Patio business finally enjoys a blast of sun
Wayne Moriarty
It doesn’t take much in the way of prolonged good weather to forget that the summer of 2016 has been mostly an inclement disaster.
OK, that’s a bit of an exaggeration. “Spotty disappointment” might be a more suitable description.
Genuine weather disasters rarely visit us. We live in a city not at all prone to climate extremes, so, through most seasons, most years, we more or less know what to expect. That said, there’s no denying our expectations this summer have not been met.
Temperatures through July were close to normal, but awakening to brilliant sunshine was something of a rarity. It was a gloomy month.
Then August hit and even the temperature seemed to betray us. This Aug. 2 was the coldest Aug. 2 since 1937.
But today, well today, this is a different story. This is beautiful. June and July are in the past. All is forgiven. We have returned to a life undisturbed by clouds and cold.
This is especially good news for Daniel Frankel.
Frankel is the CEO of three Tap & Barrel locations and two smaller establishments called Tapshacks.
What separates Frankel’s restaurants from most other restaurants in the Lower Mainland is the enormous amount of seating devoted to sunshine. Ergo, when the sun isn’t shining, neither is Frankel.
Most restaurants with patios operate on something of an 80/20 model — 80 per cent indoors, 20 per cent outdoors. The Taps run on more of a 50/50 split.
“It’s a bit of a weird formula,” he said. “Vancouver loves its patios, but relying so heavily on good weather can make operations extremely difficult.”
The complexity of running a restaurant so reliant on sunshine creates unique problems that, say, a typical Keg might not have.
“Bad weather is really a double-edged sword for us,” Frankel said. “Not only are we not achieving the revenues of a busy summer season with full patios, but our labour and training costs go through the roof.”
The Tap hires its “sunshine crew” in spring. Summer arrives. It starts to rain. It keeps raining. And, well, the sunshine crew kind of evaporates.
“If they’re not getting hours, it’s understandable they are going to look for other work. So, we literally have to rehire and retrain.”
The Tap chain has more than 1,200 outdoor seats. When the weather sucks for a prolonged period of summer. That’s a lot of retraining. That’s a lot of money going out that is not coming in.
So troubled was Frankel by the first two months of summer, he’d stay awake some nights reading about cloud-seeding and weather manipulation. He says he’s half joking when he talks about it, but, by his own admission, the half joking becomes a lot more serious when it’s 15 C and pouring rain in mid-July.
“I think the easier thing will be to change our formula a little. We’re better off with bigger interior spaces and patios that are convertible. That’s how we’ll design our restaurants moving forward.”
But that’s moving forward. No need for convertible spaces today. Today is going to blaze. The sunshine crew will reap some harvest. All is well with summer, again.