Something clicked

Two years ago I met a restaurant owner, and he told me about his rocky path to success.  He said for years his business muddled along until one day people came in droves and kept coming back.

2013 for Standing Sushi Bar is the year when something “clicked.”  Since January, the 8 Queen Street branch has been packed out nightly (except Sundays, that’s another nut to crack), the Marina Bay Link Mall location has boomed up, and Tanuki Raw is happy hour madness.  Knock on wood this continues; it’s as if a piano, cargo truck, and building were all lifted off my shoulders… still leaving a monkey on my back.  (That may not have made sense to anyone but me :D)

So why did business pick up so dramatically?

My guess is a combination of promotions, ads, publicity, and increasing brand awareness.  Sounds like obvious stuff, but the confluence of events necessary to reach a tipping point (I hate myself when I use that phrase, but it’s applicable) came through some planning and luck.

Promotions – I had toyed with various incentives to get folks in during off-peak periods, but at the beginning of the year I decided there was no point in half-assing around with weak promotions.  My philosophy is, it’s attractive to the diner if it’s making you (the business) feel uncomfortable.

Ads / Getting the word out there – Of course I wanted people to know about the new promotions, so I spent more on ads and made it a point to let people know in e-mail about what new things we were offering.  It was great that with Facebook ads and attractive offerings, people helped by sharing the information along their network.

Publicity – There was a good amount of press (traditional and online) focused on Tanuki Raw since it recently opened.  Almost every article referenced that it was by the folks behind the Japanese restaurant Standing Sushi Bar, which brought renewed attention to SSB at the same time as we were launching the new happy hour and weeknight concepts.

Increasing brand awareness – After 3 years, we’re not the new kid on the block anymore.  I would hope plenty of people have heard about Standing Sushi Bar!  I think that people have, and many of them may have made assumptions about the restaurant (too far, no seats, etc.) so never considered coming.  After seeing things shared by their friends and reading the name in the press, it may have been the nudge they needed to check us out.

I always wondered whether it was true what my friend said.  Seems like it.

On martinis and 2013

It's funny to think the strongest martinis I've had in a year have been from a sushi bar. We just launched a happy hour at the Standing Sushi Bar Marina Bay Link Mall branch so  being a good owner (read: food and drink sampler) I went down there to see how things went. 3 drinks later I was in bed before midnight, which never happens, and now am awake at 4+ in the morning.

So martinis in a sushi bar underground in a business district shopping mall. Is this something that is actually going to work? Will people come to drink? Who knows, but since the core business at Raffles Place and the financial centre is all during the weekday lunchtime, it allows us to do whatever the heck we want during the evening service.

Standing Sushi Bar Marina Bay Financial Centre happy hour

The start of the year has been interesting; perhaps full of a "I'm going to do what I want to do" spirit. In the past I think I worried about whether the staff were agreeable to my decisions, but these days as long as I "own the decision" then I'm comfortable plowing forward. Maybe it's a checks and balances thing with the staff being cautious while I lean towards recklessness.

Anyway, on to other matters! Tanuki Raw has been getting a fair bit of attention, which is pretty awesome. "Build it and they will come," as the line goes in Field of Dreams. Though it's more like, "Give them oysters and martinis and they will come."

Tanuki Raw interior at Orchard Central

The balcony over Orchard Road at Tanuki Raw

Some of the press write-ups so far:

• Business Times - Innovative Creations
  
• Business Times - What To Look Out For in 2013
• I-S Magazine - Happiest Oyster Hour
• TimeOut Singapore - Martini and Raw Tapas Bar
• CNN Travel - Small Plates, Big Appeal
• Hungrygowhere - Oysters!
• 8 Days - New and Noted
• 8 Days - Raw and Real
• Honeycombers - Hot New Tables
• Great New Places - Culinary

I could use a drink...

Tanuki has finally opened and thank goodness it's a bar since I could sure use a drink.

We're well into our soft-launch period and it's been great receiving feedback from the folks that have dropped in.  We need to tweak our menu to make a better delineation between what the Japanese items are versus the "fusion" ones and also which dishes are good for sharing and which are meant as individual entree size.

Staff is trained up, bar is stocked, the point of sale machine is finally working (on the first night it completely failed... definitely Murphy's Law), and the chefs are able to consistently execute the food items well!

So what's next... time to start beating the drums and make people aware that we exist.  We're also adding more items to the menu and gearing up to offer some lunch sets for the weekday office crowd.

Come on in, have a drink, and enjoy the holidays!

Sometimes staffing makes you smile

Most of what you read about staffing in Singapore centers around frustration - the difficulty in finding staff, the trouble with hiring good staff, and the limitations imposed by the foreigner quota.

Once in awhile you get a note that makes you feel warm.

"Hi Sir, you make me cry now, you know..anyhow the result is...but really I wanna say that THANKS SIR SO MUCH.

Hoping good news come to me and I'll work for Sir in the very next day!
Good night sir"

---

It's an applicant from Vietnam who has recently finished studying and has been on a short trainee stint at a restaurant here in Singapore.

It's refreshing to see the enthusiasm in her message.  I hope her permit gets approved!

Introducing Tanuki Raw

Three years have passed since throwing open the doors of Standing Sushi Bar.  It’s been a whirlwind of a ride; setting up branches at Queen Street and Marina Bay, opening in Jakarta, Indonesia, and putting in chairs for people to sit.  Three years of sake, sushi, and Japanese food.  It’s been heartening to see all the support from you all (yes, dear reader, I make the assumption that if you read this blog, you’re a supporter!) and there are exciting plans lined up for Standing Sushi Bar.

I’ve always envisioned Standing Sushi Bar as a modern restaurant serving straightforward tasty Japanese food.  We get a little experimental here and there, but as people would expect, we stick with Japanese.

The idea of a martini paired with oysters and sashimi has been gnawing at me.  There is something delightful in the mix of a crisp, chilled martini cutting through the brine and mineral bite of an oyster, and what’s better at bringing out the pure bright taste of sashimi than a bone dry martini?

I’m excited to introduce Tanuki Raw.  Inspired by the playfulness and affability of Seattle institutions such as the Walrus & Carpenter and Emmett Watson’s Oyster Bar, along with cocktails of yesteryear from ultra-hip Williamsburg’s Maison Premiere and Manhattan’s Mermaid Inn, Tanuki Raw focuses on delivering classic drinks exceptionally well combined with fun inventive food in a welcoming spot.

Tanuki is a mythological Japanese creature.  A playful trickster fond of pranks endowed with shapeshifting ability and a set of really big balls.

We’re opening late next week and I can hardly wait.

Learn more about Tanuki Raw on Facebook
Say hi to @tanukiraw on Twitter
Visit www.tanukibar.com

Menu: Pictures or No Pictures?

We're in the midst of refreshing our menu at Standing Sushi Bar Queen Street.  Photos of all the items have been taken, pricing has been determined, and the main thing left to do is layout the menu and then print it.

We've been having a lot of discussions about whether or not the menu should contain pictures for every food item.  I vote against having pictures in menus.  In my opinion it makes a menu unwieldy because of the number of pages and it also looks cheesy and messy.  Of course the flip side of the argument is that people won't have to ask service crew as many questions as they can just assume that the item ordered will correspond with the photo.  Some people also believe that seeing pictures of the food make people hungrier or want to "eat with their eyes."

I've decided to forego pictures on our main menu this time for a few reasons, the primary one being speed (trying to adjust the layout with pictures meant starting over a bunch of times) and trying to make the overall presentation look "cleaner."  I also like the idea of having people be pleasantly surprised by ordering the food (in text) and being happy with the visual presentation of the food once it gets to their table.

What's your opinion?  Do you prefer pictures on a menu or you're fine without it?  Does it make a huge difference to you?  Why do you think Western restaurants get away without having pictures on the menu compared to Japanese restaurants?

Singapore's Formula 1 Night Race

The Formula One weekend is coming to a close here in Singapore.  There's always lots of buzz around this weekend; tons of people come to town, the hotels do a booming business, and there's performances, parties, and a general lively atmosphere around the track area.

It's exciting to see the Singapore skyline and city streets receive so much attention and there's no doubt that it generates tourist interest.  The government are big proponents of F1.

However, it's not so rosy for business.  I was looking at the past Formula 1 weekends and comparing it with this weekend.  In each case, the business dropped by over 50%.  People are reluctant to come into the city centre as there are lots of road closures resulting in traffic and confusion, and also a sense that things will be too crazy around here so it's better to stay away.

Anecdotes from others indicate that I'm not the only one who feels like business is hurt by F1.

Ah well, what to do?

Maybe Katy Perry will drop by for some sushi before she jets off.  I heard she was playing tonight.

Sushi and Japanese food delivery begins!

Ever since opening our branch at Marina Bay Link Mall I've wanted to do delivery.  However setting up an online ordering service coupled with the additional delivery staff proved difficult.  There were existing services that would do the delivery for us, but they took at least 30% of the sale and the implementation was somewhat clunky, so after previous experiences with them I decided to pass.

Finally we are able to start delivery!  Found a good, responsive partner in Hastify, so as of today we are now doing deliveries to folks in Marina Bay Financial Centre and once that's smooth we will expand to more buildings in Raffles Place (and then the world!!!).

Order online, get sushi delivered, and eat!

Next time you're swamped in the office or don't feel like going out, simply go to
http://hastify.com/standing-sushi-bar/marina-bay
and we'll bring our Japanese food to you.  Sushi, sashimi, lunch sets, oh my! 

Beat the Clock at Marina Bay!

Recently an assistant / intern joined our team and it has been great having him help out on a myriad of tasks.  One of the things he came up with was the "Beat the Clock" promotion.  In order to stimulate a little appetite and drinking we have introduced this at our Marina Bay Link Mall branch.  So if you're hankering for some sake, beer, and snacks in the Raffles Place area, come down to Standing Sushi Bar Marina Bay Link Mall!

Beat the Clock snack menu at Marina Bay Link Mall. Onigiri, sushi, temaki, salmon skin, and more!

Tuesday - Friday from 6 PM - 8 PM we are offering our snack menu + a glass of sake for a price of whatever time it is you order.  So if it's 7:15 PM then it's 7.15 SGD for a glass of sake and the snack!  Add 3 SGD to it for an Asahi beer or Heineken too!

My personal favorite is the kawa ebi.  Deep-fried shrimp which goes really well with beer.

Scheduled Facebook Posts

Recently Facebook added the “Schedule Posts” feature to Facebook Pages.  There have been other social media management tools that would allow you to do it, but now it’s a native Facebook feature so every page admin can use it.

It’s great; now I can line up content for the week… such as when I was in Hong Kong this past weekend the little Facebook bot was putting up posts related to the Night Festival on the Standing Sushi Bar page.

It frees me from bookmarking information that I want to share later; in the past I would take a clip of information and put it in OneNote and hopefully remember that I wanted to post it on a specific date or time.  It was a manual, kludgy process.

Now if I find something interesting I can put it into Facebook immediately and have it publish later.  The feature also makes it easier to create a series of posts as part of a campaign or event.

So yay Facebook for adding it!

One thing that isn’t immediately apparent – you might want to view or edit which posts are scheduled for publishing.  To do that you go to the top of your Facebook page, where the Admin panel is, and click “Edit Page.”  It shows a dropdown with “Use Activity Log” as one of the choices.  Click that and it lists what posts are upcoming.

Scheduled post on Standing Sushi Bar page

Night Owl Sushi

I was out of town this weekend in Hong Kong so was sad to miss the first weekend of Singapore's Night Festival 2012.  Thankfully it will happen again on August 31 and September 1 so I'll get a chance to see all the exhibits.

Since the museum asked the restaurants to stay open until 2 AM, I thought it would be fun to try out a new menu item - the Night Owl sushi roll that contained Red Bull as its base ingredient.  I think it's the first-time anyone has made sushi with Red Bull... well, I couldn't find any other mention of it on the internet!

Over the past two days we had over thirty orders for the Night Owl sushi.  Looks like people are willing to give Red Bull-based food products a try!

We'll be running the same promotions again this coming weekend so if you're curious, come in for a visit!

Taipei Scouting

I’m sitting on a flight to Taipei while writing this after a sleepless night spent upgrading my laptop to Windows 8.  I guess there’s enough of a computer geek left in me that I felt compelled to install the latest operating system on my computer even though I knew it would likely cause a few issues that would keep me awake.  After all, one shouldn’t mess with the computer they’re about to take on a trip.  But yes, here I am typing happily (and tiredly) away on a PC running Windows 8 (the full version) and Office 2013 Preview.  I feel like standing up on the plane and announcing to people this momentous achievement yet I doubt anyone else will care.

Anyway, I’m off to Taiwan again and am looking forward to trying out a couple restaurants.  Whatever city I go to, I make it a point to check out what’s happening in the Japanese restaurant or raw bar scene.  In Taipei the Mitsui group (some big Japanese restaurant conglomerate) has transformed a fish market into something quite cool – it’s still a fish market for wholesalers but scattered amidst the market are various food stalls, including a raw bar and what looks to be an upscale standing sushi bar!  The restaurant is called Addiction Aquatic Development.  Taipei Times has a review of it.

(Now that I've landed and found internet connection, here are a few photos from when I went to the restaurant this afternoon - it was packed for 4:30 PM on a Sunday!  Guess the Taiwanese have no issues with standing and eating.  It makes me want to toss out all the chairs over at Marina Bay).

I’ve been on a raw oyster kick lately and after typing in the words “Taipei Oyster Bar” to Google, I didn’t get that many results back.  The main one seems to mention a place called, straightforwardly, Oyster Bar, located at the fancy schmancy Bella Vitta mall in the Xinyi area (near Taipei 101).  It seems like the restaurant is part of the food court, which is kind of an interesting place to be serving raw oysters.  Hopefully I won’t be too worn down from the flight and will navigate my way through the subway system to city hall station and find this oyster bar.

I wonder if suppliers are able to bring in oysters more easily (or at cheaper prices) to Taiwan than they are to Singapore.

Looks like I'm not the only one...

Human nature has one feeling better when one knows that other people are going through the same problems.  The Straits Times has been running a few articles about the difficulty in finding locals to work jobs in F&B.

Excerpt from the Straits Times article on August 18, 2012:

"...we are bringing in a substantial investment from outside Singapore to create three food and beverage concepts that will, in time, be distributed around the world. However, we are going to have to rethink this plan because there is a serious manpower crunch in Singapore. Manpower within this industry has always been an issue but it is certainly getting worse rather than better.

I would love to hire many Singaporeans to work in my businesses - that is, if they turn up. When advertisements are answered and interviews scheduled, the Singaporeans who put up their names for jobs do not reply. If they do reply and an interview is scheduled, they do not turn up.

If they do start work, chances are high that they will get a medical certificate and in a short time quit in search of the next best thing.

We have 17 positions available at our first restaurant which is scheduled to open in three weeks. At present, we have only three Singaporean full-time employees. The new ruling on foreign workers quota does not allow us to employ the many qualified foreigners available to do the job.

Wherever the Singaporeans looking for these jobs are, we need them to step forward now. How can we complain about service standards when there is no standard to begin with?

Lara Jay Hequet"

Visit the Museum!

It's time to get a little culture!  The powers-that-be running the museums in Singapore have provided free entry to Singapore citizens and permanent residents during the month of August.  On certain days (August 24, 25, 31, and September 1) admission is free for everyone including tourists!

On those special August 24, 25, 31, and September 1 dates, the Night Festival will be going on.  The museums (including the Singapore Art Museum wing at 8 Queen Street) will be open until 2 AM.  We don't want to miss out on the fun so Standing Sushi Bar at 8 Queen Street will also be open until that late hour!

As part of the celebration we will be offering a special menu as well as some fun deals on sake ($4 for a biiiiiiig big glass) and more!  We've also created a special "Night Owl" sushi which will definitely be one-of-a-kind.  We figure people staying up that late are definitely a little edgy so we've come up with a sushi roll that contains Red Bull.  Ready to power you through until morning!

Night Owl sushi roll.  Contains a few special ingredients as well as Red Bull.  Only available for a limited time at Standing Sushi Bar 8 Queen Street

Night Watch exhibit (SAM at 8Q)

From past experience, the Night Festival brings out a ton of people, so reservations are recommended!  It's a great time, so get it on your calendar!