The Knowledge Project
The Brutal Truth About Success No One Talks About | Panera Founder Ron Shaich
11 Nov 2025
Full Episode
I've done this now over half a century. I was part of building bakery cafes in America between Au Bon Pain, Panera.
These were the dominant brands. How do you develop the long-term thinking that you've brought to all these different concepts? I have an expression, I'm long-term greedy, not short-term stupid.
Now it seems so obvious, but how did you hit on this insight at the time? I think that the most powerful skill that I have as a business person and what I would challenge entrepreneurs to acquire is is the skill of it.
Talk to me about the difficulties of running a business, the family costs, the social costs.
When you're doing anything that takes powerful commitment, that commitment owns you. You don't own it. There's a very real personal price. I've been married twice. It's not something I'm proud of. Everything I believe in about business starts with three words.
What are you obsessed with lately? My health, actually. What does that mean for you to be obsessed with that?
Well, I'm 71 and I look at my kids. I look at my relationships and there's so much to live for and so much to see. And I really want to do everything I can to give myself every opportunity to live and see how the world unfolds. And how has that changed your behaviors?
I got more serious about it because I would say in my earlier years, 30s, 40s and 50s, I was probably more focused on work and relationships, family. And as I gained perspective on it, If I'm ever going to do it, now's the time. So I'm trying to literally work out every day in some serious way and really eat well, take the right medication, supplements, anything I can to help myself.
But to me, that's about an attitude towards life. And that attitude essentially starts with a view that it's our responsibility to figure out what it is that we're going to respect in the future. I tell it by way of a story. I watched my mom and dad pass away now 30 odd years ago. One of them died very much at peace. The other, not so much at peace.
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