#214 Transform Your Social Life with Nick Gray's Two-Hour Cocktail Party Secrets

What if you could transform your social life with just a two-hour cocktail party? Discover the secrets with Nick Gray, the mastermind behind "The Two-Hour Cocktail Party," as we chat about hosting unforgettable gatherings that bring people closer together. Nick shares his unique morning routine, featuring a twist on bulletproof coffee, while we swap stories about hearty breakfasts and the joys of air frying bacon. We also take a nostalgic stroll down memory lane, reflecting on college parties and how our social habits evolve as we grow older, offering insights into making every interaction count.

As we unpack the art of hosting, Nick breaks down his structured approach to creating successful events, ensuring you never stress about party planning again. From mastering icebreakers like asking, "What's one of your favorite things?" to embracing the "minimum viable party" concept, this episode is brimming with practical tips to rejuvenate your social connections. Whether you're an extroverted analyst or someone looking to reconnect post-COVID, learn how to foster friendships in a meaningful way, even if you opt for a mocktail party instead of traditional cocktails. Tune in for a refreshing perspective that promises to turn your social gatherings from mundane to memorable.

Chapters

• 0:00 The Two-Hour Cocktail Party Book
• 6:36 Hosting Successful Parties
• 16:06 Mastering Successful Cocktail Parties

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is a special archived episode of the Scott Townsend Show. Welcome to the Scott Townsend Show brought to you by Pizza man Productions. Today I have with me a special guest. He wrote the book the Two-Hour Cocktail Party. He's had hundreds of two-hour cocktail parties so he should know what he's talking about. He's been mentioned in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and the New Yorker magazine, I think, said something about his parties being culturally significant. So I think we need to listen to what my guest has to say today. My guest, nick Gray. Nick, how's it going, man?

Speaker 2: 0:44

It's going great. I'm excited to be here to talk about parties and making friends and all that great stuff. I'm just jazzed up about it.

Speaker 1: 0:53

Yeah, so I read the book, love the book. It's got me thinking in a lot of different directions, not just parties, so let's just start off. First thing icebreaker. What did you have for breakfast this morning?

Speaker 2: 1:07

dang, that's my favorite icebreaker question. I love that question because it helps warm up a room when there's no rapport that's been built up. What I had for breakfast? Now, don't judge me, but I am doing that bulletproof coffee stuff, basically just black coffee with a little bit of butter, but instead of butter I add ghee, and then I totally screw it up and I add coconut oil and cinnamon and a little bit of honey, which I think is cheating. It probably gets around the whole point of not having carbs, but I like the sweetness. And then I blend it all up. I just do Starbucks coffee. How?

Speaker 1: 1:41

about you? What'd you have for breakfast? Oh man, so don't go judging me. I had blueberries. Oh, toast with cream cheese spread over strip of bacon. Uh, uh, spinach with four eggs. Yes, little cayenne pepper, a little sea salt and ground black pepper. A little ketchup over that, some sprinkled over some shredded cheese.

Speaker 2: 2:12

Yeah, Scott, my mouth is literally watering. I'm coming over to your place because this is like Scott's Waffle House, which I love Waffle House, by the way. I've never had a waffle there, but I've been there hundreds of times. I love waffle. I'm coming to your place. Okay, logistical question. I know we'll talk about the book, but, whatever, how did you make your bacon? Have you ever made it in the oven? And how did you make a single strip of bacon? What?

Speaker 1: 2:37

is going on. Okay, so my wife laid out a cookie sheet big cookie sheet, uh-huh and put it in the oven uh, cooked it up, flipped it over, cooked it up, set it to like 350, 375 or something like that, left it in for 20 minutes and flipped it over, did the same thing, pulled them out and just laid them in a uh uh, glass tupper. It's not tupperware, it's glass corning.

Speaker 1: 3:01

You know corningware whatever, yeah and then put in the refrigerator. And then every so often, if you want to strip a bacon, you just pull it out, put in the microwave 10 seconds and you're good.

Speaker 2: 3:11

Is it still crispy? Look, I've never talked about bacon this much on a podcast, but I think this is now a bacon podcast recording and I want to know was it crispy? Uh, it wasn't crispy um yeah okay, would you consider an air fryer? I just recently got one and I am in love with it and I I can't believe I've fallen into the trap, but I got one and it lived up to the hype for me. Have you done bacon in it?

Speaker 2: 3:39

I've never done bacon, but I've reheated some fries that I took home from Pry's, which is a burger joint that we have here in texas and the fries got a little soggy and I just threw them in the air fryer and they came out crispy as heck and I wonder if you could do that with your bacon. Run it by your wife and let me know hey, nick gray said.

Speaker 1: 4:01

Speaking of Nick Gray, your name, it sounds like a detective out of a pulp fiction novel or something.

Speaker 2: 4:09

I'll take that. I'll take that because a lot of people say that it's like that 50 shades of gray. That's what they think about. I think the detective is a better one, so I'm for that one.

Speaker 1: 4:20

Yeah, so we'll go with that. Let's jump into the book. I ran across this book and I'm not quite sure.

Speaker 2: 4:28

I don't know how I came across it I think we reached out to you from your podcast in one of the ranking charts and I offered to send you a copy of it. So we yeah, so.

Speaker 1: 4:40

So I looked over the book and back in college, which was a long time we used to have parties all the time.

Speaker 2: 4:48

Oh, hold on, I need more details about these parties.

Speaker 1: 4:51

Yeah, they would go on till sunrise, you know, and it was, it was crazy. Ok, so fast forward. That was 1983 to 89. So now fast forward to 2000.

Speaker 2: 5:05

Where was this? Was this in Oklahoma? Yeah, at.

Speaker 1: 5:08

Oklahoma State University.

Speaker 2: 5:10

That's excellent. And did you live on campus or did you have like a house?

Speaker 1: 5:14

On campus and then towards the end we lived in an apartment, uh-huh, my roommate and I, and yeah, so it was just party central and we just had a blast. But as you get older and you get married and you have kids and you know, blah, blah, blah and you grow up and times have changed and you get older and you just want to come home at night and sit down and shut up and you know, whatever that is all about hang on a second I I'm going to turn this thing off.

Speaker 2: 5:45

You don't have to explain to me. I did the same thing last night. Last night was actually my birthday and I didn't want to plan anything. That's a whole other story. I just wanted to come home and just relax, so I got you. I'm on the same page.

Speaker 1: 5:57

Yeah Well, congratulations, happy birthday. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. So, yeah, so when I saw the title of this book, I was like you know, I just it would be nice to kind of get back into. You know, we had so much fun and especially when we first got married we had a lot of people over all the time. And now we're into it 30 years and just you know how things go.

Speaker 1: 6:22

So, anyway, we're wanting to ramp's harder back up, and we're looking to nick gray to do that. So thanks for writing the book. It's super practical. Uh, I think you might. This is my assessment of you after reading the book. I think you're an extroverted analyst.

Speaker 2: 6:44

What does the analyst part mean? The short answer is probably yes. I present as an extrovert In my own parties. I will occasionally sneak off into my bedroom and just lay down and scroll Twitter or something to recharge, but I think I originally I wasn't always an extrovert. But what does that mean, scott, that I'm an extrovert analyst? What does that analyst at the end mean?

Speaker 1: 7:11

An extroverted analyst. So you broke this thing down, this process, step by step. I mean, if you take this book those of you listening, if you're an executive, or if you're in business, or if you're just wanting to have a neighborhood party get together, but you don't know what to do, You're afraid to go, afraid to do it. Nick breaks it down from step one, analyzes each step along the way, tells you what you need to do, tells you what you need to say, how to prepare, and then you get to the end. And it's well thought out. There's a reason for everything. It's very purposeful. There's nothing left to question. If you just follow the steps in the book, you're going to have, I'm going to say, a pretty good party.

Speaker 2: 8:09

Everything's laid out. It's a formula, it's an exact formula and I guess that's right. That's that analytical side of me that really tried to write a book with a formula to help someone go from zero to one, to help someone see that there's an easier way to host a gathering. What do I mean by that? Well, I worked with a guy, not worked with, like. I read my book and he sent me a photo because I'm obsessed, by the way way, with helping people actually host a party. And I'm gonna challenge you, scott, to pick a date at the end of the podcast if you'd be willing to set a date sometime in January or February to host your party. But I thought this one guy yes, okay, great. I talked to this one guy in Washington DC. He's a chef and he said that your party gave me the confidence to finally host a little happy hour with no food. He said, as a chef, everyone expects me to cook this incredible spread. And what did that do? It caused me to never host because I'm busy with work.

Speaker 1: 9:01

I'm tired because I'm busy with work, I'm tired.

Speaker 2: 9:03

He said your book gave me the confidence that I could simply say, hey, come over for two hours, we'll have chips and guac and nuts, but like I'm not making you dinner, come over for a happy hour. And so that's the whole thesis of my book. What is the MVP? The minimum viable party to help you? Simply just bring your friends, your neighbors, over to gather again. And I think that we all need more friends. As we get older, it's harder to meet new people. I'm rambling on, but I get hyped up about that, so I'll pause to see your reactions.

Speaker 1: 9:36

My reaction is I think you're absolutely right, especially since we've come out of COVID and everybody was locked down and sequestered and everybody's been pushed away from each other. I think people now are ready to come together. And so how do you do that? They want to do it and some of them will do it and figure it out, but most probably want to know how you know. It'd be nice to know some best practices.

Speaker 2: 10:03

Yeah, and one thing I found I'm curious, go ahead. One thing I'm found I'm curious if you saw similar in your neighborhood or community. During COVID, I saw many long time hosts people that always hosted the 4th of July, the Christmas party. They stopped. They stopped hosting for obvious reasons. I'm not judging them or anything, but what I have noticed is they've lost their momentum and many of them haven't started hosting again. Did you see anything similar like that where y'all are?

Speaker 1: 10:38

Yeah, I think so, I think so. I think everybody's lost their mojo. They've kind of lost the momentum is a good word, and I think people are hungry to get back together again. What does that mean? Well, this book kind of helps you understand what that might mean for you. Talk about that so you know when you want to start what's the three week rule, when you want to, when you're thinking about having if you dare to think about having a party and I'm going to shut up because I'm talking way too much- no, I can tell you're not talking too much and I love this conversation because I can tell you've actually read the book and you're actually interested in this idea.

Speaker 2: 11:17

To host something again, just like what your wife said I don't want to cook, I don't. Oh, it's the stress. You both want to host. You want the results from hosting Right, but in the past maybe you've preparation and it'd be a great dinner party, but you know what you'd feel like your wife does. You say I don't want to do that again. That was too much work, too much stress.

Speaker 2: 11:51

I've tried to line up in here how to guarantee to make your parties a success, and one of those things is called the party runway, which says you need to plan and give yourself at least three weeks, not because it takes a lot of time, but just to guarantee a success. What does success mean? Success means that you fill the room, that as many people as you want to come actually show up, and what I have found is that the number one indicator of success for a party, especially for a new host, is can they hit the critical mass of guests? I have found that that number is 15 people. 15 people with a cocktail party, with a happy hour. There's enough energy that when you walk into that room it manages itself.

Speaker 2: 12:40

Now, why do you and your wife feel that, oh, it's too much work, too much stress, just like everybody else. If you only host a dinner party with six, seven, eight people? Frankly, even as adults we're kind of babysitting everybody all night long oh, how can I serve you, how can I feed you? Do you have enough going on? We're laser tuned in, we're on, on on With 15 people. You can step back, you can talk to a friend, you can catch up. There's enough people and energy in that space for people to mix and mingle. So that's one thing I found is that three-week party runway. Give yourself enough time for your friends to say yes. Also, by the way, host it on what I call a non-red level day. So that's controversial. I'm curious what does your wife think about that? I say you got to host this only on a Monday, tuesday or Wednesday night.

Speaker 1: 13:35

I can talk about why, but did you bounce that off her? Yet I told her we were going to do it on a Tuesday Because I was reading this book and I got real enthusiastic. I was like, okay, here's what I approached it all wrong with her. I was like, okay, so here's what we're going to do. We're going to do it on this day and we're going to do it in three weeks. We're going to invite these people. And she was just shutting me down.

Speaker 1: 13:51

I didn't approach it quite right with her. She warmed up to the idea eventually, and so, yeah, we're looking forward to it. Honest. So here's the behind the scenes story. We were supposed to have this cocktail party next Tuesday, but some people couldn't make it.

Speaker 1: 14:10

It's Christmas time and I kind of knew in the back of my head that December is really packed. Yes, there's a lot of stuff going on. I don't know if I need to be adding anything else to people's, so I went against my gut. I set it up for next Tuesday. So we're going to postpone, and you even talk about how to postpone a meeting a party and we're going to do it in January.

Speaker 2: 14:38

Okay, good.

Speaker 1: 14:38

So give everybody a breather. And January is not a lot happening. Everybody's taking a deep breath. Yeah, it'sher. And January's not a lot happening. Everybody's taking a deep breath.

Speaker 2: 14:46

Yeah, it's easier, it's much easier. Now I want to challenge you because I want to say for January, I would love for you to follow my party formula, and one piece of that involves collecting RSVPs, which frankly, seems a little. It might seem too formal to you, but I want you to create a page on one of these free online platforms to have people actually RSVP with their name and email address.

Speaker 1: 15:16

Now, I did sign up. You mentioned Millie or Mixily.

Speaker 2: 15:20

Mixily is a free platform that I like, the gen z's like this platform called um partyful. Now I've used um paperless post. My parents love and use evite and I'm not roasting them because I used to use evite. Yeah, I personally do not recommend that platform and here's why they spam all of your guests with these ads and newsletters and stuff I don't want my guests.

Speaker 2: 15:47

I don't want that. Mixily is free, you don't have to sign up, there's no ads or spam or anything. So that's the platform I recommend, but you could use others so you've got.

Speaker 1: 15:58

So you get everybody coming to the party. We're on mixily, we've got some RSVPs and we're all set. People are showing up, and let's talk about that for a second. What if someone what was it you said the first guests are the most. Is that the most awkward moment? Because everyone's kind of hey, how's it going?

Speaker 2: 16:20

That's the awkward zone. Without fail, the people you know the least well will show up first. Yes, you know that's the awkward zone, without fail, the people you know the least well will show up first. Or somebody says, oh, can I bring Darren from work? Or oh, man, can I bring my sister? And they show up first without their friend. You're like, oh my.

Speaker 1: 16:36

God. So then you've got people showing up and you're you're big on icebreakers. And I do like I read that, I was like okay, that is cool, and then so you mentioned doing it, I'll let you talk about it. Go into your icebreaker theory and how that works.

Speaker 2: 16:53

Well, there is a theory behind it, but I'll first give an example. Just like you said at the beginning of the podcast, what's one of your favorite things to eat for breakfast? And notice what I did there, by the way, I didn't make it a superlative. I said what's one of your favorite things. Many times, people will ask for an icebreaker. What's your favorite book? What's your favorite movie? Well, that, is a definitive, single, subjective item.

Speaker 2: 17:22

You really got to think about it. You want to give the best answer and I have a hard time with that question. I can't pick just one favorite book or one favorite movie. Oh my gosh, I like atomic habits for this. I like built to sell blah, blah, blah. So I an easy modifier to make it easier for people to answer is what's one of your favorite books? All right, because a good icebreaker is a fast icebreaker. It doesn't cause the person to stress out, everybody can answer it quickly and it shares a little bit about the person. So, anyhow, we do these icebreakers at the party, not because I'm obsessed with learning what you had for breakfast, but because it gives everyone a chance to sound off around the room, say who they are, what they do and a little bit about themselves, to inspire new conversations at the party. And I think that's the most important thing I want your listeners to know. These parties are designed to create new connections amongst all of your guests.

Speaker 2: 18:28

It's hard to make new friends as an adult. That is real and that is true. Why is that? Why is that? I think because we become creatures of habit. I like to eat the same things every day. I live in the city of Austin, texas, home to some amazing restaurants, and, frankly, between you and me, I just rather make the same thing. I cook all the time because it just makes me happy and it's easy. We're creatures of habit, and as we get older, people retreat into their homes, they move, they get busy with work. We just fall into the routines. And yet we need friends more than ever as we get older, and so I designed this book and this formula to help make that easier.

Speaker 1: 19:11

In your opinion, why are networking events so bad?

Speaker 2: 19:15

Networking events feel too transactional. They feel gross. People are passing out business cards and here's why they're broken. People take before they give. What can you do for me Versus? The whole idea of hosting a party is it's a gift that you get to give someone you say welcome into my home. Let me give you a drink. Here's some chips and some nuts. Meet some of my friends and neighbors. Let me give you a drink. Here's some chips and some nuts. Meet some of my friends and neighbors. Let me be the host. And I think we're flipping the whole script of that of let's give before we try to ask for anything.

Speaker 1: 19:56

Do we have to serve alcohol at these cocktail?

Speaker 2: 19:58

parties? Great question. No, you don't have to serve alcohol. I don't drink alcohol myself.

Speaker 2: 20:05

There's something funny that I wrote a book about cocktail parties and I don't drink alcohol. There's not a single drink recipe in the book. There's not a single drink recipe in the book, but we use that phrase cocktail party, which encapsulates the idea of an easy, lightweight social gathering that you can pop into with low commitment. Again, it's the difference in dinner party and cocktail party. A dinner party is a commitment. A dinner party, you kind of need to know someone or be really ready and willing to make that relationship. A cocktail party, I can just drop by too. A cocktail party is easy. I know that I'll have a lot of lightweight, little conversations and that's why I love and use that phrase. But if you don't drink alcohol?

Speaker 2: 20:50

I wrote an article on my blog. I'll try to include it in the show notes. It's how to the show notes. It's how to host a mocktail, how to host a mocktail party with some sample drink recipes. Maybe you could even just plan a networking event, host a happy hour. You could even do a book swap or a clothing swap. There's other ways to gather if you want to break out, but I have found that cocktail party is the easiest phrase to explain quickly what I'm trying to accomplish.

Speaker 1: 21:15

Okay, cool People who throw networking events together should read this book also, because you even list out what to say to people before the party, the week before, five days before, three days, before the day of I'm not sure if I'm getting all that right.

Speaker 2: 21:35

It's exactly right, you remember? It's those reminder messages that are key.

Speaker 1: 21:39

So you know. You've even broke that out, so people don't have to think about how to stay in touch or what to say pre-party. This book really gives you the ingredients. That tells you what to say or gives you samples of what you could say before the party starts, to get people prepped, ready and excited and what they can expect.

Speaker 2: 22:03

Those reminder messages are so important as well, and, yes, I include all the scripts in the book, and the book is filled with the scripts of exactly what to say. Reminder messages help keep your party top of mind to boost your attendance ratio. Reminder messages get your guests excited about coming to your party. They show that you're a host who cares, that you're not too cool to care right, that you're not just like, oh, just show up. You know. Reminder messages also create new connections amongst guests, because I use what I call my secret weapon in the last two, which is called guest bios, and the guest bio is a brief little blurb about somebody Yours it might be.

Speaker 2: 22:45

Scott lives in Oklahoma and he hosts a podcast. Ask him about his famous breakfasts. Okay, guest bios are just a little blurb to create new conversations and connections amongst your guests, but they give shy people, those that are introverts or with social anxiety, confidence to know what to expect. That's another thing about my formula is it's really trying to help that this isn't just a party of extroverts. You've got a diversity of attendees and I think that's important.

Speaker 1: 23:20

And I think, how to end the party on time and that there needs to be a hard stop, and at first that sounds counterintuitive. You're thinking well, if everybody's having a great time, let's keep this baby rolling, but I've been the guest that stayed too long. I've been the host that has had people stay too long. Yeah, and it's awkward, and that might be another reason why people don't because they don't know how to to stop it. Yeah, and you're a big proponent of uh it, I mean having a hard stop. And why is that?

Speaker 2: 23:57

Parties are better when you know the rules to be successful. Have you ever been invited to like a barbecue on a Saturday at four o'clock and you start doing this mental calculus like, well, what time should we actually show up? You know well, maybe five, five thirty? Oh no, let's show up before that. We'll know they're from Central America. Should we actually show up? You know well, maybe 5, 5, 30? Oh no, let's show up before that. We'll know they're from central america. We can't show up late.

Speaker 2: 24:18

There's all these weird things about it. When you tell people when the party starts, when the party stops, number one, they'll show up on time. Everybody. There's this weird calculus of like, all right, we can't show up on time, we'll show up an hour late. Yeah, and then the first hour is just filled with the suckers that showed up on top. It's not good. It's not good when you end the party as well. You give your guests the gift of leading the party and ending it when things are at a high note. Mm-hmm, you know, have you been at a party and like you're the first to leave and you're like, oh gosh, you're. You're thinking about sneaking out, you're trying to plan your exit, you want to leave, but you don't muster up the courage or confidence to actually leave. I've done that before.

Speaker 2: 25:04

When you end a party and when you keep it to two hours, I think it also helps. Let's just be honest On a Tuesday night you don't want to invite people to an 8 pm party. Nobody's going to come. They have work the next day, they have class, they have school, they have responsibilities. But when you host it on one of these Monday, tuesday, wednesday nights and list that it's only two hours, it shows people this is not a crazy blowout. This is not a crazy late night midnight rager like you used to host in college. This is just a stop by and hang out and say hello party.

Speaker 2: 25:39

I've thought a lot about these things, but the last and final reason you're going to keep it to two hours is so that you'll actually want to do it again. When you end your party at two hours, you have time to clean, to tidy, to go to bed on time. You'll wake up the next morning refreshed and energized and amped up and excited about all the conversations you had the night before. I'll tell you the key secret to this book and to those that have got the biggest, best results the biggest benefits come when you can make hosting a habit, when you can make hosting a habit. When you can make hosting something that you regularly do. Every six to eight weeks you always have your next cocktail party planned. It will completely change your life. It did for me.

Speaker 1: 26:26

It seems like and I should have dug into this more but there's a lot of health reasons for people getting together and cultivating friendships and versus staying alone, being alone, uh, and being, you know, depressed and out of touch, but from a medical standpoint, this actually might save your life.

Speaker 2: 26:47

I don't know no, you're smart and I think you're exactly right. I've read those studies, but even I should know them off the back of my hand. But I will say this there is a loneliness epidemic that is happening. 19% of men don't have a single close friend. 15% of women the majority of Americans have lost more friends than they have gained over the last three years. The benefits of community and friendship are unequivocated. They are tried, trued and tested by science, and I want to let your listeners know that your party will be successful because you will help your friends make new friends. I hear about it all the time from hosts. Oh my gosh, these two people hit it off. I never would have thought about that. And now they're inviting me to come out to a sports game, to a barbecue. They're hosting a party. That is what you, that's what we talk about, why networking gets a bad rep? Because at these parties it's totally different. You give before you take. It's amazing that's awesome.

Speaker 1: 27:50

thanks so much, nick, for stopping by and talking about your book, the Two-Hour Cocktail Party. Now I got mine on Kindle and it was a great read on Kindle, so, yeah, I'm going to share this. If anybody wants to get in touch with you, Nick, about this or anything about the Two-Hour Cocktail Party, how would they get in touch with you, Nick, about this or anything about the two-hour cocktail party? How would they get in touch with you?

Speaker 2: 28:16

I would love to hear from anyone. They can send me an email if they want to. I'm nick at nickgraynewscom. N-e-w-s. I recorded the audible version of the book myself in the studio so you can check the book out on audible or on amazon or anywhere that books are sold online. The name of the book is the two hour cocktail party how to build big relationships with small gatherings, and I'm on a mission myself to get 500 people to read the book and host a party to bring people together just to get us gathering again. It's easy. We can all use a new friend. I'll show you how to make it fun.

Speaker 1: 28:58

So, with my party in January, I'm going to let you know what that date is. Can you? Can you? You know? Here's an experiment, here's a fun experiment. So what we're going to do is I'm going to set this date, I'm going to, in future podcast episodes, I'm going to update the listeners as to how it's going what you know what the next step I took?

Speaker 1: 29:18

you know the, the responses leading up to after the party. How did it go, you know, following nick gray's uh formula here, and we'll just do a kind of a social experiment through podcasting and keep you and all of our listeners see how things are going on this journey to this first party.

Speaker 2: 29:41

Please.

Speaker 1: 29:42

That would be amazing.

Speaker 2: 29:43

That would be really cool. When we get off this recording, let's pick that date and I'll add it to my calendar and I'll help hold you accountable as an accountability buddy for your party. All right, All right.

Speaker 1: 29:55

Well for Nick, great. This is Scott Townsend. Thanks for watching, listening to the Scott Townsend Show. Have a great day, everything's going to be all right and we'll talk to you later. The Scott Townsend Show is a Deto man production.

Speaker 2: 30:11

For more episodes, visit the Scott Townsend Show YouTube channel listen on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.