This morning I did a final walk-through and returned my keys to the place in Ballard where I had a tiny restaurant from November 2004 until December 2008. I have reason to believe I'll get back most of my security deposit, though you never know until the check arrives.
I spent most of last week cleaning and finding homes for the equipment. Two of the sinks went to Magnolia, and the third sink, the griddle and the stove are headed for Morocco. I moved the reach-in over to my kitchen on Capital Hill where it's going to come in handy next summer, and the walk-in has been disassembled and the panels are also sitting in my current kitchen until I find someone who wants to buy them.
My restaurant experience there was valuable, though it didn't turn out the way I expected. I had great systems, great margins, fair prices, and very tasty food, but I just never managed to get many customers in the door. I think part of the problem was that a vegetarian place needs to be a destination place, and that building was just too small to justify a trip from across town, no matter how good the food. I'm also not much of a networker, and that made it hard to build up much of a clientele. And my employees who did the best job doing market prep were the wrong people to be running the store, and after a point the markets just became more important.
I have no regrets about the venture, though. It was instrumental in helping me pay off a heavy debt load, which has dramatically improved the quality of my life. And it taught me that I'm probably not cut out to be a restauranteur, which was an important lesson to learn.
It really did feel good to hand back those keys and drive away...
1 comment:
I'm a little sad it won't be around but it was too far for me to justify driving there since I'm in north of Seattle. See you at the market.
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