Karuna John examines the process behind the opening and running of a successful restaurant.
So you want to write a four-page memo about how your boss sucks, grab a goldfish in a plastic bag, quit your job and start a restaurant? Get a pen and paper and make a list; you will need 192 spoons (also the same number of forks, knives, chopsticks, carving knives, salad forks and soup spoons), 200 bulbs (and some to spare) and 36 salt and pepper shakers, all, of course, matching the crockery pieces and sturdy cookware. That, according to Madhu Menon, of the recently-reopened restaurant Shiok, is what it takes to keep an establishment of 54 tables running. Also, needless to say, you will need to have excellent management skills to face staffing challenges, changing grocery and produce costs, labour union problems and be fit enough to stay on your feet 12 hours a day. It’s not all “if Jamie Oliver can do it in his bleeding ‘ome, why the hell can’t I do it in a shiny restaurant”?
“Starting a new restaurant is not an instant process like many expect,” said hospitality consultant Manoj Kunisseri, who is scheduled to speak this fortnight at “Your own restaurant: is that what’s eating you?” a workshop for budding entrepreneurs. “A venture can take at least one-and-a-half year of hands-on hard-work to establish itself.” Something that Menon knows only too well. “It’s not easy to make a living in this business,” he said. “You have no idea how many people I’ve spoken to in the last couple of years who have told me stuff like ‘It’s always been a dream of mine to open a little cafe/ restaurant/ sandwich shop. A small cosy place. Maybe one day I can leave my job like you did and start one’.”
According to Mukta Darera, founder iReboot a consultancy that facilitates real time on-the-job-experiences before you actually switch careers, and which is organising the workshop, most of the respondents to a career survey conducted by the firm wanted to quit and open a restaurant. “That data set me thinking and now I am organising a workshop to let them experience the restaurant business,” she said. “Now, they have an opportunity to experience their dream job before they take the final plunge.”
“Two of my clients include a group of IT professionals who quit and will soon be starting a restaurant in Koramangala. Then there is a builder who will also be opening a restaurant soon,” added Kunisseri who advised that soon to be restaurateurs usually take on board an established chef as a partner in the restaurant. “A chef-owner is the best combination as they [chefs] understand the industry better. Most people who want to start a restaurant or café take on a chef as a partner and apart from paying out a salary, share profits as well. This gives the chef a stake in the restaurant and ensures that for him, it isn’t just another job with a salary.”
While, as Kunisseri put it, real estate mavens often take to the restaurant business, it is the techies that are drawn to the food and beverage industry. This was the case with former techie and soon-to-be-restaurateur Sameer Narula. “It was a combination of passion and stupidity that made me want to open a restaurant,” he said. “I have been in the information technology sector for 19 years during the course of which I have pretty much ‘been there and done that’. But I am passionate about two things, music and food and my restaurant is a combination of both.” Narula, who will soon open 64, his continental cuisine restaurant in Koramangala, added that apart from learning everything anew, he has had to wade through red tape and acquaint himself with the headaches that renovating a venue can cause.
According to Menon of Shiok, a restaurant owner is dealing with crises at work all the time. “I can’t think of one week at a stretch when I could relax and have nothing go wrong,” he recalled. “Equipment fails, labour issues crop up, prices change, raw material can suddenly go out of stock, your chef needs to go home to attend to a medical emergency, drains are clogged... I could go on.”
“Staffing is one of the biggest challenges; there are food costs to consider and most importantly the consistency of the food served and the prices charged are of great concern,” Menon said. “Sometimes, you just have to put on an apron and get in the kitchen yourself. That is why I always advice taking on a chef partner,”
While all this occurs, the restaurateur also has to ensure the customer is blissfully unaware of the chaos. “I’m very fond of saying this: a lot of effort goes into making it look effortless. It is not easy. It’s hard enough if you actually know how to make food. If one wants to start a cosy little place, one better be prepared to work like a mule for less pay,” Menon said. “Ninety per cent of people wanting to start a restaurant should not be thinking of it.” said Menon.
iReboot will hold the “Run your restaurant” workshop on Sat Feb 21 and Sun Feb 22.
Photography Lavannya Goradia
Source : Time Out Bengaluru ISSUE 1 Friday, July 23, 2010
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