 Think Tech Hawaii, civil engagement lives here. And welcome to Adventures in Small Business. This is a collaborative effort between the Small Business Administration, Hawaii Small Business Development Center Network, the Mink Center for Women's Business and Leadership, and the Veterans Business Outreach Center with the University of Hawaii at Hilo and Think Tech. We're here to talk about small business in Hawaii, talking to small business owners about their business, entrepreneurship, the challenges, what they've had to overcome to succeed in the tough business environment we see in Hawaii. Today, I'd like to welcome the owner of Hank's Cafe, Honolulu, Hank Ta-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a. It's a tough one, but Hank has been here working in Chinatown, running his business in Chinatown for over 20 years. He's starting, well actually celebrating 20 years of business tonight. Right-located in the heart of Chinatown, Niu Anu, and he's been the favorite neighborhood watering hole for years and years. Hank, tell me how you got started there and what you've seen in keeping that business going. I mean, your kind of 20 years of success as a small business is a great statistic. You know, what's interesting is about 18 months prior to me opening Hank's, I was sitting there. We went to one of the celebrations in Chinatown and I was sitting there with a friend of mine and I said, boy, I'd like to have that bar across the street. It was shuttered. You know, the guy who was a place, Doug's place and it was out of business. And I called a friend of mine, Michael Hong, and he said, yeah, I mean, that's part of our family and everything else. So that's how I got into it. And as I was having that conversation 18 months before I actually opened the bar, Dave Donnelly walked by and he said, what the heck are you doing as an old friend of mine? Well, I think, you know, I'd like to have that bar across the street there. And the day I took possession of the place, the pace was a wreck. I mean, cockroaches and everything else running out of it. And I was opening the door and Dave Donnelly knocks on this door and he said, I wanted to see who's in there. And here I am standing. I said, Dave, do you realize that you were the first guy that I even mentioned this place to and Maria is walking into the place. But anyway, I opened it as an art gallery. You know, I'm an artist. I've been doing it for years. And I was with a couple of galleries. Main galleries don't make any money. I mean, it's tough for them to stay in business. So I opened it as an art gallery. But I put the bar in to pay the rent because artists starve. And the bar took off. Yeah. And 20 years ago, that was kind of just on the cutting edge or as Chinatown and the transition of Chinatown was really coming back. The forbidden area on that side of Nualuanu. I mentioned to you earlier that the toughest obstacle I faced when I first opened was getting friends of mine who knew me. It was a halfway decent person to come down to Chinatown because they were afraid to. And as you can tell in the last 20 years, a lot of that has changed for the better. Yes, we've seen a tremendous transition or evolution of that area. And perhaps some ups and downs. And for small businesses, one of the things we hear all the time, location, location, location. So you had the advantage of coming in at the time when a lot of attention in that transition was going on. But what did you do to overcome some of that kind of reticence that people had for crossing Nualuanu and getting into the business community down there? You know, a friend of mine told me years ago, he said, to establish a place, you just got to be a pest. So when I first opened up, I sent little tidbits of information, however menial they were, to Donnelly, to Ben Wood, to Wayne Arata. And to the point that within six months, Donnelly made the greatest statement. He says, thank God for you because when we're stuck for space, we've got something to throw in there. And that helped us, really. Everybody said, boy, you're getting all this publicity. And I said, it's not because it works just so great. It's just that we've been used as a lot of filler. And that worked for us because there was a name in the paper and name. So it was kind of interesting. You got the word out. You got the repetition of your message going along. And you were persistent in getting that info to him. You were a pest. OK, I have to remember that. Be a pest. And your clientele, you kind of hit on a niche, or did you do that by design? By design, I wanted to be older as opposed to younger. I've seen how the younger groups, the younger audiences, are so fad driven. So we've been fortunate with the growth in Chinatown in that whole area. I mean, there's 17, 18 places now, where there was once four when I was there. And the majority of them are catering to the 20, 30-year-old group. We've maintained our niche as it were, being 45-plus. And that's worked for us. And so you're kind of the neighborhood bar. People come in and visit you at the late afternoon, end of the day, you know. We open at 7 in the morning, Jay. 7 in the morning. 7 in the morning. And you'd be surprised. I've never been there that early. You'd be surprised how many people are there. And surprised some of the people who are there. 7 in the morning. Start their day, start their routine, and then get on off to whatever else has to happen in the day. And so you have that kind of cheers atmosphere. The people know each other. They have their favorite bartenders. But you also have other attractions that come in. You have music from time to time. Yes, we have music every evening. And it initially started as an open mic kind of thing. Before karaoke or anything was really started out. I went to the karaoke thing for about a year and a half. I didn't like it. First of all, not everybody's a good singer. And I mean, they pay their dollar. And you got to listen to them. And they're running your other customers out. So I tried the karaoke, but we preferred to stick with the live format. OK. So but it kept the bar kept going. People kept coming day in, day out. And so it was serving its purpose. You enjoyed it. You enjoyed the people who are coming in. I did that. But you were still painting. Yeah. Because that was the original interest or passion that got you started. And in fact, I've never stopped painting in a while. So tell us a little bit about that, you know? And I know you've got a big show you're opening now. Today, yeah, this evening. I've always been. My mother enrolled me at art courses when I was in the fourth grade at the Academy of Arts. And I drew everything as a kid, just copying Dick Tracy, Terry and the Pirates. I tell you, if their parents out there whose kids have this, there's nothing like copying the comics. Because you kind of learn form and expression and line quality by copying the comics and then you get better. Yeah. I think it's important that if a child expresses that kind of interest to let them follow that. Exactly. Whether it's comic books or old art books or whatever. I used to copy. My mom had this beautiful book with prints of Botticelli's. Oh, my goodness. And I used to draw. You still draw? A little bit. A little bit. But my brothers used to look at the pictures for the naked women. But I was copying. Botticelli had them. They were pretty good sized girls. So but comic books was a place to start? Yeah. You had a different sense of color and line. The biggest thing is you have form and color. And you learn that if you copy Dick Tracy in the comics, and if you remember Dick Tracy had that jaw line that was so distinctive and it was easy to draw. And anyway, that's how I got started. That interest or that passion into a business as well. So you are a Hawaii artist. You sell your work, originals, and prints, and things along that line. Now, and you market them? What has changed dramatically for all of us is the internet. The majority of sales, I do come off the internet. It's amazing. So how do people find you on the internet? Are they looking for money? They're my last name dot com. OK. So spell that one out. Well, W-W-W-T-A-U-F-A-A-S-A-U dot com. OK. And I think during this program, we'll have a chance to show a couple of images, too, of some of the work that you've done. You work mostly in oils? Primarily in oils. Primarily. In fact, it's kind of interesting. Our other place at Hanks is a dragon upstairs. It's kind of a nightclub. When we first opened it 12 years ago, one of the tattoo artists, we had this old door. And I had to draw a dragon on it while it was glass. And it got kicked in a number of times and finally broke down. So we bought a new door. And I just painted a new dragon on it. But I had to use acrylics, because oil is very difficult to paint on that situation. So it was my first time working with acrylics. And I was quite impressed because it dries so quickly. So it's a different kind of result. And you can work a lot quicker. But no, I've been an oil guy forever. And printing, printmaking, and so on. But primarily oils and print. And so people find you on the website. They look up Hawaii artist. Because your style is definitely reflective of Hawaii, too. Bold color, bright color. And as we were talking earlier, you kind of developed some new marketing strategies and producing work as well. But you've got your Chinatown series, now the new series that you're introducing tonight as part of your 20th anniversary celebration is? Namele Hula. Namele Hula. So tell us a little bit about it. Relationship between Hula and music. The dance and music, the traditional Hawaiian dance and music. And you're dealing with themes or story lines, too, with some of the paintings? I mean, I've noticed some of them on your website. Yeah, yeah. Like one of the paintings that I did send to the people here has Aloha Tower in the back. And it reminded me of growing up in Kalihi from Aleva Heights and looking out. And that was the most prominent landmark at the time. Oh, my goodness. You can't see Aloha Tower from Aleva Heights anymore. But Killa Beamer wrote Honolulu City Lights. And he talks about seeing Honolulu, the city of Honolulu from Aleva Heights. And consequently, that's why in that painting, in the background is Aloha Tower. Yeah, it's a lovely painting. So many of them are evocative of wonderful stories and a different time as well. But I mean, you capture in the color and the sense of motion so much of what we think of as Hula. Thank you. So they're lovely. I recommend that people come out to see them and take a look on the website. So no. But they'll be more to come. And I think we're going for a quick break. And then we'll be back to talk a little bit more about how you stay alive in Chinatown for 20 years, beating the odds, beating the statistics, and marketing your changing business down there as well. So we'll be right back. That part is important. When I was growing up, I was among the one and six American kids who struggled with hunger and hungry mornings make tired days. Grumpy days. That kind of days. But with the power of breakfast, the kids in your neighborhood can think big and be more. When we're not hungry for breakfast, we're hungry for more. More ideas. More dreams. More fun. When kids aren't hungry for breakfast, they can be hungry for more. Go to hungarees.org and lend your time or your voice to make breakfast happen for kids in your neighborhood. Thanks for joining us again after our break. We're here with Adventures in Small Business, and we're talking with Hank Ta-A-Fah-A-Sao. Tell her to tell us how. This is a hard one for me. I'm sorry. The owner of Hank's Cafe, Honolulu, and a local Hawaii artist with some great works to see both on his website and at the show that he's opening at Hank's Cafe today as part of his 20th anniversary celebration. So we've been talking about what his business is about, how he got started, and some of the changes that he's seen as Chinatown has changed and evolved. So 20 years in business is a good track record. We're talking a little bit about what that means to sustain that business. Some of the changes that have gone through have happened. And what have you seen as some of the challenges you've overcome are some of the most important things that you've learned? I mean, lessons learned or surprises? Yeah, that's really interesting. When I first got into the business, I never tended bar. And in fact, I'm a bit shy, so I'm not the most gary-less guy. But when you own a bar and you put up all this money that you have, you gotta change your ways. So I got to be a lot more public with some of the things that I do, because you have to. But the guy who helped us out, the guy by the name of George Lee when we first opened up, he taught all of us newbies about bartending. But he said one thing. He said, when somebody walks in your bar, greet them. He said, the worst situation is for a new person to come into a bar where they don't belong and they feel completely alienated and not even ignored. And I think that's, and we do that. And then we do that faithfully. And in fact, this new guy that was taking over for me, he runs a bar and he's a lot more impersonal than some of the people he's hired. And he's hired a couple of younger people, so they're not really comfortable about an older audience. And I went to this one guy and I said, listen, this guy walked in and nobody has said anything. You just gotta grab him and say, hello, I'll be right with you or something. And he said, Hank, that changed my whole, I had to do it about bartending. But he said, beyond that, it increased my tips. Okay. That's why you're there. You know, to make a dollar. They're a positive reinforcement for that good customer service. But yeah, I never forgot that. So we do that also. A guy walks in, we've never seen him before. Hey, how are you doing? I'll be right with you or what can I get you? And then introduce them to the people sitting at the bar because then they become part of it and then they come back. Well, your space is not that huge space. So it does have your, in close proximity to the other customers, you do get to know them. And if you're isolated, that's even more, you can't hide. Mm-hmm, that's true. So, but... But yeah, business is tough. Business, you learn, I tell you the truth, Jane. It was great when I just had Hank's. 12 years ago, I opened the dragon upstairs. And then it got to be a real job. Mm-hmm. Which was okay. Because Hank's is open during the day and the dragon upstairs opens... It's just a club at night. At night, so. We initially started doing just jazz. And that, yeah, that worked well for me. The problem is we had trouble selling a beer after 11 o'clock because the people who like jazz are my age and I mean, they're ready to go to sleep. You know? So, and what James has done, this new person who's taken over, he's kept the jazz format earlier. But after 11 o'clock, he has DJs in there. Oh, okay. And that works well. Okay. And he said, you know, our customer base is for those people who come up to you and they give you six credit cards until you use the one that's working tonight. Oh, there's a different approach. So, I mean, and that's kind of what you see. So it's a whole different thing. And it's worked well for the bottom line, you know, for James and, you know, James was buying it. That's who, thank God, you know, he's opened up a whole new front for business. So he's kept transitioning your business to adjust to the new market reality then? Yeah, he has been running the business now for the last five or six years. And lets you paint more often. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I go down there and I'm now the janitor, you know, and the handyman, which is fine for me. And the dragon upstairs, they have their own bar facility upstairs now? The whole thing is self-contained. Self-contained upstairs. So it can be a different group than what's downstairs? Yes. No. Completely different, by the way. Do you rent that out? No. We used to do that sometimes. We still do, I mean, we're dark on Sundays and, you know, every so often we rent things out. Okay. Because I know that as that came on online upstairs, you were trying some different business models with it as well. And I'm gonna toot my horn for a second. In 2011, if you could Google the dragon upstairs and the New York Times and, you know, we were, where there's an article about, you know, weekend in Honolulu and they selected the dragon as the club, but, you know, it was two paragraphs with a picture. Uh-huh. And I sent that patch to every bar owner in Hawaii and I said, this isn't the Kauai Times. Oh, yeah. So yeah, and it's still online. Yeah, the dragon upstairs in the New York Times. Wonderful. Lucky us. Congratulations. So we were talking to, I mean, there's something to toot your horn. It's a measure of success too, that kind of recognition. But how else do you measure success? Success is staying in business. I mean, for the mom and pop operations like ourselves, you know, we've got 12, at most, 12 employees. The majority of them are part-time. They have other jobs or they're retired or whatever. But, you know, staying in business so that your people know that whatever money they can make, they can depend on it. You know, it's so easy to say staying in business not always, doesn't always work. It means like five or six years ago when we went through such a terrible downturn, I mean, you know, we didn't take any money out of it, but we never missed a paycheck. That's important. That's important. So you're also being reliable for your employees. That's a very, very important thing to see happening, be able to come to work, rely on that paycheck, and know that you're being taken care of. You know, because that employees for a small business is always a big step, and particularly now with the unemployment rate, the way it is, keeping those employees can be quite challenging too. So. Yeah, and I mentioned the part-time employees. You know, we've got maybe three or four full-time employees, which are great. But you know, it always, I'm happy that we provide a mother or a grandma and an extra four or $500 a month or so for her life. You know, that kind of thing, yeah. Gives her a little bit. Yes. Different quality of life, and just maybe a little bit more. In fact, she said to me a couple of years ago when I first, you know, she was working at City Mill part-time, and she said, you know, I think this is the first Christmas. I didn't have to charge any of my Christmas gifts, and I thought, well, okay. Mm-hmm, yeah. That's a good start, you know. That's good, yeah. We're watching on Hoi News now this morning talking about credit card debt and how much people typically carry and how it balloons at Christmas as well. So, those are important things to give you a little financial security, and so. I'll tell you what I wanna talk about, Jane, because you're SBA, but the SBA had a lot to do with me when I built that upstairs. You know, they came up with $60,000 for me. And I don't know that everyone knows, you know, how... How it works? Yeah, I mean, it takes quite a bit of paperwork, you know, in this day and age. Right. But I would not have been able to build the upstairs and run it, you know, and establish it for the first year without that $60,000 loan. I'm gonna tell you that, you don't know this, but I paid the loan back within a year. But yeah, SBA, that's where we met. Yeah, so, and there was, for a while, when SBA had the center across the street working with some of our resource partners, the SBDC was there, and we were seeing a lot of people come through at that point in time, and that is how we met. And, you know, kind of got you engaged in the SBA guaranteed loan process. So it was the paperwork, the process. So what happens if I didn't get this? Do you guys, the government has to pay it? Well, basically, the servicing for an SBA guaranteed loan goes with the bank you're working with, and if they determine that you couldn't pay it back, they would ask SBA to pay them, pay down, or pay off the guarantee, whatever percentage you didn't pay, but they are required to take all the necessary collection action with you before we pay on the guarantee. So, and one of the things that, you know, most people don't want to do is not repay a government loan. Exactly. So we try to work with the bank and work with the borrower so that we don't need to take any assets because they will look to liquidate. So your bank could have, if you, if your expansion hadn't been successful, the bank could have taken, you know, the dragon upstairs or whatever. Good luck. Let them try and read that, you know, but I'm glad to hear that it was a good experience. Well, it worked for me. It gave me the peace of mind to have cash flow. And that's, I think, one of the things we discussed too, it was important for a small business owner to have that so you can remain loyal to your employees, make a payroll, make your payments, and things along that line. Yeah, you gotta have money in the bank. You know, it's amazing how, you know, I know a couple of new rebar owners over the last 20 years who haven't lasted. And to me, the biggest problem they had was they took a lot of the money out of their operating capital for themselves. It's really simple. You read less. You start to see money coming in and saying, okay, gosh. And here goes the new car. And you know, the one guy, I mean, who's not back, he's not here anymore. He and his friend, he bought a Corvette for his boyfriend and a Cadillac for himself. And he'd not been in business a year. Oh, okay. And I said to him, I said, and indeed he lost the business. So your advice to a newer small business owner is to keep conservative and put your money back into your business, be conservative about it. And that's gonna help them continue and succeed for 20 years. Well, exactly. Yeah, but yeah, it's really simple. You cannot get paid if you don't have extra money. You know, and that's where they make the biggest mistake in life. Okay. Well, we're gonna be wrapping it all up, but I wanna congratulate you on 20 years and recommend to everybody to head on down to Hank's Cafe Honolulu on New Iwanu and check out 20 years of success and the great artwork. Enjoy that spirit of Hawaii. Thanks for joining us for Adventures in Small Business. Thank you, Hank. Thank you.