We had the good fortune of connecting with Dan Meaux and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Dan, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I am from Louisiana and a proud Cajun. I also love boiled crawfish & seafood. I moved to Houston to transfer to UH Hilton College of Restaurant Mgmt. It was a great decision for me. I also worked at Pappas Seafood all through college. So, I received a great education and excellent management experience. I thought I would move back to Lafayette and open a seafood restaurant but I met my wife Jen, also in rest management at UH. She said I’m never leaving Texas so I decided I’ll do crawfish here and I opened a small drive thru only crawfish business. It was extremely slow my first season but I added a patio with four tables my second season and business improved. Our business has been blessed with amazing growth and prosperity from there. We have just completed our 19th year in business.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
We have just completed our 19th season in business. I think what sets our business apart is our passion for our business, including our employees and customers. We truly love what we do. We work insane hours but its only have the year. I also think our seasoning sets us apart from other crawfish seasonings. I changed my recipe many times. It’s a full flavor, low salt premium seasoning. It’s also great everything. We are also BYOB and have been since the beginning. We could make a lot more money selling alcohol/beer but our customers love the fact they can bring any adult beverages they want. I’m probably most proud of the relationships we have built with our customers and employees over the years. We actually boil more crawfish for one location than any other place anywhere. We are proud of that but more so because of our amazing customers we see on a weekly basis, for years and years. The 100+ hour work weeks are easy when you have awesome employees and customers/friends.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I would take them to an Astros game and either Kemah or Galveston.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
My wife, Jen. She has been there from the beginning, when things were not so good. We had recently built our home with a mortgage and our six year old daughter and 1 year old daughter. I left a good job to persue this dream I had of owning my own restaurant. She was all in, even during the first two years of barely breaking even. After about our sixth crawfish season, our amazing growth required Jen to be full-time in our business. She was able to quit her career in the oil and gas industry and help me take our little business to the #1 crawfish boiling restaurant anywhere, including Louisiana. This would have never been possible without my life partner and co-owner, Jen.

Website: www.crawfishshack.com

Instagram: crawfishshack

Facebook: @crawfishshackcrosby

Image Credits
Those are all our own photos. No credits needed.

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