We've got a little pizzeria on the beach that we owner/operate ourselves.
I don't work there as its nights - but DH does & I do the books etc from home.
I also take care of the running around during the day (picking up fruit & veg etc).
When we first opened, we both worked in there initially to get started (we had family/friends help out)... and put staff on gradually as we got busier.
After 2 yrs we now have 3 pizza/pasta chefs (DH, his brother & one other full time), 2 girls that answer phones & waitress, 2 drivers full time (they also share cleaning duties in the kitchen) & 3 other drivers for weekends.
Sometimes we have to call in a few extra helpers for weekends at busier times (over Christmas & public holidays... and weekends like football grandfinals etc)
Its going fantastically - we are so happy with how everything has come along over the last 2 yrs.. much better than we'd anticipated so early!
Its a LOT of work, & consumes every day (even the days we're closed) but I truly think its much better to work for yourself rather than other people
DH works his butt off, & my laundry is forever full of tea towels, tablecloths, aprons etc but its worth the hard work - we were like Boomba & couldn't get the $$ from banks as the little shop had had a few average people in there before us.
Some advice is that I would second Astrid - get yourself a really good accountant!
Also I guess be prepared for it to be number one in your lives for at least the next 12 months - our restaurant has come first before everything for us to get it off the ground - it was tough at times, but we're starting to have a little bit of a life now
Anything else don't hesitate to ask.... the only other big tip I can give you is to be really specific when you choose your menu - when we wrote ours, we made sure we could use the same ingredients on many different things... doing this, we could simplify our stock order/costs each week & also cut down the risk of having too much wastage on stock if it didn't get used (eg. if you're going to have smoked salmon, have it for 3-4 different dishes instead of just one, so it has a greater chance of being used IYKWIM?)
I think Holly's advice sounds good.
I am feeling very disorganised as I am sitting here trying to work out what the correct pay rates are for people. Talk about leave it until the last minute.
We have been soooo busy in our first week, we can't believe it.
I think I would say make sure it is something you both want to do and define what roles you will have in it. My DH wants me to do more than I think I can so I am feeling very stressed at present. and he is working very hard and getting no sleep from worry.
I don't have any background in business or money so I am learning everything from scratch which is difficult. Well not really difficult as there are lots of resources but just time consuming.
I think it is going to be a great decision. But having said that we are just doing it on "gut feel" ie no business plan or research but just a missing thing in our area.
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