh capital, which is why franchising is the standard route.
Franchisees ran at 85 out of 100 and resisted changes. A procedure tested in about five company stores was adopted overnight there, while franchisees pushed back that their markets were different.
One group did not want to get faster because they liked longer guest interactions; Graves answered that service can be just as friendly and quick. He rated other franchisees closer to 65, so this group was still strong.
Around year ten he bought them all back and kept their teams. Sales, wages and operations improved in the former franchise markets afterward.
The buyback worked like a merger, and the teams gained room to grow. "A franchisee is never going to run it like you do, because it's your baby."
Company ownership also earns a far higher valuation. Company restaurants carry a valuation above 20 times EBITDA versus 4 to 7 times for franchise models.
Graves adds that franchising might make more money but does not suit his personality, so it doesn't matter to him.
5Todd Graves on keeping control and equity
Graves keeps his equity instead of selling to private equity. He says Cane's is valued above $20 billion with about $3 billion of debt, and he still owns over 90%.
Financial partners owe returns that push cuts in quality and crew pay. He asks who would share his values and what would happen to managers and crews if he sold. "If it's special to you, hold onto your equity."
He warns founders against small private equity offers when stretched thin. Private equity typically offers $5 to $10 million and takes control. He urges founders to hire finance and IT experts and learn the details themselves.
A partner is safe only if they share the founder's belief and will never sell, since owing others a return changes your thinking.
Graves runs Cane's sales-driven, not profit-driven. Sales-driven means more staff on shift and better product, which earns repeat visits. Many rivals do about a third of Cane's sales per unit, and McDonald's is about $1 million behind.
"Do you want to be profit-driven or do you want to be sales-driven?"
His purpose is helping people, and he sees money as following service. Cane's has 75,000 crew members, often in a first job where they learn values. Once the debt is paid down, he plans to put free cash flow toward helping people.
He says "it's not what you make, it's what you give." He reads customer comments and feels it personally when Cane's misses its promise.
6How Todd Graves leads Raising Cane's crews
Graves built Cane's as the opposite of the negative kitchens he knew. His earlier restaurant jobs had yelling, no music and an owner who appreciated no one. Cane's runs on music, team feel and specific praise.
His example of everyday praise is thanking someone for taking out the trash and calling it "good toast."
He coaches every day, like football practice. Graves rejects six-month evaluations in favor of constant correction aimed at winning. Corporate hires who cannot take coaching or admit mistakes get weeded out.
He is first to say "I screwed up," which takes about 30 seconds and shows the team mistakes are fine. "Every day is an eval."
Graves hires for heart, not people chasing titles or pay. In interviews he spots who wants a VP title. Good signs are liking to lead, wanting a high-performing team and caring about the community.
Plenty of brilliant people could do the job, but he says it is "100% heart."
He treats respect, recognition and rewards as three separate jobs. Respect is owed, so restaurants close every major holiday. Recognition and rewards are earned: a crew-signed hard hat at one year, a salmon at five.
The rule came after the first July 4th, when he worked a shift and saw the crew drag. A Cane's Love department of former operators builds programs like a points system, because entrepreneurs' ideas fade without structure.
Graves dresses like the crew and calls headquarters a support office. He wore a Cane's T-shirt to industry conferences while others wore suits, so he is "the founder" and not "the boss." Monitors in the restaurant support office show live restaurants.
He still works shifts and holds town meetings to thank crews and ask what to improve.
7Todd Graves's rules for running himself and the details
Graves does not delegate; he helps great hires until they beat him. When a hire performs at 85 and the business needs 95, he works alongside them, easing off once they reach 95 or 96 but still checking.
He says his co-CEO and IT team are better than he is, yet he stays in the details with both. "You don't delegate. You hire great people. You help them in doing it."
Small details reveal how the whole business runs. He cites Louisiana shipping owner Gary Chouest, who knows his bottled water cost; a 25% overpayment there suggests waste everywhere.
His advice is to keep the habits that made you successful and sharpen them with better reports.
He is never satisfied, framed at Cane's as raising the bar. After a good opening the team lists what went well, then what to fix, such as getting two seconds faster or staffing more.
He says Cane's can get to 95 because 100 doesn't exist, and after 30 years he is as fired up as on day one.
Graves sees no work-life balance in the startup years. His advice: imagine how hard it is, multiply by infinity, and commit anyway. Going from one restaurant to two is the hardest step.
His sleep swings with the business, from three hours to 10 or 11, and he wakes to email solutions. He keeps no fixed schedule and answers whatever the business needs, even at 3 a.m.
He says a business must be natural to its founder. His first partner, Craig, preferred finance and the Wall Street Journal and left, saying the fry cook life did not make him happy.
Craig later returned to Cane's for several years, started his own business and is still a close friend. Graves's line: "It's not a career, it's a passion."
How Todd Graves Built Raising Cane's
Todd Graves built Raising Cane's on one craveable chicken finger menu that experts and bankers said would fail, funding it with refinery and Alaska fishing wages, and kept control of the company for three decades. The story teaches focus, founder control, company ownership of every restaurant and a hard rule on debt after Hurricane Katrina nearly sank the business.
Graves grew up cooking and running small ventures before the restaurant. His mother taught him to cook gumbo, and as a kid he ran lemonade stands and haunted houses. He studied scriptwriting in college.
Cooking was an expression of love for him, and a restaurant gave immediate gratification. The concept's original name was Folly's Chicken Fingers, after a friend's nickname.
A professor and every bank said the concept would not work. His business plan got a B-minus because the professor said a single-product menu would fail. Bankers told him to work for Brinker for 10 years first and refused a 100% loan.
His plan was the most detailed in the class, down to apron costs and student wages. He pitched in a cheap suit with an Office Depot briefcase, arguing that people reorder the same pizza every time, so a craveable meal brings them back.
He treated each rejection as fuel to prove people wrong. Graves says the best thing an aspiring entrepreneur can hear is that the idea won't work. After 30 years of proof, he now answers doubters calmly.
"It's like entrepreneurial fuel. It's putting gasoline on a fire, because you have something to prove."
He swore a campfire oath with his partner never to quit. On a camping trip in North Carolina, Graves and his original partner pledged to see the business through or die trying.
Graves says the oath is what kept him going through two years of raising money. When David Senra compared it to Elon Musk's "retreat is not an option," Graves answered "burn the ships."
Graves worked 95-hour refinery weeks and fished salmon in Alaska to fund it. He took a boilermaker job on refinery turnaround shifts, then a coworker, Wild Bill Tolar, sent him to Naknek, Alaska, where he lived about a month in Tent City before a boat hired him.
He lived on credit cards at 18 to 22% interest and bartending tips in between. "I would have worked construction in Nebraska if that's what paid."
The money came from small layered sources and one broker's patience. He raised about $60,000 from shareholders, including boilermaker coworkers, and took a $90,000 SBA loan. Broker Red Reynolds convinced a 94-year-old landowner to hold the North Gate site for a year.
Nearly 30 years later Cane's has a 100-year lease there, and Graves buys the real estate wherever he can. Two years passed from business plan to opening day.
He rebuilt the first store with his own hands and used equipment. Graves learned plumbing and minor construction, bought used gear from Houston and Dallas supply houses and registers from Office Depot. The first month's net profit was $30, which he counted as a win.
Behind old paneling he found a mural advertising the bakery that supplied the first bread, and used its design for the logo. He napped in an apartment out back between the 3:30 AM close and opening, and the original furniture is still there for managers to see.
In-N-Out's unchanged menu convinced him focus could outlast variety. Graves found In-N-Out while working refineries in Los Angeles. Its menu had not changed since 1948, yet it kept growing while rivals added items and marketing.
He used that track record to persuade the banks for his SBA loan. Rivals feared the "veto vote," where one person in the car rejects a restaurant, and locals expected Cajun and Creole plate lunches.
Graves calls the menu focused, not simple, because every ingredient must be right. He controls the bird's weight and species and how long meat rests after slaughter, and brines chicken for 24 hours. Fries have black sugar tips removed and tea leaves come from three countries.
A large culinary department, not R&D, checks every raw product. The menu has stayed essentially the same since 1996.
He refuses small cost cuts that would erase craveability. Past CFOs proposed trimming pennies in a business earning about 10 cents on a dollar. Graves rejects them because they compound into chains that are just a cheap calorie option.
In the Middle East he spent two years building a supply chain so the food tastes identical. "It's death by a thousand cuts. Then your food one day is not craveable."
A single cook-to-order line makes speed a sales lever. Drive-through and counter service average 2 minutes 35 seconds with no heat lamps or hold times. Graves treats every two seconds as about 1% of sales, roughly $60 million on $6 billion.
He set out for craveable food and found the speed advantage later. Extra items would slow the line, and heat lamps to compensate would cut quality.
Skipping limited-time offers frees managers to coach and watch customers. Rival LTOs need new training, delivery and sales targets. Cane's managers spend that time praising crew, talking to customers and checking cleanliness and music.
Graves says Cane's visit frequency matches any quick-service chain, disproving the variety theory. "The distracted don't beat the focused."
He holds the line on the sauce against outside pressure. Texas wanted cream gravy and barbecue sauce, and foreign partners suggest turning Cane's Sauce into a dipping sauce. Customers across the US came to love it as it is.
The only choice at Cane's is three, four or six chicken fingers. Graves wants Cane's to become the name for chicken fingers, the way Xerox did for copies.
The second store proved Cane's was more than a college concept. Opened 18 months after the first, across campus, it drew office workers, parents, T-ball teams and church groups.
From it came his vision: craveable chicken fingers, a great crew, a cool culture and community involvement, with locations around the world.
Graves expanded fast on cheap sites and then burned out. Failing Fast Track burger sites came with equipment and cheap rent, and Cane's went from two to eight restaurants, opening five in five months.
Opening five at once wore him down, and he learned to set up leaders instead of putting out fires himself.
He paused growth a year to build a repeatable prototype in Lafayette. Outside architects, designers, marketers and trainers, called partners rather than consultants, built a full prototype including HR, marketing and training systems.
Lafayette was chosen because nobody knew the brand there. It produced faster drive-throughs, the ONE LOVE logo, combo meals and later a conventional loan. "No more growth. We're going to set up what the prototype is."
Graves financed growth with debt he later called a stupid way to do it. A $200,000 loan from Dr. Hill at 15% counted as equity to banks, letting a $1 million location be financed with no equity partner. New stores also deferred rent and vendor payments for 30 days.
He says he felt bulletproof at the time.
Katrina took 21 of 28 stores offline while banks still wanted payment. Graves rallied the team and reopened in about 30 days while others took 90, and Cane's was the only restaurant open in Metairie for weeks.
He gave three reasons: save the business, pay displaced crew, and feed returning residents. It meant passes from the governor's office, boil water rules and generators trucked in. First responders were fed first, and post-storm sales paid crew bonuses and community gifts.
After Katrina he set debt limits he will never cross. Proud of the team but disappointed in himself, he set a limit of roughly three times debt to equity, which took a couple of years to reach.
"I'll never, ever, ever put the company in a position that we're financially strapped."
The same improvising carried Cane's through COVID. Cane's taped off spacing, added shields and ran three drive-through lanes in parking lots, and Graves flew to every market to wave at crews from outside.
Sales rose and funded large crew and customer bonuses. "When it's personal to founders, you figure out a way."
Graves franchised early mainly as a money play. He opened franchises in Ohio, Minnesota and Nevada with proven operators, some ex-CEOs of billion-dollar firms, planning to fund company growth with royalties.
Unlike a factory, every new restaurant needs fresh capital, which is why franchising is the standard route.
Franchisees ran at 85 out of 100 and resisted changes. A procedure tested in about five company stores was adopted overnight there, while franchisees pushed back that their markets were different.
One group did not want to get faster because they liked longer guest interactions; Graves answered that service can be just as friendly and quick. He rated other franchisees closer to 65, so this group was still strong.
Around year ten he bought them all back and kept their teams. Sales, wages and operations improved in the former franchise markets afterward.
The buyback worked like a merger, and the teams gained room to grow. "A franchisee is never going to run it like you do, because it's your baby."
Company ownership also earns a far higher valuation. Company restaurants carry a valuation above 20 times EBITDA versus 4 to 7 times for franchise models.
Graves adds that franchising might make more money but does not suit his personality, so it doesn't matter to him.
Graves keeps his equity instead of selling to private equity. He says Cane's is valued above $20 billion with about $3 billion of debt, and he still owns over 90%.
Financial partners owe returns that push cuts in quality and crew pay. He asks who would share his values and what would happen to managers and crews if he sold. "If it's special to you, hold onto your equity."
He warns founders against small private equity offers when stretched thin. Private equity typically offers $5 to $10 million and takes control. He urges founders to hire finance and IT experts and learn the details themselves.
A partner is safe only if they share the founder's belief and will never sell, since owing others a return changes your thinking.
Graves runs Cane's sales-driven, not profit-driven. Sales-driven means more staff on shift and better product, which earns repeat visits. Many rivals do about a third of Cane's sales per unit, and McDonald's is about $1 million behind.
"Do you want to be profit-driven or do you want to be sales-driven?"
His purpose is helping people, and he sees money as following service. Cane's has 75,000 crew members, often in a first job where they learn values. Once the debt is paid down, he plans to put free cash flow toward helping people.
He says "it's not what you make, it's what you give." He reads customer comments and feels it personally when Cane's misses its promise.
Graves built Cane's as the opposite of the negative kitchens he knew. His earlier restaurant jobs had yelling, no music and an owner who appreciated no one. Cane's runs on music, team feel and specific praise.
His example of everyday praise is thanking someone for taking out the trash and calling it "good toast."
He coaches every day, like football practice. Graves rejects six-month evaluations in favor of constant correction aimed at winning. Corporate hires who cannot take coaching or admit mistakes get weeded out.
He is first to say "I screwed up," which takes about 30 seconds and shows the team mistakes are fine. "Every day is an eval."
Graves hires for heart, not people chasing titles or pay. In interviews he spots who wants a VP title. Good signs are liking to lead, wanting a high-performing team and caring about the community.
Plenty of brilliant people could do the job, but he says it is "100% heart."
He treats respect, recognition and rewards as three separate jobs. Respect is owed, so restaurants close every major holiday. Recognition and rewards are earned: a crew-signed hard hat at one year, a salmon at five.
The rule came after the first July 4th, when he worked a shift and saw the crew drag. A Cane's Love department of former operators builds programs like a points system, because entrepreneurs' ideas fade without structure.
Graves dresses like the crew and calls headquarters a support office. He wore a Cane's T-shirt to industry conferences while others wore suits, so he is "the founder" and not "the boss." Monitors in the restaurant support office show live restaurants.
He still works shifts and holds town meetings to thank crews and ask what to improve.
Graves does not delegate; he helps great hires until they beat him. When a hire performs at 85 and the business needs 95, he works alongside them, easing off once they reach 95 or 96 but still checking.
He says his co-CEO and IT team are better than he is, yet he stays in the details with both. "You don't delegate. You hire great people. You help them in doing it."
Small details reveal how the whole business runs. He cites Louisiana shipping owner Gary Chouest, who knows his bottled water cost; a 25% overpayment there suggests waste everywhere.
His advice is to keep the habits that made you successful and sharpen them with better reports.
He is never satisfied, framed at Cane's as raising the bar. After a good opening the team lists what went well, then what to fix, such as getting two seconds faster or staffing more.
He says Cane's can get to 95 because 100 doesn't exist, and after 30 years he is as fired up as on day one.
Graves sees no work-life balance in the startup years. His advice: imagine how hard it is, multiply by infinity, and commit anyway. Going from one restaurant to two is the hardest step.
His sleep swings with the business, from three hours to 10 or 11, and he wakes to email solutions. He keeps no fixed schedule and answers whatever the business needs, even at 3 a.m.
He says a business must be natural to its founder. His first partner, Craig, preferred finance and the Wall Street Journal and left, saying the fry cook life did not make him happy.
Craig later returned to Cane's for several years, started his own business and is still a close friend. Graves's line: "It's not a career, it's a passion."