is there anything cheaper than select briskets?
Lets see... baked beans, nope has to be bushes or i will start from dried.
It would have to be raise prices... when you look at BBQ in the past... well... it was always about turning cheap cuts of meat into something special.
OKAY NOW MY BABBLING
I would first turn to my paper prod... oh chit, I use Butcher paper so I can't get any cheaper there
look at stuff that takes other stuff to sell it... eg when you have a side that is hitting the trash... so is the fork and container it goes in.
I would also look at stuff to NOT make first.
A restaurant near me copied my Collards recipe. I let them... I mean I came in and taught them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6u_owUBXxc
Went real well for them... but its labor intensive. But then... he cheapened it.... started macerating it in a freakin food processor or something. Ruined it. So he invited me to see what was up. As he was arguing with me about the bottom line I am chomping on his brisket. Very good Brisket from an electric cookshack... if there is such a thing, anyway I am watching his kitchen staff... four of them, pulling his pork.(the kind you eat)
Now those four farks took the ENTIRE MEAL of mine pulling and BSing. I asked, whats your least popular BBQ. He said the Pulled Pork. I added "because its too dry?"
He turned around to look at what I am looking at... I said you have four people picking through your pulled pork and pulling out every STITCH of fat. Bark too... I said...they have pulled 3 butts in 18 minutes.
I said get a set of Bear Claws (he likes his pork in Big Chunks like I do... Maybe its because if you don't do it in large chunks your wrong, as opposed to right..which is my way), use those claws to pull, then remove only the fat thats not attached to the bark, and only let one person do it, now you do that and have two to go back to making your sides like collards better. Plus, another body, I said, somebody to clear the tables for the customers and make note of what THEY throw away and either nix it of fix it.
Once it goes in the self serve trash can you lose the impression of what people do not like.
You have to really watch what happens AFTER you get in the swing of things. Loss of revenue will bury you as well as rising costs. And in the example of those collards... there's a huge difference in the taste of dumping collards in a broth thats made from simmering a hock or irregular FIRST and dropping them in water and adding that same Hock and simmering.
Its like the deli I had serving my Brisket and Pork that didn't understand why it took off at first then slowed down... I came in and where they used to keep it hot in a bath (where everyone can smell it) they simply Nuked it to order.
Can you imagine asking someone to pay 5 bucks for popcorn at a movie theatre while holding a bag of unpopped microwave corn.
You have to look at everything. EVERYTHING. Not just price and cost. You must find the WHY.
