Todd Graves said he wants to be the chicken finger version of Xerox.
When people make a copy, they’re making a Xerox, he said. He aspires to have that interchangeable name association between Raising Cane’s and chicken fingers.
Accompanied by his famous yellow lab, Cane, Graves spoke with business professor Robert Justis’ franchising class Tuesday morning about his road to success in founding Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers.
Graves said entrepreneurs need to be focused and have a vision for their business because “if you don’t have a vision, you don’t have a guide for where you want your business to go.”
He’d seen restaurants specializing in chicken fingers while he was in college in Georgia and wanted to bring that concept to Louisiana. His idea was to have a limited menu consisting of high-quality food at a fast-food rate.
Graves teamed up with a friend who was studying at LSU and worked to create a business plan for what would become Raising Cane’s.
Graves’ partner presented the pair’s “bible on chicken fingers” to his business class and received the worst grade. The professor told him the business plan was good but the concept wasn’t.
The professor said though the concept worked in Georgia, it wouldn’t be successful in Louisiana because the people are different.
“Conventional wisdom needs to be broken sometimes,” Graves said. “If you tell an entrepreneur they can’t do something, it makes them want to prove that they can even more.”
Despite the discouragement, Graves followed through with his plan to create a chicken finger restaurant. But he soon learned banks don’t just hand out loans.
To earn money, Graves spent time working as a boilermaker in Los Angeles and then switched to commercial fishing for sockeye salmon in Alaska.
Eventually, he was able to open the first Cane’s location at the north gates of campus and expand from there.
But Graves warned the class about growing too fast. He opened five locations in five months and opened a sixth two months later. With the quick expansion, Graves said the concept and vision “got away from us.”
Learning not to overgrow was the first big lesson he said he learned in business. Afterward, he worked to develop a more solid vision, recruiting, marketing and design plan.
Cane’s now boasts 122 locations in 16 states. Graves said he hasn’t changed anything on the menu other than portion size since the restaurant’s opening.
The original menu consisted of a Box combo and a sandwich.
Graves stressed the importance of having a faithful, lively crew, and he said his employee turnover rate is 88 percent, as compared to the typical 300 percent of most fast food restaurants.
He encouraged the budding entrepreneurs in the class to have a presence and give back to the community. He said it’s not only the right thing to do, but it ultimately brings in a greater profit for the business.
Matt Menard, sports management graduate student, said there have been visitors to the class from other franchises, such as Smoothie King, Wendy’s and Taco Bell.
Menard said he was looking forward to hear from Graves because of his notable presence in Baton Rouge.
“It’s really interesting to hear how [Raising Cane’s] got started,” he said.
 
—- Contact Emily Herrington at [email protected].