Where to start. Again I find myself having less and less time to contribute to this, though this is most likely a positive thing as I am kept busy with ensuring we stay up to standard. Our goal to become one of the best Italian restaurants on the Northern Beaches, and in Sydney continues, and arguably is making progress. It is just over a year since the first lockdown, I keep finding myself wondering if I would have opened a restaurant had I known what was coming shortly afte

What a crazy few months it's been. Obviously I have not been keeping this up, and I'm sure most people can understand why. The weekend of December 19th was the first full weekend me and my partner have both taken off together, and we did so after lots of planning to attend my brothers wedding. However once we had left Sydney a couple of days earlier the cases started to skyrocket, with the lockdown announced a day before the wedding. We went from being fully booked for over a

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

What a month its been. July was our best month ever yet again despite the restrictions (at least in terms of sales). The staff costs however are mounting faster than anticipated as we work so hard to support all our staff. The negative effect of this is definitely on both me and my partner. Still living with my parents is tough even though they are incredibly kind and it is a great opportunity to spend quality time with them it has meant we have put our lives on hold while we

Running a restaurant at the moment is definitely more exciting and difficult than ever. After recently opening for lunch things have been moving well for us, or at least as well as we could expect. Though lunches are not as busy as we would hope yet they are growing steadily as our dinner business also has over the last year, and the hope is to continue this growth slowly to ensure our quality is up. This being said I have not managed to have a day off in over a month and the

The last couple of weeks have certainly been some interesting ones. After lockdown restrictions were lifted even more in the middle of last month our indoor capacity went from 25 to 35, something that might seem insignificant but made a huge difference. In total now we can have around 40 people including outside, and this has resulted in our weekends being much busier. In more exciting news we were named as a finalist for the Northern Beaches Local Business Awards. As far as

What a crazy two weeks it has been. From the start of this month we have been permitted to have 1 person per 4sqm. Though this is still a huge change turning a 70 seater restaurant into one that can work with only 30 it seems like the hard work we put in throughout the lockdown and beforehand is starting to pay off. It is still too early to really know as we won't ever be able to compare how we are doing until we open to full capacity, our customers have continued to regularl

I keep trying to find the time to write in this blog but am so busy with keeping the restaurant running at the moment I barely find myself with time to get my admin work done. Luckily this is what makes this industry such an interesting one to be working in, that every day is different. The last few weeks since we opened for dine in have been as good as I could possibly hope for. This week we had every single 6pm seat booked out by Sunday and had 2 full sittings booked on Fri

While on my weekly cycle with my father this week he was talking to me about values, in particular those values held by a business and how to create these and ensure that every new staff member shares them. This got me thinking about my own values, and how they are reflected in the business so far. Despite having worked consistently for the past 10 years I have had to go into very few interviews, and as such have rarely considered this. However after some thinking today I bel

Every day bring with it new challenges. With any new restaurant the bills looming over your head are always a worry and staying on top of them juggling the many different costs is always difficult. In this new landscape the worry of equipment suddenly breaking down or not making enough money to cover the bills in a week has increased 10 fold. We are lucky enough to have a landlord who is assisting us as best they can through this time, but the ongoing costs of running a resta

Day three into the closure of restaurants and despite the record low sales (as expected) there is only one other thing that has been bothering me, the rest is all positive. Most of us if not all do not get into hospitality for the money. For those who have spent their lives in the industry certainly nobody stays there just for the money. Long and strange hours, difficult shifts and meager paychecks are definitely not the hallmarks of a lovable job, however it is usually all w

What a crazy 24 hours it has been for us still trying to make in hospitality. After posting on Facebook last night the support from friends and strangers has been overwhelming. Though this is very moving it unfortunately does not help me to pay the bills or keep the staff employed, and as such after meeting with my remaining employees today we made the radical decision to diversify our offerings and create an emergency action plan on how to keep the restaurant alive until we

As most of you know COVID-19 is having a significant effect on all of us, hospitality is one of those industries hit hardest. As we look to completely change our business model one of the things that I believe will help is breaking down the barrier between the customer and the business. To do this and to give those who are not involved in the industry an inside look into how this is affecting all of us I have created this blog. Let me start by describing a little about myself