OPINION: Why restaurants are so f**ked

[Saunk]

The article is instructing us to overpay for meals when eating out.  No thanks.  I rarely eat out, the price of eating out in the states just isn't worth it.  It's much cheaper and healthier to simply cook at home.  

As for eating out in Thailand, you can open up all the trendy eateries you want, but they'll still be street food and food courts that are much cheaper and the smart people will continue going there instead of the cool, overpriced trendy spots.

[9S_]

So is she talking about Thai Restaurants? Or restaurants in the west?

[yselmike]

5 hours ago, Chinalarry said:

Runnng a restaurant can be very unrewarding. The investment can include long hours and dealing with difficult customers.  But your article completely ignores a very important profit centre, and that is alcohol. Beers, spirits and wines add substantial to gross income and are not perishable. They are often sold at multiples of the cost. It is widely known that they are in fact the major contributors to overall profitability. If food covers the fixed costs of running the restaurant plus the variables such as labour plus damages and kept, then drinks provide the gravy.

An old saying about the catering industry is "drink me rich eat me poor".You forgot coffee in your list.Add on people who want to bring their own drinks and not pay corkage,and then give you bad reviews!.The pay and hours are the killers as British caterers are finding now that lockdown is over their old staff won't work like slaves anymore,and the former EU workers are not paid enough to reach the threshold that the UK government has set,over 25k a year I think.Going out for a meal will be a treat from now on as menu prices rise to cover the living wage for the staff.Enjoy them while you can you are going to miss them.

[King Cotton]

16 minutes ago, 9S_ said:

So is she talking about Thai Restaurants? Or restaurants in the west?

Good question! I initially assumed that 'Guest Blogger Joelle Parenteau' was summarising Thai restaurateurs' hardships but, having scanned through her lengthy report, she only makes specific reference to a German kebab takeaway franchise and links to a report by a Philadelphia journal. Exactly why it's featured by TN, as if it was a Thai Covid pandemic victim, is beyond me.

Thanks for making me look, though!

[THETRUTH]

1 hour ago, Dooleygank said:

Some fake pretty girl sellin some fake hipster "german" doner kebab (Turkish). Not sure why people waste their time.

Now this is turning into a targeted bashing but whatever. I've been having this thought everytime I order from the mentioned "Döner" place. I just like shawarma better and it's half the price too.

What I miss is the same kebab experience that I had at home in Europe, but this place doesn't deliver it. I'm not saying that their food is is less "authentic" or whatever, but I just don't like it as much. Besides their meals cost 300 baht, in Thailand, whereas mine cost just over 200 in the richer part of Europe.

And they're now selling curry wurst. What a sell-out.

[riclag]

7 hours ago, Abbis said:

By the way, If you are rich and have enough money to support yourself and them, then go and do it.

Dave Portney of Barstool sports was and is a very successful  Entrepreneur , he is famous for his phantom Pizza shop reviews in the USA and now this,he started a fund for small business that were ripe for going out of business ,due to the virus from china. To date I think he raised  close to 50 mill. My daughter was one of the recipients of his generosity! 

She applied after reading about it on facebook last year when he started it ! All she needed to do was make a video and explain her pandemic  story ! She got a call and a 50k check a few weeks later !

https://www.foxnews.com/media/barstool-fund-giving-boost-to-help-small-business-recover-from-darkest-times-portnoy

[AdvocatusDiaboli]

1 hour ago, King Cotton said:

Thanks for making me look, though!

If you had looked at the link I posted earlier 

https://joelleparenteau.medium.com/why-restaurants-are-not-f***ed-80383594c593

you would have seen that she was not talking about Thailand, buy trying to save her own business back in April 2020.

Strange the way the Thaiger picked up on this blogger puff piece. I hope this won’t become the norm.

[Dooleygank]

2 hours ago, THETRUTH said:

Now this is turning into a targeted bashing but whatever.

My bad, I was just being a complainer.. Back in my home city we are saturated with this kind of place. Trying to sell some product (beer, food, coffee) thats trying to over-impress and under-delivers. I didn't need to get too specifically bashy on this person or their establishment.

[JamesE]

9 hours ago, AdvocatusDiaboli said:

Sounds like Joelle Parenteau may just be in the Restaurant Business.

"Startup Founder. Poker Player. Street Food Addict." according to her medium page. Her May 18, 2020 blog entry is titled "Why Restaurants Are Not F**ked" so, at best, she's playing both sides of the argument. She also states in her most recent article that she's "Tired of restaurants playing the victim card."

Like many of The Thaiger's opinion pieces, it's best to have several grains of salt nearby.

[AdvocatusDiaboli]

56 minutes ago, JamesE said:

Like many of The Thaiger's opinion pieces, it's best to have several grains of salt nearby.

And a large fries

[Nocke]

And if you ban alcohol in restaurants, why whould I go there at all?

[Korby]

Sitting here and reading this makes me understand the entire situation. The views are not local to Thailand but the entire concept of the business is still similar. Many restaurants here are family owned and run. They keep the business within the family and when corvid hit, it hit them hard. So it is not that surprising to see so many restaurants vacant and completely closed. The surprising thing is many of them scaled down and become smaller. At the same time they become street vendors still selling food. 

[King Cotton]

6 hours ago, Nocke said:

And if you ban alcohol in restaurants, why whould I go there at all?

Fair question I'm sure, when for a huge proportion of diners, the pre-meal beer and with-meal wine are half the pleasure. And your forum post, too . . . thanks for that!

Hello, Nocke and welcome to Thaiger Talk

Please feel free to tell us a bit about yourself in 'Introductions'. It's good to pick-up on those sometimes differing regional or geographical perspectives.

And check-out the Guidelines, too, when you get a free minute. They're there to help us all enjoy our time here.

Happy posting

King Cotton

 

[King Cotton]

23 hours ago, semrand753 said:

Every industry is about supply versus demand.

Sure, supply is dropping, but nowhere near to a level where it might become hard to fulfill demand. To raise prices as a single restaurant without losing too many customers, you'd first have to drain supply (of cheap meals) by getting just about all restaurants to agree to price inflation.

A whole lot of organization, collaboration (at a national level), and time is required to get into a position to be able to achieve that. Objectively (but somewhat harshly and without nuances) put, it'd be easier if the entire restaurant-scene would collapse to ground-zero, so that it could be rebuilt from scratch in a new model.

Another excellent post on this foody thread. And your debut post, too . . . thanks for that!

Hello, semrand753 and welcome to Thaiger Talk

Please feel free to tell us a bit about yourself in 'Introductions'. It's good to pick-up on those sometimes differing regional or geographical perspectives.

And check-out the Guidelines, too, when you get a free minute. They're there to help us all enjoy our time here.

Happy posting

King Cotton

[bushav8r]

On 8/16/2021 at 4:29 AM, AdvocatusDiaboli said:

Really, look when this was written, on their blog site.

https://joelleparenteau.medium.com/why-restaurants-are-not--80383594c593

April 13 2020. 
 

Now I am left wondering if restaurants are f***ed or not.  I wonder how Raan Ja Fai is doing?  It is a street food  stall with a Michelin Star and  they charge an incredible amount of money for their food.  I don't think this restaurant has all of the overhead costs mentioned in the article either.  The Michelin Star made them famous but it has always been just one lady cooking all the food by herself.   

[Rain]

On 8/16/2021 at 1:20 AM, AdvocatusDiaboli said:

Oh really. 
https://www.chiangmaicitylife.com/citynews/covid-19/chiang-mais-10000-plus-restaurants-down-to-under-2000/

still plenty to choose from in CM.

By supporting your favourite restaurants increasing menu prices. That’s it. For too long they’ve avoided doing this out of fear that we would rebel. Armed with new knowledge, let’s be more understanding. That’s how we #supportlocal. That’s how we keep enjoying our favourite foods.

Sounds like Joelle Parenteau may just be in the Restaurant Business. 
 

Ones that are still open have a good local trade and are not reliant on Tourists (both Foreign and Domestic), Have reasonable rent or own outright, are not reliant on alcohol sales (which Joelle does not mention), and finally in areas of good foot traffic for what they are offering. It does not matter how one or two people feel about supporting local with increasing the price of food, it is what the majority of their customers will do with foot traffic, and an increase may just price them out of the market. 

Well said. 

Frankly, I believe articles such as the OP above amount to much to do about nothing.

[King Cotton]

53 minutes ago, Rain said:

Well said. 

Frankly, I believe articles such as the OP above amount to much to do about nothing.

Brief and to the point and thanks for this, your debut post!

Hello, Rain and welcome to Thaiger Talk

Please feel free to tell us a bit about yourself in 'Introductions'. It's good to pick-up on those sometimes differing regional or geographical perspectives.

And check-out the Guidelines, too, when you get a free minute. They're there to help us all enjoy our time here.

Happy posting

King Cotton