UCF students interested in hearing the story behind the wildly popular 4Rivers BBQ restaurant will get a chance to this week.

John Rivers, CEO & Founder of 4Rivers Smokehouse, is coming to UCF on Wednesday, Sept. 24 to speak about how he started one of the fastest growing restaurants in Central Florida. Rivers will be speaking in the Student Union room 218B from 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm. 

Rivers originally managed a $1.4 billion pharmaceutical operation before he turned his focus to starting 4Rivers. Since then, he also opened up The Coop, a southern- inspired chicken restaurant.

Rivers has made appearances in FOOD Magazine, Cooking Light Magazine the Paula Deen Magazine and was most recently named as a finalist for the 2014 Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award.