Restaurants: a quiet reopening
Restaurants are gradually reopening but the Journal found there wasn’t a rush for Monday’s lunchtime. Time Out’s J.P. Karwacki (he seems to be the only writer on the local version of that paper) lists 13 restos which have closed permanently.
René 09:49 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
In the east end, it’s anecdotal but i’ve seen more restaurants announcing that they will continue to offer take out/delivery only and not open their dining room.
It might depend on the size of the restaurant but it doesn’t seem to be worth it…
CE 10:04 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
I work with restaurants and most of my clients are on the smaller side. Most of them said it’s not worth opening the dining room if they can only use half their tables. If you have 8, that’s only 4 tables, you can’t keep a waiter paid with that.
DeWolf 10:39 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
Yesterday I passed by a number of restaurants that are still doing takeout only, but which have added outdoor tables thanks to the loosened terrasse regulations. I imagine we’ll see more and more of that over the summer.
dwgs 11:18 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
I heard a rumour yesterday that the Bar B Barn downtown might live on in a new location where a different restaurant is going out of business.
Ian 12:57 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
I wish ill on no-one but I’d be happy to her Bar-B-Barn found new digs.
Bill Binns 14:13 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
This is going to be rough. Montreal restaurants tend to be tiny and badly overstuffed with tables. At least some of these places should consider doubling their prices if they halve the seats. Some people can pay and I’m sure there’s pent up demand. You can look at it as helping your favorite places survive without endangering your own health. Could work in the short term until (maybe) we get a handle on this thing.
I also think some of these places may not be doing all that bad with delivery only. There is a place Ontario called “MacBar and Fromage” that has something like four “restaurants” operating out of the same kitchen.
Ephraim 16:20 on 2020-06-23 Permalink
Interestingly enough on the 10th of June, UberEats got out of the ghost kitchen business. Meanwhile there is a new startup called CloudKitchens as well as a few other ghost/cloud kitchens out there, like GhostKitchensCanada. With the delivery business, the front end is a lot less important. but the 30% that UberEats takes off the top is a real business killer.
Bill Binns 09:03 on 2020-06-24 Permalink
I will (usually) not order food from a place unless I have eaten inside the restaurant. There was a scandal in France a few years ago about Asian delivery places serving food that had been made in private apartments in disgusting conditions.
Maxim Baru 12:31 on 2020-06-24 Permalink
i think the closure of Café Coop Touski is going to have ripple effects throughout the non profit / community group / arts universe in mtl, who used it extensively. people in my circles were sort of surprised it closed without at least another attempt at fundraising like they did for their new building.
Kevin 22:14 on 2020-06-24 Permalink
I think Touski will come back in another form when they’re actually allowed to deal with customers.