IOWA CITY — What do football and entrepreneurship have in common?
Former professional football place-kicker Nate Kaeding would say teamwork and competition.
After almost a decade in the NFL, Kaeding, 41, began a new vocation filled with risk, drama and pressure: Opening his first restaurant about nine years ago, the Pullman Bar & Diner, at 17 S. Dubuque St. in Iowa City.
It was a “soft landing” after leaving the NFL in 2013, a career that has a “shelf life,” he said.
“In some ways, it was starting at ground zero,” Kaeding said. “Kicking a ball between two uprights is a unique, specific skill set. Once you’re no longer doing that, it doesn’t have any utility in the world beyond getting into coaching.”
Today, Kaeding owns and operates several restaurants in Iowa City under the company he founded, Gold Cap Hospitality. Those properties include the Pullman Bar & Diner, St. Burch Tavern and the famed Hamburg Inn No. 2, which he and others reopened earlier this year.
Teamwork
Those teamwork muscles he built as a professional athlete helped him transition into being a business owner, Kaeding said.
As in football, building a new business from the ground up requires an “elite team,” Kaeding said. He’s been lucky, he said, to have really strong partners -- in engineering and construction to culinary and the front-of-house operations needed in a restaurant.
Kaeding said he wants to create jobs people find fulfilling and who create an atmosphere that attracts customers. While the quality of food and drinks at a restaurant is important, equally important to Kaeding is creating a place for people to “hang out.”
“These are places where folks celebrate birthdays, retirements, baby showers and get together with people after work,” Kaeding said. “The ultimate goal is for these to be places locals feel like they have to take people to get the spirit of Cedar Rapids or Iowa City.”
Kaeding said he doesn’t want to create another restaurant or business “for the sake of doing it.” In every business decision, he said, he wants to explore where there are unmet needs in the community and match that “with a really good real estate location.”
Kaeding believes the Hamburg Inn — which has a 50-year history of family ownership — is in a “strong location.”
It also holds a “romantic and nostalgic” place in his heart and the hearts of the people at Gold Cap Hospitality, Kaeding said.
“It feels like it’s part of the fabric of the place,” he said.. “We view ourselves as stewards preserving it for years to come.”
Coming home
Coming back to Iowa after his pro football career made leaving football “more palatable,” Kaeding said.
Kaeding also is the director of business development at Build to Suit, a company behind dozens of apartment, health care, industrial and retail and restaurant projects.
Most recently, Kaeding is on a team working on the $81.5 million 1st and 1st development at First Street SW and First Avenue West in Cedar Rapids, where the Big Grove Brewery and Pickle Palace bar and grill are slated to open next month.
Playing a part in shaping that property has been a “privilege,” Kaeding said.
“Our goal is for it to be a quintessential part of Cedar Rapids,” he said. “It’s a lofty goal.”
Kaeding grew up in Coralville and played for the Hawkeyes before graduating from the University of Iowa with a degree in history and a teaching certification.
After leaving the NFL, Kaeding returned to the UI to get his master’s in business administration degree. Becoming an entrepreneur, he said, appealed to him because he’s able to be “strategic and nimble” as opposed to the more formal structure of a larger organization.
Kaeding and his wife, Samantha, have four kids -- Jack, 15, Wyatt, 14, Tess, 11, and Harper, 8.
Kaeding also is on the Midwest One Bank board of directors and the Enhance Iowa Board through the Iowa Economic Development Authority, which provides grants to projects that provide recreational, cultural, entertainment, educational and sports tourism attractions.
Given Kaeding’s name recognition, it’s plausible he could run for office one day. While Kaeding said he would “never rule anything out,” holding a political position is not now on his radar.
“I had one big career change, and I’ve enjoyed that,” he said. “Maybe when I’m older, wiser and have a lot more free time.”
Comments: (319) 398-8411; grace.king@thegazette.com
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