Alumni Profile: Gary Leff '92

Insatiable and loving it
Savoring a decade of success with his Stir Crazy restaurants, CEO and founder Gary Leff is hungry for more

By Romi Herron

For the debut of his first Stir Crazy restaurant, Gary Leff '92 hosted dozens of taste-testing events to ensure every Pan-Asian creation gracing the menu of his dream venture deserved to be there. And on the delightfully oversized ceramic plates of his patrons.

Ten years and nine restaurant openings later, the founder and CEO is still putting his taste buds and culinary artistry to work in Stir Crazy kitchens, now peppered throughout suburban Chicago with additional locations in Florida, New York and Missouri.

He and his chefs excite in creating new favorites, like their latest — chili lemon grass shrimp — but despite countless sampling sessions and a round-the-clock, all-access pass to "the freshest Asian entrees around," Leff says he will always be hungry, and not just to satisfy his palate.

"Starting any business, especially a restaurant, takes a lot more than business knowledge and a passion for food. You have to be real hungry for success," he says.

And he always has been, with entrepreneurial instincts that led to landscaping and asphalt maintenance businesses prior to his studies at the Kellogg School, where entrepreneurship wasn't his academic focus but a constant ambition. Post-MBA, Leff worked as a consultant before setting out to whet his restaurateur appetite. 

"Cooking was always my hobby, and I thought about what I would offer if I ever created a restaurant. My basic concept was and still is to offer healthy Asian food in a much fresher and more contemporary environment than a typical Asian mom-and-pop shop," says Leff.

He flushed out the details and a local investor loved not only Stir Crazy's premise but another key ingredient: Leff's passion.

A culinary experience, most celebrated through Stir Crazy's signature Create Your Own stir-fry, was the central pitch.

With it, vibrant red and green pepper slices, tomato wedges, carrot and yellow squash medallions, bamboo sprouts, water chestnuts and more are carefully arranged on a buffet of ice, inviting patrons to select their favorites and experiment with new combinations on each visit.

Heaping the ingredients into a small wok before dousing it with one of 12 house sauces, each guest may also add beef, chicken, shrimp, calamari, tuna, salmon or tofu, with noodles or rice, before a chef stir-fries it all to perfection.

In essence, Create Your Own is what Leff did on a summer excursion to Asia during his Kellogg years, sampling food from street vendors, blending and creating to suit his tastes, falling in love with the wonders of experimenting. Leff's recipe for success also merges aptitudes acquired at Kellogg.

"Finance and marketing tools are critical to understanding the metrics of this business," he says. For the venture's initial push, he knew he needed patience and continual involvement with management and staff, resulting in 80-hour work weeks.

Today, conservative expansion of up to three sites per year allows him to maintain the quality he and his patrons value, says Leff, who also drives the interior design and architecture of all the restaurants.

"I'm basically running a manufacturing center (of egg rolls and dumplings) in the back, and on the lines we're cutting meat and slicing produce, which we shop for five days per week. And then I have a service operation and artistic presentation component up front. Our volume is up to 1,500 meals per day."  

The Create Your Own option is only one of a full menu of original entrees, and none of those has even a shake of MSG. Canola oil, twice as expensive as other oils but a healthier choice, according to Leff, is used for all cooking. With an average check around $14, Stir Crazy has little direct competition, prompting plenty of requests from those who want a bite of the action through franchises.

"Every week we get requests," Leff says. "But we're not serving hamburgers or coffee, and we wouldn't be able to deliver the same kind of quality. It's just not what we're all about — even if some people might think I'm crazy."