Inspiring Conversations with Matthew Burns of Dream Wingz

Today we’d like to introduce you to Matthew Burns

Hi Matthew, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I wish I could say that my beginnings in the field of ownership was a smooth and fun experience, but the truth is it all came down to two options, SUCCEED OR BE HOMELESS. As with many others in 2020 Covid left me with no job. I had an offer with Shoneys that would’ve been the most money I ever made and I had also been doing Doordash, Uber black, and Lyft to get myself by. One Covid hit my offer was rescinded and I was let go from all rideshare platforms. This couldn’t have come at a worse time as I had just had my beautiful son Myles and had being fighting for custody of my other children from a previous marriage. Being the only person with income with no avenue to make income in a field I’ve worked in my entire life while having to pay lawyers, rent, utilities, etc can make you feel hopeless. I couldn’t afford to be homeless or I would instantly lose my custody battle and my newborn son and his mom would have to move with family who lived at the bottom of Alabama. I wished during this time I still had my best friend to talk to but he had passed two years prior and I couldn’t let my kids or anyone else see the defeat in my eyes so I found myself driving around at nights struggling on whether I should go back to my old life of crime or was there another way I could use the last $450 to save my from inevitable plight I see coming towards me at full speed. In this moment my sons mother called me and advised me she was hungry and wanted a Fish Sandwich at McDonalds. I hadn’t even realized that I had been gone all day while baking the grief of what’s to come. What should’ve been an easy drive through a restaurant drive thru quickly escalated into a treasure hunt looking for any restaurant that would be open. Due to Covid I learned that night that after 10pm your chances of getting food was almost zero. While I want able to get her some food I was able to see a big need for the Clarksville area. The question now was how do I fill that need and that alone left me up all night. By the morning time I cane to one idea but it was a gamble, Use the last $450 and start a wing business with the downside being if I failed there would be no more lifelines and I would lose my place to stay and with it my custody battle for my kids. I promise this decision would’ve been easier if the government had made landlords defer rent just a little earlier. With the $450 I bought 4 $50 home fryers and 3 cases of chicken plus fries, seasonings and 4 sauce flavors. I literally had no more money at this point. I then cooked 10 wings and and some fries and took pictures to have a photo of my product. I then added it to every community chat group on Facebook and with Facebook marketplace with a deal of but 10 wings get 10 free. With this deal I didn’t make any money but I didn’t lose any either and it was a deal that was too good to pass up. Within hours my phone and inbox was flooded with potential customers and the only catch to the deal was they needed to leave a Facebook review. Getting customers was easy but now it was on me to keep them. I ran this deal for two weeks and by the end of it I had built a strong following. The community chats had been flooded with reviews of how good the wings were asking with the current deal I was running and now that I had them hooked it was time to charge regular pricing to see if the product was good enough to carry itself. This is a scary moment because despite all the race reviews you wonder if people like you because you’re actually good at what you do or because they truly like your product. Thankfully the product held and the sales continued to pour in. At this point I needed help getting orders delivered because I realized that if no restaurants were open after 10 and all the rideshare apps cut back their staffing then there really wouldn’t be any delivery drivers after 10 and I took ahold of that opportunity to be even greater by announcing that we would be delivering to anywhere in Clarksville until 3am. I bought myself a pos system and began doing orders over the phone while still in my kitchen. With my drivers Perry & Andrea working hard Dream Wingz because a well known go to if you wanted food late night. Eventually we outgrew the home we were living in and had no choice but to attempt to find a building. Life at this point was good. My son was progressing very well, I was able to pay rent asking with all my other bills, and the custody battle had completed in my favor. All that was needed now was to find a building which we did. Due to code regulations we were forced to have to stop or get in trouble so once I found a building I decided to shut down operations until the opening of the new building. I offered both my employees at the time minimum wage at 40 hours a week guaranteed every week even though they didn’t have to work for it and all I wanted in return was that they continued to work for me one we opened. Perry couldn’t accept the offer as he was not sure he’d be in Clarksville still but Andrea did. During this time I also started allowing other really close friends I deem as my brothers to stay with me. My first build out was definitely an experience. The building owner wanted to be the general contractor and went 6 months over the agreed completion date meanwhile I still kept my agreement to Andrea to continue paying her every week until we opened. I almost got back to where I was when COVID first hit but with the support of Monica (my youngest sons mother) and my intellect I was able to make it through. During this time even my wife & I became close again and she even moved to Clarksville and helped out with things tremendously. I’ve we opened to the public we had one goal in mind, be the best wing spot and the city and we did just that. STILL, this road continued on with pain. As success grew I still had to fight certain battles. In 2022 I found out my friend, a person I viewed as a real brother had habits that I could not allow to be around my kids. It could put my custodial rights at risk. I thought that by having money I could just fix the problem by throwing money at it and I paid him a hefty severance package and covered all travel expenses to wherever he wanted to go. This was probably the worst mistake of my life. Although we stayed in constant contact I found out on October 15th 2022 while I was inside my Tiny Town location preparing for it to open that the contact would never happen again. My brother had passed. At that moment I could literally feel myself die inside. I had never recovered from losing my best friend, someone else I called brother, in 2018 and now this? As I scream and yelled in the lobby in anguish all I could think about is how I threw all the money to help him move and be well off but never threw a dime into his recovery. I hadnt realized myself the connections in Clarksville I had made through facebook and while he was with us the tension between him and Monica because of his affliction had grown advice the boiling point I thought I made the right decision but in that moment on the 15th I realized I hadn’t. It’s a grief that I have to live with and that loss poured over into Dream Wingz. I found myself less interested in serving customers and more interested in escaping life but I still had so many more depending on me that I couldn’t take time to process my grief. Instead I got more practice hiding it with a smile to be able to continue to serve my community and not just with food. When my best friend passed in 2018 he called me that morning and I missed his call. I decided I was going to call back the next day as the day he called I decided I would file for divorce and the next day never came. Now with the death of my brother I began to feel I was never there when people needed me the most and it drove me to help whoever I could whether I knew them or not. Over the next year we worked hard at Dream Wingz to not only be the best wings in the community but also do our best to help whoever we could in the community. In October 2023 I suffered yet another loss as another one of my closest friends, my brother, who was also apart of the same circle as the other two, had been murdered in dallas texas at their dart station. This yet another major blow but thanks to my ex wife, Flo, who had now become the closest person to me she made sure I didn’t fall into despair. The community of Clarksville supported me the same way I had been supporting them and it helped during those times to keep pushing. As things continued to improve at Dream Wingz the tornado hit in December 2023. My family (my kids and Flo) were in the building while I was outside it in my car in its direct path. After it passed I ran inside to ensure that my family was okay. After knowing they were I immediately ran across the street to help the residents who’s apartment buildings had been demolished. I lost so many people but this community kept me strong. They became my family. I refused to lose any more people and I was determined to save as many as I could. Since then we as a community have grown stronger and as a business Dream Wingz will continue to expand carrying the family values with our communities to honor the memories and the family lost along the way. This isn’t an ending but a new beginning and the light at the end of THIS tunnel seems ever so bright

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It has not been a smooth road. Ive been taken advantage of as a new business owner, bands make it extremely hard to get funding for small business owners, many people I hold dear have passed, we had to rebuild after the tornado, chicken prices went up over 100 percent from 2023 to 2024, and all expansion efforts end up being self funded which is delaying the speed of growth

Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Dream Wingz?
We are known for having the best wings. We believe in quality. Quality of the product, quality of the customer service and quality of customer recovery when we get it wrong. I spent almost 15 years working for other major brands in the restaurant industry. Thanks to that I’ve been able to take a little good from each one while also noticing the shortcomings of each one to create a overall better experience and product

Can you talk to us about how you think about risk?
Every new endeavor is a risk. The restaurant industry itself is a risk and shouldn’t be taken lightly. When taking these risk first you should consider what the unfavorable results are. Determine whether it’s too much to bare. If so it’s not worth the risk. Go back to the drawing board and find a better way. Enlist good friends that’ll help guide you in the best direction.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.dreamwingz.net
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/@dreamwingzinc/?mibextid=LQQJ4d