In my initial two posts, I was being frank about why I did not like the Flyer/Hand-out approach that you were choosing as a method to advocate for vegan cuisine. My response touched only on the tone and attitude of the flyer as I saw it; how it comes across to me. I assumed that is why you posted what you did; to see what a response might be.
Now let me explain some things, based on a restaurant's unique business model, in a crash course of things to consider. I do hope this may be of help.
Restaurants are different than other businesses in that it isn't about how many sales that a single menu (product) item has, it is how many
seats are filled during the course of a service (breakfast, lunch, or dinner). A restaurant doesn't focus on how many times
one person, with a specific preference, will choose to eat at his/her restaurant. This is because one person may choose to eat out a few times a month, and select a different restaurant some of that time unless they REALLY like my food. So I do not focus on the
same customer that comes in on one, single day, because they won't eat at my restaurant EVERY SINGLE DAY.
What I focus on is my need to sell the same seat, to as many customers I can, for each hour that I'm open, for each day I that I am open, 365 days per year (or however many days a year I open the restaurant).
Look at it this way: Suppose I have a tiny restaurant with a seating for 40 people. Based on average opening hours, if I sell every seat once every thirty minutes, I can seat 400 people per day. That is 146,000 people per year. Now, consider this: Because I have sold meals to every seat, and those meals were ordered and eaten, that means without changing what I do or how I do it, I have 100% capacity.
If I have 100% capacity, the only way to earn more money is to either expand the restaurant's footprint (bigger store or second store), or to increase my profit on each menu item served without losing customers. Increasing profitability can mean anything from raising the price of each menu item by 10 cents, to getting a better deal on my menu ingredients, or increase efficiency of kitchen and front of store staff after decreasing personnel on my payroll, or become more efficient with utilities (water, electricity, gas), etc., or all of the above.
As a business, then, my biggest problem would be a lack of profitability due to empty seats. As a business person who wants to survive, THAT is when I would seriously look at expanding my menu (or even changing my menu) as one method to fill those empty seats. As with any business, part of what one does is to sell what the customer wants, not what I want to sell to the customer.
In order to effect a change to make Vegan offerings commonplace along the Camino, you need to understand the above. It is also important to know whether or not you are talking to the owner of, for example, a barbecue joint or other specialty cuisine which fills seats
BECAUSE of its specialty, and whether it is truly practical to target that restaurant.
A restaurant that has been around for a while has an owner that knows and understands business. S/he understands their target market, what food items or offerings by his competitors siphon off his customers, and if gaining those lost customers can be done profitably.
A stranger comes into my store. This stranger is a foreign visitor/tourist passing through my town. The stranger hasn't ordered anything. The stranger hands me a flyer which informs me that I am not serving a specific type of cuisine and that I need to add vegan menu items or she will eat elsewhere.
Furthermore, that stranger, who has no idea about my restaurant business and financials, insists that I am missing out on a business opportunity. If I MIGHT be interested, or am trying to be polite, I ask the stranger some important questions like:
- How I would need to rearrange my kitchen to avoid vegan foods from being cross contaminated with meat or dairy or eggs during prep and cooking?
- How to arrange product storage in my limited cooler and freezer and pantry space to make it vegan acceptable?
- Can I use the same pans, stove, fryer, knives, hot holding and cold holding equipment, etc, for both vegan and non-vegan (I am somewhat familiar with Kosher requirements so I ask if this is the same with vegan)?
- Can I use pre-packaged foods from a factory which also processes animal products?
- Is there an extra expense to buying vegan ingredients?
- Is organic part of the vegan requirement?
- ETC, etc, etc
The stranger speaks so little Spanish, that there is no hope of communication about these questions. More importantly, I get the sense that the stranger has no real knowledge of the restaurant business, marketing, or even what a simple menu ingredient costing might be.
So what I am faced with is someone telling me something about my business that they are woefully ignorant about. Heck, they cannot even speak my language enough to give me a proper business pitch even if they had that information.
In the meantime, I have a full house of customers waiting to buy what I am already selling. The stranger, on the other hand, has given me a flyer that includes an ultimatum. I hope that this clarifies why I would crumple the flyer and escort you to the door of my establishment and tell you to feel free to open your own restaurant. I want you to see your demands as I would see them from the perspective of a business owner.
So what can perhaps eventually make a change? Awareness. NOT to a restaurant owner, but to fellow vegans and vegetarians. Produce and distribute a flyer to fellow non meat eaters on Camino. Ask them, when they pay their bill for a meal or drinks, to gently compliment the owner for his hospitality, and that as a non-meat eater, they appreciate the restaurants help in making a special meal.
That does two immediate things:
1. It makes the owner appreciative of a pilgrim with a great attitude of gratitude.
2. It lets the owner know in a non-confrontational manner, that yet another non-meat eater/customer was served.
IF the owners get enough customers, it is my guess that they will make some effort to add more options for non-meat eaters on the menu. A flyer, or a transient advocate of veganism, cannot accurately make a marketing assessment that is meaningful. What
is a meaningful marketing indicator, are the number of individual customers asking if the restaurant can prepare a non-meat meal off menu. That is guerrilla marketing potential that a restaurant owner will notice
If in the course of 3 months I get 100 requests for non meat meals, I am going to pay attention. If I get a transient stranger handing me a flyer with demands, not so much.
So do the flyer. . just do it for a different group.
You really can’t talk to davebugg like that; he’s a Camino institution and his opinions are generous, thoughtful and much valued. Your suggestion is naive and pretty much guaranteed to generate a fairly strong sense of ill will amongst the Spanish community. Pay close attention to Magwood’s post; it is far and away the most diplomatic approach.
- and ... this is a forum and the meaning of that word is "a meeting or medium where ideas and views on a particular issue can be exchanged". So when you made your post you invited us to respond and exchange our ideas about your Vegan flyer concept.
. . . . . . . . .
I think not.
