So You Want To Be A Restaurateur?
Crave|March 2017

Before starting your own restaurant, consider the risks. From putting your savings on the line to carving a niche in a fiercely competitive market, Hong Kong restaurateurs tell it like it is, drains and all.

Tiffany Chan
So You Want To Be A Restaurateur?

You love food. It’s your passion. Your mum makes a mean potato salad, marvellous meatloaf and, in your opinion, is the best home cook in the world. Since she passed on her recipes, you have spent long, hot nights cooking for your nearest and dearest, and you’re a decent host. Friends say you can cook. Now you want to share your food and hospitality skills with the world. But what are you passionate about, really? Consuming food, or creating food?

People open F&B businesses for all sorts of reasons: passion, status, money (there is none, most restaurateurs will tell you). But above all, restaurateurs are romantics. At the beginning, they rarely understand that starting a restaurant anywhere, but especially in a fiercely competitive market such as Hong Kong, is a risky business – or, to put it less gently, financial suicide – if you don’t know what you’re doing. And, sometimes, even if you do.

Before starting a restaurant, it’s important to ask yourself this question: are you prepared to lose everything?

“You have to be prepared to not have any time or to take any time off,” warns Sandy Keung, executive chef and founder of Table Seafood and Good BBQ – a depurated seafood-focused restaurant and a chain specialising in sous-vide siu mei, respectively. “I’ve been an accountant and an investment banker. Sure, we had late nights, but never like this. All the times you want to leave, when people are happy celebrating, you’ll be working. If you want a boyfriend, a marriage, have a life, don’t do it. Forget travelling. Forget skiing.”

This story is from the March 2017 edition of Crave.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

This story is from the March 2017 edition of Crave.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

MORE STORIES FROM CRAVEView All
Kitchen Ink
Crave

Kitchen Ink

Professional cooks love their tattoos. Six Hong Kong chefs reveal their body art and the stories behind the ink.

time-read
6 mins  |
March 2017
Seoul Searching
Crave

Seoul Searching

Ryunique’s Tae Hwan Ryu on the art of plating, the scarcity of Korean fine-dining and the importance of sourcing locally.

time-read
4 mins  |
September 2017
Kenneth Wong
Crave

Kenneth Wong

Third-generation owner, Kowloon Soy Co Ltd (Mee Chun Canning Co Ltd).

time-read
2 mins  |
September 2017
Yip Tin
Crave

Yip Tin

Managing director, Yuan’s Soy Sauce (Fu Kee Food Co.)

time-read
2 mins  |
September 2017
In With The Old
Crave

In With The Old

Fermenting, pickling, salt-drying - how age-old food preservation techniques are transforming modern cooking.

time-read
4 mins  |
September 2017
Lofty Ambitions
Crave

Lofty Ambitions

Architects Vince Lim and Elaine Lu used their 1,200-square-foot Happy Valley apartment to declare their design intentions, creating a home inspired by New York loft living, but with the rough edges smoothed off.

time-read
3 mins  |
September 2017
Here's To A Brew-tiful Christmas
Crave

Here's To A Brew-tiful Christmas

For Christmas gifts that look as great as they are functional, Nespresso has the answer.

time-read
1 min  |
December 2017
The Chocolate Man
Crave

The Chocolate Man

The founder of Valrhona’s chocolate school, renowned pastry chef Frédéric Bau is a master of the dark, milk and white arts of cooking with cocoa. 

time-read
5 mins  |
February 2017
Around The World In Hot Chocolate
Crave

Around The World In Hot Chocolate

Served thick and creamy in Italy, with cheese in Colombia and bananas in Panama – discover how people around the world drink their chocolate, and try four recipes to warm the soul.

time-read
2 mins  |
February 2017
Getting Saucy
Crave

Getting Saucy

From shrimp paste in Tai O to chilli sauce in Aberdeen, we meet four sauce-makers responsible for the flavours of Hong Kong.

time-read
2 mins  |
September 2017