Some of the biggest mistakes restaurants make and can lead you to close.

 

 

Are you in the edge, losing money? Are you surrounded by the right

people? Your future is in jeopardy and seems nobody cares?  

 

When a restaurant closes:  "Is never fault of the owner"...?  Owners do not realize or appreciate

the specific set of demands that come along with owning and running a restaurant. Once realized, it is often way too late.

 

Partnership disputes, family members, and friends "working" their own way, divorces, and broken relationships between partners, owners, and/or management that has been doing wrong for far too long thinking that because the door still open they are right, team members with education, and degrees or diplomas but zero experience in charge of positions for experienced professionals, young good looking members, with very little, or very poor knowledge about the customer service industry, the classic dinosaurs that truly believes they are the key person and without them the place will sink, lack of authority from management, excessive confidence from employees with coworkers, installations, and management, fear to say bye the wrong team members, incapability to analyze, and recognize weakness, and qualities in your team members, unhappy team members, wrong atmosphere from management, tired, thirsty and hungry team members, lack of motivation of the team, excessive abuse from owners/management to team members duties, culture of saving in the wrong things, unpaid hours = tons of problems, lack of training, lack or non culture of smile, big egos around that makes impossible to fix anything, employees talks like they couldn't care less.

 

Theme restaurants that manage to tell their story in one visit while discounting the fact food should be the first consideration if building a return patronage is the objective. Examples: A décor featuring reptiles, vintage auto parts, fading sports banners, fading movie memorabilia, excessive displays of religious artifacts, or denominational prayer cards on tables, so at the end your guests wonder if they are in the wrong place.

 

Blame the other guy, too high taxes, lack of financing when first opening, serving food that has gained a reputation for being anything but biodegradable, belief that "if we open--they will come," Inability to control food costs, lack of balance between other operating expenses, and primary expenses, buying raw product.

 

"Executive" chefs with zero background, or experience, as well as owners with no culinary education or experience whatsoever, managers that are named "Manager" just for being friend of the inexperienced owner.

 

 "Location, location, location ", bad food, service, or lack thereof, lack of policy in handling complaints, no damage control, inability to deal with unhappy customers, and fix the situation in their favor, negative word-of-mouth reputation, strong competition opening nearby, proliferation of dinner houses for the same dining-out concept, zero marketing in opening plans, Ineffective advertising, failure to inform public what the restaurant is about, prices, cuisine, hours, alcohol policy, reservation, smoking policies, menu price range for various meals, minimum wage mentalities, failure of morning crew to arrive in time to prep, sometimes failing to open the door, wrong music and ambiance, employee theft, rude or crude answers to customers who may or may not have valid complaints, excessive menu, tax office claiming its part on the share, deteriorating neighborhood resulting in second thoughts about business growth, eviction from property owned by a second party who sees greater return with a different client, sanitation violations compiled by stubborn health department inspectors, a name too long to be instantly recalled, impossible rent structures, etc...

 

Excuses are the common duty, and easy way out for failures, excuses to problems that in the first place should never exist. Problems and excuses resoult of one thing: Unexperienced owners and management taking the wrong decisions,