John Foley woke up one day and found himself in the restaurant business. It was mere happenstance that while working for a local paper in St. Paul, Minnesota, he wrote a story about the city's 100 year old grocery store. After reading the story, the owner of the market decided Foley had more passion for his business than he did so he sold it to him. The transplanted New Yorker found himself in the grocery business without any knowledge or experience. To make matters worse, he convinced his girlfriend at the time to give up her six figure executive job and join him in the business. It isn't often that an entrepreneur can turn a mistake into a profitable venture. But with the help of his partner, who eventually became his wife, Kranston and Foley did just that.

With over a decade of experience as a restaurant designer, owner, and operator, Foley views the business as nobody else does- as a social addiction. For over ten years Foley worked in his restaurants, grew the company, and learned every aspect, from hands-on experience of the business.

Foley's insight to the problems, the solutions, the constant concern for perfection, and the feeling that the everyone else is running a more successful restaurant, not only brings a smile to the reader's face, but offers tips and advice on how to overcome the daily stress of the business.

Today, Foley owns an internet site, works as a culinary consultant, a public speaker, and has recently completed a manuscript about his decade-long experiences that will be published in 2006. In his dining decade, Foley learned the business from the bottom-up, worked every position in the restaurant, (at least once), mastering the tricks, techniques, and secrets of growing a single unit company with 20 seats into a multi-unit group with a total of 590 seats, including a classic sixty-foot catering boat- in two states.

Currently Foley continues to associate with many restaurateurs but has overcome the constant urge to call the numbers on the numerous "Restaurant For Lease" signs he passes.