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David Meltzer knows what it feels like to lose everything — and come back from the edge.
“How much money did you lose?” Restaurant Influencers host Shawn Walchef asked on stage at the National Restaurant Association Show.
“Over $100 million,” Meltzer replied without hesitation.
“$100 million,” Walchef repeated. “And you’re still here. Better than ever.”
For most people, that number would be the end of their business story. Meltzer turned it into a platform.
Related: He Turned Failure Into a Massive Food Truck and Restaurant Operation. Here’s How.
A bestselling author and keynote speaker, he now teaches entrepreneurs how to amplify their message and align their purpose. That’s why he was at the Restaurant Show — not as a restaurant operator, but as a mentor showing how storytelling can turn a moment into momentum.
Melzter readily shares the story of how he lost the money in interviews and on social media — but he refuses to call it a sacrifice. To him, it was an investment.
“My wife doesn’t like me saying this,” Meltzer admits. “I invested $100 million. Without that investment, I wouldn’t be where I am today. So how could I not see it as an investment?”
That reframing is central to Meltzer’s worldview. Sleep, he says, is his top nonnegotiable because recovery fuels everything else. Activities aren’t divided into work and play, but into investments of time and energy.
“I don’t believe in sacrifice,” Meltzer says. “That’s a vision of shortage and scarcity. I believe in investing. When you love the earth, it loves you back. When you love your relationships, they love you back. I make that investment.”
Meltzer’s job now is making sure those lessons live on in a digital age where content outlasts its creator.
“I’m identified as both the guy who lost everything and the guy who’s successful,” he says. “In all my activities, I’m successful, but I fail at every one of them.”
Related: Want to Be a Successful Entrepreneur? Fail.
The Stage Theory
If Meltzer’s philosophy is about investment, the Restaurant Show was where it came to life.
He called it the “fishbowl of content.” Cameras circled an open stage on the final day, but the seats were nearly empty. For many speakers, that would be a problem. For Meltzer, it was the point.
“I don’t care who’s sitting in the chairs,” he says. “I care how many cameras are here and what systems I have to amplify it.”
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That is stage theory in practice: Capture content and amplify it. A meetup with two people can turn into millions of views if the story connects. Meltzer proved it when someone asked about the coolest athlete he had ever met. He told a story about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Dr. J from his days as a 12-year-old ball boy.
“Two people were in the room when I told it, but that piece of content has over 10 million views,” he says.
It was a familiar lesson for me. When I opened Cali BBQ in San Diego, I spent 14 years focused on the four walls of my restaurant. Working with Meltzer showed me a bigger opportunity: Build in public, fail in public and share the process.
“One of the most important things you helped me realize is the power of asking for help,” I told him at the time. “By making podcasts, YouTube videos and doing stage theory, I hope more people get out of their restaurant and see what’s possible.”
“Business is fun,” Meltzer says. “Life is fun. Activities you get paid for, activities you don’t. But they’re all investments.”
The audience at the National Restaurant Show may have been quiet, but the cameras were rolling. And that means the conversation we recorded will live on long after the booths are packed up — a perpetual stage where the real audience is the one still to come.
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