Restaurant Evolution - Part II
July 1, 2006
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Our panel of outstanding food and beverage professionals (continued)
John Svensson, director of catering and convention services, Cornell University School of Hotel Administration's 150-room Statler Hotel and J. Willard Marriott Executive Education Center. In addition to heading the catering and convention services, Svensson shares his experience with the 200 Hotel School students who work in the hotel and provides management skills to a select group of students in the Statler Leadership Development Program.
What specific action/actions have you taken in response to changes in your business environment?
Kornick: We're changing the way we recruit and screen people. Now we hire much more for attitude and train for skills---for example, servers from Olive Garden rather than Valentino. What's the biggest growth segment in restaurants today? Everyone's opening a steakhouse, but N9NE has capitalized on doing lots of business with people who don't visit traditional steakhouses---women, young, and old---by offering amazing things for non-steak-eaters, like sashimi with three types of fish and a spicy ponzu dipping sauce.
McBeth: We know great food is the ante to get into the game, so we focus on that to get customers in the door---and great service to bring them back. We rolled out our "Legendary Service" program a few years ago that's going to be our competitive edge in the future---more personable, feel-good service, based on treating people the way they want to be treated. We give our employees autonomy to do whatever they have to, to achieve it. [For example], an employee changed a tire for an elderly couple and asked if they wanted a drink at one Qdoba restaurant in a strip mall---and they weren't even customers. But they are now.
Robinson: We're in a hotel renovation that will be finished in 2007 (The Sir Francis Drake opened in 1928), and Scala Bistro's kitchen is getting a complete makeover with upgraded equipment, re-opening in July after closing for a few weeks. We're reinvigorating a concept that's been successful for many years, but [we’re] also cashing in on the PR angle.
Sandoval: As many more Mexican restaurants have opened, people stopped thinking of [Mexican cuisine] as fast casual food, and their expectations were higher. So we began aggressively changing our menus four times a year from twice a year. We're now training to promote managers from within, giving the chance to move to another of our restaurants. For example, one waiter at Tamayo in Denver was promoted to a management position at Zengo in Washington, DC.
Schwartz: Everything's getting more expensive---you can't just buy whatever you want. You need to be critical, careful, a lot smarter, [and]. . . very quality-driven. Pay attention and give people what they want. . . a good solid meal and farmer’s market products.
Food in the US is in a weird place . We got so far out there that we forgot what we were doing. . . I sometimes hire more aggressive cooks that want to do the latest---like what is coming out of El Bulli in Spain---but it’s just not practical. I'm always impressed with eating in Italy; it's not re-inventing the wheel, but simple and great.
Svensson: We're being a lot more creative in giving three choices---beef, fish, or chicken---and vegetarian requests are much more common. And we're looking for more restaurant experience in our banquet staff.
What has been your most effective cost-saving measure this past year?
Sandoval: We enrolled the executive chef at each restaurant in a bonus plan to reward cutting food costs. They get money for how many points they save on food costs on a quarterly basis.
Kornick: Food cost is the number-one purchase at all three of my restaurants, but we look carefully at the menu mix to see what supplements those high costs---like veal chop with morels versus trumpet mushrooms. It's more difficult for independent restaurants all the time, since they can't commit to national pricing or volume purchasing, which most industry suppliers are looking for. You also have to train for labor efficiency and minimize time in the kitchen through physical layout. Keep a coffee station nearby: coffee is a profit center, due to higher-priced coffee drinks.
Svensson: We're tightening up on every way to control costs, and [we] look for the best price for value, trying not to lock ourselves into high-cost items.
Schwartz: There's such a disconnect with people in the kitchen. Make everyone aware of what everything costs down the line. I tell them, “Pretend it's your money and you're cooking for someone you love.” We track different purveyors to make sure we're paying the lowest amount for the best products.
McBeth: MenuLink is an invaluable tool to pull costs in line. It helps identify food and labor cost problems in real time, so you can go back and diagnose. We spent a lot of time perfecting the system and helping our franchisees roll it out.
Robinson: Our biggest expenditure is labor, so it's our biggest opportunity to save. We have over 300 F&B employees, so overtime can get out of hand. I feel very strongly about cross-training staff, so we don't have to pay overtime but can pull someone from the floor to the bar or vice-versa. We changed over our scheduling from Excel to ADP Timesaver, which factors in productivity and forecasting, so we can see daily how we're doing and gain more control over scheduling, which was spotty in the past.
How do high-tech tools help you run your business better?
McBeth: We have an outstanding IT department that brought us MenuLink, and our operators can slice and dice the data any way they want. Our customer-loyalty program offers a Qdoba Card, which is swiped at the register for a free entree after ten to 12 entrees and sends special offers by e-mail, and a Qdoba-Cash gift card. Both are written and maintained by our IT department.
Svensson: Delphi for our sales system, which follows all the way through to the end and when to contact the client again. Adaco for our food system.
Schwartz: We've always used OpenTable to track customers, and just started Avero three months ago, so we can track trends, see why things are not selling, [and] see [what] things we want to do more of.
Robinson: OpenTable is a tremendous asset, used Kimpton-wide as a marketing tool to send out customer e-mails, not just for customer profiles. We also use Avero Kimpton-wide, and [we are] just starting to use an inventory management system to dramatically improve handling as we're such a large property.
Kornick: We just bought a very expensive purchasing system, and the goal is to manage our costs in an easier way electronically. OpenTable is the best tool to come along for my role in a long time---easy to use and gives long accurate histories about customer profiles.
Sandoval: We use Avero, which pulls together all our point-of-sales information so every week we can look at it, see what's selling and what's not, and make appropriate business decisions.
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