Dale Dyck wrote about Restaurant failure, and I wanted to agree with him and give s similar viewpoint. Today’s restaurants faces the “perfect storm” of economic factors, which they have been unable to overcome. I use some of his points and inflect some of my own.
Recognizing that the profit margins in restaurants are low, and in particular if your restaurant’s food to liquor ratio is quite high. At least if you are serving higher percentages of liquor, beer and wine, you have the benefit of higher yield from beverage sales to at least somewhat offset the low profit margins from food sales. I believe that this goes to Menu Engineering and P & L management.
The other friend of the successful restaurant is volume. If you can turn the restaurant over two or three times an evening, the majority of the days that you are open, and assuming a decent average check as well, you are doing well. Or a higher check average and take the tables longer on a 2hour turn.
No place should be doomed to fail, what are the parameters? Is a failure a failure to adapt from what is considered “fine dining” or what a truly memorable dining experience has become? The intersection of the three circles, great product, great service, and exceptional experience is the elusive Holy Grail.
Are people no longer looking for white table clothes and fine linen napkins as the be all end all fine dining experience? In fact, Is the sight of an overly formal “dining room” can be enough for people to turn around and promptly exit stage left in search of an alternative location? Highly Doubtful, Is finding themselves in an overly formal room, where you need to be in a suit and tie and that whispering is the only form of acceptable conversation over dinner. Who cares that the serving staff that looks like they have just come from the opera and everything about the restaurant screams pretentious. It is what true service with taste is. There are ways to meld the two and do both.
I agree that what people lately are looking for are any one of a number of variations of a simple common theme; good, fresh local ingredients, prepared and presented in a unique and captivating manner by knowledgeable and friendly staff, highlighting and celebrating the region where the restaurant is located. Sure, the setting plays a role, but not one of pretentiousness, but rather a clean, warm and inviting room where people feel truly welcome and comfortable to settle in for a while, to enjoy the company of their friends and family in an environment where the food is the star, not the room. It’s about the experience.
Dale writes, That’s the formula for sustainable success in the restaurant business today. The time for table clothes and stuffy rooms where you feel like you need to pass a social status test in order to enter is over. I think he is right and wrong. Special occasion restaurants, as many of these tend to be, are sustainable. It shouldn’t take an anniversary or other special occasion, to feel the need to dress up to go out for dinner, true it won’t be enough to keep people coming through the doors in large numbers, and your days and nights will need some marketing and I agree that if you fail to adapt and change it will be a long road.
Having been a Maitre’d in two 5 star restaurants within luxury properties the game is the same and rules may have changed but in the end it turns back into the Menu and the Service in which it was delivered. Times are still tough and those that have learned to flex and modify without giving up quality and to not compromise their standards in the essence of maintaining consistency will endure.
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