Has anyone started a restaraunt or cafe?
I have a friend who wants to start a cafe/restarant type business, ideally in the CBD to cash in on city workers at lunch.
His idea is actually quite good and pretty unique, and I really think it can work if executed correctly.. so I thought I would do a bit of digging for him, hopefully someone on here can help.
Has anyone started a restaraunt or cafe, and can give us a few tips on where to start?
I have worked with people who have and I have friends who have started them....some successful most not. I can probably tell you almost everything what and what not to do with a restaurant. And remember 50% of restaurants go out of business within the first two years or less.
itycoon, what do you think some of the reasons for that sort of number of businesses going bust? Location, Food? Marketing? Staff.. ?
My friend ran a cafe in the city - and bailed out after 5 hard years.
Issues:
Cheers,
- super long hours - 4:00am to midnight (they did lunch and dinner after discovering lunch traffis insufficient)
- unable to make money if they were away or sick (self employed)
- not enough profit margin (costs higher than expected, turnover lower)
- high staff turnover (combinantion of low pay, hard work, etc) - constant retraining, etc
The Y-man
Prior to getting into signage, I completed an apprenticeship in pastrycook/baker.
It was an experience and certainly not the faint of heart - extremely long hours, low margins etc.
From my experience, cafes net around 10% profit, 300k turnover = 30k profit before you take a wage.
If you did something unique as in a gluten free and diabetic menu then it may be worthwhile, but I would certainly do the homework first and think hard.
My dad used to own a restaurant for a few years, it was reasonably profitable but the hours were horrendous, he would get in at about 10am and leave after midnight.. and there was no time for holidays, time off etc.. so be prepared to work hard!
My Fiance' was a manager of a CBD cafe for a few years also, 6-7am starts, hard graft and quite a cut throat industry.
So the thought of owning a restaurant or cafe sounds great to people.. but in reality its lots and lots of hard work, and as justinsigns says, low margins and long hours.
I'm friends with some former cafe/restaurant owners, and I would have to say I agree with the above posters mentioning it's one of the hardest industries to get into. Personally, I wouldn't recommend it, especially for the inexperienced in the industry.
Where was the cafe located? was it a CBD location or outskirts?Originally Posted by The Y-man
Knowledge is power.
CBD .
Cheers,
The Y-man
I would be interested to know what sort of numbers a CBD cafe does in terms of turnover/profit.. have you got any rough figures Y-Man?
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