Making Bigger Bets

Homegrown Provincial Restaurants Are Confidently Taking a Gamble by Entering Manila’s Flourishing Dining Scene

- Tricia Morente

Having run local concept Blue Posts Boiling Crabs & Shrimps for four years now, and the now-defunct Blue Post bar in Davao for 25 years, Anthony Ang is not exactly a newcomer to the local F&B industry. He is used to running restaurants and operating a fast system. But he admits to not being totally prepared for the change in tempo to a more upbeat rhythm when he expanded his brand and opened in Metro Manila last year. “You need to really love challenges to open in Manila kasi hindi ka mauubusan,” he relates, half-jokingly.

Successfully launching a metro-based restaurant in cities like Davao and Cebu is quite a familiar tale. But stories of the reverse are few and far between. Growing one’s footprint in Metro Manila has always been a double-edged sword: You have a population of 12.8 million with growing purchasing power, but then there’s the cut-throat competition that is definitely not for the weak-willed restaurateur.

It’s no wonder, then, that it took Zubuchon six years (it launched in Cebu in June 2011) to finally open a branch in the country’s capital. It was a decision that owner Joel Binamira shares he “did not take lightly.”

“Manila is a much larger market than Cebu, with eight to 10 times the population, and definitely more competition in terms of restaurant choices,” explains Binamira, such that even when as early as 2012 he had been receiving several requests a month to either open a branch or allow a franchise to operate Zubuchon in the mega city, it took “another two years before we finally found the right place to open our first branch, and attach roasting pits,” he says.

TALES FROM THE FRONT