C’mon Over for Dins

Watching the food world reinvent themselves was bound to happen. For a restaurant to stay in business when they can only accommodate 25% of capacity is not a win. Some have attempted to do delivery but many of them are not set up to do that or have the true skills to do that. Creativity is abound.

We have been in NYC just a few days am have been out. The restaurants are so thrilled to have us there as they always have. There will be some strong nimble survivors but it is not easy making the numbers work.

Many chefs and just people who have worked in the industry have started making food, bread, or pizza from their homes. They have created their own mini home restaurants.

Years ago there were a bunch of start-ups that had created marketplaces between an at-home chef and the local neighborhood. There was a pick-up component and then delivery began too. So if I had made a double batch of spaghetti and meatballs I could post it and let people know and people could buy it. This was not something the FDA applauded.

Once the Government got wind of this, everything was shut down. You can’t sell food to people from your personal kitchen, they want to make sure the place is sanitary. The times have changed.

In Los Angeles, one county gave people the ability to get a permit to operate micro-home kitchens. Pull a permit and get certified by the public health office. This is game-changing.

This will be a whole new type of restaurant. Small, communal, and more than likely amazing food. They have to be good to get customers just like restaurants have in the past.

Again….not great for Commercial real estate. If it works there, we will begin to see shifts in other places too. If we want some of the restaurants back then rents will have to go down dramatically. Taxes have to change for restaurants to succeed and pay their employees fairly. The cost of running a restaurant was killing the industry pre-Covid.

We will begin to see a super creative group of people rise up from the ashes in the food world. It is inevitable. We all like to eat out.