8/26/09

From theory to practice (or the common wish to own a restaurant)


How many of us have ever thought of starting/owning a restaurant?

Setting up a restaurant is maybe one of the most common ideas one can ever have, when it comes to imagining what kind of business would be "fun" to set up. Though - how many of the individuals that ever think about it, ever take a first step to making it a reality? Very, very few ... and that´s ok. If launching and running a restaurant would be so easy, I guess the "magic" or "sexyness" of doing it would be probably gone.

It seems like I am not an exception to the rule. Since a couple of weeks my housband and I decided to give a try to the plan of opening a restaurant in Bogotá and invited a group of friends to join the effort.


How do you do it when you (and your partners) hava a full time job and at the end of the day you are not an expert in the business? Well, we came with the idea of hiring a full time project manager for two months to help us "hands on" to design a business plan. Yes, a business plan Scary word for an entrepreneur. But certainly a needed exercise. Sure we do not want fo fall into the mistake of "too big thinking too early" but if we want to jump into something new, we better reduce (read well: reduce, not eliminate) the chances of failing.

That`s the news.
October shall be the final decision taken (if we move on doing the "real" investment and opening the doors to the public).



The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It's as simple as that. A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer - Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari and Chuck E. Cheese's