We are close to opening our new shop and was wondering how many of you did a trial run before you opened? I was thinking about doing something for friends and family,operating how I plan to when open than getting everyone to fill out cards on how they felt so that we can iron out those issues before we actually open.
Anytime you can avoid practicing on the customer, I would say go for it! While you will inevitably have some kinks when you first open, you can eliminate a large majority of them by your suggestion.
Since we put a lot of emphasis on our lunch buffet, we did a double test-run—contractors, city officials, vendors for the lunch buffet, then friends and family for dinner. We had most of our employees in for one or the other, including drivers (who also are primary dishwashers) and every server had at least one table, every kitchen did some prep, made some dough, and made at least one each of pizza, salad, appetizer. We paid for everything but beer and wine. I wouldn’t do it any other way.