RSS
Home
What Exactly is a "Concept Restaurant?"
Print
Email
RSS
Subscribe
Not an actual restaurant.
There is a big difference between choosing a restaurant concept and a "concept restaurant." Any, and everyone, opening a food spot will eventually be forced to decide on a concept. What types of people are you looking to attract? What kind of food and drinks? Dance floor? Sommelier? Etc. The biggest difference between the two, is in one you choose every element of your restaurant and in the other, the restaurant chooses for you. That is to say, if I look at the Atlanta market and I see a lack of farm-to-table restaurants, but I see a surplus of southern food places, how can I make the most money off of this information. A concept restaurant would then be born from this data, "Welcome to the newest spot. A farm-to-table southern-soul food inspired restaurant."
What I'm saying is, in a concept restaurant, with a theme that is so tightly defined, it is hard to play with any of the other elements of the restaurant. If it's southern-food, then there must be fried chicken. If it's farm-to-table, then there must be fresh collard greens, etc. As for the decor, expect a home like feel, similar to what you would see in Gone with the Wind, perhaps there will even be pictures from the movie on the wall.
I'm not totally against concept restaurants, they work and usually make a lot of money. I guess I'm more against them in the realm of fine dining. Casual dining, maybe, but a fine dining establishment will bring more to your table than concept food. A fine dining restaruant will bring you something you never saw before and will never see again. True indivduality and creative freedom are what make the difference.
A concept restaurant is typically the safer way to go. It makes sense, that, if there are three candy shops on 5th St. it wouldn't make sense to open another candy shop there. However safe concept restaurants are, they can also create a sense of claustrophobia in a chef. Concept restaurants tend to constrict the brain waves of the most talented chefs. A chef in our previous "southern food farm-to-table" model would not have to think about what to serve, he in fact would not have to do much thinking at all. And we know from our adolescent years that practice makes perfect. If the chefs in Atlanta aren't practicing, will we ever get better?
