Many people with a passion for gastronomy love to share their feelings; however, a food business is often an entirely different proposition from a simple enthusiasm. Furthermore, USA Today has noted that dining is likely to change in huge ways over the coming years as restaurants adapt to the new normal.
When looking at the approach of turning your love for food into a business, it’s important to get a business-owners head on and look at exactly how day-to-day management might go.
Dealing with Staff
As the owner of a restaurant, you cannot run a one-person show. A professional kitchen can have a whole host of staff, working rotas depending on when you want to run service, and it’s a stressful affair. One study published by the Journal of Industrial Health found that kitchen work is stressful and, worse, the higher the stress levels, the more likely workers are to suffer burn or cut injuries in the course of their work.
It is necessary, then, to be able to professionally manage a group of staff and provide workers compensation to ensure that any high-stress services are covered against any liability. This should be your first priority before opening a kitchen—the people—closely followed by food.
Devising a Menu
Every food lover is different. There is no way you can reliably separate out taste in an objective manner, and this is important when you’re devising a menu. You need to create a cuisine and stick to it, rather than branching out into more creative, yet potentially disparate, ways.
If you cannot cook a cuisine, don’t try—you need to excel in your kitchen, not become a jack of all trades. There are enough restaurants out there, in all ranges of budgets, that cater to every background and every taste. You need to find an identity, hone it, and then stick with it. Crucially, get outside opinions—what works for you may not work for the wider audience.
Keep it Professional
With the cash that comes with opening a business, it can be tempting to hire friends, family, and non-professionals you have a high opinion of when it comes to the culinary arts.
However, it’s important that you hire objectively and professionally, and act as a boss rather than as a friend. As soon as you let sentiment slip into your business planning, you’re at risk of losing sight of everything important to running a successful business. Know your competition, know what you want to create, and run it as a business, not as a passion project.
In short, it’s important that you view your restaurant as an enterprise. If you simply want other people to enjoy your food, consider cooking for friends, or having cook outs. If you have the passion for a wider audience and the business savvy, too, move to a restaurant. Just keep it professional.
Feature image: cottonbro; Image 1: Natasha Kapur