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Area restaurants make changes to stay afloat
Patrick Tafoya, chef and owner of P30 in Sebastopol puts the finishing touches on dinner plates.
Published: Thursday, February 25, 2010 at 6:51 p.m.
Last Modified: Thursday, February 25, 2010 at 6:51 p.m.
Patrick Tafoya has spent enough time in the restaurant business to know that opening a new eatery at any time is a risky proposition.
Facts
Sonoma County Restaurant Week
WHAT: Restaurant Week is a county-wide event meant to boost dining business during the slow winter period by offering fixed-price, three course menus at $19, $29 and $39 per person.
WHERE: For a list of the 90 participating restaurants, visit www.sonomacountyrestaurantweek.org.
INFORMATION: For more information, contact Justin Hayashi at the Sonoma County Economic Development Board, 565-6411.
But after 15 years working his way from dishwasher to executive chef, the 30-year-old last month opened a restaurant in Sebastopol, pushing a down-home menu of macaroni and cheese, stew and pot roast – nothing priced at more than $15 — as a way to buck the recession that has claimed at least 19 Sonoma County restaurants in the past 14 months, according to real estate and state sources.
Through a combination of networking on Facebook, a blog, and a website, Tafoya and his wife Christine have touted their restaurant, P30, as a destination for “cheap and chic comfort food.”
It's just one of several ways restaurant owners said they're keeping afloat during the recession.
Some have shed staff and reduced operating hours. Others have spun off second establishments to help capture more business and diversify, while still others have closed their doors, only to open a new restaurant at a new location with new offerings.
Tafoya said the success of P30 — launched after a $20,000 retrofit of the former Saint Rose space and supported by personal savings and a handful of friend and family investors — will depend on catering to local customers.
“People still want to go out to dinner,” he said. “They still want to go out and have a nice time. They just don't want to have to empty their pocketbooks as much as they used to.”
That trend, under way throughout the nation, has hurt even established names like Charlie Palmer, owner of Dry Creek Kitchen in Healdsburg and a dozen other restaurants from Las Vegas to New York.
Palmer said he laid off two staff members at the Healdsburg restaurant and is boosting business by offering live jazz and fixed-price menus on weeknights.
“This is one of the toughest times that I've ever experienced from a financial standpoint,” said Palmer.
Several Sonoma County restaurant owners said their receipts were down more than 25 percent from their peak months in 2007.
“No one has seen anything like this slump,” said Jack Mitchell, owner and head chef at Jack and Tony's Restaurant and Whiskey Bar in Santa Rosa's Railroad Square.
Others said slumps brought on by the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and previous to that in the early 1990s may have cut deeper but were less sustained.
This week, in an effort to boost business during a traditionally slow time of year for restaurants and cafes, 90 area restaurants banded together to participate in the first-ever Sonoma County Restaurant Week.
Modeled after San Francisco's annual Dine About Town promotion, the event is meant draw out patrons by offering fixed-priced, three-course menus ranging between $19 to $39 per person. It continues tonight and lasts through Sunday.
At several Santa Rosa establishments Tuesday night, the deal appeared to pay off, resulting in full tables and brisk business.
Among the capacity-crowd at El Coqui, a Puerto Rican restaurant on Mendocino Avenue, which opened in June, Sonoma State University students Meg Carlucci and Jocelyn Leatherman said they have increasingly relied on deals or shared meals to be able to dine out.
“I don't mind spending money at a local business that I want to succeed,” said Carlucci. “I'd rather share a meal of higher quality than go cheaper.”
Patrons of another downtown Santa Rosa restaurant, Bistro 29, where the fixed-price menu was $29 this week, said they still looked at dining out as a treat – albeit a rarer one these days.
“This is Girls Night Out,” said Linda Kachiu, 49, of Santa Rosa, explaining her gathering with friends Cher Dikitanan and Sheila Anderson.
For such occasions, the women said they opt for higher-priced restaurants with entrees in the $25 to $35 range.
“We only do this every three months,” said Dikitanan, 37, of Cotati.
Still, with the volume of customers and value of receipts down significantly over the past 18 months, local restaurant owners have developed ways to stay afloat beyond menu or staffing changes.
Some seek a greater share of the market by opening second establishments.
Examples include Bistro M, opened last month in Windsor by the same owners of the smaller Restaurant Mirepoix, and Jackson's Bar and Oven in Santa Rosa, opened in November by the owners of the nearby restaurant Syrah.
The new ventures have allowed the owners to scale back hours at their original locations and buy food at cheaper bulk prices to stock both restaurants.
They've also offered loyal customers of the original restaurants — both more expensive than their spin-offs — a more modestly priced menu, which results in more frequent dining out, the owners said.
Owning two restaurants “definitely helps pay the bills,” said Bryan Bousquet, owner with her husband Mathew of Mirepoix and Bistro M.
“This period would have been a lot worse for us if we didn't have both restaurants,” said Josh Silver, owner with his wife Regina of Syrah and Jackson's.
The one-off expansion of locally owned restaurants could be a factor in the overall increase in the number of Sonoma County eateries operating since July.
A number of Sonoma County restaurateurs, however, have faced the equally tough decision to close their doors within the past 14 months.
The shuttered restaurants include Manzanita and GG's in Santa Rosa, Eloise in Sebastopol and Odyssey in Windsor, among others.
Each of those closures likely involved a slow coming-to-terms with both financial realities and pride and ego, Jack and Tony's owner Mitchell said.
Early this year Mitchell, 42, opted to close his original restaurant, Sassafras, which operated on North Dutton Avenue for eight years, to focus on his new restaurant and bar in Railroad Square.
Mitchell purchased Sassafras in 2003, and he said he intended to continue operating both businesses when Jack and Tony's opened in February last year.
But starting in late 2008, business at Sassafras had dropped to the point that Mitchell was only able to make overhead about 10 percent of the time, he said.
He maxed out a business line of credit and business credit card to cover payroll and taxes and used $10,000 in personal savings plus a portion of a $20,000 private loan trying to keep the business afloat.
Around the holidays last year, he announced a temporary closure to allow for a remodel of the business into a more casual café-style joint, where breakfast would be served.
But when it came time to pay for that makeover, there was no money left.
“The well was dry,” Mitchell said.
The temporary closure became permanent.
Now Mitchell said he hopes to make it with the 150-seat Jack and Tony's, which just passed its first anniversary.
“If we pass two more years, that will be a legitimate gage (of survival),” he said. Until then, “it's basically hold your breath and after that hopefully you can reap some rewards.”
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