Helpful Steps to Open a Restaurant Quickly
The path to open a restaurant is a twisted, but narrow passage that frustrates thrills and torments the entrepreneur. Most people opening a restaurant are in a hurry. Once they have made a commitment, the steps it takes to get the doors open of a restaurant, café or any food service operation are more like hurdles than steps.
The steps to open a restaurant listed below are to some degree are dependent on location, concept, region and preferences. The process is understated.
- Develop a restaurant business plan
- Choosing a location.
- Establish your company format and name.
- Create a bank account and accounting.
- Communication with all regulatory entities to verify that a restaurant is operable in the location you choose. That includes local zoning, health regulators, building code enforcement, municipal authorities and state licensing agencies.
- Acquiring your location (lease or buy).
- Hiring of a designer or architect to design your space.
- Selecting a contractor to build, remodel or make the changes necessary.
- Determine your exact equipment needs and select supplier(s).
- Start menu design and inventory list.
- Finish the space with décor according to theme/concept.
- Purchase POS system for sales, accounting and other options.
- Write staff manuals for each position.
- Implement a pre-opening marketing plan.
- Develop relationship with your chosen suppliers.
- Purchase your initial inventory.
- Employ and train staff.
- Test each menu item.
- Make final menu changes and publish menu.
- Do one or two test runs with all staff.
- Open your doors without publicity (soft opening).
- Schedule “grand” opening.
Restaurants are one of the most highly regulated businesses. You could have multiple regulatory entities looking over your shoulder as you work through the steps to open your restaurant. The inspection process during pre-opening is generally a waiting game, since many items are dependent on one another.
The complete process may take two weeks if you are taking over an operating restaurant, two months if you are just making cosmetic changes, six months if you are doing a bare walls build out and a year if you are building from the ground up.
For a complete reference guide to starting your own restaurant, The Restaurant Ebook provides details on all of the steps above. Other tools should include The Restaurant Marketing Plan Handbook and websites like On A Wait and Starting A Restaurant Blog.
