I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Matt Thompson, co-owner of Tallahassee’s Madison Social located in College Town. The very amicable and charismatic Thompson talks about his time here at FSU as a studentm, and now a patron of a new wave of culture and social life in Tallahassee!
Courtesy: Matt Thompson
Her Campus (HC): What was your experience like as a student at Florida State?
Matt Thompson (MT): I attended FSU in 1995 and met my business partner in a public speaking class. I was a Public Relations major and he was a Mass Communications major. We went through the masters program together and at the time it was called Interactive Communication and New Information Technologies. It was a masters program that was meant to be a liason between a CEO and a tech guy. We went ahead and got our masters degree because at the time we had a great football team, we would golf four times a week and we ate a lot of steak. I tell students who I speak to all the time, “Are you ready to leave Tallahassee?” If the answer is yes, then 100 percent go ahead and begin your real life duties. If the answer is “No, I still like going out on Thursdays” I don’t think getting a masters degree is a bad idea. For me it helped me grow up.
HC: What was life like post-graduation?
MT: I am from Orlando so after I graduated with my Masters Degree I moved back. I became the Director of Marketing for a small software company where I raised revenue 92 percent in the 18 months that I was there. I taught at night at the community college to make more money. Eventually I wanted to leave the job I had and they had a full-time teaching position so I took up that opportunity. I’ve always been the type of person to look for opportunity, I became sort of like the educator of the educators because at the time blogging, social media and overall the easy access to the Internet was just becoming really popular. So for most educators it was rather intimidating because it was this whole new world that people were being opened up to. Becoming so involved in this led me to my next job, which was at a digital marketing agency in Orlando. Although I had minimal agency and management experience, I was a professor. This gave me the skills of managing students and providing information.
HC: What about Tallahassee made you want to come back?
MT: When my wife got pregnant with my daughter Lily she didn’t want to put her in daycare if it was possible. Tallahassee afforded that opportunity, so we moved. I became the Director of Digital Strategies at Zimmerman Agency. I oversaw the social media departments.
HC: How did Madison Social come into your life? Did you create the idea on your own?
MT: My partner had moved to NYC after graduating and opened up a bar in the Upper East Side called The Saloon. He quickly noticed how many Nole grads had moved into the city and needed a place to watch the games. So he got really involved in the New York City Nole Club. He was down for the Oklahoma game tailgating with me and approached me asking me if I knew about this new project the boosters were developing which was College Town. They had approached him with the possibility of opening the anchor unit of College Town. Without having any idea on a name or anything for this unit, he pitched the idea of an “Open-air, gastro pub, industrial feel” type place. The boosters loved it. The idea was for this place to be a gathering location, not a sports bar. It is meant to be a place to connect and there just so happens to be 20 TVs up. About a month after he pitched the idea to the boosters he offered me the opportunity of being his local partner. At the time I was looking to diversify, and that’s kind of how it all happened.
Courtesy: Matt Thompson
HC: Madison Social came to Tallahassee during a time of change because of College Town and it gives Tallahassee a new look. Was this part of the plan?
MT: We started the marketing for Madison Social about nine months prior to opening. We opened in August of 2013 so we began roughly around January 2013. At that time is was really giving everyone information not even just on Madison Social, but College Town in general because no one really had any idea of what was going on. We wanted Madison Social to be a place where college students could walk in and not feel intimidated. We’re not going to be on the same level as Natty Light and Ramen Noodles – we want to elevate the college student.
A friend of mine’s grandmother is part of the FSU Emirates Club, which means you graduated from FSU over 50 years ago. She tells all her friends that Madison Social is the best place to go. Nothing warms my heart more than walking into Madison Social and seeing a group of 80-year-old women chatting while sipping on their Madison Mules, and then looking over and seeing a group of 21 year olds, maybe a little louder, enjoying themselves as well. That’s what we set out to do from the beginning. This has been a vision and it may be a little altruistic, but I want a place where a 21-year-old sorority girl can sit next to a Marching Chief who can sit next to a 25-year-old grad student who can sit next to a 45-year-old business man and they all get into a conversation that they never would have imagined getting into because of the social norms that everybody follows.
HC: What is it like owning a very busy and popular bar in Tallahassee?
MT: Well, I am a very big control freak. I like to control the experience. Both my partner and I are very meticulous about everything and can notice if something is off or we don’t like. We’ll walk into a Thursday Happy Hour and we’ll hear something and just not like the feeling of it. We let people do their jobs and try to stay out of the way, but we are very meticulous about the quality of what we expect. You will never catch me patting somebody on the back saying “That was great” and there wasn’t a problem. I will always find 90 different things that we can improve.
Courtesy: Matt Thompson
HC: As a student did you ever see Tallahassee changing into something other than just bars and clubs?
MT: No, I would have never thought. As a student if you think there’s a line now, it is nothing like what is was 15-20 years ago when I went here. You literally could have built a wall on Tennessee and Monroe because students just would not go past it. It was very rare. The only reason I knew of people passing that wall was because they either had family visiting, a girl babysitting or because there was this one liquor lounge. You just really didn’t go on that side of town. Now Tallahassee has given you reasons to go over there. There are new restaurants to try and market places. Just like Madison Social is giving people from that side to come this way. Professional folk and young adults now come this way now because they used to think the only thing there was just the Strip.
HC: Now that Tallahassee has evolved into something totally different than the past, what is competition like?
MT: It is something you must always work on. There are tons of new places that are opening up and competition is increasing more and more. Being on top of all the food trends and the crazes that everyone goes through is important. For example, it is no secret that fall comes around and it needs to be pumpkin everything. A lot of it is listening to our customers, what they want to see on our menus or specials.
HC: When did you guys think it was a right time to change the menu?
MT: We would like to do new menus more than once every year so if anything I think we are lagging. There’s challenges with our volume, its not necessarily a bad thing. We are slammed from Thursday – Sunday. There isn’t really time for R&D we really have to make the most of Sunday after 4 o’clock and Wednesday when you close. That’s also the time where you need to order more things, perfect something. We haven’t really felt a slow time either. Most people would assume business becomes terrible when students leave, but we’ve never really felt that. We haven’t really changed enough from the menu as we would like to. Everything begins with numbers. We look closely at what is slipping in sales, and what does excellent. We need to also consider all of the food that is being made. We pump out a lot of food. Our kitchen needs to be as streamlined as possible to get our food out quick and given to the customers.
Courtesy: Matt Thompson
HC: Top picks on the new menu?
MT: MadSo Burger is still #1, Short Rib Tacos, Meatball Grilled Cheese, Shrimp Lettuce Wraps, Fresh Catch.
HC: Lastly, what advice would you give to a person that may be at the point of graduation and real life?
MT: I would say to infuse creativity in anything that you do. Your generation is the easiest generation to create something without really even knowing how to do it. You don’t have to know how to do anything, you can go and create your own video drop it on your editing software, post it somewhere and begin a project. Everything is so easy for you guys, it’s at your fingertips. You have the power of creating and making things different that will separate yourself from everyone else.
Courtesy: Matt Thompson