My discovery of the Mixx deciding to cut their hours of their downtown location to only 11am to 2:30pm today got me thinking about a long time pet peeve of mine. Mixx opened it's doors a little over a year ago and has flexed their hours all around in that time.
Why do restaurants apply a double standard to their downtown location? This seems especially true with a restaurant or retailer with multiple locations. It happens almost like clockwork in downtown KC. A business will give downtown almost token evening/late hours but almost instantly start closing at inconsistent times or all together taking away evening hours. Why? It's not like these businesses are packed at their other non-downtown location. A place like Subway is a great example of this. Have you ever driven by a subway anywhere after lunch? Are they EVER busy? Hardly....yet they stay open in every random strip mall you can find but they don't even give a second thought to closing up shop after lunch rush downtown.
Now I'll admit I've never ran a retail or restaurant operation but if I'm trying to build business, I would try and cater to not just employees but tourists and residents that live downtown. Maybe I'm looking at this with just too big of pro-downtown glasses on but someone explain it to me. OK say you aren't busy at first in the evenings. How much does keeping the lights on and two hourly employees cost for 5 more hours? $50 a day? What is that, 4 diners?
I can't believe this continued hour shifting by new downtown businesses is simply economic. So what is it? Perceived safety of employees? Assumption that there is no one to sell to after the workers eat lunch?
A perfect example of actually trying evening hours and sticking with it comes from the former Cupinis. When they first opened, they stayed open until 8pm. No matter what. Rob stuck with it until they day he closed to be closer to his family. You know what, he got customers in the evening too....not right away, but after people realized he was there and open, people went there.
As a downtown worker and resident, a small piece of advice to any current or future restaurant or retailer. If you truly want to build evening business, post your hours and stick to them. Give it at LEAST one year. Put that in your business plan. It will be slow at first for the traditional "lunch" places like Subway, Quiznos, Ingredient, Mixx, but as people realize you are open, you will build that following. Tell us you are open, you will get our business. If you don't want to commit to that, then don't even tease us with your token evening hours. We will respect your business more if you don't go jerking hours around on us.
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2 comments:
You might want to not harp on Subway so much - the one downtown Subway on Broadway actually is open late every night. At least til 9, might be 10.
The Mixx's South Plaza location does very good dinner business, and is usually packed well into the evening with locals from the neighborhood. It's a very visible contrast to dinner time at the Downtown location.
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