Restaurants Are Scrambling To Survive. How One Chicago Place Is Keeping Afloat On Carry Out

The past month has been a nightmare for many of the 1 million restaurants in America.

A number have closed in the wake of COVID-19, some for good, like Momentum Coffee near Houston.

Others tried to stay open by offering limited menus, only to shut down for the duration, like Lucky Strike in New York.

Some, like Commander’s Palace and Saba in New Orleans, are selling their wares in grocery stores. Others, including Panera Bread, have become grocery stores by offering the products they get from farmers and vendors.

In Chicago, Barry Sorkin, the co-founder of Smoque BBQ, is staying afloat on carry out and delivery, although the latter has been a headache (more on that below).

He estimates Smoque, which has received multiple Michelin Bib Gourmand awards as a good value and regularly makes lists of the country’s best BBQ spots, can survive through the rest of 2020 even if restaurants can’t reopen their dining rooms.

It could possibly earn a small profit.

“Our restaurant sales are as good as they’ve ever been right now,” he says of the 13-year-old spot.

Yet, he knows that something can go wrong health wise at any time, whether a spike in cases in Chicago, or illness among his own employees. “Right now we’re faring very well, but I also think it’s incredibly fragile,” he says.

Maintaining that equilibrium has required a complete redeployment of Smoque’s operations. Here’s a look at what he’s done.

Reconfigure the layout. In normal times, Smoque, on Chicago’s Northwest side, serves guests at long communal tables and a few individual ones.

Diners walk up to the counter to order, and are seated after they pay for their food, which they collect when it’s ready.

Now, the area where people would sit has become a production line. Since Smoque already did about 50 percent of its business in carry out orders, Sorkin says he had a jump on other restaurants that are learning takeout on the fly.

“It was an easy pivot point, relative to people who have full-service sit down restaurants, and bars where liquor is 50 percent of their revenue,” he says.

Smoque only accepts pre-paid orders, with food purchased online or over the phone, eliminating the need for cash to change hands.

Each day, employees are checked for symptoms, and anyone who is sick is sent home, Sorkin says.

Food orders are prepared, packaged and then sealed to ensure nothing is exposed to potential contamination. Plastic utensils and napkins come packaged in sets, rather than dropped individually into bags and boxes.

Smoque built a “hot holding desk” so that orders wouldn’t grow cold before customers arrived to collect then.

Outside, there is a curbside station where cars and customers arrive to collect their food. “As people drive up, they stay outside, and we have runners to take their food out to them,” Sorkin says.

Limit delivery. Early one weekend in the virus crisis, Smoque ran into a delivery meltdown that Sorkin says turned him off using third-party companies.

The restaurant was paralyzed by a series of mishaps. In one case, he says, a driver arrived too early to collect a set of orders.

Rather than wait for the food, the driver canceled the orders, and left for a pickup at another restaurant. Sorkin subsequently heard from an irate customer who never received their food.

“There’s a whole huge part of the operation that’s out of our control. I don’t know that the order’s been canceled,” Sorkin says.

The dismal weekend sparked an apology on its website and a change in policy.

Now, third-party delivery is no longer available after 4 pm on Friday, Saturday or Sunday. At other times, the restaurant recommends only Door Dash and Caviar.

“While we recognize that these services offer a convenience to our customers, it has also become increasingly clear that, through them, we are unable to deliver the kind of consistent, timely, and dependable service that our customers deserve,” Smoque wrote on its website.

Give staff new tasks. A few employees chose to take unemployment compensation rather than return to work, Sorkin says.

But he estimates he’s been able to use everyone else who wanted jobs. “All of our regular employees and full-time staff are still with us,” Sorkin says.

He has even hired some of the temporary employees that he used to use for catered events. In all, Sorkin says the business is operating with 47 to 53 employees, depending on the day of the week.

Some have different duties than the pre-virus days. Catering workers are used as runners to take big orders out to cars.

Sorkin says he’s exploring how to set up his own delivery fleet, an idea that restaurants in other parts of the country have tried.

The virus crisis came as many restaurants have struggled to hire employees, from cooks and servers to front of the house managers. Now, millions of restaurant employees have been laid off due to the pandemic.

“Twelve weeks ago, we could have put out a help wanted ad and maybe gotten one or two responses,” Sorkin says. “I suspect if we do it now, we’d be overwhelmed with responses.”

Looking to the future. Sorkin says he isn’t trying to predict what will come next for restaurants.

“My industry may get mad at me for saying this, but this can’t be about what’s good for restaurants. It’s got to be about what keeps people not dead,” Sorkin says bluntly.

He’s doubtful the crisis will end for restaurants during 2020. “I’d love to think it’s true. I’d love to think we can reopen and go back to work in June and July,” he says.

But without a vaccine, “I don’t see anything that gives me that kind of hope.”

Now, says Sorkin, “We’re trying to plan for what our business looks like if we have to operate like this for the next 12 months.”

He adds, “We’re always waiting for the other show to drop. We’re very grateful for the position we’re in. We just hope our customers will have patience while we work the operational things out.”