A recent letter to the Cape Argus by reader Merle Kaplan about rising prises and decreasing levels of service in Cape Town over the Festive season was food for thought. Our response to her letter, sent to the Cape Argus, was as follows:
“While not a restaurant owner, but a frequent restaurant user, I cannot agree with Ms Kaplan about price increases. I want to commend our restaurants for holding their prices in these difficult times - they probably have no choice anyway. I must immediately exclude the mad prices charged for New Year’s Eve dinners and entertainment, with up to R 2 000 per head charged for 3 or 4 courses, 2 free glasses of bubbly, and some entertainment.
A sensitive point raised is that of staff. If Ms Kaplan had any idea about how difficult it is to run a hospitality business, then she would be more sympathetic to the staffing problems our industry experiences. Realities are no-shows of staff - something else comes up or they want to go out with their friends, who are all on holiday. Staff move from one job to another on the basis of a few Rands, without giving the required notice period, as per their contracts and the Department of Labour’s Sectoral Determination for the Hospitality Industry. Students are a fantastic source of help, but they need to be trained. Students do not appear to be as “hungry” as they used to be, and they too would prefer to spend the Christmas and New Year’s days with their family and friends and forego the income. Unfortunately not arriving at work is not a “dismissible offence”, as Ms Kaplan claims - one can issue 3 letters of warning and then hold a disciplinary hearing before one can even contemplate firing an employee. Then the restaurant owner is still guaranteed to be called to the CCMA, or the Department of Labour.
But hardest of all, is the extreme short-term nature of customers’ decision-making. Last minute bookings, or arrivals without a booking, must be a restaurateurs’ worst nightmare, as they cannot predict how many customers they will have each day - this affects planning for stocks and staffing. Restaurants experience good and bad days, and there is no pattern to predict when they will be busy and when not.
I also think that after a quiet year due to the credit crunch, during which everything went at a slower pace, it is hard for restaurants and their staff to pick up the pace and deal with full restaurants again. All our businesses have become leaner, due to the credit crunch. Cape Town’s hospitality industry must get out of the credit crunch mode, and must gear up to face the busiest June and July ever during the World Cup.”
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com
