After years of hard work and dreaming of this moment, you are about to embark on opening your first restaurant. However, since restaurants are some of the businesses most prone to failure in their first year, you want to do everything correctly from the very start. To make sure opening your first restaurant will be successful and possibly lead to many more being opened in the future, here’s what you need to know.
Licenses and Permits
After you’ve put in your hard work and plenty of money to get your restaurant open, the last thing you want is to be shut down or fined because you don’t have the proper licenses or permits. Thus, make sure you take care of this beforehand. From a business license to liquor permits, know what you need and get them early on in the process.
Food and Equipment Suppliers
Even if you’ve got a great location and idea, you won’t get very far without having excellent food and equipment suppliers working with you. Whether it’s making sure you always have the finest foods and freshest ingredients for cooking your restaurant’s meals to having a Manitowoc Ice IY0304A 161 ice maker and refrigeration units, lining up reliable and affordable suppliers will keep your restaurant running smoothly.
An Experienced Staff
While you can certainly hire some lower-level staff members and train them accordingly, it is critical you have an experienced staff you can trust from day one. Therefore, be sure you put in plenty of time finding just the right chefs, managers, and others who will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of your restaurant. If you think just anybody can do these jobs, you are wrong. Unfortunately, once a restaurant gets a bad reputation for poor service, it is hard to overcome.
Multiple Sources of Financing
In the business world, even the simplest of restaurants can be very expensive to get up and running. Therefore, you should always put in plenty of work ensuring your restaurant has multiple sources of financing to get started. Along with traditional loans from banks, you should also consider such funding sources as Small Business Administration loans, investors that can include family and friends, and even online fundraisers, such as GoFundMe, Kickstarter, and FoodStart.
Though the competition will be fierce, most people agree that there can never be too many great restaurants in which to stop and have a meal. By taking care of these and other details, your restaurant may soon be considered a five-star dining experience.
Anica is a professional content and copywriter who graduated from the University of San Francisco. She loves dogs, the ocean, and anything outdoor-related. You can connect with Anica on Twitter @AnicaOaks.
