Culture of the Restaurant #5

I was left wondering when someone asked “What is the Culture of your Restaurant”.

Culture? 

I can explain taste, hygiene, service, ambience, location, USP, but ..... culture?

Over the next couple of months, with that word at the back of my mind, it slowly dawned on to me the actual meaning. 

When a customer enters the Restaurant does he feel a positive vibration around him? 

How is the staff behaving. Is there an air of artificiality in their expressions or are they really feeling peaceful within. 

Are the customers all around in a vibrant mood or you feel like anyone will pick up a fight with you any moment. 

.... and how is the right culture ensured? 

Well it’s quite easy. 

They say, ‘ as you sow so shall you reap’. 

As a leader, are you ethical? 

Is the staff salary paid in time? 

The vendor payments? 

The Government taxes? 

The raw material that is used for cooking, is it genuine or are you opting for a cheaper option which can harm the customer’s health? 

If the answer to each and every question above is a big ‘YES’, then rest assured that the culture in your Restaurant is also right. 

No force in this world can dethrone you from your citadel. 

Honesty, humbleness and all such values are going to add on your strength. 

All said and done, 

having the right location, 

providing the top service, Hygiene, service,

a top USP, 

and a beautiful ambience, 

will still not ensure your super success in this field. 

The only anchor is ‘Culture’. 

Be Ethical, be Human!

Experience the best! #4

Man has been bestowed upon with 5 senses, 

Sight

Hearing

Taste

Smell 

Touch. 

The Ambience of the Restaurant plays the most crucial part in your perception about it. If you like it then you feel like coming again and again to enjoy it. 

The Restaurant maybe a closed air-conditioned one or a poolside or further still at the edge of a cliff overlooking a breathtaking view. How the Architect makes use of its inbuilt advantages or a different theme will result into a successful sighted Place. 

When you sit for having food or a get-together what do you hear. Is it some  beautiful music in the background, the chirping of birds, the swaying of the branches of tree or the waves of the sea. Subconsciously it will affect your liking of the place. 

If their is unwanted noise then you will want to get out of the place as soon as possible. 

Taste is the whole purpose of us visiting a food joint. From the soup till the saunf everything has to satisfy our tongue. You order a dish according to your affinity towards sweetness or spicy, sour or bland, with coriander leaves or without it. Whatever your demands, if the dish doesn’t live upto your expectations then you will be thinking twice before revisiting that place. 

To arouse your appetite a deliciously smelling dish has no substitute. Apart from taking care that no stinking of washrooms, uniforms, or other things remain in the Restaurant we can proactively work towards a value additions of aroma like Room freshners, flowers, Agarbattis around the sitting areas. 

We may not realise but the cushion we sit on, the cutlery we use to have food, the floor we walk on, the glass we drink with, do play on our mind. The right combination of all the touch points adds on to our experience inside the Restaurant. 

Of course, one more thing that helps is the marketing of the Restaurant. It captures our imagination even before we enter the Restaurant for satisfying all our 5 senses. Hence, Marketing our USP becomes the crucial part in pulling the crowd towards our place. 

Apart from the 5 senses we also have a sixth sense which attracts us towards a place. 

We had a great time in our college, especially in the college canteens. Do we have the urge of going there even after completing our degree. 

What about our first date. The memory of the place of meet lingers. 

The place where we just go and chill out. Not for food, not for music, not for anything else but just because it makes us feel relaxed and whatever challenges we have in life just vanishes once we sit in that favourite chair of ours inside that particular joint. 

What’s the reason for this...... nothing but the sixth sense! 

All this can be summed up by that wonderful word.... EXPERIENCE! 

The experience inside a Restaurant determines the reason for visiting that place once again. 

What is your Unique Selling Point. #3

The heart of a Restaurant is its Unique Selling Point .... USP. 

Have you identified your USP? 

Is it an item? 

Is it your Location?

..... your interiors, music you play, or anything else? 

Recently, in Pune, a Tea vendor has been making waves with his simple tea, costing ₹10/-. He sells nothing else, only and only hot and fresh Tea. 

A Wada-Pav seller has the same experience at a Garden in Pune. 

A Hill-Top Restaurant can be the attraction for many........ it’s location matters. 

Another might be situated amidst a lake with water all around. 

Somebody had this unique idea of a Restaurant inside a Bus.

A USP of a special dish for every month.... can very well be the reason for customers to come to you every month. 

I know of a Bar where people flock in only because the Restaurant specialises in playing Kishore Kumar songs! Getting drunk and Kishore’s sad songs have an unbreakable tie. 

I had once visited a Resort in Velavadar,  Gujarat, which is famous for the animal ‘Blackbuck’. Naturally this Restaurant situated in the jungles has ‘Blackbuck’ as it’s USP. Each and every item inside this resort had  the theme of Blackbuck in it. Even the towel holder inside its Washroom had the shape of a Blackbuck with the hooks designed in the form of the horns of a Blackbuck.

Once your USP is set it becomes easy for deciding a lot of things. Theme of the Restaurant becomes clear. 

The Menu options decisions are driven by this factor. 

The Marketing of the Restaurant now revolves around the USP. 

Hence, ...... the heart of a Restaurant.... it’s USP! 

The basics - Service, Hygiene and Quality. #2

 

Let’s get to the basics straightaway. 

Imagine the following 3 situations.

Situation 1 : You enter a Restaurant. You are offered a table. The Menu card too is given immediately. You go through the whole Menu but order the dish which you always do without experimenting on a different one. Then you wait..... and wait....... and wait. Due to some reason your dish is not served for the next half hour. 

What is your reaction?

Situation 2 : This time round, everything is ok even the dish you ordered is served within 10 minutes of your ordering. As you are eating, suddenly a small cockroach crops as as an ingredient of your serving! 

Eeeks! 

Situation 3 : You enter a Restaurant, order a dish, it’s served within 10 minutes and you complete eating the dish too... without any surprises. But......

You didn’t enjoy the dish. There was something about it which you didn’t like. You exit dissatisfied. 

The above 3 factors, Service, Hygiene and Quality are of prime importance. Either together, or even two of them should be good, in some cases any one can make your day. 

Your bus is about to leave and you are hungry..... speed of service matters. 

You want to carry something for a patient from the Hospital Canteen. You are ready to wait and also compromise on the quality but Hygiene is of prime importance.

A mouth watering Pani-Pooriwala, putting up his टेला over a road side drainage is not a problem. You are ready to wait in the queue to have that चटपटा Poori on your tongue. 

This proves that sometimes one, most of the times two and preferably all three criteria should be fulfilled for us to come again and again into the Restaurant. 

If Purpose plays an important role in deciding the Location and Size of the Restaurant then Culture determines whether the Restaurant have their basics right. 

The Culture of discipline, perseverance, and dedication will make you a successful Restaurateur. 

Where is your Location? #1

We come into this world not having a choice of to whom we are born (Parents) where we are born (place) or how will we grow physically. 

A Kohli born in a Cricket fanatic nation or a Maradona born in a Football fanatic nation get an added advantage of being short in height as a batsman and a forward respectively. A Stephen Curry (Basketball, USA)  or a Usain Bolt (Runner, Jamaica) are tall. A Basketball player or a Sprinter benefit from being tall. 

It shows that the place of birth and your physique determines the difference between a fairly successful career and a world beater. 

The Location of a Restaurant is the most important part for its success. The location  is decided by the purpose for which it is established. 

A Restaurant can run equally well at a thickly populated area, or in an island where no one resides or even at the top of the Mountain where accessibility itself is an effort. The only condition is our clarity of purpose for which the Restaurant has come into being. 

The next important factor is its size. Again the purpose of the Restaurant plays an important factor. A चाय की टपरी (roadside outlet) can be as viable as the Restaurant having space enough for a 1000 Customers. 

We have to define our demand for the location and space required in advance. Once it is freezed and we finalise on a place there will be no option left. If we fail in this then to make the Project successful either we have to change the purpose of the Restaurant altogether or...... close down. No 3rd way out here! 

5 factors for succeeding in Restaurant business.

“Restaurant business is a high returns giving one, I want to open one”. 

How often do you hear this statement. 

As an owner of a Restaurant I have heard this from a Bank employee to a Software engineer, from a Politician to a Film Star and from a Tendulkar to a Tata. 

The fact is, out of 10 Restaurants which opens, 6 gets closed down in the first year itself while 9 out of the 10 closes down in the first 3 years. 

In India, after Bollywood, Cricket and Politics, a Restaurant owner seems to be the most popular one. He is discussed among people. Hence maybe the attraction towards having our own Restaurant. 

But are the efforts worth it?  

Those who have come to me with some Project or the other have been discouraged, warned, tried to show sense behind the business, the challenges involved, but alas have fallen on deaf ears. Each one comes with an amazing positiveness about succeeding and doing something which no one earlier had done. 

Often the results after that are frightening. 

Some face financial loses, some get into depression loose their confidence while others spoil relationship with their near ones. 

Does this mean that Restaurant business is a gamble? 

Could we establish some laws which can help us guide or give some basic insights into this Profession. 

With the experience of more than 25 years, I have arrived into 5 factors which might eliminate some failure reasons and increase the chances of success. 

You might still fail. But this is an attempt to have at least some anchor points which will enable us to go ahead with our plans. 

Let’s know about it in the series of next 5 blogs. 

If anyone has any inputs on this subject please do share. 

Handling Pressure

Way back in 1991, my dearest friend Jaydeep cajoled and convinced me into joining Football. A hard core Cricketer, for a change, I decided to play  this game too. It was a decision made not out of enthusiasm for Football but love for Jaydeep. I knew, this would be the reason for spending more time with him. 

Alien to Football skills, I invariably took to Goal-keeping. Slowly and steadily I started enjoying my role below the Goal Post. 

Purshuramians, the club which was bearing me, was a disciplined unit. Boys used to arrive in time, do their warmup, play the game and do the stretching before retiring for the day. After the stretching exercises we would gather behind the Goal Post where our kits used to be kept and change our shoes, our soiled t-shirts and other equipments. 

In one of those days, after a hard game, totally tired, we having completed the stretching sat down to change the shoes. Our Coach, Satish Deodhar was not satisfied with one of the young forwards, Raghu, and was still on the field giving him lessons. 

According to Deodhar Sir, Raghu had committed a serious mistake and if not rectified would harm his game as a Forward. Deodhar Sir was angrily explaining to him that whenever he would be marching towards the opposite goal with ball in his possession he should anticipate at least two defenders, one to his left and other to his right moving along with him. His words of wisdom were, ‘Forwards should be able to carry along these two defenders and march towards the goal to strike at the right time. Never expect the defenders to leave you alone to shoot a goal’. 

This left me thinking. Till then my imagination of an ideal goal was the strikers leaving the defenders behind them and running along to score the Goal. This new concept of travelling towards your goal with opposition tagging along was strange...... 

and bingo I learned the lesson of my life! 

In life, there are so many occasions when you face challenges. Solving these challenges is a task. Some succeed, some falter, some freeze while others flight. 

For me, after the lesson learnt from Deodhar Sir, I will never be left alone by issues as I march my way towards my goal. It’s upto to me how I handle this small and big pressures while  never loosing my focus of achieving the ultimate. 

Raghu may or may not have scored further goals in Football matches but I got the magic formula to score my goals in life! 

Sinhagad calling!

This incidence dates back to Oct 28th, 2015.

Overconfidence, almost every time, leads you to a mess!

As decided, for Wednesdays, inspite of a lot of mental and physical resistance, set out for Sinhagad at 5:10am.

The fuel indicator showed that the petrol was at the minimum, but I continued, deciding on filling the tank on my return. 

As I crossed Khadakwasla the car started giving warnings. I preferred to ignore it. As I crossed Donje Phata, the Car started stuttering on upward slopes, I had no options but to carry on.

As I neared the base of the mountain, the slope of the road increased and the car gave away! I was stranded on the middle of the road! My attempts to park the vehicle on the sides failed as the car decided that it is not going to cooperate and teach me a lesson for its under nourishment.

It was stark dark outside and the same condition inside my mind. No idea as to what I should do. I was desperate. A little fear too existed.

Finally, I decided to leave the car as it is and set out for my journey up the hill. 

As I walked, initially a lot of thought of my return journey were coming but it subsided as the elevation increased. This was my third climb in three weeks. On one side I was proud of myself for attempting this climb while on the other I was frustrated on myself for the foolishness I had made. 

I completed the day's target of 40min climb and after a rest of 5 min started on my way back.

As I came down, the Temple of Vittal Rukhmini, in which the devotees were getting ready when I started, was in its full flow. The devotees had warmed up and were in their zone reciting lovely bhajans and swaying their body on its rhythm. The 'Gabara', lightened up with the light of the Arti,  was looking amazingly pure. I immersed myself into this mood for sometime and after the bhajan got over resumed with my walk.

A thought crossed my mind, though selfish, that will my god help me out of this situation. 

By now, I was pretty clear on my line of action.

The solution was quite simple. I had to reach the nearest Petrol Pump, somehow. Get 2-3 bottles of Petrol filled. Come back to the car. Empty the bottles in the Tank and see if the machine starts.

With the resolution firm and with the new found faith, as I was passing the village, first I saw a Bus waiting for the passengers. Just some moments ago, I had seen the Driver and Conductor of this Bus climbing up the hill. I calculated that it will take another 10-15 min before they return. Hence, I decided not to enter the Bus but to look for anther option. 

At hardly 20 steps away I saw my saviour! A school Van filling its passengers, small kids, 5-6 years old, waiting on the sides. I identified the driver and asked him whether he would give me a lift. Though he was a little tentative, he agreed to partially solve my problem. He offered to take me along till the Petrol Pump.

I boarded this vehicle not knowing another beautiful experience lay in store. This Van used to stop at particular intervals and parents would be waiting  for this Van to see off their kids. It was a cute experience. One of the kid had his younger sibling coming to see him off and as he climbed up the Van, the younger one said good bye to him at least 4 to 5 times with so much excitement which we elders can't even imagine of. It was apparent that the kid was desperately waiting to grow up and like his big brother enjoy this Van some day. 

As we neared our destination, the Van Kaka, intelligently informed that after filling up the bottles in the Petrol Pump, I won't be easily getting any lift back and he said that he will be again going back the same trail to pick up some more kids in his second round. So he asked me to wait on the side of the road for 5 min until he returned and that he will help me reach my car. I couldn't believe my luck!

Everything happened as planned by Raju Chavan, the Van Kaka, and within a short time, I was near my Car. 

The procedure after that was easy and in no time I was behind the steering wheel on my way back.

Wondering I was, whether, it was actually the Van Kaka or God Vittal himself giving me this beautiful experience!

So what do I learn? Should I be more organised the next time  and avoid all these unplanned activities or will I get one more opportunity to be messy and in the process experience Him!