Jacksonville Venture Competition returns Aug. 19 – Here\u2019s what judges are looking for<\/a><\/p>\n\u201cI think St. Augustine is so unique in what it offers, right? So you could say that it\u2019s hyper-local, but you can also say the tourism, so which one is it?\u201d she said. \u201cWe went into St. Augustine knowing that we could feed the local community\u2026 but we could also feed people from out of town and really get our name out there.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Chef Michael Cooney, the location is personal \u2014 and it fits what many diners want when they visit the Ancient City.<\/p>\n
\u201cI grew up going to St. Augustine\u2026 walking those historic streets, going to St. George with my family, making memories there,\u201d he said. \u201cGetting away from those chain restaurants\u2026 we\u2019re just really excited to get in there and be able to showcase our food.\u201d<\/p>\n
As they plan for growth, the couple said consistency comes from culture and training \u2014 not just recipes.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt takes\u2026 choosing our team very wisely\u2026 and then the amount of effort that we put into training them and building the culture,\u201d Chef Cooney said. \u201cWe wanted to create an experience where our restaurants were an extension of our home\u2026 You come in, we take care of you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brittany Cooney added that kind of hospitality requires owners to be present.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to be, as the business owners, you have be present and you have to be the best role model for that,\u201d she said. \u201cAre the owners present? Are they there? \u2026 We do. We listen.\u201d<\/p>\n
The discussion also touched on staffing \u2014 an issue they say never really goes away in the restaurant business.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s one of those big challenges\u2026 the age old challenge,\u201d Chef Cooney said, adding that he\u2019s learned the hard way it\u2019s better to be short-staffed than hire the wrong people.<\/p>\n
And while running restaurants as a married couple can blur the lines between work and home, they say the partnership makes them stronger.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe restaurant industry is so tough,\u201d Brittany Cooney said. \u201cBut it makes us that much stronger together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 A successful local restaurant doesn\u2019t expand by accident \u2014 and Ember and Iron\u2019s owners say…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":376614,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[7364,116,118,117,7363],"class_list":["post-376613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-business-edition","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-this-week-in-jacksonville"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/376614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}