A few weeks ago I visited my favorite restaurant. The sign on the door noted regular business hours of 11 am to 8 pm. It was 7:30. The restaurant was closed. If the sign says you’re open for business then you should be open for business.
Today I found out that this favorite restaurant of mine is closed for good.
The restaurant that I speak of made gourmet sausages. It truly was amazing. Best sausages I’ve ever had.
I was their best customer. I got to know the shopkeeper very well as I was in there quite often. The shopkeeper always told me that the restaurant wouldn’t be able to survive much longer. He always had a different theory as to why business was bad. The main theory was that the location was bad but there were always other excuses.
I had my own personal theory as to why the restaurant couldn’t survive – The restaurant was hardly ever open. There were many occasions that I visited only to find the doors locked during what was supposed to be regular business hours. Not only that, the restaurant never opened on Sundays. The restaurant was in a plaza containing 6 other specialty restaurants and cafes. All the others opened on Sundays and were always open during the posted business hours. All except for the restaurant in question.
I asked the shopkeeper about this. He told me that it wasn’t worth the cost of operating the establishment to open on Sundays and that he often would close early if there weren’t enough customers coming in.
I think this was dead wrong.
Do you ever notice that malls stay open to the last minute? Do you ever find the door to your bank locked even a minute prior to the posted closing time? Does a movie theatre ever turn you away because you were the only customer to show up for a screening? The answer to all of these questions is no.
Businesses, especially new businesses like my favorite restaurant, must stay open during regular business hours even if it means operating at a loss. A new business must build customer loyalty and goodwill and this cannot be achieved by locking the doors. every customer that is locked out could be a lost customer. That lost customer could have been a future repeat customer. But you will never know if the doors to your business remain locked.
Are you open for business? Then stay open!
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