Mixy · @mixyhimself
11th Jul 2020 from TwitLonger
The life of a small business owner (Food based) during Coronavirus
My interactions with other small business owners lately, including Todd Bruson, the son of the godfather of poker who has come off as a caveman tweeting irrationally at his governor with nonsense, have made me want to relay some of my journey the past 4 months. I own a food based business where we teach cooking classes, host private events, cater parties, all things that can't be done at the moment. 3 weeks before being forcibly shut down by the Mayor of Hoboken, NJ (We were one of the first cities, and I stand behind his decision from a citizen's perspective on safety), I started the process of building the back end on my website to take orders for "mealkits", that are effectively large scale family portions of takeout. We have pretty talented chefs and I thought that things will close down, there will be a void to fill and I'm not ready to cut staff and I'll do what I need to do to survive. The first day we closed (we were notified 11 pm the night before), we took all of the food in house brought in for a bridal shower that had to be canceled and turned it into 12 mealkits that fed 48 while paying off the staff for the day and turning a small profit. That week we started selling these mealkits. Our first location in Hoboken, NJ was doing well enough to continue keeping employment while maintaining payroll at 85% of what it used to be due to a pay structure I created to help the staff's cut in hours but have them receive higher wages per hour. Basically they were being paid the first few months on an incentive basis. The more we sold, the more they made per hour. Things were closed, we were open, and our food was phenomenal and traveled well so it could be reheated in homes as if it were made fresh. I had staff not willing to come in based on personal family needs and we were super short staffed while having a demand for takeout meals. I worked 7 days a week the first 5 weeks of quarantine and had constant anxiety of waiting to be told takeout was closing as well. Once that anxiety passed as it was clear we wouldn't have to close down takeout, I continued to think of the coming months and how long it would be sustainable to do takeout. I knew eventually things would open up, options would increase and we would no longer be doing well enough to break even. Months 1 and 2 we were cash flow positive while we did takeout mealkits, virtual online cooking classes and custom catering pick ups. Our 2nd location which was opened 2/1/2020 and received no government relief was losing money weekly but the overhead was a lot lower with only rent and a few small salaries to worry about. The 1st location was carrying the load. Our NJ location received a large PPP loan and at the time, I thought, ok this will help me get through the next few months even though I will have to pay out extra funds to staff. I felt a duty to my staff and managers to keep things going even though I had constant nights of anxiety and was averaging 5 hours of sleep.
As things started to open back up, I could see our sales going down but I was ready to shift to outdoor dining when that opened back up. We always did more than just cooking classes, we would do family style dinners with live music, tasting menus, pretty much anything food related and we were fortunate to have a lot of outdoor space we could put tables at. We have never been a true restaurant, but instead always focused on sustainability in selling tickets in advance. That way, we bought exactly what was needed and ensured no food waste occured. It's also the most efficient way to purchase and pay for labor. Over the past 5 weeks, our outdoor dining which can have up to 40 people outside, has been slow, our to go business that was thriving and allowing us to pay off our salaries and monthly expenses has completely died and I am confident the PPP loan our location received will dwindle to close to zero in the coming months, well ahead of when the government believes these funds should be rationed until. I have done endless research on government programs, have done everything I can on a weekly basis to pivot based on what I believe is to come in the coming days, weeks, and or months in regards to government restrictions and I'm barely staying afloat. Sorry, that's an exaggeration, June was a significant loss for the business (both locations) and July will be a loss as well. Barely staying afloat is far from the truth - I'm terrified of each month and how the consumer will shift their desires. Furthermore, the PPP loan is intended to take my business from losing small to back to where I should be over 4-6 months but anyone who sees what's going on understands that this is the new life of business until early 2021 (if we are lucky). There is no chance indoor dining on any scale in NJ will be allowed anytime soon. I have accepted that.
I'm writing all of this because I'm tired of seeing small businesses be represented by people who don't seem educated, are poorly explaining how bad the situation is and seem like we all demand and want hand outs. I am lucky enough to have been born with intelligence, I'm a great business owner (or was), and I'm struggling daily to cope with running a small business. Explaining every day and every week to friends and family who ask how I'm doing is tough because it isn't something I can nor want to explain in terms of how truly difficult it is. It's also repetitive and I'm tired of being so negative about how things are going. The lack of leadership and any sort of concrete plan on how to actually help small businesses, both at the federal, state and local level is frustrating daily. I am proactively thinking through ways that my cities can help us that is mutually beneficial but get little in return and see no collaboration between government and the people running businesses.
Oh and by the way, I signed a lease 1 year ago and I'm building a 3rd location in Brooklyn that I am financial obligated to. That will also get no government relief (you need to have been open for 1 year to be eligible for any truly beneficial government relief). I try and stay positive as much as possible, but it's tough when you see a 7-9 month path ahead that has nothing but uncertainty and having employees look to you for some stability is pretty tough as well.
My businesses will survive, as will I and I'm confident things will get better next year but that's a long ways away, many weeks and seasons of pivoting away, all after 6 years in which I finally was ready to start paying myself enough to make the past years of non stop grind worth the road I chose when I left poker. That's one other thing I want to relay, I chose this life. I hated poker, knew it after year 4, and spent 2 years trying to win money at something I knew I had talent for so I could start something else. I was fortunate to win a bracelet and even more fortunate to be able to start a successful business a short time after that using the money I made.
This wasn't written that well, not something I was ever great at but I hope this gives people a glimpse at how tough even a successful business owner has it right now. I also want people to understand that there are lots of terrible business owners out there, many of them were ill-prepared all along but survived despite themselves. They chose bad economics, treated their employees poorly, made terrible business decisions, but made money because sometimes luck has a strong role even in business. I don't think the government should focus their attention on these businesses. This pandemic has most likely just accelerated their inevitable fate of failure. The government should be thinking how they can help the businesses who are doing everything they can to keep their employees paid, their rent paid and their customers fed.
That's all I have to say but happy to answer any questions if anyone has anything they'd like to ask. Oh and my business is @hudsontable (www.hudsontable.com). We have an amazing product and the saddest thing is seeing this truly amazing product that my chefs and staff work so hard to create be underappreciated at times. If you are ever in the North Jersey, Philadelphia or soon to be Brooklyn area, have a visit. And if you think I'm a prick on twitter, which is accurate and generally true in life, I'll happily serve you dinner and have a chat with you. I've always been honest, whether that comes off the right way or not.
Thank you for reading.