Hire a Good CPA

I wouldn’t recommend our CPA to anybody. He was forever paying our sales and liquor taxes late – and that comes with penalties. Of course I made him pay the penalties, but still, I didn’t want our history to show we always paid late. Our CPA never communicated unless he needed something from us. He didn’t tell us to file an extension on our income taxes because he wouldn’t have our reports ready by April 15th. I had never filed an extension before. I didn’t mind doing it, but when you email someone over and over as April 15th approaches and they don’t respond, it’s very frustrating. And then you still don’t hear anything by September and your extension ends in October, you just want to scream.

Before we opened the restaurant, we had made the decision to use my home address for important mail, as we didn’t want to rely on the kids working the front desk to handle our mail correctly. And as you may have noticed in previous posts about the bad behavior of the rink employees, that was a good decision. However, I moved while I was running the restaurant. I sent my new address to our CPA. He didn’t update his records, the financials, or any governing bodies we needed to communicate with, like the State of Texas. I don’t mind taking care of these things, but he didn’t tell me I needed to. I didn’t find out until we weren’t receiving any notices and consequently didn’t pay for something. The notices were still going to my old address and some weren’t forward-able.

Pierre should have known not to use this CPA since he was Pierre’s CPA before we started the restaurant. Or maybe he was acting on Pierre’s orders to make things difficult for us. I don’t know. Pierre knows people in the restaurant business and could have gotten us recommendations. Or maybe this guy was the cheapest one – you get what you pay for.

The CPA charged us a monthly fee plus a Quick Books membership. For that, it was his job to do our payroll, our financials, and our taxes, including the business income taxes and the figures for us to file our personal income taxes. My mistake here was not asking for references and talking to them. I trusted Pierre to set us up. Trusting Pierre may have been my biggest mistake of all.

Backup Marketing

Marketing is definitely not my thing, so I had been relying on Pierre. It became obvious that he was not stepping up and we needed a backup plan. My first attempt at marketing was to purchase Hunt Brothers’ mass mailing of coupons. I don’t think 1 person came in with a coupon. So that didn’t work.

My next attempt was the RTUI grocery store cash register receipts. I used to like the coupons on the receipts so I thought that might work for us. I asked the salesman for recommendations from local restaurants, but all he gave me were nail salons and 1 restaurant in Houston, which is not nearby. It was an expensive disaster. I finally posted a bad rating on their facebook page and someone called to help me. A director came out for an evaluation. Turns out the receipt coupons only work if you’re in the same strip center as the grocery store or very close by. We were in a relatively undeveloped area so the grocery stores were 2-7 miles away. The director told me the salesman knew this and should never have sold us a plan. Did they give me any money back? NO! And I asked several times. They did extend our service several months and worked with me to design different coupons. With over a year of printing coupons, we got 2, possibly 3, coupons redeemed. It was very disheartening and I felt truly cheated by that salesman.

Kyle and some of the other employees passed out flyers near the baseball diamonds and soccer fields. When we finally got our sign, it was hung on the side of the building facing the baseball diamonds. I think that helped a little. I still don’t understand why Pierre wasn’t actively working the baseball market – after all, we had climate controlled restrooms and beer. Kyle and I set up all sorts of social media pages and events. Pierre still did nothing. Half the time he didn’t even respond to our events or invite his friends.

My biggest mistake here, aside from partnering with Pierre, was RTUI. Never do business with RTUI, unless you’re a nail salon next to a grocery store.

Worst Managed Rink in the World

Pierre taught lessons in this building at least once a week, so I trusted him when he said opening the cafe was a good opportunity and this was the best facility in the chain. He also reminded me regularly that Todd was never around and certainly not trustworthy. Like I have said before, I had no idea how bad it could really be.

It’s true Todd wasn’t around much. I was there all day everyday and I hardly ever saw him. On one side, that’s a good thing because he was very disrespectful of me, his tenant. However, there was also a downside to his absence. During the day, he had some women running the show. They may not have smiled a lot, but they were very professional and knew their jobs. Evenings and weekends, the kids took over. They may have looked like adults, late teens and early 20s, but calamity reigned. These guys sat with their backs to the front desk and chatted most of their shift. This band of miscreants wasn’t welcoming or helpful. They didn’t enforce the rules or take care of business – and many of them stole from our cafe.

Max, the ringleader, would call me names and tell parents not to buy from us because I was such a bitch. I don’t think he ever stole from us, but not sure about that. (Your landlord should never campaign against your business.) I brought this to corporate’s attention, but Max was not punished and later he was promoted, and the harassment continued. One night someone vomited in the lobby and there was a trail leading into the bathroom. People had to step over it all evening because the employees didn’t feel like cleaning it up and there was no adult working to teach them to do the right thing. I brought this up with corporate, but it continued to happen. Who wants to buy food when there’s vomit on the floor? And some of the boys stole from us after we closed for the evening.

It’s truly heartbreaking when you give people free leftovers almost everyday and a discount on everything they buy, just to be treated like dirt. My mistake here was not hanging out in the lobby at various times of day and talking to people who were there regularly. At this point I felt trapped in hell. How can your landlord be so dedicated to your failure?

Be a Good Example

From the very beginning, we gave our employees something to eat on every shift. We wanted to make sure they tried everything. Many customers ask about the different menu items and we wanted our employees to be able to describe and recommend our food. That is especially important when you’re cooking food in a non-traditional way. Most people have never had baked French fries so we wanted our employees to honestly say they are good. And they are – especially when you dip them in the nacho cheese.

We also made a rule that our employees could not bring in food from another restaurant. It’s very hard to build a restaurant when people are allowed to bring in outside food, so we couldn’t risk customers seeing our employees eating outside food.

The only person not on board with this plan was, of course, Pierre. We tried to tell him how important it was, but he still brought in food. How can anyone go around telling everyone that they own the cafe and then not eat there??? Sometimes, I wonder why in the heck Pierre ever wanted to do this. He never seemed at all engaged in making the cafe a success.

What is Marketing?

The dictionary says marketing involves promoting and selling goods and/or services. Pierre told me over and over that he was Marketing. When we first opened, Pierre spent some time taking free pizza to the businesses around us to let them know we were open for lunch and dinner. Since we were in a relatively undeveloped area, that didn’t take much time. Pierre gave free coffee to coaches and parents to let them know our coffee was good and encourage them to buy from us. That was definitely a good start. After that, we saw little evidence of him doing anything.

Our building was right next to a bunch of baseball diamonds. I took pizza to the owner one day and told him we would like to advertise to their teams. He invited Pierre and me over for a tour and gave us 3 options – give him flyers to put in the tournament packets, pay to put up banners, or take over their food stands. Pierre never did any of these. We did get a little business eventually but not much. I also researched online and found a list of local clubs with their phone numbers. I gave it to Pierre and asked him if he would call one a day to let them know we could do club meetings and parties. He said he would call at least 2 a day, but I don’t think he ever called any. He did bring in 1 private party in 2.5 years and he paid for a bunch of his friends to come watch a football game once.

We finally got our liquor license in October, 2015. Kyle was all gung-ho to get the bar hopping, but not much happened. Kyle got Pierre to spend about $200 on some signs, but Pierre never got the city permits to hang them. It was clear Pierre’s idea of marketing meant to doing nothing. I got the sign permits in less than 2 weeks. Kyle and I partnered with the Allen Americans so our name would be on the banner during their games. Kyle and I started finding places to list our bar online. Kyle and I started contacting groups to let them know we could hold meetings and parties. But it’s hard to do all the day-to-day business and marketing too. Pierre could have done all of this from the comfort of his own home at times convenient for him and yet he did almost nothing.

Every once in a while, Pierre would man the cafe so I could do something else. If I came in that day, I would find him sitting in the bar talking to students and parents. He didn’t set up for business by turning on all the machines and prepping the stations. I guess he made a few sales because people would come to me later and say they needed to pay for some food because the cash register wasn’t working when Pierre was there. Who knows how many people didn’t come back and pay, as Pierre made no list or notes. Nothing was broken, Pierre just didn’t want to remember his training on the equipment.

Pierre told me over and over, that we just didn’t understand his role. He was Marketing. Obviously, that didn’t involve sales. And if you ask me, it didn’t involve promoting either. I partnered with a guy who didn’t put in his seed money, didn’t work in the cafe or bar, and didn’t promote our business. Mistake, mistake, mistake. I’m an idiot.

Does Everybody Steal?

When you’re in a position to hire people, you know once in a while you’re going to get someone who steals from you. You set up procedures to make it difficult for them to steal and cameras are a good idea. In this case, I had no idea I was truly entering a den of thieves.

I went to work at different times each day depending on errands and what time I got home the night before. Regularly, I would open the door to find Todd, the building manager, helping himself to whatever he wanted. He never offered to pay. I didn’t say anything because I wanted to keep a good relationship with him and I didn’t think he was taking much. He was our landlord and he was supposed to be recommending us to everyone in the building and to those who called to rent the party rooms, so a good relationship was important. I told Pierre that Todd was stealing from us, but I don’t think Pierre said anything to Todd either. Eventually, we figured out that almost all of the guys that worked for Todd stole from us. The head of Operations was a great guy and we never saw anything that made us think he stole and we never saw anything that indicated any of the women stole from us.

When we rented the space, no one told us every employee working for Todd would have access to a key to our space. Apparently, all Operations employees in all the rinks have a master key that opens every door in every rink. Many of the Ops people are teenagers or young 20’s. That’s a lot of responsibility for a young person – keys to locker rooms, tenants’ spaces, the local hockey team’s autographed memorabilia, executive offices, etc. And the ones who don’t have a master key, have access to tenant keys that are kept behind the front desk. So everyone who worked for our landlord could enter our space when we weren’t there and take whatever they wanted.

Our contract stated that our landlord could only enter our space by appointment or in an emergency. The catch? We had the only ice machine in the building and they needed ice when someone was injured. That’s an emergency, right? Not necessarily. The rink’s procedure was to get a big bowl of ice and divide the ice into small ziplock bags to be kept in their refrigerator/freezer in their office. That way the ice was easy to grab when they needed to treat an injury. It’s very easy to schedule this procedure when we are in the cafe, but some of their employees needed emergency ice almost daily.

As the stealing escalated and we asked our landlord to help us stop it, we found there was no help. And why would there be? You know the employees have seen Todd help himself, so how could he punish them for doing the same thing? We were told the camera security system didn’t work and they had no intention of fixing it. No surprise there. So we had to invest in our own cameras. We finally caught someone on camera and filed charges. That made all his ‘friends’/coworkers hate us. These were people we gave free leftovers almost everyday and discounted everything they bought from us. It was a horrible situation.

I’m a senior citizen and almost everything in the cafe was paid for out of my retirement savings. So basically, these people are stealing from an old woman. Not that they care. And really it doesn’t matter – stealing is WRONG no matter what the circumstances. When the stealing didn’t stop, I finally went to my corporate contact, Damon, to get some help. His response was he couldn’t do anything without hard proof. I wasn’t asking him to fire everyone, just to have one-on-ones to let their people know this was not acceptable and there would be serious consequences when caught. Instead, everyone working for the local hockey team treated me like I had lost my mind and was totally overreacting. And still, Pierre did nothing. Oh yeah, he’s just marketing and he doesn’t have much money invested. I felt so alone.

Baby, Bye Bye Bye

I can’t read minds, so I have no idea what Pierre and Robbie were thinking when we were planning the restaurant. Now, it sure seems like they both thought we would stock the restaurant, hire a bunch of people at $10/hour, and sit back to rake in the dough. So it’s no surprise Robbie decided he wanted out not too long after we had our fight. I was pretty disappointed because I thought sure Robbie was our ace in the hole. He was young and had the energy to really make things happen.

Robbie didn’t say much to me, just that he thought working more hours would make him feel burned out and he didn’t want that. It was Pierre who told me Robbie wanted out. Of course Pierre’s idea was for me to give Robbie his $12,500 back and I would become 2/3 owner of the restaurant. He thought that was fair because I was doing most of the work and would reap more benefits when we started making money. So, I gave Pierre a check and he got Robbie to sign away his partnership in the restaurant for the return of his money. I went along with it because I thought our finances would turn around when we got the liquor license and eventually I would make my money back and more.

That’s when I learned how vengeful Robbie could be. His friend, Dawnell, had already quit. Another friend, Dan, had just started working every other weekend. After Robbie left, Dan didn’t show up for a shift and then said he was quitting because he was only working to help Robbie. We owed Dan about $150 and he wanted to come by and pick it up in cash. I told him he would have to turn in the payroll paperwork so we could take out withholding and report the earnings. Dan never came back. Robbie said some mean things to me because I didn’t pay his friend. I had every intention to pay Dan, I just wanted to do it legally. I don’t know why Dan didn’t want to get a regular paycheck. Before Dan quit, Robbie sent me another friend and her daughter. They didn’t show up for their interview, so I called the Mom. She said Robbie told her not to come because the restaurant was closing. Their family really needed the money and we really needed the help but Robbie made her feel like a traitor if she were to take the job. Really? We didn’t do anything to hurt Robbie and yet he sure wanted to hurt us.

My mistake here was refunding Robbie’s money without question. We had a fight and Robbie quit, Pierre attacked me verbally, Pierre hadn’t put in his seed money, and I was killing myself working all the time. Restaurants fail even in the best of circumstances. With all this crap, we didn’t have a chance.

Our First Fight

I started out working 6am – 10pm everyday, midnight on the weekends. However, as soon as it became apparent the figure skaters weren’t going to support us, I started coming in around 9am or so. I got to go home at 4-5pm some nights when I had someone to work the evening shift. I did all the day-to-day activities including food prep and sales, ordering, stocking, cleaning, hiring, accounting, and working on getting a liquor license. Robbie worked when he felt like it. He still had his full-time job, so he didn’t come in very often. Pierre only worked in the cafe in an emergency. He went to the bank and the store for us when we needed help. Granted, I was the only one pulling a paycheck, but I couldn’t do it all by myself. And my paycheck wasn’t much. It didn’t pay all my bills, just helped me survive until we started making money.

So it’s no surprise we had a big fight after a couple months. I told Pierre and Robbie I didn’t feel they were pulling their weight. Pierre responded by verbally attacking me – saying I was too old and he wasn’t sure I could even do the job, etc. I was shocked considering I had been doing almost everything so far. Pierre did say he expected Robbie to put in at least 20 hours per week to help us get the restaurant going. And once again, Pierre reminded us that his job was marketing.

You’d think between the money (or lack there of) and Pierre’s attack, I would have walked out that day, but I didn’t. I still believed our restaurant had big potential. I drank Pierre’s kool-aid and continued to pursue the dream. Big Mistake!

Kyle Joins the Team

The best thing that Pierre did was introduce us to Kyle. Kyle was the bartender at the Farmers Branch rink. He had a lot of restaurant experience and was a hard worker. We offered him a job, but he turned us down. It would have been a much longer commute to our restaurant and he was still going to college.

Fortunately, Kyle was willing to give us some much needed advice. We opened the restaurant in such a hurry, we didn’t have adequate procedures in place to protect our inventory and our money. Kyle was instrumental in designing our bar setup, recommending food prep procedures, and creating more money handling procedures.

During all this, we lost our first employee. She quit the day we told her about the new money handling procedures. Turns out she was robbing us blind and padding her time card. I was already suspicious and this confirmed my fears. I was really bummed because she was a great worker when she was there. Dawnell was a good friend of Robbie’s and even lived with him and his family for a while. I couldn’t believe he didn’t warn us when he recommended her for the job.

As luck would have it, the Farmers Branch restaurant and bar gave Kyle 2 days notice that they were closing and he didn’t need to come back to work. We scooped him up in a heartbeat and paid him whatever he asked. He was worth every penny, and still is. Even though Kyle no longer speaks to me, I will always think of him fondly. He was my only saving grace for 2 years.

I Am the Stupidest Person On the Planet.

While we’re talking about money, let’s go back to the beginning for a minute. Before we opened, I paid for the Hunt Brothers startup out of my own pocket – over $4,000 for the new oven and supplies. I also paid some City of McKinney fees, $500 to open the checking account, and some other needs itemized on an expense report with receipts.

I told Pierre and Robbie I planned to deduct these expenditures from my $12,500 seed money and deposit the difference into the checking account. Pierre suggested I talk to the CPA before I did that, as the CPA would probably want us to deposit the entire $12,500 and then get reimbursed later. I called the CPA and he said to put in all the seed money. So I did. And I reported his wishes back to Pierre and Robbie.

Robbie deposited his $12,500. Pierre put in NOTHING. Not one penny. Yes, Pierre bought the fancy coffee machine – which was under $5,000. Pierre also supplied the Keurig, but he got that back once the fancy coffee machine was hooked up and working.

So here I was, a few weeks into opening the restaurant. One of my partners has not deposited his seed money and had to be pushed to give us our unverified credit card money. Looking back, I am the stupidest person on the planet for staying. It’s embarrassing to think I still thought we would be successful and make some money. You will see as we continue on with the story, Pierre never did put in his seed money. He always had some excuse when I asked him for it. After about 1 year in business I told Pierre we needed money for payroll – it wasn’t the first time I told him that. He deposited $2,000 into the checking account. Two weeks later, he wrote himself a check for $2,000 and took his money back. I just feel so stupid for trusting him.