5 keys for my restaurant to survive COVID19 What can I do to make my restaurant survive COVID19? This question is being asked by the more than 314,000 hospitality establishments that exist in India (or existed before the COVID 19 pandemic), of which almost 200,000 are bars and 80,000 restaurants. And beware, we are talking about a sector that contributes 6.2% of GDP and employs 1.7 million workers, which is being hit by the pandemic and is not receiving sufficient support from the administrations or the entities that are supposed to look after their interests like some business associations and confederations. Hospitality establishments were the first to close and the last to open. With reduced capacity, with increases in its costs to adapt its facilities, with new closings / confinements decreed. Suffering day by day so that others enjoy a moment of pleasure (and yes, I say pleasure, because eating a good dish, well presented, cooked with love is a pleasure for our senses). Your business will not work the same as before. COVID has changed everything. The sooner you realize this, the better for you . If you are hoping that the vaccine will come and everything will return to normal, in my view you are wrong. There are things that are going to change. The client is adopting new habits, which together with the changes that were already taking place will generate a postcovid client different from the precovid one. Your restaurant, your bar, needs to evolve. COVID has changed everything. The sooner you realize this, the better for you. If you are trusting that everything will return to normal, in my point of view you are wrong. A postcovid client other than precovid is being created. Your restaurant, your bar, needs to evolve. The sector is going through one of its worst moments, that is why I have decided to write these 5 keys so that your restaurant survives the covid 19. I am not saying that they are a panacea, nor an immediate solution for you if you are the owner of a business of hospitality, but what I can assure you is that they will help your business survive the pandemic. And this is now the objective: to guarantee the survival of your business so that, in due course, you can recover and grow again. Key 1 for my restaurant to survive COVID19: security for your customers. Your client needs to feel safe . He needs you to guarantee security to him and his family. He wants to see how your waiters wear a mask. They want to see how the tables and chairs are cleaned and disinfected with each use. They want to have a safe space around them. They don't want to touch cards that others have touched. They want to be able to scan the letter and access it via mobile . You want to pay by card, with any method that protects you from touching anything. They want to have disinfectant solution nearby in case their children touch something they shouldn't. They want to avoid crowds . He wants to see that your facilities and employees are cleaner and cleaner than ever. They want to use table linen just for them . They want to see that what they are going to eat is not exposed to the open air. Does your restaurant allow them to do all this? Do you protect your clients? If you want me to send you a protocol so that the clients of your restaurant feel safe and protected against covid, you just have to send me an email with the subject: I WANT THE PROTOCOL CV1E ANTICOVID19 and I will send it directly to you. Key 2 for your restaurant to survive: new lines of business. If your business only offers service in the establishment and they close the establishment, your business will go to hell.
Before the pandemic we thought: How are our businesses going to shut us down? Now we are only thinking: When will they be closed again? And then you must think: What happens if they close it again? Is my business ready? There are trends that say that the restaurant business is changing. It is getting more and more to eat at home; both the dishes of a restaurant and the chefs of one of the restaurants come to your house to cook for you. It all depends on the economic capacity of the client. I'm talking about "Take away" and "delivery" . If you do not know what it is and you have a restaurant, I encourage you to inform yourself of both concepts and consider how you can apply it in your business. Is it going to save your life? NO. Now it is one more leg to lean on to survive, tomorrow it can make the difference between whether or not your business is still open. Key 3 for your restaurant to adapt to the new situation: flexibility. A restaurant has many structural costs: renting the premises, paying services, paying staff, etc. That means that you need to apply a high margin to the raw material to be able to cover all those costs. And it also means that if you don't sell, every month that your box hole goes by it grows very quickly. So now, more than ever, you need to make your costs more flexible. Of course, how are you going to make them more flexible if you don't know them... Read also: auditors in Dubai This is something that I always discuss with my clients. Cost efficiency is a MUST, always. A business must always work under the premise of cost efficiency. But you can only be efficient if you know your cost structure to the bottom. Study your financial contracts, study your guarantees with distributors (beer, soft drinks, coffee, ...), study your rental contract, your service contracts. Review all your financial commitments and go talk to all your suppliers to try to relax the conditions . With everyone, from oldest to youngest (remember, a single grain does not make a barn but helps the partner) And with regard to personnel, you have new possibilities open to make your personnel costs more flexible through ERTEs , take advantage of them. Key 4 for my restaurant to survive COVID19: digitization. The COVID19 has left him face to all those whose businesses were not digitized . Without compassion. It was something that was known. Digitization is coming (like the winter is coming from Game of Thrones), or the wolf is coming (from the famous story). But we didn't pay much attention to him. Slap. Now it's here. If you are not digital, you suffer more . As simple as this. Maybe it's time to see how your website is, to check your position on TripAdvisor , JustEat , Google My Business , to know the status of your social networks, to see the images of your letter circulating on the internet, to see what they say about your online business.
In short, this is the time to review the digital strategy of your restaurant. Yes or yes.
Key 5 for your restaurant to beat the pandemic: management. Respond honestly: Do you follow any indicators in your restaurant beyond the box? Be honest with yourself. And if I tell you that you should be measuring other things beyond sales such as traffic (tickets or customers), average ticket, separation between food and drink, consumption per customer, the margin of each of your products, costs personnel, staff productivity, and customer feedback. This without going into the analysis of your financial structure. I'm just saying one thing: if you're not doing it, now is the time to start. Only those restaurants that know their business and their customers perfectly will survive. Read also: how to get a bar license in India The goal of your restaurant or bar is now to SURVIVE. You need to guarantee the survival of your business so that, in due course, you can recover and grow again. .