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In Episode 31 of the Hustle & Heat Podcast, we sit down with Kevin and Max Doyle, the family behind the legendary Celtic Ray Irish Pub. From building one of Southwest Florida’s most beloved restaurants to creating a community gathering place known for great food, live music, and authentic Irish hospitality, Kevin and Max share the story behind the pub’s success.
We dive into entrepreneurship, family business, the challenges of the restaurant industry, customer service, and what it takes to build a destination that keeps people coming back year after year.
Whether you’re a business owner, restaurant enthusiast, or simply love hearing inspiring local success stories, this is an episode you won’t want to miss.
Transcript from the YouTube captions, with names and places corrected. It may contain errors.
0:00 What’s up guys and welcome back to another Hustle and Heat podcast. I’m George your host and welcome back to episode 31. We have some very special
0:07 guests today. One of the most famous people in Punta Gorda and these guys have been working for what over 30 years now. Almost 30 years.
0:15 Almost 30 years. This almost as old as I am. I turned 30 in October, baby.
0:21 [laughter]
0:22 Well, I’d re I’d really have the honor to welcoming these guests. Uh Mr. Max and Kevin Doyle. We appreciate you coming on from the Celtic Ray downtown
0:31 Punta Gorda. Uh thank you for coming on. It’s a pleasure to have you guys on. Tell us a little bit about yourselves and what you guys do and why you do it.
0:38 Well, uh I’ I’d have to start that off because I was here first. [laughter] Well, we came over to uh Florida for a
0:47 two-eek vacation uh 45 years ago. And as soon as I got here, I felt like I was
0:53 home right here in Punta Gorda. And then uh I got a job in Disney World uh at Epcot, the uh United Kingdom pub. And I
1:03 thought, wow, this place is popular. I bet I’m going to open up a pub myself one day. And I know the town, Punta Gorda.
1:10 So this was a ghost town. Found some cheap red place on the corner. Place that failed over and over. And I thought, well, I can make something of
1:19 this. I just wanted to. The only thing I missed about my country was the pub. Yeah. Yeah. So, I made one.
1:26 So, you made a pub. You made yourself feel at home, huh? Yeah.
1:29 How old were you when you moved here from your country? I was 28. 28. What was that like?
1:36 It was great. It was raw. What I was what I was able to pull off here with no money at all. Uh, could not be done
1:44 today, but I could do it then. Yeah. You want to elaborate on that?
1:49 Yeah. Well, we just could found a building. The rent was 800 a month. That was easy to do. We could only get a beer and wine license. So we price we made
1:58 our prices accordingly to what the market will bear comparative but we comparable with other places but we
2:06 didn’t do anything other places did. We didn’t do the food, the beers, uh the entertainment. We did all our own stuff
2:14 and we decided not to compete with anybody.
2:16 So what what did that look like almost 30 years ago? What was your like uh business strategy? Well, what was your identity other than a pub?
2:25 Like, did you serve [clears throat] food? Was it just beer and wine?
2:28 Initially, we served beer and wine. Then people left after a beer. So, we thought we got to get some food. We had a the place before had left a 20-inch wide uh
2:38 gas oven in the kitchen, four burner, and we started making we had an oven, so we made some pastries, uh, meat
2:46 pastries, and then we got a couple of fryers and made fish and chips.
2:51 And um we expanded on that and uh we were paying the bills quite nicely after about a year. I borrowed from a lot of
2:58 friends 500 here, a thousand there, 2,000 there and paid them back all of them in six months out of what we made.
3:06 Very nice. And did you ever back then did you ever imagine you’d be as big as you are today?
3:12 No. People say, “Well, you had an amazing vision doing this.” I said, “This was never my vision.” What was your vision? My vision was a
3:20 quiet little pub on the corner and I’d seen a documentary on a flight to back to Ireland about um the rural Irish pub.
3:28 And the caption at the beginning, can’t remember the name of it, but it said, “In order for a rural Irish pub to
3:35 survive, you need a dozen regulars and three alcoholics.”
3:40 [laughter]
3:41 And we we we had just kept growing and growing.
3:44 Yeah. And then we said, “Well, we the place next door, which is right below us now, was a hairdressers, the old-fashioned blue rinse lady perm
3:54 hairdressers.” And uh they closed up and went out of business. So we took over that place. Then we bought the building
4:00 and then Charley happened and the the value of the building went cut down in half and we’re struggling all over again.
4:08 So when Charley happened, how did you recuperate? Well, um, we were the only place that stayed open. We had no power.
4:16 We had no water. We had candles on the bar. That’s a true bummer.
4:21 And, uh, you know, beer works off CO2 and nitrogen, so we didn’t need electricity for that. So, we were without electricity for about a week and
4:29 a half. But, we had a landline telephone, which nobody else had because it wasn’t a rechargeable type. It was
4:35 just hardwired into the wall. And um one of the stormchasers that we made friends with cuz we stayed
4:44 open during the storm uh was dropped off a DVD. Somebody came in with a computer and said, “Do you want to see what
4:51 happened here last week?” He said, “Yeah, I’d love to.” So, it was about a 10-minute DVD and he had a Nextel telephone. We had a landline. So, I
5:00 called him the Stormchaser and I said, “Um, do you want to make some money together?” He said, “On
5:07 what?” I said, “On this DVD, we got the entire footage from before the beginning till after the end.” He said, “Yeah.” Said, ‘Well, come up and let’s have a
5:15 chat. And I told him, “We would sell them for $20 VHS at that time and and
5:21 DVD and we would buy them for 12 so he’d cover his cost and make a profit.” And we’d sell them for 20. So, we made $8 on
5:30 each one. Got 500. And uh later that day I called him and said, “I need another thousand.” He said, “How did you sell
5:38 them?” I said, “I got some friends of the newspaper and they given the newspaper to everybody free.” So I got on the front page that you can only buy
5:45 them at the Celtic Ray. And so there was a line down the street.
5:50 Even though nobody had any electricity, they wanted that souvenir. And uh it was the first major storm to hit here since 1964.
5:59 And it was unedited. So that all Oh my god. all that stuff was in it and we ended up selling uh 8,000 so 64,000 net
6:09 profit in a couple of months and we were able to put on the roof and uh the window we boarded up the windows. We put
6:17 the windows in downstairs and the doors and then we were but just closed up for seven years so we could have to save up
6:26 and as you know nobody no bank will loan money to a restaurant. No bank [clears throat] will loan money to restaurants. They’re smarter than that.
6:34 [laughter]
6:34 They’re a lot smarter than that. They weren’t. Yeah.
6:37 Yeah. So, it was about It was before that that Max came along. He he came down for a vacation from California.
6:44 Uh how old were you then? 18. Just 18.
6:47 Just 18. And he said, “Can you put me to work?” And I said, “Well, I could use a dishwasher.” The We didn’t have a dishwashing machine.
6:57 So, it was three sinks. We wash, rinse, sanitize, drain. And he he was doing that for five minutes and we called him
7:05 and he we needed him on the bar because we just opened the second side before it got destroyed. Do you What do you remember about that?
7:13 Well, I came to visit first before I u moved down here. Um the place had been open about a year and I was 18, freshly
7:21 freshly 18. I lived in uh you know Bay Area, California and this was a tin this is a small town now but this was a much
7:29 smaller town back then and this is a much smaller pub but uh me and some friends had gotten into our Irish heritage a little bit and um even though
7:38 we were kind of young for it we were Irish pubs were cool my dad out of the blue one time like hey what’s going on he’s like oh not much just working on
7:46 this Irish pub I opened and I’m like whoa what [clears throat] Irish pub hu and he’s like yeah wow Okay. So, I came to visit and like I said, it was a small
7:55 town, smaller pub, but I was just blown away on how cool it was cuz uh it’s just
8:02 a small no pub. Just, you know, it’s real, you know, like uh the no Budweiser thing, the no domestic beer
8:10 was was great. Like, like I said, I was 18 already, but I was already drinking and stuff like that. And I was already against I wasn’t into like domestic
8:18 beers anyway, so I thought it was really cool that he didn’t sell that. And uh it’s definitely different. Yeah. As a consumer, it’s different. Yeah.
8:26 And I actually like it. Yeah. Especially this part of the country. Yeah. And back in that in those times.
8:32 So I was just I was just impressed. I met some people here. They were really cool. And uh you know, at that point, I I never wanted to move back to Florida ever again. I just didn’t have a good
8:40 taste in my mouth about Florida. But uh about less than a year later, I moved down here. What made you finally move?
8:47 Um I just was I just called him. I’m like, “Hey, do you do you need any help? I’m thinking about getting out of here.” And uh he’s like, “Maybe some dishwashing.”
8:56 And uh didn’t you drive?
8:58 I drove here from California with my with a friend. And uh he got put in the kitchen. I was dishwashing. And then like you said, um at one point it got
9:06 too busy and I got thrown behind the bar with zero experience of bartending and uh just kind of got thrown to the wolves and and learned how to do it from there.
9:16 Wow. And um I’m sure throughout the years, what how big of a role have you played in helping your father create this vision and create this establishment?
9:26 Uh what was the question again?
9:28 How how big of a role have you played helping your father uh continue to grow Celtic Ray?
9:32 Uh went from small to bigger. I I bartended for years and then um I’d say
9:38 2012 2014 when we started um coming up here, building up here um I started shifting towards management a little bit
9:47 and then uh and design and design. Yeah, I have a little help in the the design here, but uh yeah, he’s he’s the main man obviously, but uh
9:55 we we we come up with some ideas together a lot. We get some ideas from other pubs across the pond or even
10:02 breweries over here. Um, just it’s it’s a fun uh career to uh I bet do research with [laughter]
10:13 uh for you Kevin. What’s it like uh having your son by your side? Oh, it’s great. Takes a load off me. Yeah.
10:20 Uh and I can I know matter what it’s going to be taken care of well. So I said, “One day, son. All this will be yours if you’re not careful.” If you’re not careful, huh?
10:30 So, but it’s a I mean, I can take vacations and not worry about a thing. Yeah.
10:34 I can take time off. And I know he’s got it covered.
10:38 Are there any more plans to expand Celtic Ray? Or you think you’re set in stone right now? I’m set in stone.
10:47 What about this guy? The young guy can can do other things.
10:49 We’ve been set in stone like five or six times and we’ve expanded it. [laughter] for now. I mean, we got one more project that we’re doing outside, but after
10:57 that, I think we’re done. But there’s other ideas we have that we might put in place in the future. But, um, it’d be
11:05 cool to just chill and relax and just enjoy the place for a couple years without without stressing yourself out. Huh.
11:12 Yeah. But it’s either way it’s exciting. Well, what’s the employee scene like? Are you are you guys set on employees? Do you guys struggle with employees?
11:20 We are told by we’ve we’ve gone through a a couple different payroll uh companies, but they say they both say that we have some of the smallest
11:28 turnover out of anybody that they’ve ever dealt with. That’s awesome.
11:32 Um so we keep our employees for a long time. I I believe we we treat them and pay them pretty well and we have a pretty good relationship. Kind of like
11:39 it sounds corny, but we’re kind of like a family here. Yeah, I I get that. Olive Garden stole our our our jingle. We have what 48 employees?
11:48 Yeah, 48. Oh, that’s that’s a big size. Yeah, a lot of a lot of our regulars are also old employees, you know, that used to work here,
11:56 stuff like that. So, what what what are what are you most proud about when it comes to this establishment?
12:05 Um, how people have taken on pub culture and uh just how they’ve taken it on, how how
12:12 how many relationships have started here and how many uh Oh gosh. Yeah.
12:17 How many how much life would be different if this place didn’t exist? Yeah, it’s a big staple here in Punta Gorda.
12:22 I I come here all the time, especially when I was younger.
12:25 Yeah, I’ve thrown up in that bathroom for God’s sake. [laughter] In back in the beginning, when I got the
12:33 lease, I wrote a check out for first class in security and I had 40 $41 in the bank and they obviously it was like
12:41 nearly $3,000. And uh my then wife said, “Why did you do that?” I said, “Because we got to have that building. It’s old.
12:50 We need an old building. But you haven’t got the money. I’ll get it. So I did from friends. And um I just sat down
12:57 under the window in this empty room, looked around. I thought, how am I going to make this look like an Irish pub? I didn’t want just an Irish pub. I wanted
13:05 an oldfashioned Irish pub that I remember as a child when my dad used to leave me in the car with a bottle of Coke and a straw. And uh he would So I
13:15 looked around and said, “Well, we got bricks. We got a tin ceiling. Uh, all we need now is rich colors and dark wood.
13:23 And we want people to walk in the front door and feel like they walked into Ireland. And when they leave, they walk back into Florida. So that’s why there’s
13:32 no TVs, no no domestic beers, no burgers and things. We have our our own what what you’d find in Ireland.
13:39 That’s true. Is there any pub back home in Ireland that you go back to that reminds you of this place?
13:44 I when I go back to Ireland, I find a little bit of this pub everywhere I go. Yeah. Everywhere. Is it true you have the best Guinness?
13:53 Yes, it is.
13:54 Better than Guinness in Ireland? Uh, it’s the same as Dublin. Yeah.
13:58 Yeah, we have the best Guinness in America. What makes it What makes it the best? But everybody says that, don’t they?
14:04 We did a taste test. [laughter] Five of us did a taste test. We went to Dublin, five five of us, uh, for a week and we
14:11 went to several pubs every day and judged every pub while we were drinking it. And we found four pubs that didn’t taste as good, didn’t we?
14:19 This is the This is the research I was talking about that I enjoy. Yeah. Yeah. No, it’s it’s a great job.
14:24 Yeah. [laughter] And we found out there wasn’t anything better than ours.
14:28 So, what makes yours different? You you Well, it’s a it’s a combination of things. It’s it’s actually a science. We have uh two gases, nitrogen, CO2. They
14:37 go into a gas mixing station and they’re measured. So, it’s 70% uh nitrogen in the Guinness, 30% CO2.
14:46 And uh if the one of the gases runs out, it just stops. So, it’s not badly gassed. Most most places, if they use mixed gas, they have already mixed gas.
14:56 Well, gases are different weights. So unless you take canister off and roll it up and down, it’s not it’s never going to be consistent.
15:03 Is that all you drink, Dennis? Yeah, if I’m here. Yeah.
15:08 Car bombs. This is Oh, no. No, no.
15:10 This is This is the the home of the car bombs. I did my first car bomb downstairs. It probably is unintentionally.
15:17 [laughter]
15:18 Don’t ask for one of those in Ireland. No. No. No. Or a black and tan.
15:23 Why not? Black and Tan’s are named for the filthy uh criminal soldiers that were sent over by Churchill to deal with the Irish scum back in 1916 to 20.
15:34 So what happens if I ask for one?
15:37 Well, we’ll give it to you, but don’t do it. Don’t do it in Ireland. [laughter] They’ll just say, “F*** a tourist.”
15:44 I have to believe that. [laughter] This is an unfiltered podcast.
15:50 Oh, good. [laughter] I like that. I don’t like censorship.
15:54 Me neither. Me neither. So, do you ever get away from this place?
15:59 As often as I can, which is how often? About four times a year.
16:03 Yeah. I always see you here. Even at like 1:00 in the morning.
16:06 Well, I’m here I’m here every day. I’m here every night, but I’m not here all day and all night. Yeah. You You live close by? Yes, I can walk there.
16:14 There you go. Yeah. It’s good. 15-minute walk. Okay. You You walk there often?
16:20 Oh, yeah. You got to keep your legs going, huh?
16:22 Yeah. 15-minute walk here, half hour walk up. [laughter] He’s half hour walk. It’s the wind.
16:29 It’s the wind for sure. [laughter] Just depends how much research he’s done that day.
16:36 [laughter]
16:38 Yeah. And we got to keep the legs going. Yeah. Doctor’s orders.
16:42 Yeah. No, I know. Once you stop, you fall, man. Yep. Yeah. It’s true. Right. That’s true.
16:48 I see it all the time. Um, we have a friend who does that all the time. False. [laughter] Um, for you, you’re also a comedian. No.
16:58 Yeah. Part time.
16:59 Yeah. So, tell us a little bit about that venture.
17:02 Um, it’s something I wish I would have got into sooner, but, uh, something I’ve
17:09 always I mean, me and him used to watch standup, you know, back when I was like 10, 11. Uh, it’s humor is just something
17:16 that’s always been a way that we deal with things. So, I don’t know. I was just watching Chris Rock one time when I was 19 and I’m like, “Ah, that’s what I
17:25 want to do.” And uh, finally I got the balls to do it five five minutes, five years later. [laughter] And uh, it’s been cool. I’ve been And
17:33 the cool thing about this pub is I’ve been able to bring some of my interests here and and use it for good. Um, like
17:40 we uh, started bringing my comedian friends here. We started doing comedy shows. Um, it was crazy. We used to do 10:00 shows on Wednesday nights. I don’t
17:48 know how we did that, but uh, but since then I’ve grown up a little bit and we we we do professional shows or we sell tickets and we do it 8:00 on
17:57 a Thursday night. It’s gone over really well. Um, pubs just have a good atmosphere for comedy. It’s just it’s just like a comedy club, but it’s also a
18:05 pub feeling at the same time. So, it just goes over really well.
18:08 You guys have really nailed down the pub feeling here for sure.
18:11 Yeah. The main the main thing here is is atmosphere. Yeah.
18:15 And you seen right now we have a a pull down screen.
18:18 We used to do that because we had entertainment downstairs and so people could see who’s playing downstairs up here. But uh now we have a stage out
18:26 outside and for the first time ever we’re playing the World Cup.
18:28 Yeah. Your dad told me for the first time ever. And what and what good timing that was.
18:33 Not not just for the place but for you know the country and everything else and the world because it’s a world event and it’s this is the last thing we’ll do here for the next four years.
18:43 Yeah. Are you a soccer fan yourself? Kind of. Kind of. He is now. I am now. Yeah. I think a lot of people are now.
18:49 I think Well, I I was a soccer fan when I we I lived in England before I came here and I was a soccer fan there and I knew some
18:56 of the players of Manchester United. But when I came over here back in 1981, there was no football, soccer, there was
19:05 no nothing on cable was pretty new. So there was no football. I lost completely lost touch with it and by the time it
19:12 came on I’d forgotten about it. So when the World Cup came around and every every World Cup I get into soccer.
19:20 Yeah, I feel like a lot of people do. This is my first time getting into it.
19:24 Yeah, to be honest, I’m I’m really enjoying watching these games. I’m more of an American football guy, but I was born and raised here. So,
19:32 yeah, this is unifying the world and giving America a better view of America than what they’ve heard. I agree. Squashing stereotypes and whatnot.
19:40 Yeah, I agree.
19:42 Take the politics out. It’s a great country. 100%. All politics. Yeah. 100%. So, you’re very you’re very patriotic.
19:50 Absolutely. America first, huh?
19:53 America has a few flaws. It’s so massive. This has to have a few flaws.
19:57 You guys are still the best country in the world. I agree with you.
20:00 And that’s why everybody wants to come here and live.
20:03 I agree. Everyone does want to come here and live here.
20:05 But, you know, no matter how much people complain or about America, you’re still living here. So, yeah.
20:12 You can’t do I can’t do I couldn’t have done what I did here in any other country. No, me neither.
20:16 It seems that people that about Especially my own.
20:18 It seems the people that complain about America the most have never been outside it. [laughter] I don’t know nothing of outside. Exactly.
20:26 Yeah. 100%. They don’t know no different. I don’t know. America gives a lot of opportunity to people. Like you said, I was I got helped. Yeah.
20:34 For me, I was 23 when I started my business and I don’t think I could have done that anywhere else. Yeah. You know, and I’ve thrived and you know, now I’m
20:42 trying to give back to people by doing these podcasts and stuff like that and just get your exposure out there and get your story out there. So, um, very thankful for living in this country.
20:52 Yep. Yeah, very thankful.
20:56 You you you How often you go back home though? Actually, I’m going next month. For how long? 10 [clears throat] days.
21:02 You got a place back there or you just go be hotel?
21:05 No, I I don’t go back to Ireland as much as I go back to Manchester because none of us we I’ve got I’m one of eight
21:13 siblings. None of us went back to Ireland to live. What about Manchester?
21:18 Manchester four live there. Uh two live in London. One lives in Australia and I live here.
21:25 How different is it over in Europe? Completely. Yeah.
21:29 Yeah. It’s pretty sad that they have to live there. [laughter]
21:38 [laughter]
21:39 I’m from the cloudiest part of the cloudiest country and I couldn’t imagine just there for a few months and then just a
21:47 constant clouds and drizzle all day every day just really does it on you, you know. Yeah, it just gets you after a while. I don’t
21:54 I could I couldn’t do it. [snorts] I missed the whole summer one year. I overslept that day. [laughter]
22:04 That’s funny. You guys do a lot of live entertainment here. Do you have like specific nights that you do it?
22:11 In the season, it’s every night in the season. into offse and a couple a couple afternoons and in the
22:18 summertime it’s Thursday, Friday, Saturday night and Saturday, Sunday afternoon.
22:24 All right. Is there any big big bands you get here? Big names that people love to come see.
22:29 Oh, yeah. There’s a handful. Um, not big big names, but big names for here.
22:36 Let’s see. The uh the occasions, the collections, [snorts] collaborations.
22:42 Yeah. Um, Victims of Circumstance. Um, that’s one that’s like our house band. One of our f that is our favorite band.
22:50 The Free Coasters. They’re they’re up there, too. Yeah, they’re up there.
22:54 Um, we like to focus on um we we do help some local musicians out, but we also we mainly like to play uh feature bands
23:02 that you’re probably not going to see in the area. Um, we just don’t want to oversaturate, you know, the same sound.
23:08 Like, uh, like southern rock, classic rock, and country is very popular in this area. So, we play, we’ll do like ree, scoff, rockabilly, sometimes blues.
23:19 Of course, Irish music, R&B, and cell, too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
23:25 We just like to have something different. That is different, huh?
23:29 And we like And we also like that kind of music. It helps. Do you still listen? You listen to Irish music, too? When I’m here.
23:36 When you’re here, but not when you’re in the car at home. No, I don’t need to.
23:39 No, that’s You hear it enough? I hear enough here. Yeah. Yeah. You’re saturated with it. Yeah.
23:45 Uh talk to us about your food. Um what’s your what’s your most popular item other than fish and chips?
23:53 That would be uh the Reuben pasti. A pasti is uh the ingredients are wrapped in a puff pastry and baked in the oven.
24:02 And we have several pasties, but the Reuben pasti is probably the most popular now with that and the bread and chicken. Breton chicken go.
24:09 Yeah, the bread andton chicken is breast of chicken uh cooked in a rosemary shardon sauce wrapped in puff pastry and
24:17 baked. That’s that’s all homemade food. Everything even our chicken strips.
24:22 Is it your recipes? They started out as my recipes and they’ve evolved. Yeah, that’s usually how it goes. Yeah.
24:29 And then my cousin Yeah.
24:32 My cousin who’s a chef from uh also from Manchester, he he uh got us started on uh doing curry of the week. Yeah.
24:40 And that’s and that’s since been taken over, but uh it’s that’s been going over really well. It’s cool. We have we’ll have people we have Indian people from
24:48 the UK, California, India, all over. And they come here and they say it’s amazing. That means that’s that means a lot more than you know someone else.
24:56 So So you do a specific curry every week? A different curry every week. Yeah.
25:01 Yeah. So um every day they can get that plate. Yep.
25:04 And there’s also this there’s also the menu item chicken curry which is milder. Yeah.
25:09 People introduce people to the curry taste, but the of the week is pretty spicy. It can be.
25:15 Yeah. Whereas the the chicken curry we have on the menu is uh it’s like a gateway curry.
25:21 Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. You guys like spicy food, huh? I do. He does. What about you? No. Can’t stand it.
25:29 Me, too.
25:30 Burns my burns my tongue. Burns my roof in my mouth. Even a mild uh
25:37 buffalo sauce. It just leaves my tongue stinging. It kills [snorts] my stomach, man.
25:44 I can deal with the tongue and the mouth thing, but my stomach it kills me. Yeah.
25:48 Yeah. Uh what what other dishes do you have on the menu?
25:52 Uh we have that are traditional like Irish dishes.
25:54 Oh, toasties. Uh toasties, which is quite simple. It’s a sandwich. We have roast beef, ham, uh turkey, smoked turkey, or um now we started corn beef.
26:07 So it’s through the Reuben toasty as well.
26:10 Yeah, they took off. Yeah, it’s good bread.
26:13 And it’s good bread, too. And it’s toasted both sides. Nice. And um every year you guys do St.
26:19 Patty’s Day here. Talk to us about that event. What’s what do you guys bring to the area? What do you guys do for St. Patty’s Day?
26:25 That has grown and grown and grown over the years. I know. It’s crazy.
26:28 We’ve had a lot of practice and I think like the last 5 years we finally know what we’re doing. [laughter] We about 20 only took you 25 years.
26:35 Yeah. A lot of practice. [laughter] 2019 or 2020 I want to say is when we started closing the pub because we just get our furniture racked every year. So
26:44 we we just finally decided let’s close the pub, close out the street, get beer trucks outside, use our outside bar, and just have and just have a massive party.
26:52 And it’s just it’s gotten last year was probably the biggest. It was roughly around 10,000 people was estimated. Jesus Christ.
26:59 And this police estimated with their drones 10 to 12,000.
27:03 Yeah. We don’t know if that’s the biggest in the state or the country or the world because we’ve never seen outside of this place on that day. So
27:10 we’ll never know. But it I I do know that places like Savannah, Chicago, New York, they are a a a combination of different
27:18 bars that form a giant place where we are just one. Yeah.
27:21 So it’s I’d like to pat oursel on the back on that one. And we couldn’t do that with our staff. Our staff, they’re like army ants. They just play. They
27:29 just they just Yeah. tents, everything. It’s just it’s crazy.
27:35 That’s awesome. So there’s no work that day. It’s just all the all the work is the prep. Yeah. Ready for that. And then breaking it down.
27:43 Yeah.
27:44 But they have our staff just they do 18 to 23 hour shifts. Yep.
27:50 Wow. Straight on voluntarily because they don’t want anybody interfering with their rhythm.
27:55 On average 18. Sometimes they’ll get a hotel across the street so they can just be right here. Or one time they got a camper and just stayed on the parking lot.
28:02 Really? I bet it’s a big payday for them though.
28:06 Yeah. It’s the worst. It’s the worst tipping day. It’s the worst tipping day. Tips average 5%.
28:10 Yeah. They don’t rely They don’t rely on tips that day.
28:13 No, you pay them extra on that day.
28:15 Well, what we do is we we we put everything together and then whatever we’ve made that day, we just we just share with all of the staff. We’ve got 364 other days to make money.
28:26 Yeah. So, even the revenue you share with the staff. Yeah. That’s awesome. Yeah.
28:30 That’s great ownership, right? And that’s why some of them been here 15 years and 9 years and seven years.
28:36 That’s not the only reason, but that’s the kind of a culture it is.
28:40 What else do you do for your staff that uh makes them feel valued?
28:45 Well, my wife makes sure they all get a birthday card signed by everybody
28:49 [laughter]
28:52 and with whatever whenever they want days off or vacations and we work around it to suit them. If they’ve got kids and
29:00 the schedule is a bit awkward for this kind of business, we just accommodate somehow. We work it out.
29:08 Yeah. As you know, we’re a seasonal town and once May 1st hits, you know, a lot of places will just cut people or whatever.
29:15 We just find a way to everybody take their vacations at certain times where it all works out. It just works out.
29:21 Yeah. So, they’re making less money than the season, but they’re still making a good living. Yeah. Yeah. That’s usually how it goes.
29:27 Yeah. Yeah, that’s awesome. Well, is there anything that we haven’t covered that you like to get out there for you guys? Oh, yeah. What? As soon as we walk away.
29:36 Probably.
29:36 Yeah. But there’s always something like that. Yeah. Uh sets us apart. Yeah.
29:43 Oh, yes. We got a We’re going to have a big street party too next year because we got St. Patrick’s Day and our 30th anniversary.
29:52 30th anniversary, which is when? February 19th. February 19th. Wow. 27. Yeah. Okay. What?
30:00 Uh in 2027. 27. Yeah.
30:02 That’ll be our 30th. That’s Yeah. What are you guys going to do for that?
30:05 We’re going to we’re going to close We’re definitely going to close the party as we always do for St. Patrick’s Day. And I think we’re going to go that route for the anniversary as well. Yeah.
30:12 Just going to get creative with the festivities and whatnot.
30:16 Is it true you guys have a merchandise night where they get like a discount if they wear Celtic Ray stuff?
30:20 Yeah. Yep. It’s $3 off everything. So that’s unless it’s $6 or less then uh so
30:28 every like it’s $3 off every pint, $3 off every drink, $3 off every meal. The more you order, the more you save.
30:36 So every plate, everything that’s on your on your um Yeah. It’s three bucks off. Yeah. Wow. It’s not a happy hour, it’s a happy day.
30:45 [laughter]
30:45 Every week you guys do that, huh? Yeah.
30:47 And it’s it’s really paying off. It’s it’s our Monday is has become our third weekend night. Yeah. Yeah.
30:54 That’s awesome. That’s awesome. Are there any other daily daily specials you guys have going on that happens every week? You got What’s your happy hour like?
31:03 Happy hour we don’t do.
31:05 No. Okay. But as Max pointed out a few years ago, our busiest time is when people are doing happy hour.
31:12 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
31:15 I personally feel uh happy hour kind of uh encourages binge drinking a little bit. Uh, for example, I went to a place
31:23 and you can cut this if needed, but I went to a place uh I I had to go to Staples and my copies weren’t ready yet.
31:28 So, I went to the bar next door. I was like, “Yeah, let me just get a Jameson while I wait.” And then I, “Oh, it’s happy hour. Here’s two.” So, I got drunk
31:36 [laughter]
31:38 and I was I’m not going to not drink it. We’re not going to call it research.
31:42 Yeah. So, and that’s one of the reasons I don’t like happy hour or two ones like that. They they usually just there for happy hour and you never see them any other time.
31:51 Yeah.
31:53 And I did work at a place that had happy hour and it was in a retirement uh community and these people with their golf carts, you know, happy hour stops
32:01 at at 6:00 at 5:57. These people were going nuts ordering like two drinks at a time, just going crazy. I’m like, “Wow, okay, maybe not.” [laughter]
32:09 And we’ve never done happy hour. Well, that’s awesome.
32:12 That’s as close as we’re going to get is t-shirt day.
32:14 T-shirt day. That’s a good deal. Yeah, that is a good deal. And we we you know we still make money. Yeah, I bet you do. Yeah.
32:22 You guys big on social media, Facebook, Instagram.
32:26 And then and don’t even know what any of that is, but he is Max. Yeah, you guys got a Facebook page, Instagram.
32:32 Thanks to my wife and her sister. We They do all the social media, all the email.
32:35 Chris, make sure to plug all that in the bio, please.
32:38 And we just started a TikTok account yesterday. TikTok. There you go. Did we? We did. Yeah. I don’t know these things.
32:44 [laughter]
32:45 Kevin’s like, “What’s TikTok?” I sound like a wristwatch.
32:50 [laughter]
32:52 Well, [clears throat] we’re going to wrap this up. I appreciate you guys coming on. And for you guys watching, please look be on the lookout for February time to celebrate the 30th
33:00 anniversary with them. And always, there’s no better place to go on St.
33:04 Patty’s Day than the Celtic Ray. So, make sure you guys follow these guys on all their social media and come see them in downtown Punta Gorda. It’s a great place and um we appreciate you guys.
33:15 We’ll see you on the next next one. Thank you.
Hustle & Heat is brought to you by Dubz BBQ, named Best BBQ Joint in Florida in 2026. Catch the next episode over smoked brisket and ribs, or stop by for happy hour, daily 2–6 PM and all day Thursday & Sunday.