You and Nancy make excellent points. The best work we do in the take home meal department is accomplished when we sell meals that are also carried on our restaurant menu. It has been a drain on our time and resources to try to maintain a program for selling prepared meals as if that part of our business could generate the same revenue it used to. We still want to sell prepared meals and believe that it is a valuable service. But I think we are going to back off and allow Janet and the staff to focus more on the restaurant. We will offer a smaller menu of assembled meals and a more diverse restaurant menu. We will focus more on the seasonal offerings and on meeting special dietary needs. Your input has helped us each that decision. Thank you.

David

I've purchased take home meals and accompanying bottled beverages in person several times. I found it uncomfortable that the price was not listed on the product or to be found anywhere near the cold case. Each time, I had to ask a staff member who had to ask someone else to find out what the price was. It made me feel uncomfortable having to ask for prices and also like I was being sized up before a price was quoted.

I appreciate that your intention is likely to foster a sense of community by not plastering a price on every item like QFC. However, I think it has the opposite effect of your intention… especially these days with everyone watching $$$.

I think you'd do really well (as a previous poster said) to analyze your cost per item and volume and produce things accordingly … and list the price on the item.

Thanks for soliciting feedback and all the best!

One other thought…advertise!! I don't think people know you are there. Put coupons/flyers on doors. Put up a big sign. I tell everyone I know about BT b/c I think it's great.

Sara Peters

I start off by apologizing that Bruce and I have such 'screwy" eating times we miss your table meals. I missed every day of fresh bakery goods!!!!! . Since summer is here are you thinking of a picnic meal once in a while? Fruit, salad, roll ups, desert and of course a Bottle of Wine. I actually need a picnic basket for the zoo concerts. Also I will remember that many of your take home dinners are great for weekend camping.

Thanks for the conversation

Judy Brown

I appreciate your insights into the analytical side of the business and lord knows I give it a lot of thought. For us, the food is more profitable than the wine, the wine grows the ticket. Our markup on wine is minimized and intended as such in order to engender relationships and regular diners. Regulars tend not to be regulars at places where they are gouged on wine. The problem with us "choosing a horse to ride" between take-home or dine-out business is that the rent load relative to the dining capacity makes it very hard to have a profitable business at this location. This neighborhood has a dinner hour. The demographic is much more homogeneous than the close-in urban neighborhoods. If we were in town, with Janet's biography and our approach, the "foodies" would be there for us. It's the foodies who make the hot spots hot spots. They create the buzz. And… they go out at times other than 5:30 – 7:00 on Friday and Saturday. They work on Friday and Saturday. They go out after work. They give you "turns". So, by "this location" I don't just mean that we're small. I also mean that the lifestyle of the dominant demographic is a limiting factor.

With regard to children in the restaurant during dinner hour. Let me help the person who is grumpy about that find a very special place where they won't be bothered. Some place far away. We are all about getting folks back to the table and building community. With regard to you personally, I want to say that I have also had a number of people make the effort to tell me how darling Makena is as she eats, smiles and waves to passerby's. We don't have and don't want a restaurant that is not a welcoming place for you and your family. That's just whe we are and there's no future for us in taking any other approach. We have wondered if folks would show up after 8 PM if we made a lane change by turning down the lights and turning up the music… less table "seating" and more hanging out.

As to your comments on the meals… I think I agree with you. Perhaps this is one of the ways that focusing on the restaurant has undermined the meal business. We typically have 25 items on the take home meal menu and we have fallen from 12 to 10 to 8 new items in the last 3 months. And, honestly, some of those new items have been remarkably similar to their predecessors.

Hmmm. Anybody else?