Hospitality
Frank Bennett
The DNA Required to Clone a Successful ...

Successful full service neighborhood restaurants are rarely duplicated in a second location, even by their original founder. I have observed this phenomenon over and over throughout my forty years on the New York restaurant scene. Whenever a successful restaurant in one neighborhood tries to expand to another location, it rarely enjoys the success of the original restaurant and often fails completely after a short stay in business. Why? Why can't successful restaurateurs do it again? The failure rate for duplicating successful restaurants is too high! What goes wrong when industry leaders try to repeat their success?

 To find the answer, I decided to interview 25 independent restaurant owners who had tried to open a successful second restaurant and had met with varying degrees of disappointment.

The DNA Required to Clone a Successful Restaurant

Successful full service neighborhood restaurants are rarely duplicated in a second location, even by their original founder. I have observed this phenomenon over and over throughout my forty years on the New York restaurant scene. Whenever a successful restaurant in one neighborhood tries to expand to another location, it rarely enjoys the success of the original restaurant and often fails completely after a short stay in business. Why? Why can't successful restaurateurs do it again? The failure rate for duplicating successful restaurants is too high! What goes wrong when industry leaders try to repeat their success?

 To find the answer, I decided to interview 25 independent restaurant owners who had tried to open a successful second restaurant and had met with varying degrees of disappointment.

STRATEGIC PLANNING: A Dream Is A Wish......

Restaurateurs are typically hands-on business activists who largely ignore the classic business-school approach to business. Most know how to draw up a financial plan and utilize an operating budget, but few restaurateurs understand the value of the strategic planning process.

 STRATEGIC PLANNING: The title alone makes us groan. But, perhaps, with a little reflection, we might see the value of strategic planning especially when we are about to open a new restaurant.

WHY GREAT CHEFS OFTEN FAIL AS RESTAURANT MANAGERS

Why do great chefs often fail when they try to fill both the role of Manager and Head Chef in their own restaurants?

 26.2% of all independent restaurants close after one year. By year two, 45.4% have either closed or changed hands. In the third year, fully 59.7% have gone out of business. To evaluate these statistics as either good or bad is meaningless. Suffice it to say that trying to fill both key positions in your own restaurant will likely include you in the statistics.

TEACH, DON'T TRAIN

My first impression of my first restaurant kitchen was…WOW! It was a bright, organized, almost serene place. The glassware twinkled and the dinner plates squeaked when you ran your finger over the rim. The silverware was stacked in precise military piles and mirrored your image when you looked closely at the bottom of a soup spoon or ladle. The pots hanging overhead were polished to a sheen that made them all appear new even though they were well used daily in this popular restaurant on the shores of the Great South Bay.

As I roamed the kitchen waiting for the chef who had hired me, I was immersed in the distinct smell of fresh food cooking in an immaculately clean kitchen. It reminded me of the soothing aroma that greeted me in the local bread and cake bakery early on a Sunday morning. I knew, at that moment, that I was home.

HARVARD-YPO SPEECH

GOOD EVENING….MY NAME IS J------  AND I HAVE BEEN ASKED TO BE YOUR GUIDE TONIGHT AS YOU ENTER WHAT IS, PERHAPS, THE MOST EXCLUSIVE AND UNUSUAL CLUB IN THE WORLD…
pause…remembering…
 NINE YEARS AGO I SAT WHERE YOU’RE SITTING… FRANKLY NOT SURE WHAT I WAS IN FOR…
pause…remembering
I HAD HEARD HORROR STORIES ABOUT THE CASE METHOD AND THE CLASS DISCUSSIONS HERE AT HARVARD… I WAS NEW TO YPO AND FELT A LITTLE AWKWARD THINKING OF MYSELF AS A YOUNG PRESIDENT…WHAT WAS I DOING HERE? I GLANCED AT THE OTHER PARTICIPANTS SITTING NEAR ME…THEY ALL LOOKED SMART AND CONFIDENT…
pause…
INCIDENTALLY…MOST OF THEM ARE STILL CLOSE FRIENDS AND ACTIVE COLLEAGUES OF MINE TO THIS DAY…THEN I NOTICED 

eMONEY POOL Blog: THE ARANDA TANDA

Ten Mexican American women from Santa Ana, California make jewelry, straw hats and blankets for sale at the swap meets in Southern California. They are all sisters and cousins in the Aranada family who have painstakingly developed small craft businesses to support themselves in a culture that has marginalized them. They are loving mothers and aunts living in a society that has always oppressed and exploited their people.

They have survived and prospered, however, by developing social support systems to help them rise above their implanted immigrant status and lack of social capital.

THINKING OUTSIDE THE CASE: BLOG POST

"Thinking outside the box" has become a cliché', but it is often still a good idea. Both non-profit and governmental agencies, large and small, are desperately looking for new techniques to relieve the enormous backlogs and long wait-times that burden both caseworkers and clients. Doing things the old way "because that is how we have always done it" is no longer accepted wisdom. One state agency has begun thinking outside the case.

BABCOCK'S DINNER PARTY: BLOG POST

VELKOPOPOVICKY KOZEL - Babcock's Dinner Party

I have wasted a good part of my adult life listening to one Thomas P. Babcock Esq. explain the difference between a drinkable pint and a great beer. For the past ten years, Tom and I have met every night after work at the Cambridge on Charing Cross Road and enjoyed a pint and a bite to eat before heading home to family. Tom loves beer. He REALLY loves beer. He has even applied to be admitted to the British Guild of Beer Writers.

 "Tonight, I have a special surprise for you," he began before I could get my umbrella down and stow my Macintosh.