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April 17, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Building Team Experiences

Building Team Experiences to Keep Staff Engaged
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 04/17/2017

Within the industry, we always talk about “experiences” — and rightfully so. At the end of the day, experiences are what restaurants sell to customers. All of the emphasis, however, is on customer experiences; but what about staff experiences?

Desirable experiences don’t stop with just your customers. Your team craves experiences, too! As owners, operators, and managers; it is up to you to make your concept more than just a “job” or way for staff to “pay their bills”.

Ask yourself this. Does your team come to work excited each and every day? How do you think they speak about your restaurant with their friends and family off-duty? Is it a positive message?

Implementing the right culture statement and team-based strategy will assist in controlling your labor costs and reduce turnover, resulting in not only stronger consistency within your operations, but also a positive environment that will flow through to your customers and help amplify word-of-mouth marketing.

Here are some tips to help you get started.

Web Presence and Social Media

Restaurant consumers are seeking to learn and understand the culture of a restaurant when deciding on their eating destination. This is a great opportunity to showcase your team on your social media channels and on your website. Create a bio for your staff noting something unique about them, take a photo (or better yet, a video) of them, and share this content to your online community. This will equally make your staff feel like they’re a part of a team and the business development process.

Create a Stay Interview

Many have likely heard the term “exit interview,” but what about a “stay interview”? Take video to the next level by interviewing your staff and developing a series of testimonials as to why they love working for your restaurant. This tactic will create a sense of place and family among your team and also assist in your hiring process; positioning you to attain higher-quality candidates who seek a positive working environment.

Continuous Education

A great team member is one who craves learning and one who brings the same set of values as you do to the table. Depending on your concept and financial model, consider developing an educational program for your team. Think outside the box and create culinary/hospitality scholarships and/or consider sending your team to farms, breweries, wineries, etc., to learn about specific products you offer and their development processes. Continuous education will create a sense of appreciation, enticing your team to stay loyal to your establishment while benefiting not only their experience, but your customers experience as well.

Profit Sharing Programs

It’s safe to say that people enjoy working towards a common goal. Consider creating a realistic monthly revenue goal (slightly above your current average) for your establishment. Now share this goal with your staff and create a plan for the month on how to collectively obtain that goal. If you surpassed that goal (congratulations), distribute a percentage (5 percent, for example) of the monetary difference among your team. Repeating this process each month will not only increase your revenue and profit, but will develop a team-like working environment; reducing turnover and making your team feel important to the business and its success.

SMART Staff Reviews

Speaking of goals, there should be team-oriented goals (profit sharing) and also personal goals developed within an overall action plan. You should sit down with each individual teammate at least once every three months. During this meeting and using SMART (Specific. Measureable. Attainable. Realistic. Timely.) objectives – give each teammate something to work on over the next three months. This could be increasing revenue per transaction averages, providing accurate inventory counts, reducing waste levels, or having accurate end-of-day cash reports. Of course, reaching objectives should be rewarded, therefore create a reward program that works for your concept and financial model.

Creative Mindset

Don’t let your staff get complacent by having the same menu month-after-month and year-after-year. This will lead to boredom, which will eventually lead to turnover, especially in the kitchen. Allow your team to be creative by “creating” food or beverage options that fit within the confines of your concept. Consider holding an in-house contest each month to choose one featured food and beverage option created by a staff member. Highlight this on your social media and in-house marketing (effectively creating a story), while rewarding that individual with a commission on sales from the item during that month. If the product sells really well, consider adding that item to your everyday menu the next time you re-engineer your menu.

In summary, execute a marketing plan approach to your staff recruitment and staff development program. The time, resources, and effort spent on this will be well worth it in the long-run. Just ask your staff!

April 3, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Restaurant Supply Chain Management

Restaurant Supply Chain Management
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 04/03/2017

Depending on the size of your restaurant model and the size of your menu, the restaurant supply chain can be simple to some and complicated to others. With raw materials, food safety regulations, delivery logistics, best-before dates, and overall packaging to coincide with your often limited storage capacities, the system can become one that sticks together or untangles on you in the blink of an eye.

When it comes to restaurants, bars, cafes, and food trucks; the producers, manufacturers, delivery drivers, owners, managers, and servers ultimately share the responsibility to create a safe and enjoyable dining experience within your concept.

It is imperative that your food service business understands the supply chain of the product it serves, in addition to having an emergency plan in the case a link of the supply chain “breaks.” This is now more important than ever at the restaurant level, with the farm-to-table and garden-to-glass movement; plus the continuous growth of craft beers, local distilleries, and of course, wineries.

Transparency, traceability, and accountability must be a top concern when deciding on vendors to ensure all products (both food and beverage) entering your restaurant or other food service business, are not only safe for your customers, but for your community.

Consider what a food-borne illness or product recall will do to your image, productivity, margins, and overall bottom line. The challenge with an illness or recall is the unpredictability of when it will happen, but the solution is to be more proactive and understanding at the restaurant level.

Initial Planning

At a more local level, this is more easily managed, whereas at a corporate or chain restaurant level, planning can become much more difficult. The most ideal situation is to deal directly with certified growers, co-ops, or distributors as much as possible who meet a high level of government standards. You need to reduce your risk by eliminating as many third parties as possible. When planning your menu(s), keep them compact and look for ways to re-purpose ingredients as much as possible. This will allow you to list out a limited number of targeted suppliers, including data on their company history, any past recalls, their storage facilities, delivery logistics, and ethical working environment.

Multiple Vendors

Freshness and seasonality play a large part in many restaurants across the nation. Outside of just delivering quality product and rotating menus, it’s important to meet with your above noted vendors, tour their facilities (if possible), and implement a back-up plan. Be proactive by developing a relationship with a primary supplier and secondary supplier for each of your core food and beverage products and ingredients to reduce the risk of not only running out of fresh inventory, but being quickly prepared in the case of a recall from your primary supplier. Lastly, when meeting with them, discuss their traceability program. If they don’t have one, simply move onto the next!

Data and Software

Data continues to define restaurants and food service businesses, and data within the supply chain is no different. Many Point-of-Sale (POS) companies have come to understand the current need for better inventory and supply chain management software, which will better track shipments, local SKUs, and improve vendor communication.

Having transparency throughout the supply chain will not only position you and your concept to make solid business decisions, but it will also help protect you through deeper HACCP compliance and SKU tracking, from the day of ordering the product to the day your customer arrives to eat or drink the product.

Operation Manuals

Basic manuals will always create a sense of accountability — an effective manual will not only identify product specifications and supply chain information for each product, but will also provide solutions to quickly respond to a food safety crisis if one were to happen.

Safely managing food safety is an ongoing process that requires commitment, communication, correct processes, vigilance, and teamwork at a multitude of levels. Ensure your values meet the values of your supplier and that there is a programmed system of communication in the event of a crisis.

In most cases, the paying customer wants high-quality product at the lowest price possible. Rising food costs — and the known importance to keep these costs within a certain percentage of sales — can often lead to a link within the supply chain breaking through poor decision making and quality control.

It should be no surprise, however, that supply chain management is the means to enhancing food and beverage quality and safety, all while reducing and controlling your costs. At the end of the day, the right supply chain can actually be used as one of your best marketing tools and simply cannot become overlooked or cheated on.

March 15, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Restaurant Start-Up SOS

Restaurant Start-Up SOS
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 03/15/2017

Outside of preparing for hidden costs and understanding strategies to save time and money during start-up, there are many other factors that can make an aspiring restaurateur scream “SOS” on or before the day one opens their doors.

One word that cannot be stressed enough during this phase is, of course, planning. Sometimes, however, even with a high level of planning in place, things can unfortunately go sideways for some — and they can happen fast.

The good news is that you can try and stay ahead of the most common problems with these five SOS-related problems and solutions!

Property Surprises

Problem Area: One of the most frequent problems that arise is found within your property choice. New restaurateurs often find out after a lease is signed that their property may not be fully compatible for a restaurant and will need further upgrades to meet standards for energy, ventilation, and revised building and/or health codes.

Solution: Have a commercial inspector walk through the property with you before signing your lease, looking at common areas for mold and leaks (water and air), in addition to the most updated building codes and food-service-related health codes needed to operate. Secondly, within your concept development plan, list out your priority pieces of equipment and their specs, including the energy consumption they will use. This step will help you understand if you will need to upgrade electrical panels or gas lines, while not forgetting about your hood system and ventilation needs. Thirdly, if you have immediate neighbors, it’s ideal to understand their concept, operating hours, and the acoustics within the walls separating the units. Will interior noise levels affect either your business or theirs? Make sure this is planned and budgeted for, if upgrades are needed.

Inevitable Delays

Problem Area: Many start-up projects see at least one — or even a variety of — delays with building permits, material suppliers, and/or contractors. These delays will slowly eat away at your cash flow, create a heightened level of stress, and of course, extend your ideal opening day.

Solution: Mentally and physically prepare for it. Learn the average time for building permits to get approved in your area, and then add 1-2 weeks to that time frame. Meet with your flooring, lighting, and wall finishing supplier, as well as your hood system, kitchen equipment, mill-worker, and furniture suppliers before construction begins. This step will position you to find out their specific lead times required to produce, organize, deliver, and/or install. This all needs to be coordinated with your contractor and then laid out in an organized project management Gantt chart which shows activities (tasks or events) displayed against time.

Quitting Chefs

Problem Area: A scenario that, believe it or not, happens more often than it should is a chef who quits before opening day or shortly there-after. This situation will leave a restaurateur scrambling and leave a question of doubt among you and your other hired team members.

Solution: Before hiring your chef (if you’re not a chef inspired owner) or even before hiring your other team members, make sure your four key statements (Value, Vision, Mission, Culture) are completed. Equally, before hiring your chef, management, and other key staff, make sure your menu concept is completed and you show them the plans for the kitchen and bar space, the size of team they will lead, the wage structure, and overall growth plans. In summary, be 100 percent transparent so there are zero surprises, which is often the main reason a restaurant loses its key start-up staff.

Strapped Cash

Problem Area: Approximately 7 out of 10 start-ups face crucial financial decisions before opening their doors, sometimes (sadly) even leading to the doors not opening at all. Outside of possible delays strapping ones cash, some owners begin losing sight of their budget because they want the best of the best for the interior design of their concept.

Solution: Going hand-in-hand with preparing for hidden costs and delays, what can you do to avoid cash-flow problems? It’s imperative that concept development plans, business plans, and start-up budgets are in place and you’ve accounted for a variety of hidden costs. To reduce a significant portion of your start-up costs, consider leasing your equipment or taking over an existing foodservice space to leave further financial room. Secondly, as an owner, it is important to balance what is most critical to your concept and balance those interior element costs. Have your start-up budget updated on a weekly basis to hold yourself — and your supporting start-up team — financially on track and accountable.

No Customers?

Problem Area: Opening day has finally arrived! The renovations are complete, everyone is excited, and the hired team is trained and ready. You open your doors and only a few customers trickle in, leading to more questions and doubt. What happened?

Solution: The adage of “if you build it, they will come” sadly doesn’t exist in the restaurant industry. With a marketing and advertising plan, a startup needs to create buzz long before opening day. You must engage with the community prior to opening day through a launch day strategy plan. As a start-up restaurateur, you need to develop a strong budget for this category and keep it locked away and off to the side from your other expenses.

One of the main reasons this problem area occurs is that the startup needs to dive into the marketing category to pay for other equally important financial categories because of hidden costs in property surprises, inevitable delays, and re-hiring of staff.

Starting a restaurant, bar, or cafe takes a level head and plenty of research, organization, and financial planning. Use these startup SOS tips to stay ahead of the game!

March 3, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Choosing the Correct Restaurant Equipment

Choosing the Correct Restaurant Equipment
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 03/03/2017

A memorable, profitable, sustainable, and scalable restaurant arguably starts with the correct choice of equipment. When setting up your location, the kitchen and bar planning process can be one of the most exciting, exhausting, confusing, and detrimental aspects that will, in fact, determine the long-term success of your venue.

Much of the process comes down to research and truly understanding your concept and size of location. It would also be wise to work with a trusted supplier, consultant, chef, and/or experienced bar manager to develop a reliable and productive space that will maximize every available square foot available to you.

Choosing the wrong equipment or choosing the wrong placement of equipment can have a significant impact on both your start-up and operating cash-flow, in addition to productivity levels, staff morale, customer service, and overall food and beverage quality.

Let’s look at four key areas that can assist you in your equipment decision-making process.

Budgeting

A lot of your decisions can be made early on within both your business plan and your concept development plan. Everyone has a budget and equipment plays a large part, often 15-25 percent of the start-up costs. It’s important to first determine your wants versus needs, plus the style and size of kitchen or bar that you’re planning to develop, in comparison to your new and exciting menu.

When you know your budget, you will know if you can afford average or premium equipment, or new to refurbished equipment. Pro Tip: Determine your most vital pieces of equipment based on your menu and look for premium in these items, as they will be used the most.

Consider working with an accountant who can develop a plan to reduce capital gains while discussing other available options to aspiring restaurateurs. Alternatives should include leasing your kitchen and bar equipment during the start-up process.

Productive Capacity

With utility costs continuously on the rise, it would be ideal to locate more “green” equipment that will improve your cash flow — and essentially pay for itself through energy savings in the long-term. Measure this against your operating hours and meal-break strategy to determine how long specific pieces of equipment will be on for. This will assist in helping you determine your specific needs and the options most suitable to you.

Gas ranges, for example, will provide a variety of heating speeds dependent on the units BTUs. Take the time to research the unit through the available spec sheets. By doing so, you will learn just how long the range takes to heat up and the BTUs it will require to match your style of service.

Productivity doesn’t stop there. Ergonomics or “staff mobility” is equally as important. Consider the number of steps required by staff to reach fridges or other workstations, in addition to the height of tables and equipment stands, to reduce the amount your staff will need to bend to complete a task. A comfortable working environment will enhance your staff morale and there are numerous options available to you through today’s manufacturers.

If you know your location’s electrical, gas, and plumbing capacity, try to work within its parameters when choosing items, or expect utility upgrade costs with your contractor. Discuss these details with your property management and project engineer. Finally, always look for ways to reduce water and chemical use. Choose equipment that is also easy to maintain and clean for the most optimal productivity.

Choice of Supplier

When trying to decide on your main equipment supplier, look for vendors that have a large range of options for the same items (different price points), excellent customer service, showrooms, delivery and installation services, preventative maintenance programs, and financing options. Discuss new versus used, look for product or service “value adds,” product warranties, training programs, and future availability of parts. It is worth shopping around to 2-3 trusted suppliers in your region to make an educated decision based on experience, price, and their valuable options.

Balancing Menu

Before finalizing your equipment purchase, keep room for scalability and future flexibility within your menu. Understand your target market and proposed menu mix. How much fresh product will be used to execute your menu and concept? What is the delivery schedule going to be from the vendors in your area? How much fridge space is going to be required to keep the product fresh in comparison to the estimated sales and delivery schedule? How many ranges and deep fryers are you going to need, for example, to keep up with your seating capacity?

Once your equipment is purchased and you’re nearing the start of your operations, create a manual for all of your staff. This manual will help them understand the equipment pieces. Establish proper training and cleaning schedules, in addition to when each piece of equipment should be turned on and off, to ultimately reduce utility costs and unnecessary wear and tear.

You also want to keep a budget off to the side for kitchen and bar small-wares that seem inexpensive at first but add up quickly. These are just the starting points that need to be considered when choosing the correct equipment that will not only work hard for you, but ones that will also maximize your financial investment.

February 22, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Effective FOH & BOH Systems

Developing Effective FOH & BOH Systems
Originally Posted on RestoBiz – By Doug Radkey (02/22/2017)

The more any restaurant depends on the owner’s day in-day out involvement in the operational details of the restaurant, the greater the risk of failure. Starting and operating a successful restaurant or bar relies heavily on having the right systems in place, allowing the venue and its hired team to work as a cohesive unit.

Having the correct systems in place will create consistency, develop operating capital, enhance your team morale, and build business value while positioning your concept for future growth opportunities.

Below are some basic systems each venue should have in place (and can easily implement if they don’t) to allow the owner some freedom to work on the business and not in the business.

Operating Systems

HR Management | Create a paper trail for all employees, be compliant with local laws, and keep your HR system organized in print form with a digital backup. This would include application forms, emergency contact information, warning notices, copies of any incident reports, plus any staff incentive programs and quarterly staff performance reviews – which should be recorded every three to four months.

Inventory Management | The average restaurant & bar can see three to four percent of revenue lost to theft or mismanagement of inventory, especially in high ticket items such as alcohol, proteins, and day-to-day supplies.

Ensure there is an auditable system in place (digital, app based, and/or paper) at your venue for all inventory in addition to what is referred to as a Top 10; your 10 most expensive items. These items must be recorded and accounted for each operating day to help monitor your bottom line.

Team Communications | How often are you holding individual reviews and team meetings? Do you hold pre-shift meetings? How do your employees communicate with one another, especially between front-of-house and back-of-house during service? Get into the habit of holding daily shift meetings, monthly team meetings, and quarterly staff reviews.

Take it up a notch and consider adding in special training days at a brewery, winery, or a local farm every couple of months, so they can learn, communicate with customers, and train new staff about your offered menu items first hand.

Financial Systems | How often do you review monthly, quarterly, or yearly budgets? How often do you complete a sales mix analysis and review your menu, suppliers, and costs? When you complete your staff schedules, do you complete a roster analysis that measures sales per labour hour, for example? This easily available data will ultimately save time, control your costs, and generate further gross profit!

FOH & BOH Systems

Chef/Mixologist Shift Checklist | This important checklist will keep the leader of the kitchen organized with what needs to be completed in the morning, afternoon, and evening. It should also provide an area to:

Project daily sales
Record the number of reservations
The day’s labour cost for the kitchen (and bar)
The previous day’s food waste
What needs to be ordered each day

Manager Checklist | Similar to the above checklist, general managers and bar managers should have a similar mindset and list of daily tasks, daily financial goals, and daily staff costs, etc.

If a chef, mixologist, manager, or supervisor is sick or on an extended leave, another team member can step in and understand exactly what needs to be completed, to ensure consistency in your operations.

Kitchen & Bar Prep List | This is a crucial system to ensure your venue minimizes waste. A daily prep list should include all required ingredients, the portion sizes, shelf life, quantity on-hand, and the amount to prep based on both the minimum and maximum you’ve produced and sold on that specific day of the week (in relation to any waste) over the past three months.

This must go hand-in-hand with printed sales reports to visualize trends, maximize efficiency, reduce waste, and improve production times.

Line Cook & Server Checklist | The lists don’t stop at management. All team member (FOH & BOH) positions should have a checklist to hold staff accountable, engaged, and working towards a series of set goals for each day of the week.

Quality Control Measures | It is important to track the number of occurrences related to food quality, service problems, and drink related issues. Find trends in temperatures, timing, presentation, and other forms of customer feedback. Put a dollar figure beside each occurrence, discuss with your team, and take immediate action.

It takes effort, honesty, training, reviews, and accountability by the entire team to ensure these basic systems work and are implemented on a daily basis. It may look like more ‘work’ up front, and there are many more systems to suggest, but these will provide the results you need to begin leading a successful operation, starting tomorrow!

February 16, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Adapting to Market Changes

Adapting Your Restaurant to Market Changes
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 02/16/2017

The word “sustainability” has been used often of late in various ways within the food and beverage industry, with sustainable energy and ingredients being in the forefront. The word sustainability can easily be defined as the capacity of something being maintained over a period of time, without jeopardizing its future needs.

The same can be said for your concept. It should be able to continue, for the foreseeable future, right?

With ever-changing demographics, the likely saturation of your hyper-local competition, the ever-changing wants and needs of customers, in addition to the changes in ingredient availability plus fluctuation in both food and beverage costs, how can your food service business be ‘sustainable’?

Nothing in life is ever guaranteed, but some aspects are in your control when it comes to your properties longevity — if you approach your restaurants conceptual planning, with the right mindset.

1. Be Scalable

The first thing, and arguably the most important, is ensuring the concept is scalable. This means providing the opportunity to pivot with market changes and position the concept to grow in a strategic manner through menu changes and pricing changes, all while quickly adapting to a newly-opened competitor without losing your overall vision. Introducing a restaurant business model that is based solely on a current food and beverage “trend” is not building a scalable concept.

The second aspect of scalability is engaging the local community. If you have or plan to have multiple locations in different markets, position your concept to operate in different size capacities in addition to having the ability to purchase product from local farms, breweries, and wineries, etc. specific to that market. And through it all, you must of course keep your core value, vision, mission, and culture statements consistent across the board.

2. Be Profitable

At the end of the day, we all need to make money. Can the concept continuously produce a profit for you and all of your shareholders (staff included) over a long period of time? For a long-term budget forecast, consider the rising food, energy, real estate, and wage costs over time for the most accurate projections.

In three years, can your restaurant withstand these increases based on its capacity for seating and production? Can your restaurant adjust prices and control costs in the future based on the current menu style, price mix, and target demographic? Or will your target market turn a blind eye to your brand if you were to raise prices too high? What would be your plan to deliver the perception of value now and in three years?

3. Be Memorable

We all know, or should know, we’re in the business of selling emotions and experiences, not just food and beverage. Delivering new, memorable experiences will keep your customers coming back, time and time again, over a longer period of time.

Can your concept also invest in improving society and the food system all at once? Every aspect of your concept needs to tell a story, explain your key statements, and resonate with your target market. As the market changes, adapt and scale with it.

Today’s industry news is filled with concerns surrounding food costs, energy costs, climate change, wage increases, nutritional factors, and numerous other social issues, which are (thankfully) forcing concepts to operate more socially-focused business. Each of these concerns, however, provide an opportunity for you to tell your story on how you’re adapting and addressing these concerns.

This is why telling the story of where your meat, fish, vegetable, and beverage ingredients come from is so important, as it also helps customers navigate past the notion that their favorite menu item has recently increased in price. To summarize, storytelling develops a lasting memory.

4. Be Consistent

The overall design of a sustainable restaurant starts with the menu and the types of food and beverage preparation that is required to support that menu in a consistent manner. Having the correct FOH and BOH systems in place will create a level of consistency within your restaurant.

The word consistent needs to start at the top, with the owner/operator, and work its way down with a systematic approach. Creating consistency will equally create a level of trust, anticipation, and eagerness to return for all of your customers.

Matching all of the above with the briefly mentioned sustainable energy and sustainable ingredients, in addition to finding solutions to reducing your level of waste, will ultimately position your overall concept to be ‘sustainable’ long-term and adapt to frequent market changes.

It starts with research, design, and multiple levels of planning plus an innovative, progressive mindset. Do you have it?

February 2, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Are You Really Ready?

Are You Really Ready to Open a Restaurant?
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 02/02/2017

At some point in life, it seems nearly everyone has aspirations to one day open their own restaurant or bar. With the saturation of restaurants in recent years and months, it appears that the entry-level barriers must have become easier to overcome or are less expensive to do so, and many are jumping on board.

But is everyone really ready to open their own restaurant?

The simple fact is: This industry is not for everyone. It’s not what it’s made out to be on television and across some social media feeds. This industry is cut-throat, plain and simple. If you’re wanting to open a restaurant because you can cook at home for your friends and family or if you want to open a bar because you love hanging out at your local drinking spot with friends, stop here — please!

This industry may not be for you. Consider saving your investment, now!

If you’ve worked in this industry, you surely know what it’s like. No matter how much improvement we’ve collectively made in recent times to keep operations manageable, flexible, and “fun,” there are still the long hours, the working on holidays and weekends, the minimal margins, the rising costs, and the demand of the market to deliver quality food & drink, all at often the lowest price possible.

If you’ve experienced managing a restaurant or leading the kitchen of one, and you have paired this with the willingness to sacrifice and the required systemized thinking, social skills, creativity, stress management, and a lot of passion, then — and only then — you should consider opening a restaurant.

Self Assessment

Take the time to look in the mirror and ask yourself about the above character traits. You then want to ask yourself, and also write down, why you want to open a restaurant or bar, followed by: explaining why you think many restaurants fail within 18 months, explaining the difference between success and survival, explaining your expectations of profit versus the lifestyle you want to live, and finally, explaining how important growth is to you, both personally and in business.

Learn to Cook

Assuming you’re not a chef-turned-owner, make sure you learn about different cooking methods, different kitchen positions, and the use of different commercial equipment. Look for shared or co-op kitchens in your area to rent and test out, visit restaurant equipment suppliers, and consider working with a caterer or restaurant for a short period of time if you haven’t already.

Course Instruction

Hospitality, financing, and business administration courses are a great educational foundation to have when owning or operating a restaurant. This formal style of training will ensure you bring additional skills to the table in terms of management, operations, and menu development.

As an owner, you need to monitor your inventory, employees, food and beverage preparations, legal issues, budgets, and other local regulations, in addition to marketing, and of course, your customers. Depending on the size of restaurant, you may be wearing many hats. Be prepared.

Live the Industry

Embed yourself in the industry as much as possible. Read industry articles or books, visit trade shows, listen to podcasts on the way to work, and meet other owners in your community. Simply, get involved.

Define Your Role

What type of owner will you be and how will you look to position yourself within the operations of your restaurant? Will you be the chef? Will you be the FOH manager? Will you be a silent owner? If you plan to grow into multiple locations, leave yourself (and your team) room for growth within the operations with different positions to learn and develop.

Begin Planning

If you’re ready after all of that, it’s time to begin planning and developing your support team. Find out the financial start-up requirements for building, renovating, or buying an existing restaurant. Use this time — before you get too deep — to complete a feasibility study and ensure you’re creating something your market needs and wants, not just a concept that is your favorite to visit.

It’s impossible to know for sure when you’re truly ready to be an owner, but make sure you’ve done your due diligence, have experienced the industry, and have trained yourself as much as possible to become one first.

January 6, 2017by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

New Year’s Resolutions for Your Restaurant

New Year’s Resolutios for Your Restaurant
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 01/06/2017

Another year has passed us by. It’s time to reflect and make even greater improvements. Whether you believe in developing resolutions or not, your mindset for the upcoming year needs to be about “doing.”

The restaurant industry is known to have its more quiet moments during the first 1-2 months of the calendar year, so this is the perfect time to plan your to-do list and set SMART goals. Let’s get started!

Team Meeting No. 1

A yearly review is not just about looking at the financial statements of the past year. Hold a team meeting and truly listen to your staff. Engage in a positive, organized conversation. What did they enjoy and maybe not enjoy about the past year? What did each department (front of house and back of house) learn? What challenges did they face? What strengths do you as an owner, operator, or manager possess moving forward in the New Year in terms of personnel and what areas need to be addressed?

Business Evaluation

Now is the time to review financials. Did you set budgets and goals last year for your venue (let’s hope you did, if not, get into the habit now)? Did you achieve your financial goals? If not, what threats (challenges) did you face that prevented you from delivering a positive result? Look at your food and beverage costs, gross margins, sales mix analysis, labor costs, inventory management, waste reports, RevPASH analysis, reservations, and other aspects of your business.

You also want to evaluate your restaurant from the point of view of the customer. What reviews did you receive, both offline and online? What types of experiences are your guests having and sharing within your community? Take notes and look for both positive and negative trends to help make future adjustments.

Explore Your Surroundings

What opportunities may present themselves during the upcoming year for you, your team, and your venue? What events are happening within not only your community but also regionally and nationally?

You want to take this time and review your competitive landscape. Which restaurants closed in the past year within your city and within your hyper-local area? Which restaurants are suddenly doing well or are preparing to open? Which weaknesses of theirs could you capitalize on?

Use this quiet time to walk around your establishment. What needs to be fixed, painted, or touched up, both inside and outside? Does anything need to be updated or upgraded? Look at your kitchen and bar equipment, as well as washrooms, tables, and chairs.

How much did you spend on repairs last year? Is it time to reinvest back into the business with some new equipment?

Develop SMART Plans

Using all of this collected data and begin to develop SMART plans for the upcoming year. If you’re unsure of what this might mean, SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.

In order for goals to translate into motivation and improved operational performance, goals must be specific. Goals must also be measurable to be able to provide progressive feedback and to know when the goal is actually achieved.

A goal must also be attainable by an individual or team member, or properly delegated throughout the organization or by third parties. The goal must be challenging yet realistic. By setting goals unrealistically high, you will not see an increase in motivation or performance in yourself or your team.

In order for goals to positively affect motivation and performance, goals must also be time-related. However, a timeline of tomorrow may make achieving the goal unrealistic. Similarly, within three years may be a timeline so far into the future that it lacks urgency and motivation.

All of your financial budgets, marketing plans, and personal development reviews must meet this SMART acronym to be successful.

Example: “Reduce food costs by 1 percent over the next 60 days by implementing new inventory program, re-training staff on portion control, and meeting with vendors while reviewing our sales mix analysis every 10 days.”

List as many as you believe you and your team can realistically accomplish and ones that you believe, based on the data collected, are the most critical to the restaurant and its success.

List all of your available resources to make goals attainable and try to keep the goals in bite-sized breakdowns; easy for your staff to understand and remember. You also want to recognize the potential for any possible challenges for each set goal so you and your team are well prepared.

Team Meeting No. 2

Take these SMART goals and plans and discuss them with your entire team during a second (very important) team meeting. Agree to a timeline for each goal by signing it with your own signatures. Own your goals and include your entire team in the process.

Have meetings with your team on a scheduled, regular basis regarding performance and progress. Provide and receive ongoing feedback and align a reward system with desirable results.

It’s no secret — personal resolutions often fall apart. That’s why gym memberships soar in January, but facilities are empty come March. If you work as a cohesive unit, you can hold each other accountable to deliver the results you want this year – creating a successful benchmark for your restaurant!

December 22, 2016by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

How to Define Your Restaurant Value Statements

How to Define Your Restaurant Value Statements
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 12/22/2016

The most influential decisions you will make for your restaurant will happen during the start-up phases. Before opening your restaurant startup, you need to determine your value, vision, mission, and culture. (Or if you’re a restaurant veteran, consider this if you need to amp up your already-existing value statements.)

Understanding your goals and being able to state them clearly is the first step toward making them happen.

The definition of value is “the regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth, or usefulness of something.” For your restaurant or bar, it is a statement that informs not only your customers, but also your staff, about the business’ goals and what its core beliefs are.

Values and company culture coincide with determining your brand identity. Creating a value statement and building the foundation for culture within your concept will create consistency, accountability, and room for growth.

It’s a four-step process. To survive this cut-throat industry, each statement should be clear, powerful, and broad enough to guide your decision-making and help explain your restaurant’s intentions to consumers.

Writing Your Value Statement

Most restaurants and businesses jump right to writing a vision and mission statement. What should come first, however, is a value statement. It will help you determine the rest of the statements and create a sense of consistency throughout.

Start by listing out the following:

List 10 key items that will make your concept competitive. Example: The customized decor and vibrant and energetic atmosphere.

List five key items you know your guests will talk about. Example: Knowledgeable and attentive staff with effective attention to detail.

List 10 key items that you dislike when you’re a guest at another restaurant. Example: Dirty dishware, floors, tables, menus, and washrooms. Make sure to turn these into positives for your restaurant or bar.

List five key ways you can recover from a poor customer service scenario. Example: Taking the corrective and fast action to resolve the situation.

List 3 key ways (for each) that your team can increase awareness, revenue per customer, and repeat business. Example: Being active within community, using suggestive selling techniques by understanding menu, and by creating consistency.

Now summarize your findings and create a top five list using short, powerful words on how you’re going to drive importance, worth, and usefulness. This should be used as your value statement. This is a great exercise to complete with your team or new hires to not only see their answers, but ensure there is cohesiveness between your values and theirs.

The Vision Statement

Now that you know your values, you can create a vision. What future do you want to create for your restaurant? What potential do you have? Why are you doing what you’re doing? Why are you building the concept you’re developing? Write these answers out and choose positive, carefully crafted words to create a short — 20 words or less — summary that will also not hinder your future growth by being too specific.

The Mission Statement

Using your value and vision statement, you can develop a paragraph that will then build focus, service levels, experiences, and accountability. To assist, look at reviewing your strengths and weaknesses, your target customers, and your suppliers. How will you turn your vision into a promise? Keep it simple but actionable, and under 50 words.

The Culture Statement

Now that there is purpose and focus, who is going to deliver your vision and mission? What values and characteristics must they bring to your concept? How will they be compensated? How will they be rewarded? What kind of work environment are you going to build and sustain? Summarize your findings and create a top five list using short, powerful words, similar to your value statement.

Remember, you want to see the business through the eyes of both the customer and your staff. Creating these four statements should assist you in defining your restaurant’s positioning and should be reflective in all of your future hiring processes, day-to-day operations, marketing, and customer service sequences.

These four statements are only going to be successful if your entire team not only knows them, but also understands them and believes in them, and that rests on you as an owner, operator, manager, chef, and/or shift leader.

December 7, 2016by krghospitality krghospitality No Comments

Restaurant Business Plans – Deconstructed

Restaurant Business Plans – Deconstructed
Originally Posted on FoodableTV – By Doug Radkey 12/07/2016

It’s no secret. The failure rate among restaurant startups is significantly higher than many other industries. The question is: How can you position yourself to increase your chances for long-term success? The answer starts with having a sound business plan.

The old adage “Failing to plan is planning to fail” has never been more true. Many people think that a business plan is only used to obtain funding, and that couldn’t be further from the truth. A business plan, when properly written, will also guide you through the start-up stages and prepare you for the challenges you’re about to face.

Would you build a house without a blueprint? Let’s hope your answer was an emphatic no. Then why build a restaurant without a business plan? A restaurant is a business and needs to be thought of as that, first and foremost. However, there are components of a restaurant-focused business plan that are different than that of a traditional “small business” business plan. Let’s have a look!

Executive Summary

Write this section last. Be creative with your writing and tell a story that will leave future readers intrigued. Outline the overall concept, food and beverage focal points, key market statistics, and financial objectives.

Business Objectives

Describe what will define your restaurant or bar. List three to five first-year goals and list three to five long-term goals. What action will be done to reach these goals? Use the SMART acronym when describing each of your goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Timely) to hold yourself accountable.

Competitive Landscape

Describe your top five competitors plus what advantages and disadvantages you will have in terms of marketing, food and beverage, service, and any other areas of concern. From there, outline three to four keys to success that will make your restaurant competitive and successful long-term.

SWOT Analysis

A SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) evaluation is a popular tool to specify the objective of the restaurant venture while identifying the internal and external factors that are favorable and unfavorable to achieving your noted objectives. Try to list four to five for each section, at minimum. Consider using the SWOT evaluation against each competitor, as well. It is also a great exercise to use on yourself as an owner — what are your strengths and weaknesses?

Operational Analysis

Outline your location specifics and/or needs. To name a few, this would include total square feet, kitchen size, front-of-house size, total occupancy, washroom facilities, square feet per customer, summary of leasing requirements, and required customer parking. You also want to describe potential hours of operation, training programs, certificates needed, and permits required for start-up and day-to-day operations.

Personnel Profile

Describe the ownership team while including their qualifications and background. Outline the management team, their roles, and their salaries. Outline the remainder of the team, both FOH and BOH, to determine hiring requirements such skill-set needs and wages over the next three years. With this data, you can estimate the necessary working hours per week and your future labor costs.

Menu Development

You may not have your entire menu formulated at this point, but you should have the concept and key items completed. Outline your menu, describing core items in detail, while describing potential suppliers, cost objectives, supplier deliveries, quality control, pricing strategy, and average revenue per customer. You also want to outline specific equipment needs, costs, and equipment specs needed to execute your proposed menu.

Industry Trends

Look at industry trends for your region, service style, and overall concept. Discuss flavors, technology, growth patterns, and more. Combine as much detail as possible, and as always, outline your sources of information.

Market Summary

Arguably, this is one of the most important sections of the business plan. Define your market segments, overall demographics, hyper-local analysis (5-10 mile radius), market growth patterns, market spending habits, and much more. Use graphs and charts to help describe your collected data.

Brand Development

How do you want your customers to remember you and your brand by? List out colors, fonts, atmosphere, customer experiences, and the development of stories you want to see come to life at your restaurant.

Marketing Plan

Using the previous data and knowing your target customer(s), describe how you will generate awareness, maintain and increase your average revenue per customer over time, and generate repeat business. How will you position your restaurant or bar within the market? What external tactics will you use for promotions? What internal tactics will you use for promotions? Describe your perception of value. Outline your marketing goals and proposed budget for start-up and ongoing campaigns. A separate marketing plan (document) should then be completed, prior to opening.

Sales Plan

Working alongside your marketing strategies, what sales objectives and tactics will you use? Will you have a gift card program? Will you have day-break menus? What programs will you use to develop your business? Will you use online ordering? What will you do to combat typical slow periods within the industry? What industry and community related partnerships will you need to make?

Business Development

Starting a restaurant is a monumental undertaking and it can be intimidating to do it alone. In this section, set up a timetable of milestones for completing tasks and their proposed completion dates, as well as who should be responsible for these goals. These should be broken down into start-up and growth categories, plus potential exit strategies.

Financial Highlights

Now the “fun” begins. Outline all of your start-up costs in detail, complete your opening day balance sheet, and define your financial management strategies. Describe the investor/lender strategy plus potential return on investment.

Financial Analysis

In this section, describe your key performance indicators, financial goals, and financial assumptions. Complete your break-even analysis, daily foot traffic report, sensitivity analysis, RevPASH (Revenue Per Available Seat Hour) analysis, and three-year financial projections. Complete these month-by-month in the first year and quarter-by-quarter in years two and three with a three-year financial summary (year-by-year).

Remember, your business plan should be revised as you move along — this is why many call it a “living document.” This minimum 30-40-page document should be reviewed monthly, adjusted accordingly, and measured against results to be most effective!