How restaurant owners are rising to the challenges of COVID-19

COVID-19 has changed the world. As the foodservice industry closes out 2020 and looks ahead to the Q1 of 2021, we are preparing for the ongoing challenges of COVID-19. Restaurant owners have had to navigate uncertain times and pivot in new ways over the past year. This past October at the Restaurants Rise conference powered by MUFSO, we got the opportunity to interview several restaurant operators about how they’ve risen to the challenges presented by the pandemic. Our speakers were:

• Cindy Keys, Director of Purchasing for Snooze Eatery
• Nate Weir, VP of Culinary for Modern Restaurant Concepts
• Caleb Benton, Director of Operations for Gastamo Group

We took away some key lessons for other restaurant operators out there to use as we all continue to navigate COVID-19 challenges.

Think differently for delivery

One thing Cindy Keys and Nate Weir both talked about was creating offerings that worked specifically for delivery. At Snooze Eatery, they took note of what kinds of foods people were ordering for delivery, and began offering kits that matched, such as their Taco Tuesday Kit. Modern Restaurant Concepts restaurants Modern Market and Lemonade both offered kits too, as well as “grocery boxes” with ingredients from their kitchens.

Another great example of thinking differently for delivery is how Lemonade, a cafeteria-style restaurant, changed up their menu to be more delivery-friendly. For one new menu item, they took a chicken salad that was offered as a scoop on your plate for dine-in, and paired it with a bread and a sauce they also offered individually, and created a delicious chicken salad sandwich.

“I think everyone had to, at the blink of an eye, think outside the box and adapt very quickly and pivot, and try to adjust to whatever the new normal was going to look like,”

Cindy Keys, Director of Purchasing for Snooze Eatery

Get creative

All three of our panelists talked about how they’ve had to get creative during the pandemic. Modern Market is known for frequently adding exciting new menu items. So at a time when they couldn’t easily have cross-team meetings and trainings on new recipes, they had to find new ways to make that happen. One way they did it was by using existing ingredients in new ways, to be sure they could get new menu items right with minimal training. And when they did add new SKUs, they chose items that would do well for delivery – like chicken thighs, which travel better than chicken breasts.

Caleb Benton talked about how the Gastamo Group thought about how to continue to incorporate hospitality into everything they were doing during the pandemic, because that’s what they’ve always been about – and because that’s what customers are looking for from restaurants during this time. They had to get creative about how to make their restaurants a place of escape during such a chaotic time, and think about how to add the hospitality element into pick-up interactions as well.

“We’ve seen what a tremendous difference hospitality makes for guests right now. We’re trying to make memorable experiences in really stressful times,”

Caleb Benton, Director of Operations for Gastamo Group

Partner with your community & use social media to stay connected

It’s no surprise that community support and connection came up a lot in our conversations with these three restaurant operators. Benton talked about how helpful the Colorado Restaurant Association has been, and Weir talked about how having great relationships with their delivery partners has helped them.

Keys talked about how they stayed active on social media during this time. Their brand presence was already strong in the community and staying connected that way helped. They also celebrated Earth Day by promoting their carbon neutral commitment, which received a lot of positive response from the community.

Every restaurant is facing their own unique COVID-19 challenges – but there is a lot of common ground, too. We hope these tips will be helpful to other restaurant owners in the coming months as we continue to get through this time.

“Good things can come out of this situation too, if you’re willing to stay open-minded and embrace the chaos a little bit,”

Nate Weir, VP of Culinary for Modern Restaurant Concepts