TV dinners &A GHOST KITCHEN
Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar defied the odds by pushing out its growth plan during a pandemic
When it first hit, the pandemic lockdown felt like a punch to the gut.
So says Lazy Dog Restaurant & Bar CEO Chris Simms, whose Costa Mesa-based restaurant chain — founded in 2003 with now 39 restaurants across the country, including throughout California — went into what he calls “pure survival mode.”
The restaurant furloughed 95% of its employees but fought to persevere in the face of restrictions to slow the rapid spread of COVID-19 by rolling out three years of strategic plans — think Friends and Family Meals, retro-inspired TV Dinners and Jolene’s Wings & Beer, a virtual or ghost kitchen brand.
There was even a $40 Home Essentials package in late March that included hard-to-find basics like eggs, milk and toilet paper.
All of these online rollouts proved effective with sales now near what they were in 2019, Simms said by phone, sounding hopeful one morning in mid-december.
“Thankfully, we’ve done all these things to set us up for a situation where we can do plenty of takeout and delivery business, which was definitely a smaller piece of our business before COVID,” he said. “Fortunately, we’ve been able to grow that business substantially. That’s definitely helping support the company here in California.”
But a wave of despair washes over him.
“It’s really the teammates that I am having a hard time thinking about right now,” he said.
Below are edited excerpts from our conversation.
QHave you been able to bring back employees?
AOh yeah! We brought the vast majority back throughout the summer and into the fall. We’ve definitely tried to bring back as many as we can afford to help with the takeout and delivery.
QDoes that include your servers and other front-of-house workers?
AThat’s definitely the group that got hit the hardest. Without any patios or any restaurant dining, there are only so many people that you can bring back to support the operation.
QCan you talk about the thinking behind Lazy Dog’s COVID-19 era rollouts?
AFunny enough, these things were all on our strategic plan for two and three years from now. They weren’t necessarily on this year’s strategic plan. But I find that 2020 has been the great accelerator.
It’s amazing how quickly our teams have reacted and created and innovated and rolled things out as we’ve needed to react and adjust to survive. When nobody could find toilet paper on the shelves and the markets were running out of things, we put together pantry kits so that people could get the essentials.
Then we developed the Friends and Family Meals so that families could eat affordably, and at the same time, we could give back by donating food to our communities.
As we moved into summer, we realized that although things were opening up, many people weren’t comfortable going out. We said, “How great would it be to develop a frozen dinner or lunch that people could order, stick in the freezer and then bake to order whenever they’re ready to eat?”
QThe TV Dinners?
AYes, and they have been incredibly popular. There’s a fun, retrocool vibe to them, but at the same time, they’re just freshly prepared food that comes to life when baked at home in the oven. And what I love is it gives our cooks something to do so we can keep them employed. The latest is Jolene’s Wings & Beer. Since we rolled that out a few weeks ago, we’ve seen great success and sales, yet again helping give more hours to our teammates during these crazy times.
QAre there plans to turn your Jolene’s concept into a brick-andmortar location with dining rooms?
AIt’s a possibility. We don’t want Jolene’s to be a true ghost brand. We said, “Let’s spend some extra time to create the brand with care. Let’s have a story behind it. Let’s make sure all of the food is quality. Let’s make sure that everything is just right as if we are setting up this brandnew company that will live on past COVID.”
With that said, we want to make sure we connect it to Lazy Dog because we are very proud of our Lazy Dog brand.
QAnd how is the restaurant doing now?
AWell, it’s not easy for the state to shut down all of your patios and dining rooms. That cut sales substantially. That’s a huge hit. While I am definitely optimistic because the vaccine is now approved and starting to be distributed, we’ve got a couple of pretty tough months to get through. But I’m feeling a lot better today than I did nine months ago.
We worked really hard over the summer to develop these new opportunities to feed our guests. And thank goodness we did, because they’re definitely helping us survive. It gives me a lot of confidence to see how well these things work as we go back into this phase of lockdown in California.