The Tao of Pancakes

Had a wonderful time recently, making a promotional video for Chris Cakes of Louisburg, KS. At first glance, Chris Cakes is a catering service that shows up at your event and makes and serves delicious pancakes. However, unlike anyone else, they also flip the pancakes onto your plate from several feet away (if you want them to) and in fact, they own several Guiness Book world records for these tricks!

(They also do hamburgers, hot dogs, bratwurst, barbeque and other stuff. Chris Cakes, as they like to say, is not just for breakfast anymore. PLEASE NOTE: they do not throw meat.)

Owner Steve Hamilton is a perfect fit for his business - the rare combination of business savvy and showmanship, with a gentle yet piquant sense of humor that infects everything Chris Cakes does. Steve's spirited, funny and reliable Kansas City crew serves probably a million pancakes a year at schools, churches, businesses, community events, private parties (I could go on, but it would take hours). As you can probably guess, fundraisers are a big part of it.

They're so good at serving their customers that most of their business comes from referrals and return customers. Until recently, they didn't even have to think much about advertising or marketing, but then it got so they couldn't handle all the out-of-town engagements (they keep getting calls from Virginia and Maine and Arizona and everywhere else) and Steve decided to open franchises in several other states.

That's why they made the video - to hand out on DVD and to post on YouTube and their website for their new franchisees. At last report, business was up twenty percent - pretty good for the middle of a recession.

Steve thinks we did an excellent job of capturing the essence of his business. We both wanted the video to be more "raw" than polished and I think it works - at any rate, it was great fun to make something that diverges so completely from the more button-down corporate stuff that normally butters our bread.