Marcus Aurelius, the ancient Roman Emperor, once said, “Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.” Zig Ziglar, the sales guru, broke it down like this, “Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will.” Then Bill Gates put it where the goats could get it when he spit, “Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.”
Nearly two years ago next month John Schnatter, founder and CEO of Papa Johns Pizza, allowed success to fool him into believin’ that he could say whatever he wanted to say to folks and it wasn’t goin’ to nose dive his business. He got so comfortable that he jumped out of the birthday cake butt naked foamin’ at the mouth talking reckless about the NFL protests and how it was hurting his business. Let me refresh your memory.
He said, “The NFL has hurt us. We are disappointed the NFL and its leadership did not resolve this.” He didn’t stop there bruh. He went on to say, “Leadership starts at the top, and this is an example of poor leadership.” Ole boy said that he thought the issue had been “nipped in the bud” a year and a half ago.
The use of that type of language was equivalent to spitting in black folks’ faces and his company lost $70 million in one day. Shares hit the floor after his comments and rightfully so.
Well playas…in the last few months the big homie Shaquille O’Neal has put on his Super Man cape and stepped in to save Papa Johns, for a fee of course. Everybody loves Shaq and pizza and he knows it. So instead of watching the duns sink like the Titanic he’s taken the reigns to pull the company out of a huge whole at his advantage. He was like, I can do you this solid but you’ve got to pay me playa.
The four-time NBA Champion and Hall of Famer is using his influence to make even more bread off of the fumble of Papa Johns and boyz “ain’t” mad at him. He’s joined the company as its first African-American board member, a brand ambassador and part-owner of nine franchises. Now he’s doing commercials for them and nobody’s mad at him either.
Let’s keep it real or all the way 100, whichever comes 1st! When John Schnatter stuck both of his feet in his mouth he opened the door for someone like Shaq to get paid at his expense. As long as Shaq wasn’t doing commercials with Schnatter he was good. We all know that Schnatter’s still getting a check some kind of way because it’s his company. However, as long as he’s out of sight he’s out of mind and a black man is profiting off of Schnatter’s racism. Congrats to Shaq for using his influence to make a fortune off of a ole boy’s fumble because there is no way a black man would have ever gotten a chance to sit on their board or become the brand ambassador for Papa Johns had this not occurred. So thanks for the unforced turnover. Salute to my brother Shaq for seeing the opportunity to get into the board room, make some more bread and get Papa Johns right from a cultural competence perspective. Growth is necessary. Stop me when I start lyin’!
