Part 40. Holiday

Bud vases, increasing revenue and a holiday.

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Hiya, you OK? Good.

Right, let’s get on with it. We had been open for two years and we were very busy. We were also very tired. But, hey, you just get on with it don’t you.

We drove into York from our house which was in one of the outlying villages and parked up. We had found a private car park which was cheaper than the public car parks, so we didn’t need a wheelbarrow of pound coins anymore.

On the way to the restaurant Donna popped into the church to look for goodies at the jumble sale, always time for Bric a Bracking.

When I arrived at the restaurant there was a little surprise on the doormat, a postcard from our Keanu, all the way from Canada. He said he was doing well and all that. Good lad our Keanu. Nothing from Tony Cannelloni though.

A few minutes later and Lozza arrived, it was a Saturday and she was focused, she knew it was going to be busy, Lozza was in machine mode.

Then, about twenty minutes later Donna arrived, arms full of useful items, a Wade plate for a couple of quid and some old wine glasses we definitely didn’t need.

She also had a big bunch of flowers wedged under har arm. Donna made up little bouquets of flowers for the tables and they needed replacing quite often. And today was the day.

And here’s a little secret. The flowers were put into little green glass bud vases which sat on the tables, people often mentioned how pretty they were. Right, they weren’t bud vases, they were soap dispensers from Ikea. Donna thought the green glass was attractive so she bought enough of the dispensers for the tables and discarded the pumps and stoppers from the top. But we didn’t tell anyone at the time.

An example. You can still buy them in Ikea. They didn’t have a screw top back then, so they looked even better.

.Tricky Vicki and Blackhead arrived at ten minutes to twelve. Next was Briggy, and finally Bud. Everyone was ready for a busy day.

However, Bud had some bad news.

“Mate, I don’t think I’ll be able to work Saturdays anymore, it’s a bit too much. Plus, I miss going for a beer with my mates.”

“Fair enough Bud, l get that. You still OK for Tuesday to Friday though?”

“Yea, cool.”

This was a bit of a nuisance, trying to find someone who would work for one day, would be tricky. Then you have to start the whole process of training them again.

“Small utensils in the grey box, sieves on the top shelf, pans underneath, keep us supplied with plates, make sure everything is clean, knives in that box there, blah blah blah.

Then when Vicki came to the kitchen for some tea towels we told her about Bud.

“Hey Tricky, Bud doesn’t want to work Saturdays anymore.”

“Bud you lazy sod.”

Steady on Tricky.

Bud wasn’t insulted, “Yea I know.”

But, and isn’t it great how things swing, Blackhead came to the kitchen a couple of minutes later.

“Andrew.”

“Yes Rosie, how can I help you? Are you in trouble with your drug dealer? Have you been fighting with Nazi skinheads again?”

“No, do you need someone to replace Bud on a Saturday?”

“Yes we do actually, how do you know?”

“Vicki told me.”

That was quick.

“Do you want to do it?”

“No, but my friend might want to.”

“OK, does she work anywhere now?”

“He, he’s called James.”

“Ooohhh, your boyfriend Rosie?”

Blackhead was the coolest person in York, nothing seemed to bother her, not even my constant pestering.

“No, he’s just a friend.”

“OK, give him my number Rosie and we’ll chat with him. Is he a good lad?”

“Yes he is, I’ll give him your number.”

More about James next time.

If you think we deserve a three quid coffee for writing this guff, that’s the button.

So we had a busy day as expected, very busy. And we must have turned away more people than we actually looked after. It was always like this. And at the end of the night we said goodbye to each other and went home. Knackered!

Then the next day, Sunday, Donna and I started on the paperwork. All the takings needed removing from their individual paper bags and logging onto a week sheet. Notes and coins needed counting, petty cash receipts needed tallying up and suppliers needed paying.

It was boring. And we were tired, we’d done our seventy hour week, and we were still working. We looked at the amount of money we’d taken, it was good, but there was an issue.

You see, people often said to us, “You work too hard, why don’t you employ more people so you can have time off.”

Now if you’ve never been in business, that’s like someone saying to you, “You look tired, tell the boss you want twenty weeks off a year.”

Sounds daft doesn’t it? Exactly.

Employing more staff would mean more money. Where does that come from?

So after turning all those people away the day before, we started pondering. If we could have accepted those diners, the takings would have been greater, therefore the profits would have been greater. Then we could afford to employ more staff so that we could maybe drop down to sixty hours a week.

But how could we accept those people who we were turning away? We could turn tables of course. That means telling people who arrive at six that we need them to leave at eight so we can seat more people. Or those who have a reservation at seven could be told that they need to leave at nine so we could use the table again.

But we hadn't done that for the last two years, it would seem unfair to start doing it at this stage. Or, we could cram more tables in. That would be good. But then it’s not very comfortable for people when arses of those going to the loo squash past other diner’s backs.

So we did nothing about it, we carried on working and turning lots of people away.

As the day ambled on Donna and I chatted about the week, about staff, about diners, about the new guy who might be starting with us on a Saturday. Then Donna remembered that there had been a lot of people in from London during the week, some had actually made a point of coming to us as part of their visit. And some of those fancy London types told Donna about the vegetarian restaurants which were abundant in the capital. It seemed that there were many more in London than there were up north.

Now, we won’t use the real names, but some establishments were mentioned more often than others, the special ones. To us, these places were what we aspired to be, they were in London, so they must be good.

A quick explanation here. When you’re from the north, there's this assumption that everything in London is bigger, brighter, more professional and much more special. Everyone is a millionaire, people drink Champagne instead of tea, they even wash their clothes in it. And the streets really are paved with eighteen carat, nobody nicks the gold from the streets though, they already have enough money.

Donna and I chatted more, we decided that it would be an amazing experience to go to London and eat at one of these high end vegetarian restaurants. Well, if they would let us in that is. They would hear our scummy northern accents and chase us from their polished ebony and oak doors. The concierge would call the police because we looked like thieves, or beggars.

But we needed some inspiration, as with all jobs, even if it’s your own place, complacency can slowly creep in. And getting away for a few days would be a nice break.

One problem though, the restaurant, who would look after Vanilla Black while we were away? Nobody, that’s who.

But hang on, we could do what we did at Christmas, close shop for a few days. That was very difficult though, it would mean less revenue.

A little financial insight. Let’s say that in one week you took five grand, that five grand is enough to pay the rent, staff, insurance, suppliers, phone, and all the other things we try to forget about. Plus it would give a little wage for the owners. But if you closed for a week, that would mean that the next week, your takings would have to be ten grand. Or during the month, the other three weeks would have to be six and a half grand to make up the shortfall. So closing the restaurant was nasty.

But we became fixed on the idea, we would just hope that the usual quieter days, Tuesday and Wednesday became a little busier to make up the dosh which was short.

But first of all we would have to speak to the team, because they may not want to be off on holiday at that time.

So the next week we asked them all what they thought, obviously they would be paid, but did they want to be off at a particular time set by us. Well yes, they were all in agreement. In fact, they liked the idea that we were all off on holiday at the same time.

It was like we were all going on a family holiday, just not together.

In the end, we decided that it should be a whole week that we closed, we would just ignore the money part. We chose a week which had no bookings in and we blocked it, big lines through the diary.

Then Donna and I chose a cheap hotel and we booked a train, we booked some tables at a couple of restaurants also. Obviously we put on our posh voices on the phone so they didn’t think that we were miners or shipbuilders.

And as time went on the team started planning also. Briggy had decided on Tenby in Wales, apparently she had friends there. Tricki couldn't go anywhere because she worked full time at the office next door. Blackhead mainly worked a Saturday, so she said she was going to use the free day to go shopping in Leeds. Bud said that he would pop back to his home town of Northampton for a few days so he could get his mother to do a batch of washing.

And for the weeks running up to the holiday everyone was excited. Donna kept singing Holiday by Madonna and Briggy rabitted on about the golden shores of Tenby. Blackhead nattered on about how much money she was going to waste on clothes, although that was never going to happen, she later became an accountant. Bud was focused on wearing one set of clothing as the rest of his clothes were stuffed into big black sacks, especially for his mam.

Vicki wasn't too fussed as she was still working.

I was excited, I’d only been to London once before, Donna had been maybe three or four times. To me it was like a foreign holiday, Costa del London. We had lots to plan, we had booked a table at vegetarian restaurant, let’s call it The Mung Bean, one of those we had heard about. We had also booked a table at a meat restaurant called Sketch, we’d heard it did an interesting veggie option. And it had Michelin stars.

And….. we had organised a train from London to Brighton so we could go to Terre a Terre. A well known vegetarian restaurant which had been around for a long time.

And Lozza, where was she going to go for her week off. Well, she looked up the restaurant Sketch in London, and decided she would like to go there, for the interesting meat options. So her and her boyfriend booked a few days in London also. Everyone was sorted.

Now finally, before we go, we need to tell you that we met James, the the new Saturday washer upper. Rosie was right, he was a good lad, we liked him. However, his name was changed at a later date to Cak Boy. We’ll tell you about that next time.

Thanks for reading and see you next week.

Donna and Andrew