The Barstool MBA

Why Running a Bar Beats Running to Business School

By: Dan Maccarone, Bob Sullivan

Narrated by: Dan Maccarone, Bob Sullivan

What can working in a bar teach you about launching a successful startup? The answer - as bar owner Dan Maccarone and best-selling author Bob Sullivan reveal in The Barstool MBA - is just about everything.

In February 2009, Dan Maccarone, a digital product design executive who works with some of the world’s top brands, walked through the doors of what would be his new bar, Destination, in Manhattan’s East Village. The overwhelming stale-beer smell, ruined floor, and “Happy New Year 2008” banners that hung from the walls were the least of his worries. He had just six weeks and a budget of $150,000 to turn the place into the neighborhood’s new favorite hang-out - and start turning a profit.

For Maccarone, the experience of building out Destination was an unlikely crash course in conceiving, launching, and running a startup. From hiring the right staff to keeping the lights on, from getting patrons through the door to keeping them on their stools, Maccarone saw that the lessons he was learning day in and day out in the bar could be applied broadly to the challenges many of his clients on the digital product side faced when trying to get their businesses off the ground and keep them alive.

To tell this story, Maccarone teamed up with best-selling author Bob Sullivan, whose side-gig as a musician sends him to bars around the country. They spent two years interviewing dozens of bar owners, managers, bartenders, and industry insiders to uncover the secret wisdom behind running a successful bar and what it can teach us about business. With strategies and a-ha insights that can be applied to any new venture, The Barstool MBA is a delightfully unconventional and surprisingly practical resource for anyone weighing the cost of business school versus jumping right in.

This Audible Original is read by the authors.

©2019 Dan Maccarone and Bob Sullivan (P)2019 Audible Originals, LLC.

Great timing learning important stuff!

This is such a great book on business. Dan and Bob not only have unique and useful experiences to share in helpful ways you can apply to your own life or business but they follow through with a ton of research and insight from other professionals. The bar stories are fun and educational. The writers are generous experts you want to sit down and have another drink with when the book is done.
I wish there was a print version so I could go back and capture some of the bullet points and resonant quotes for reference. Please publish a print copy! Photos would be fun too.

Great Book

This is a really comprehensive look at what it takes to open the bar and run a business. Having worked my way through college at bars, restaurants, and nightclubs, the authors stories really resonated with me to the point where I was chuckling out loud. Dan and Bob are also accomplished in the business world so a lot of the names and stories they tell our relatable to someone in the technology space. Would recommend!

Fun, engaging and informative.

This is a funny, engaging and informative book. Dan and Bob do a great job of balancing humour, with tips on running a successful bar, linking these to to online and startup business. I forgot i was learning, but have loads of takeaways. Highly recommend this.

Don't miss this book!

This book is amazing! It was filled with surprising insights, and makes me want to spend all my free time at bars, learning their secrets. Thank you, Bob and Dan, for sharing your passion with us!

Underlying principles are right

His premise is wonderful and some of the information is great. Being a bar/restaurant owner in NYC for most my life I find his false stories about the bar world ridicules. The whole fake dialogue to tell the story is annoying. 99% of his super important and famous bars he talks about were barely a place worth going. His dig on Iggy’s was just wrong. Stick to telling stories to your hipster friends you are never going to be a Bukowski.