Self-Isolation, Phase 1, Day four thousand nine hundred seventy three…
Just kidding, it’s only been a few weeks since Arkansas’s governor ordered all restaurant dining rooms to shut down, which was about a day after we had already closed the dine-in portion of our business. I’ve talked to lots of people in foodservice about where we all think we’re going after things open back up, and whether or not our business models are sustainable. Formats like Western Sizzlin’s buffet look to be relics of the not-so-distant past, while counter-service might be the wave of the future.
Small, funky places like ours are in a dangerous limbo. Big Springs is a kind of fusion of my history, weird new ways to present things, and marketable food. While we consider ourselves artisans, we still need to get paid for our crafts, so here is my thought process on what might be sustainable for us going forward, and why.
April is almost never a profitable month for me. Our location near the Buffalo National River and on the route to Branson means that around 60% of our trade comes from tourists of some kind. A lot of those people are what I call “semi-regulars” in that they come back several times a year but don’t live in the area. Some of them own property here and come stay quite a bit. The other 40% are the people who really support us, who come back every week, and who live or work within 30 miles of us. April is such an in-between month, with spring break falling in March and the summer season beginning in May, that it falls through the business numbers cracks. And falls, and falls. The first week of the mandatory shut down, we operated take-out only. I could do this with me plus one or maybe two other people working. We installed a take-out window on our patio (which we’d been planning to do anyway). We compared our numbers to for that week to the same week last year. We took in about 30% of what we did the year before. Not 30% less, I mean 70% less. Devastating. That’s why I decided to close until dining rooms could open up again.
Now it’s nearly a month later, and social distancing is still necessary. I’ve been spending a whole lot of time staring into space trying to figure out how a small restaurant can operate without wait staff. Our model with our take-out deli style offerings already gives us a little of a leg up over others that exclusively concentrate on the dine-in experience. But how many of our regulars will go for it? I suspect that not many of them. The National Park is still shut down. Branson shows are closed. Recreational lodging is prohibited. How do I draw more than twice as many in when I can’t even offer them what they really want?
What is it that they really want, anyway? This is hard for me to express in a pithy little catch-phrase. So I won’t even try. Our regulars come in for a good meal that they didn’t prepare themselves, for a break from cooking, cleaning, watching tv over a quick meal. They come in to see their friends and neighbors. Eating out is entertainment. It’s a little bit of gossip. It’s more being part of something. How do we give people that when they’re supposed to be staying away from each other? It’s going to be a challenge, but I’m going to try.
So. My current tentative plan is to re-open for take-out and deli sales on May 8. We will have a self-service outdoor seating area, with all tables appropriately separated. I think this outdoor space will be just as fun and funky as our dine-in space has evolved to be. All serve-ware will be disposable. Disinfectant wipes will be provided for tables and door handles, hand sanitizer as well. We will remove the tables from our front dining room to provide more room for people to come in for retail purchases, and expand those offerings. Our volume of things like salads and burgers is going to be reduced, so we will offer sales of some of the ingredients that go into making those things. I’ve got more retail refrigerator space already ordered. Our hours will drastically change, with mainly weekend service.
Who knows, we may kind of turn into a diner, with counter service. We plan to roll with the punches, and continue to make our living here. We will be smart about it, and look at our numbers every day. How much money did we take in? Is everyone getting paid enough? Is this sustainable?