Lucky Number Seven
Table & Apron founder Marcus Low shares life lessons learnt from managing a popular restaurant
Table & Apron’s Marcus Low dishes out seven life lessons
Seven years is a long time for anything. Especially in the food and drink business, where eateries often go from open to closed in the blink of an eye.
Table & Apron, a popular restaurant in
SS20 Damansara Kim, is certainly standing the test of time. Since 2014, they have been delighting diners with hearty comfort food such as duck leg comfit, beef ragu, and of course, their trademark buckwheat fried chicken.
It’s been quite an adventure for founder Marcus Low. He began his culinary journey by running a successful supper club known as The Kitchen Table, before deciding to open a restaurant of the same name in 2014. It would later be renamed Table & Apron.
Low currently runs the restaurant with managing partner Asya Tan. They oversee about 50 employees, including those at the neighbouring Universal Bakehouse.
“During our 7th-year anniversary, we’ll be featuring some dishes that were a blast from the past that people kept asking to be on the menu, and we coined them appropriately as our ‘Greatest Hits’. Like that rock band staying relevant with the times, we’ve brought on some past signatures that have stood the test of time, another reason to love what we do,” said Low.
Here, Low looks back at seven amazing years in the industry. He shares with Tatler the seven most important lessons he’s learnt from running Table & Apron.
1 RUNNING A RESTAURANT IS HARD
Coming off a supper-club success high as The Kitchen Table back in 2013/14, I thought I had a good idea of what it took to run a restaurant. That idea was immediately dismissed in the first week of opening our restaurant. When you’ve just hired a team, you can’t help but feel that you may be an impostor. And then when you think the food speaks for itself, you realise it doesn’t—because you have to train the servers. It’s hard when it’s all on you, so make it a team sport, and keep remembering that what you’re doing is a marathon, not a sprint.
When we set out to open the restaurant, we tried to be something for everyone. We offered anything and everything under the sun you can think of—from cakes by the counter to a brunch menu alongside our current menu. What we said we were: a ‘contemporary Malaysian’ restaurant. And what our guests thought we were: a fusion restaurant, an interesting cafe with thoughtful food, a bakery that was maybe a restaurant if you walked in, a Malaysian restaurant but not. Bridging that gap was a lot simpler than we had expected—inviting perspectives from our own teams. How we’ve navigated anything else till this day is by checking in with our teams first.
3 HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW YOUR REGULARS?
Our identity crisis was a low for us. We weren’t doing great, seemed headless at a time, and had poor confidence within the team. Then, we asked ourselves how well we knew our regulars. Of the five servers I had working with me at that time, we could only rattle off five names. We’ve embarked on a mission since then to be more authentic, and at any chance we can, address our guests by name immediately while introducing ours. It was a game changer.
4 CAN WE BE YOUR FAVOURITE RESTAURANT?
We all know it, there is no such thing as the best restaurant in the world; but there is that elusive mirage that you just might have a favourite restaurant. So we set out to pursue this narrative: ‘How do we become your favourite restaurant?’ Did we remember the last meal you’ve had with us, or that last joke you shared with us the other time? If we could do that, we have a better chance of becoming your favourite restaurant. We learnt it wasn’t so much about what we cooked or served, but more of how we made you feel.
5 HOSPITALITY IS A TEAM SPORT
When you really break it down, each of us is only a small cog in the machine. A great dining experience is the sum of many small things done consistently well.
We’ve established key rituals that keep us on our game. Whether it is pre-service and post-service meetings, or role playing hospitality scenarios, or wordplay sparring on hospitality—these drills keep our teams highly engaged when ‘it’s game time’. Having this lens on keeps our team taking their work seriously as a craft, while not taking themselves too seriously.
6 HAVING IMPACT BEYOND OUR FOUR WALLS
At Table & Apron, we seek to impact communities across different spectrums that are important to us. We have strong ties with our SS20 community in Damansara Kim, from pitching in with water shortage supplies to contributing green compost to the different parts of the park initiated by the community.
We’ve addressed food insecurity, especially during this time of pandemic, by working with like-minded folks like Joyce from Pit Stop Community who serves the homeless community, and supporting local produce purveyors in the Taman Tun Wet Market like Alan from Robert Greens whose business has been impacted by the rise of supermarkets over the last decade.
7 WE ARE ONLY AS GOOD AS OUR PEOPLE
If you think we are in the business of food and service, think again! We’re learning to appreciate every year what it means to be in the business of people. That means inspiring our talents to become better versions of themselves for the good of the industry and those around them.
I’m fortunate to have surrounded myself with people who are better than me at many things. In my prior life as a cook, I have always wanted to master a craft; although I don’t do much cooking anymore, it has become our obligation to make way for our cooks to be better at their craft with the opportunities that come to us. That’s a legacy worth having.