Don't Let Your Dream Become A Nightmare
Many people imagine opening their own restaurant. It sounds exciting to design your vision, decorate a theme, and create a menu. What we don't envision are the risks and hardships that go along with running a food and beverage establishment. It goes beyond high expenses, safety, and time; many hard truths must be considered.
1. Hidden Costs
Opening a restaurant involves high operational costs you may not have even thought of. You’ll be forking up a lot of cash upfront for marketing, product, rent, utilities, labor, insurance, and much more. Make sure you research everything you need and that it fits in your budget.
2. Slow Start
Unless you’re a celebrity chef, you probably won’t have a world-famous restaurant overnight. You will likely have very low sales when you first open and you might have a lot of food waste. You should prepare yourself for a slow start and make sure you can financially handle it.
3. Food & Storage Safety
Research your region's rules and regulations for health and safety in the restaurant industry. There will be storage rules you need to follow that require purchasing the proper equipment to meet their standards. You'll also want to cover all bases, ensuring everything from electricity to plumbing is up to scratch. You don't want to walk into a fridge that lost power over night and spoiled all of your food.
4. Health & Safety Violations
Nothing ruins your reputation more than a health code violation. You'll attract negative media coverage and legal issues that could shut you down temporarily or permanently. Sometimes a violation is out of your control like a contaminated produce or the fault of an employee. There are strict rules that must always be obeyed and you never know when you'll get a surprise visit from the health inspector.
Senior Airman Shane Karp on Wikimedia
5. Fire Risks
A harmful fire is arguably the worst nightmare of a restaurant owner. Your running a food business that requires ovens and stoves. The risk of a fire needs to be taken very seriously and you'll need to have a lot of safety measures in place along with trustworthy chefs.
6. Dishonest Employees
It doesn't always happen but we've all heard the stories of the restaurant employees who steal products from the fridge, come to work intoxicated, or don't follow the health and safety rules. The dream is to grow a trustworthy family of staff but you could encounter a bad egg so beware.
7. Injured Employees
There are several risks taken by the back and front of house staff of a restaurant. The cooks in the kitchen are constantly chopping with the world's sharpest knives and cooking over open flames. Injuries are bound to happen and there's nothing you can do about it but prepare and equip your establishment with first aid.
8. Mean Customers
You can treat them with all the kindness in the world but you'll still come to face to face with mean customers. You need to have thick skin if you're the owner of a hospitality venue. You'll be dealing with all kinds of personalities every day and some of them aren't nice.
9. Customer Allergies
Customer allergies are a difficult reality for everyone. You'll be to blame if a customer has an allergic reaction at your restaurant and you don't wish that upon anyone. Your staff must know every ingredient in every dish and be trained on how to handle allergy situations. One mistake could be life threatening.
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10. Food Poisoning
Even if you follow all of the rules sometimes food becomes spoiled or contaminated without knowing. Food poisoning is a common risk in the restaurant industry and it's something to consider beforehand, you may have to deal with this unpleasant experience at some point.
Myblessing (owner of informant4u.com) on Wikimedia
11. Proper Licensing & Certification
To run a legal restaurant you have to apply for many licenses and certificates, from a liquor license to your capacity allowance. If you don't do your research, there are many you might not have known about or that will require you to make adjustments to your venue. Not having all your proper licensing in place could shut you down.
12. Too Much For One Person
Opening a new restaurant, even a small cafe, is a lot of work. There's inventory to manage, staff to hire, products to buy, floors to scrub, money to keep track of, and so much more. You'll be spread pretty thin if you're taking all of this on your own and it can become very stressful.
13. Poor Customer Service
If you're new to the industry then you may not be up to par with customer service standards. Either that or you're overworked so you'll be testing your patience. A customer complaint or a late employee may push you over the edge and you might not be able to keep your cool all the time.
14. No Days Off
You might try to take a day off but when you first open a restaurant, all the little unforeseen things will pop up. You'll end up running to the grocery store on a Sunday because you ran out of lettuce or you need to be around as the new staff are trained. Your customers will have a lot of questions for you that you'll want to be o site for and you'll basically live there until operations can run without you.
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15. The Competition
We're creatures of habit and we like what we know. Established businesses will be your biggest competition and it could be hard to compete with the familiar. You want to make sure you have a solid niche or a drawing factor that'll have people give up their Starbucks for your unheard of latte.
16. Power Outages
Whether its a bad storm or a random blackout, power outages are something you may have to deal with. It can be a nightmare for a restaurant when fridges and cash registers rely on electricity. You'll need to spend more money on backup generators or have a backup plan to save your food from wasting. The internet is another thing to consider when your card machines only work with wifi service.
17. Keeping It Clean
It's not easy keeping up with the cleaning. Hopefully many people walk in and out your door but that also means a lot of outdoor debris and messy tables. You need a solid cleaning schedule and cleaning staff to keep your venue clean and tidy. It's easy to overlook a dusty shelf or a stained cushion but patron eyes won't miss these things and neither will the health inspector.
18. Your Favorites Aren’t Everyone’s Favorites
You might be stoked about your menu and your daily specials but that doesn't mean everyone else will be as thrilled. Just because the Baklava is your favorite dessert doesn't mean it will sell as fast as you want it too. It's difficult to please everyone's taste buds and you'll have to deal with people altering your dishes or disliking your menu items.
19. A Messy Partnership Agreement
It can be a nightmare if you don't have a proper legal partnership in place. If you're opening up a business with a partner, even if they're your friend, you need to cover yourself. Life happens and people change their minds or want to pull out after they experience how much work a restaurant is. You want to ensure you end up with your fair share and your business can still run without them.
20. Staff Turnover & Inconsistency
Restaurants are notorious for high staff turnovers. It's an industry that often hires students, working tourists, and young people who will jump jobs and locations frequently. You'll need to prepare for retraining sessions and letting go of people you like. Consistency is important in a restaurant and staff turnovers make it tough.
