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I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

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Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#81

Post by dahart »

notl4wy3r wrote: post #74
dahart wrote: post #28

Having started a software business with too much optimism and too little business knowledge myself, and failed, I seriously have no idea how people start successful restaurants at all these days. No matter what mistakes he made, I feel for the guy, and the thousands of people every year trying to get a restaurant off the ground and ending up bankrupt. Aside from marketing, the initial costs of getting a SAAS business…

You'd think that you'd work at a restaurant a little while before trying to start one. Learn the ropes a bit, etc. That has got to help with your chances of success.

While I agree deeply, it's kinda hard to get the right sort of experience without just jumping in. Owning and running a restaurant is very different from working at one, right? Same with software; I worked in software for a couple of decades before trying to start my own, and while it did help me with the writing software part, it didn't help me with the running the business and marketing and pitching parts. If anything, one of the most important things I learned by trying is that I waited too long to try -- there's a ton of valuable experience you get by trying which can increase your chances of success. This goes right to your point, but I guess I'm just adding the caveat that you have to learn the ropes of restaurant management, as opposed to cooking or waiting tables or washing dishes. It has recently become very clear to me what the stark difference is between a product and a business...

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#82

Post by mathgenius »

Seems like this was his life's dream to do, and he got to do it. So, I'm not sure it was entirely a bust. But certainly it was a very expensive dream to follow. And how many really ambitious people fail and fail again, before finally succeeding at something? It is a common story. Not that failure is any guarantee of success.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#83

Post by tw1010 »

Lazare wrote: post #76

> In 2011, I applied to operate a booth at the Toronto Underground Food Market [...] my fingers cramping so severely from peeling 100 pounds of potatoes that I almost called 911. [...] I lost money So his first experience was extremely painful, almost landed you in the emergency room, and you lost money on it. What valuable lessons he learned going forward? > I didn’t care. None. > Eighty per cent of first-time resta…

I think his behaviour is already well described by Carl Jung. His world view is skewed by mythology (like movies and hero worship) instead of by rational thought.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#84

Post by adventured »

ufmace wrote: post #10
acchow wrote: post #3

> We had started with $60,000; after six weeks, we were down to $3,000, and there was still so much to do. I don't think he did nearly enough research into how much it costs to start a restaurant.

I don't know much about running a restaurant, but I figured he'd be in big trouble as soon as I read that number after reading the condition of the place. I've done remodelings, and I'm pretty sure that just remodeling that place alone would eat up the entire $60k. I have to figure that bootstrapping a new restaurant would run at least that much on its own, between laying in food, kitchen equipment, hiring staff, doi…

I'm surprised there isn't a big WeWork for restaurant start-ups. A large space converted into numerous kitchens, that can be rented for relatively inexpensively (no large upfront cost to buy equipment or the building, no large initial lease, etc). The WeKitchen owner would have its own inventory of kitchen equipment that could be rented and moved as needed, to facilitate a lot of various types of kitchen arrangements.

The idea would be strip as much cost out of the initial part as possible for the start-up (given their odds of early failure are ~97%). Most of them would still fail, the WeKitchen business would get paid their upfront monthly (or quarterly) fees as the restaurants come and go (and there's a perpetual supply of people wanting to try restaurant businesses, this would increase that supply by lowering the cost / risk; it could also accelerate experimentation). It could also enable a lot of other types of food businesses, such as tilt-up bakeries, rather than only restaurant-style.

The overall system would focus on orders to go, aligning with the increasing rise of food delivery services.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#85

Post by nubbins »

Every so often one of these articles comes out about someone's dream restaurant or coffee shop that failed and I'm starting to think that maybe there are lots of just soft, naive people out there who just got by in life checking off the boxes and being responsible enough to get an easy office job (they're usually decent at writing a dramatic article though). Unless you get lucky making anything stick in the real world is very hard. Having succeeded and failed in business before most days I can't believe how easy my office job is.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#86

Post by adventured »

bduerst wrote: post #25
binarymax wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An order of magnitude higher than 60k, if your goal is to compete in the market he was targeting. For 60k he could have opened a pizza or sandwich shop.

You'd have a hard time even opening a Subway with $60k

Bet on closer to $200,000, with room for $250,000.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#87

Post by icedchai »

tw1010 wrote: post #83
Lazare wrote: post #76

> In 2011, I applied to operate a booth at the Toronto Underground Food Market [...] my fingers cramping so severely from peeling 100 pounds of potatoes that I almost called 911. [...] I lost money So his first experience was extremely painful, almost landed you in the emergency room, and you lost money on it. What valuable lessons he learned going forward? > I didn’t care. None. > Eighty per cent of first-time resta…

I think his behaviour is already well described by Carl Jung. His world view is skewed by mythology (like movies and hero worship) instead of by rational thought.

Not much different from some tech startup founders I’ve encountered.

Re: I poured my blood, sweat and life savings into my restaurant. It ruined my life.

#88

Post by Fezzik »

mikeash wrote: post #46
ufmace wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know much about running a restaurant, but I figured he'd be in big trouble as soon as I read that number after reading the condition of the place. I've done remodelings, and I'm pretty sure that just remodeling that place alone would eat up the entire $60k. I have to figure that bootstrapping a new restaurant would run at least that much on its own, between laying in food, kitchen equipment, hiring staff, doi…

I know almost nothing about the restaurant business and I haven't even read the article, and my first reaction was still that this number must be missing a zero. I recall stumbling across the franchise agreement for a frozen yogurt place once. They wanted proof that you were able to invest something like $400,000 in the venture, and that's a way simpler setup.

I had the same reaction. I was looking at investing in franchises and they range from initial cash investments if $400k to $600k for one restaurant. And, like you hint at, these are behemoths that have networks of fine-tuned resources. Also, this information is astonishingly easy to find, so getting the gist of what opening a restaurant costs is stupidly simple.

For example Dairy Queen requires:

Investment Range: $779,675 – $1,729,160 Liquid Capital Requirement: $400,000 Net Worth Requirement: $750,000

https://www.dairyqueen.com/us-en/Company/Franchise-With-Us/S...

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