The first and most important condition is that you must not have any experience in the restaurant business. But you must have a certain understanding of the business in general, of sustainable development of the enterprise, an idea of craft beer and cocktails and of social inequality.
Location. If you really get the idea, choose the most abandoned and seedy area of the city. Believe me, the fame of your establishment will spread quickly and lead to you customers. If you have already lived in Bulgaria, of course, you will ignore this advice and choose a place in the center.
Renovate the place. Scrape the plaster off the walls and ceiling. But not thoroughly, but as if someone obsessed with free creativity had done it – somewhere better, somewhere worse. The more conspicuous the electrical and water utilities, the better. Let the wires hang freely.How to open a trendy hipster establishment in Bulgaria
Furniture. No identical tables or chairs in your space. Instead of tables, you can use doorways or euro-pallets. Chairs should be stained – with paint or something else that can’t be scrubbed off.
Black chalkboards. There should be plenty of them – on any available wall surface, or at least so many that you can write different inspirational thoughts on them daily. These thoughts you will then post on Instagram with the background of someone’s beard (about that below).
Furniture
Arrange and lay out old books, newspapers, magazines, posters and other paper rarities you can find everywhere.
Dishes. Make sure that you have enough jars of different shapes and sizes because you will be serving food in them, whether liquid or not. Also collect other items – shovels to serve burgers on, baskets and buckets for fries, and mini hangers to hang toast from.
Forks, spoons, and knives – don’t be foolish to accidentally buy sets of identical cutlery. Go to antique shops and buy silver and melchior, which at least ten years were not used by the owners for their intended purpose and as much more dust at the antiquarian. No cleaning, of course.
The same goes for cleaning the room. The less often, the better.
Title. You can’t just write “restaurant” or “diner” on the sign. You need something more creative, like “place for communication” or “happiness workshop.” The name shouldn’t be something that has a direct meaning like “Alex’s” or “Best Burgers.” Something more mysterious like “Alex and the Star” or “Be…Bu…” will get more attention.
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Menu
Curly kale, lots of kale. And, of course, chickpeas. Be sure to have “author” vegan or vegetarian dishes form the basis of the menu.Cook without recipes – by inspiration. Yes, you have buns and toast – but homemade buns and homemade toast. Fried with an idea. Portions should either be very small or huge – nothing medium, rely on your understanding of business development in this matter.
Work with a creative inhouse team
And of course, under the hood of unusual place should be the strongest marketing and creative team, the only way to go forward, a step or two ahead of the market. In Bulldozer Group this is done by a special creative incubator – different employees of the company have a chance to be in it, depending on the propensity for creativity and creativity.
Create not a restaurant, but… The Story
Things with a story sell better, and more and more companies are using storytelling techniques in business. Why not adopt the technique? Remember, he who knows how to tell a story rules the world, in our case, the gastronomy world.
Careful of food experiments
Just a decade ago it was possible to stand out by means of shocking combinations in gastronomy, today the conventional tiramisu with black caviar will hardly suit the guests, fusion is not in fashion.
Open up the processes
Until recently, almost any restaurant and even a banal pizzeria made unusual an open kitchen. Today, however, this approach is increasingly becoming a marketing tool, and it is even clear why: this element intuitively inspires guest confidence in the establishment and its dishes, emphasizing their fresh format.
Travel more.
People who travel regularly are, on average, 7 percent happier than others. If you’re thinking about launching an unusual restaurant, you have a good chance of joining the ranks of the “lucky” ones.
Put a 300% markup on all products and put the words “organic,” “bio,” “Kraft,” and “low CO2” in the names of the dishes. Whether this is actually the case is another question.
COFFEE – at least 20 varieties! And then there’s Kraft beers – white mushroom-flavored, vodka-flavored, brettanomyces-flavored (you have to know about that!) and brine-flavored, but American-style brine. Forget wine, unless it’s berry- or blue-flavored. The extreme compromise is natural wine (you do know about the devil in wine – sulfites).
Bartenders, waiters, chefs – all with beards and tattoos if they are men. If they are women, obviously only with tattoos. They all address customers on a “first name” basis, strongly advise them to try this or that dish, recommend them to make a deliberately erroneous choice. At the same time, customers unconditionally follow the recommendations.
Uniforms. Not required, but may be. But, heaven forbid, white. The phosphates found in laundry detergents kill the environment and it’s simply irresponsible to bleach uniforms frequently.
Social media. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and 2-3 others that are unknown to the mass user. Have a constant presence there! What matters is what you post, not what you prepare.
Social Responsibility. This, too, is more important than the taste of your food. Support campaigns like “Dog With Us at the Restaurant” or “We’re Against Industrial Livestock,” etc.