It’s often said that the customer is always right, but I never quite bought into that philosophy. I believed the customer wasn’t always right, but in matters of taste they were rarely wrong.
I came from a generation that understood that anyone willing to put in the work and make smart decisions could make a successful life for themselves, and when running a business, understanding what it is your customer actually wants is a crucial part of this.
And much of the time, you won’t get it right. You can’t please all of the people all of the time, but if you can please enough of the people enough of the time, you’ll be able to build a reliable and loyal customer base that will sustain your business. If something didn’t land, it wasn’t because they failed to understand. It was because we failed to listen and adapt.
But then, every once in a lifetime, maybe many lifetimes; once in a blue moon (if that even is a moon) the stars align, and one hits upon that magic combination of ingredients that pleases nearly everybody nearly all of the time, and changes the very foundations of society for generations.
I was one of those rare lucky few that managed this.
My name is Duke Lorgis, and for a time I was best known in the Milwaukee area for “The Writing on the Wall,” a small chain of local nostalgia driven 50s style diners with bar and grill. They hit the right notes and attracted customers for a time, but as with most endeavours, popularity waned as customers found other new and inviting avenues to explore.
But then I came up with the idea that would change everything. In fact, even if you’re not a native of Milwaukee, you’ve almost certainly heard of it.

MAN-STEAK MONDAY.

One of my establishments was located in a heavily industrialised neighbourhood, and I would observe that every Monday, there would be workers going home in the evening, depressed, miserable, no doubt contemplating that the work week had only just begun and the worst was yet to come.
And there I saw a business opportunity.
I thought back to when I was young, and how much I looked forward to a good steak dinner at the end of the week. That was where the idea was born—Man-Steak Monday, an affordable Monday night treat for labourers who felt that they had earned it. Figuring that the market opportunity was not going anywhere, and that you needed to spend money to make money, I sunk a lot of resources into researching not just customer needs, but customer desires.
A steak alone was not going to cut it. It needed to be a hefty, hearty steak, ridiculously large for a single meal, but served at a price the working man could afford, even if only as an occasional luxury.
I asked hundreds of people passing the store as to how much they’d be willing to pay for which sizes of which cuts of meat. Opinions were varied but decisive. It became very clear to me that most people had a very clear idea of what they were eating and what they were content to pay.
Eventually I settled on the ultimate meal deal for this particular location at this particular time. A 500 gram chuck eye steak and a large beer for the low low price of just $15 (adjusted for inflation).
Now, of course, that alone was not going to cut it. The devil is in the details.
The steak was not merely a cut of meat, but was pre-seasoned and prepared in a unique manner borrowed from many global influences. I employed salting and smoking techniques from Brazilian barbecue to bring out a deep bass note of earthy darkness in every bite.
The gravy was a fusion of styles incorporating the citrus tones of Japanese ponzu with the more familiar caramelised onions, garlic and mushroom suited to a western palette.
These would be served with coleslaw that incorporated crumbled blue cheese and hints of root ginger, and three varieties of potato—creamed, boiled and baked.
The food was just part of the deal. Something I was adamant about was that the beer needed to be served within a minute—give or take—of ordering. Sitting at a table with nothing to consume is detrimental to the entire experience. And of course, the sooner they started their beer, the sooner they would finish it and order another, as there would invariably be a beer to steak imbalance.
I also arranged a number of familiar side dishes exclusively for this deal, which were all premium but affordable options. These ranged from table ready snacks such as mixed nuts and pickled egg pretzel combos, and those that took some minimal preparation such as pickle chips, battered cheese curds and onion strings.
I considered putting a serving of popcorn on the table at seating, but ultimately decided against it. You have to respect your customers. They wanted a good deal, not a handout. They worked hard for their money, and were very proud of this. A freebie like that doesn’t feel generous—it feels cheap.
I’d seen the same thing in fast food where meal deals included a low quality drink they could as easily give away for free. It felt deceptive, like people were being charged more for something they didn’t even want. People judge the chain by the weakest link—and more often than not, that’s the soda.
Popcorn was off the table.
So after much research and minimal fanfare, I launched Man-Steak Monday early one May at a single store for a limited time. And I’m not going to lie—the response was unfathomable!
The first night, I saw miserable looking workers walk halfway past the restaurant, hesitate for a moment, and then decide on the spur of the moment to come in. By the time they left, they were the picture of unadulterated joy.
The customers were right, and I’d succeeded because I listened.
The next week, it was chaos! Word of mouth had kicked in, and this time there were queues down the road before opening, and it wasn’t just working men, but women, old folk, families with young children. Everyone wanted their taste of Man-Steak Monday. I was so unprepared for the enthusiasm that the police ended up having to peacefully intervene and send people home.
I saw those same police officers from time to time in plain clothes as customers. They would never accept a service discount. They had their pride too, it seemed.
By the end of the first month, all 5 of my locations were offering Man-Steak Monday, and within six months, with the help of professional consultants and very strict contractual restrictions, I was licensing the deal to other eateries up and down the country.
I had stumbled upon the social phenomena of the century. And decades later, enthusiasm hadn’t waned one iota. Many competitors had popped up with similar offerings, but they all fell short. They all felt like cheap imitations.

Now I don’t know if it was due to a perceived lack of enthusiasm on the part of the customers, or my own determination to not be a one hit wonder, but I eventually did start making changes to the menu. The fundamentals of the deal didn’t change, allowing for inflation, but I varied the side dishes a little.
The Nachos had always used habanero peppers as a topping, but I felt these were perhaps a little spicy for many of our customers. They were all I’d had available when I first developed the recipe, so I tried secretly swapping them out for jalapeños. The reception, like the new peppers, was lukewarm. Some were perfectly happy to eat either, while others complained bitterly that I was watering down the experience. Infantalising it even. My choice to switch fryer oil from beef tallow to vegetable as some fast food franchises had done was also received badly, but didn’t seem to negatively affect sales.
I never understood what the problem was. My improvements to the menu were objectively better.
I guess the customer isn’t always right…
Ultimately though, these were just minor niggles, tiny ripples in the ocean. The real problems started when I tried to replicate the blue moon combination with the benefit of decades of experience.
Long story short, it didn’t go well.
I tried once more to leverage the original intent of Man-Steak Monday, to recreate the excitement I had as a child at a good steak dinner. And just like that was born the Family Matinee.
This was a weekend and holiday lunchtime deal, focused on families, which offered a junior sized version of the steak with a side order of fries and a milkshake made from real ice cream.
The kids loved it!
The problem was that the adults didn’t. Grown men and women didn’t feel milkshakes belonged with their favourite steak meal, and the kids ultimately lost interest in it after a short time.
But it was an objectively good deal. To them, it was just a fad.
The customer isn’t always right.
On the plus side though, those kids and their families still came back for Man-Steak Monday. There was no love lost, just disappointment.
Or at least that’s how it started…
The Family Matinee only lasted a few short years, but the damage was done. People would continue to talk about it for over a decade after it ended, at first in good humour, but increasingly with hostility aimed directly at me. This was especially true of the kids who were now grown up, who had it in mind that I was some kind of culinary hack, an opinion they would share loudly as they chomped down on my finest creation.
And ultimately I decided I’d lived long enough for enough to be enough.
I retired and sold the franchise to the highest bidder.

Now, it’s often said that hindsight is 20/20, but when you have a franchise as universal and persevering as Man-Steak Monday, a successful conglomerate that’s paid good money for it need only maintain it for future generations to enjoy, to receive a steady stream of guaranteed income from it. I felt safe in my creation’s legacy, even if I no longer profited from it.
But there was one thing I hadn’t taken into consideration.
I knew going into business that you had to spend money to make money, and as money for me was tight, I spent that money very carefully. I couldn’t afford to squander any. I worked hard for it, and this was a source of pride.
It never occurred to me that a corporate entity able to pay as much as they did for my brainchild would absolutely have money to squander by the truckload. Enough so that they could piss everything I worked for into the wind and laugh when it splashed all over their stupid grinning faces.
If you could imagine somebody purchasing the original Declaration of Independence, just so they could set fire to it and see how long it would burn for, you can imagine how much my decision to sell came back and bit me on the arse.
I think the problem came down to the mindset of those who had been assigned to manage it. I crafted the product with love and dedication. It was my life’s blood. To them, it was just fodder, something they could poke at and experiment with, until such time as other new and inviting avenues to explore might arise.
And in this instance, the manager assigned to my franchise was likely fresh out of a grievance based business degree, and this was her first foray into righting the world of all the perceived sins she could muster.
The first problem she decided to tackle was the discriminatory aspect of the customer base.
While Man-Steak Monday was what put my entire restaurant chain and associated licensees on the map, approximately 70% of its customers were deemed to be men. This was a problem she was in a position to tackle, regardless of the cost because she had no stake in it. I doubt she even cared if that pun was intentional or not.
Man-Steak Monday, in her eyes, needed to be more inclusive to all demographics, but especially women—people like her. Also to ethnic minorities to some extent, but only the most visible ones. And maybe sexual minorities at a later date, depending on how the wind of social change might blow.
Something had to be changed, and it didn’t seem to matter what, or why. The devil was most certainly not in the details.
A hive-minded think tank was founded, and it was determined that the biggest reason it wasn’t appealing to quite as many women as it was men, was the menu itself. The steak, to be frank, was too big, and wasn’t an appealing cut. The 500g chuck eye was replaced with a more tender and manageable 150g tenderloin, lightly salted and buttered to bring out its more delicate flavours.
The sauce was a big problem, as nobody likes the smell of garlic and onion on their breath, so various alternatives were suggested: herbed brown butter with lemon zest was a strong contender but ultimately a red wine and berry reduction won out with its sweet and tangy overtones.
The coleslaw was fine, once they got rid of the blue cheese and ginger, but the potatoes had to go. In a health conscious and overweight society that disproportionately impacts women, who are held to a higher standard by other women, a more balanced menu of carrots, broccoli and green peas would fit the bill. Buttered corn was suggested, but it was felt the appeal was too universal to further the goal of equal representation in the customer base.
The drink was a problem too, as beer was just not that popular with women. They considered adding alternatives to the menu, but ultimately beer would provide the best value and would likely be the default choice, so they abandoned it completely in favour of wine coolers.
The price point seemed fine, so they kept that as is, adjusting for inflation.
On opening night, the streets were buzzing with anticipation at this second coming of Man-Steak Monday, but after the experience, people were leaving the restaurants confused, bewildered even. Word got about, and the very next week showed a noticeable decline in customers of all genders and races.
For the first time since inception, there were empty seats.
Social media posts showed a general dissatisfaction, that this was not the Man-Steak Monday they grew up with, but the conglomerate assisted by its media specialists were quick to condemn such voices as being remnants of a more bigoted and less refined past that it was time for us as a society to move past.
It was the customers that were wrong.
The natural reaction was to double-down.
The think tank reconvened and determined that Monday was not an optimal day for women to enjoy their steak special, so they moved it to Wednesday. They kept the name of course, because branding was everything.
And clearly there were some issues with the sides, which felt somehow unrefined with the new meal offerings. They experimented with wild mushroom duxelles in puff pastry petals, quail eggs with truffle aioli and baby gem lettuce wraps with lobster and yuzu vinaigrette, but these were complex and costly to produce, which was all passed on to the customer. These were an instant flop, and were quickly replaced with the much more simple off-the-shelf approach of baby carrots, fried spaghetti sticks, jerky and peanuts.
None of this went down well at all. The original customers who loved Man-Steak Monday no longer wanted anything to do with it, and the new customers once attracted by the franchise’s popularity found the new offerings to be overpriced and underwhelming. Again, the conglomerate assisted by its media team went on the offensive.
It was the customers that were wrong.
Now, every day was Man-Steak Monday. There was a Mondays in every corner of every town. It saturated the market. The offerings were meagre, low quality morsels you could find in any low end eatery, but priced like haut cuisine. A minority of the clientele remembered the magic of Man-Steak Monday and went purely for the hope of nostalgia, but would invariably leave disappointed.
The remainder were just there for the drag shows.

I used to think you needed to spend money to make money. I think now that the real key is to respect the money, and those who spend it.
The customer isn’t always right. They’re fickle, contradictory, sometimes irrational. But in matters of taste, they can’t ever be wrong.
And that’s how I built my Man-Steak Monday empire, my beautiful, once in a lifetime, shining star—by listening to what people wanted.
And perhaps it’s why the Family Matinee failed. Perhaps, in my hubris, I forgot to listen.
But one thing I know for sure is that even a successful empire like mine that had stood the test of time could be easily torn down by a sufficiently dedicated band of rebels insistent on telling people what they should and shouldn’t like. When you don’t respect your customers, they’ll take their hard earned cash elsewhere.
But when it’s the customers that are wrong, I guess it’s good riddance.