As the end of September gets closer and closer I get more wary of the fact that we will be losing our government assistance. This means this month has been incredibly stressful as I try to juggle all the different aspects of increasing sales while simultaneously reducing staff costs. The most difficult aspect of both of these is that while we will no longer receive any assistance, we will still be required to hire extra staff and also have a reduced capacity.
To attempt to do this we are pushing lunch service as hard as possible, and signing up to as many delivery services as possible. We are also looking into the prospects of a "dark kitchen". Though I don't know much about this I have been learning what I can to try and create something to utilise the staff more without reducing the quality of our product for the main restaurant, which is always our number one priority. The disadvantage of trying to hard to achieve both these goals is that my app which is completed but not published has had to be delayed, as have my attempts to start communicating via our mailing list and finishing our new wine list (though we have already stocked a number of our new wines they are currently sitting in storage waiting to be utilised).
In other news our specials will be returning as I have now finished painting the black boards. I am working with the chefs on what to do first, but there are so many possibilities we will have plenty of time to go through them all. If we do wish to become one of the best restaurants on the Northern Beaches, or in Sydney for that matter it is vital that I find the time wherever I can to sort out these things, with my priority at the moment being the new wine list and specials.
The other positive thing to come out of the last few weeks is we have solved the problem of delivery pizza going cold before reaching the customer (or improved it at least). Though this creates a balancing act between calling the order ready long before the timer says so it has so far been positive and helped us regain traction. Unfortunately it takes years to build a loyal customer and seconds to lose one, and this is even more true with delivery services where the customer does not get to interact with the staff, and where we cannot fix an issue when it arises.
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