gpop
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- Dec 29, 2011
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I was in a culinary shop buying a new skillet, waiting on the shop clerk to finish with a couple of guys buying several items. I overheard most of the conversation as the store is very small; I surmised that the pair were opening (yet another) pizza/empanada/parrilla. What got me was the complete ignorance and short-sightedness of the clients. Seemed as though he had SOME experience cooking on the line, but clearly had no sense of what he was getting into as a restaurateur.
This punctuates something I have long suspected. When porteños start anything in food-services, most are with pipe dreams because some family member complemented a successful meal, so they figured they could capitalize on it.
A restaurant is a long, stressful, stinky business and requires more resources and experience than most people would believe. This is not exclusive to porteños, but from what I've seen around the city; how businesses are planned (or not), how they begin, how they are run, and how they ultimately fail... I'm not surprised. The luckiest ones are the ones that have killer locations and the traffic to support their small budgets. The rest are foreign sponsored so their backbone is more sturdy (although not impervious to) against economic slow-down.
All restaurants have slow periods. If they cannot survive a 3-6 month slow down; they they should not be in business.
EDIT: Booze always makes money though... even during the dry spells, drinking *probably goes up !
This punctuates something I have long suspected. When porteños start anything in food-services, most are with pipe dreams because some family member complemented a successful meal, so they figured they could capitalize on it.
A restaurant is a long, stressful, stinky business and requires more resources and experience than most people would believe. This is not exclusive to porteños, but from what I've seen around the city; how businesses are planned (or not), how they begin, how they are run, and how they ultimately fail... I'm not surprised. The luckiest ones are the ones that have killer locations and the traffic to support their small budgets. The rest are foreign sponsored so their backbone is more sturdy (although not impervious to) against economic slow-down.
All restaurants have slow periods. If they cannot survive a 3-6 month slow down; they they should not be in business.
EDIT: Booze always makes money though... even during the dry spells, drinking *probably goes up !