A former mechanical engineer, Vamshi Konuru has carved out a place for himself in the F&B industry. Deeply reflective Vamshi always wanted to start his own business. Along with his friend, he started a coffee shop with limited food items. Gradually, he refurbished the place and reconstructed it into a 400 seater restaurant, called the English Cafe. Catering to the growing appetite and evolving tastes of the residents of Hyderabad, his venture soon became a household name. Vamshi has succeeded in building a place for consumers to unwind after a taxing day at work!
In Conversation With Vamshi Konuru of The English Cafe
In an exclusive conversation with The Restaurant Times, Vamshi Konuru talks of his journey in the industry, the story behind his restaurant, understanding the target audience, and a lot more.
About The English Cafe
The English Cafe is fast becoming the town’s favorite foodie hotspot. The concept of The English Cafe is inspired by colonial times with a quaint ambiance. The interiors are capacious and uncluttered. The sports fever is always pulsating in the lounge. Vamshi shares that The English Cafe is located in Nanakramaguda, the financial district of Hyderabad, which is frequented by the corporate crowd and ex-pats. Aptly named in accordance with the theme and the target audience catered, the English Cafe endeavors to offer customers a premium experience It also supports the regional musical artists in Hyderabad.
Understanding The Target Audience is Key
Restaurants face an additional hurdle when compared to other business models because they need to know how to target the demographics. According to Vamshi, the smartest place to start a restaurant is by understanding your target market demographics.
Identifying your demographics is key to growing business as well as attracting and retaining consumers. The English Cafe is situated in the city’s financial district mainly frequented by corporates and ex-pats. Vamshi had his plan clear that he would set up something according to the audience. The English Cafe is designed to attract and cater to corporate clients mostly.
Knowing your demographics is significant to maximizing your chances of realizing your goals and achieving success when you become a restaurant owner.
Food and Liquor Inventory Management
Running a flourishing restaurant isn’t just selling menu items and fulfilling orders – it’s also about measuring the amount of inventory that you have in the restaurant, daily, weekly, and monthly.
According to Vamshi, one of the biggest budget items for restaurants is buying all the ingredients needed to prepare the food items. It is crucial to accurately track this investment in inventory to keep your restaurant’s accounting organized and connected.
Restaurant inventory management can be challenging. Having restaurant management software can help in controlling inventory. Vamshi has been using Posist as his outlet. Inventory control allows you to track your physical versus actual food cost variance through real-time reports. Tracking this metric, including both inventory usage and exhaustion, helps one to identify trends over certain intervals of time. Proper restaurant inventory management can reduce loss and waste, helping you spot inefficiencies in your operations.
Similarly managing liquor inventory is equally important. Lounges lose a good amount of sales to theft, spilled drinks, and free drinks. Vamshi says that the best way to minimize waste at a bar is having a liquor dispensing system. Any liquor dispensing systems are designed to link to your POS system, allowing you to compare what is being poured to what is being sold. Certain measures like using a meniscus to pour a drink help in reducing spillage.
Dealing With Competition
Competition is omnipresent, no matter what industry you’re in, there is never a deficiency of competitors. With improved standards of living, consumers have begun to explore different aspects of their lives and are striving to explore all things that are new and trending. This evolution is being observed in the food consumption segment as well.
“You need to articulate the ethos of your restaurant, the essence of your offering so that consumers will know why they should come to your restaurant instead of your competitors,” says Vamshi.
Vamshi adds that it is important to connect with consumers through a defined USP. At the centre of the USP, however, is creating a core company identity that extends from your product or service. Also, they plan to extend The English Cafe as a coworking space for corporates, which will work on the subscription model along with free WiFi, coffee and snacks.
Vamshi wears his success lightly, everything he says is concise and considered. While concluding Vamshi mentions that his most favorite part of being in the F&B industry is that apart from providing guests with sumptuous delicacies, a restaurant is a place where guests come to unwind and relax. For Vamshi, what could possibly be better than working at a place like this!
