One of the most expensive propositions if starting a business is the restaurant... the upfront costs in machinery and equipment, furniture, decorations, advertising, training, permits... supplies, not to mention the foodstuffs you'll be working on, and then the long term financial commitment to a lease ... aarrrrgggh... what a challenge!
Instead of waiting for your ideal to get financed, you can still open a restaurant with no money, no location, no equipment and cast off furniture... with maybe $50 in foodstuffs. Eeeeew... who would eat at such a place?
Me. and apparently countless others. While awaiting Les Schwab to rotate my tires, balance and check them out, a free service for the life of the tires after buying tires from them... I wandered down the barren industrial landscape to an Army Surplus store that is hanging on by selling paint-ball supplies, and then further on a parking lot which apparently served no business. But there in the lot was a sort of canopy, rather hiding an antique vacation trailer, which had been remodeled to serve tacos and burritos and Jarritos.
The clientele I surmise from the plate offered is fairly Mexican, since the tortillas are fresh made and the service is meat, onion, pepper and tomato in tortilla - no cheese and lettuce, no taco de la gringo. Nonetheless, I was satisfied with three tacos and a Jarritos tamarind drink, $5. Now, I am going to guess her profit is more on that $5 than the same thing at $8 if I was at a chain... Her overhead is de nada. (And a nice touch, she knows better than to waste time recycling.)
Another example of this is a restaurant in Seattle, that started in a bit of abandoned warehouse deep in a parking lot, in the side of a hill... speaking of Tamarind, called the Tamarind Tree. With less than ideal circumstances, profits were plowed back into the physical plant, and the entry just gets more attractive each visit. They've opened a 2nd restaurant. The first Vietnamese restaurant I encountered was circa 1976, in the Seattle Public Market. A counter surrounding 4 burners and a reefer. I alternated between two plates on my weekly lunch visits: bbq pork, rice, veggies; and salmon or ling cod, rice veggies. With both always I had cha gio, a cup of chicken noodle soup, and hot jasmine tea. It was called Saigon, but it is gone now.
Perhaps if one finds oneself booted out of the American Dream, one might do well to think like an immigrant. "OK... I've got nothing, I lost everything... but hey, I speak the language... so, what do I do?" Well, never think that money is the problem.
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