Questions to Ask Restaurant Owners
Questions for anyone considering opening a restaurant, or writing about one, asked of an owner: what it cost to open, where the money goes, how staffing and leases work, and what they would do differently.
The questions
Open any question for the note
How long have you been open, and what did the first year cost you?
Why ask it
Opening costs and first-year losses are the numbers aspiring owners underestimate and current owners remember precisely. Whether they answer at all also tells you how candid the rest of the conversation will be.
How did you land on this concept, and what did you change after opening?
Why ask it
The changes are the useful part, because a concept only partly survives contact with a neighborhood. Menus shrink, hours shift, and the target customer usually turns out to be someone else.
What did the build-out cost, and what did you underestimate?
Why ask it
Ventilation, refrigeration, grease traps, and permitting routinely run over, and every week of delay is rent with no revenue. Ask what the surprise was, since it is often a code requirement nobody flagged.
Where does the money go, as a share of what comes in?
Why ask it
Owners think in percentages of sales: food, labor, rent, and everything left over. Their breakdown teaches you the arithmetic of the business faster than any general advice about passion.
What is your food cost, and how do you hold it there when prices move?
Why ask it
Food cost is watched weekly, and keeping it steady requires menu changes, portion discipline, or switching suppliers. A vague answer usually means the books are not tight enough to know.
How do you set prices, and when did you last raise them?
Why ask it
Pricing is where cost pressure meets what a neighborhood will tolerate, and owners can usually name the point where customers push back. When they last raised prices tells you how much room they believe they have left.
What is the busiest hour of your week, and what breaks first?
Why ask it
Asking what breaks at peak surfaces the real constraint: one station, the dish machine, the host stand, a single cook. It is the most practical thing a prospective owner can learn about designing an operation.
How do you find and keep kitchen staff right now?
Why ask it
Kitchen hiring is the daily problem in most restaurants, and the answer covers pay, scheduling, training, and who actually shows up. What they do to keep people is more informative than how they recruit them.
How do you structure pay, and how do you handle tips?
Why ask it
Wage structure, tip pooling, and service charges vary by jurisdiction and are a frequent source of legal trouble and turnover. Ask what they changed after getting some part of it wrong.
What does your lease look like, and what happens when it comes up?
Why ask it
Rent terms decide whether a good restaurant survives, and renewal is when many close. Length, escalation, personal guarantees, and who pays for repairs are all worth hearing about in detail.
How much of your business is delivery, and does it make money?
Why ask it
Platform commissions can consume the margin on an order, and many owners keep delivery for volume rather than profit. The answer shows whether they track each channel separately or just watch total sales.
Which menu item earns the most, and which do you keep for other reasons?
Why ask it
Margin and menu presence are different things, and owners hold on to loss leaders for traffic, for regulars, or for the reviews. The item they would cut if they could is the interesting half.
How do you handle a bad review or a bad night?
Why ask it
Owners describe reviews as the most personal part of the job, and the practical question is whether they have a process or take it home. Listen for whether they respond publicly and what they actually changed.
What is the slowest month, and how do you get through it?
Why ask it
Seasonality is predictable and still closes restaurants, because rent and payroll continue regardless. Ask for specifics: reduced hours, private events, cash saved from the busy months, or staff let go.
Who are your suppliers, and what happens when one fails you?
Why ask it
Supply failures happen weekly on a small scale and occasionally on a serious one. The backup supplier, or the menu flexibility to absorb it, is the answer that matters.
What did the inspection process teach you?
Why ask it
Inspections cover holding temperatures, date labeling, handwashing stations, and repairs, and what an owner now watches closely is practical knowledge. Most have one violation they learned the most from.
What is the biggest mistake you made, and what did it cost?
Why ask it
Ask for a number if they will give one, because the cost is what makes the lesson stick. Common answers involve the wrong location, the wrong partner, an oversized menu, or opening before the kitchen was ready.
How many hours are you here, and what has that cost you outside work?
Why ask it
Owner hours are the expense most often left out of the plan, and independent operators frequently describe six days a week for years. The second half is the part nobody tells prospective owners about.
What would you do differently if you opened another place tomorrow?
Why ask it
The second-restaurant question gets past defending the current one. Answers tend to be concrete: a smaller room, a shorter menu, a different street, more cash held in reserve.
Would you tell someone else to do this?
Why ask it
A blunt closing question that experienced owners answer with conditions rather than a yes or a no. What they say someone would need before starting is usually the most valuable sentence of the conversation.
Learning the Business From an Owner
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Getting Useful Answers
Go at Three in the Afternoon
The gap between lunch and dinner service is the only reliable quiet hour in a restaurant. Ask for twenty minutes, arrive on time, and leave before service starts.
Ask for Percentages, Not Books
Owners rarely share revenue and often will share the shape of their costs: food, labor, rent, and what remains. Framing questions as a share of sales gets you the arithmetic without asking anyone to open their accounts.
Eat There and Pay for It
Having sat through a service tells you about the room, the pacing, and the staff before you ask a single question. It also makes the request for time land as interest rather than extraction.
Ask a Manager and a Line Cook the Same Questions
Owners see strategy; the kitchen sees what actually happens at seven on a Friday. Where the two accounts diverge is the real operating story, and it is usually about staffing or equipment.
Numbers Worth Understanding Before the Conversation
- Food cost as a percentage of sales, and how often it is counted
- Labor cost as a percentage of sales, including payroll taxes
- Prime cost, meaning food and labor added together
- Rent as a percentage of sales, and what the lease escalates by each year
- Average check, and covers per service
- Delivery platform commission per order
- Cash needed on hand to cover a slow month of rent and payroll
- Cost of the build-out per square foot in your area
Common Pitfalls
Asking Only About the Food
Menus are the most enjoyable part of the conversation and the smallest part of whether a restaurant survives. Leases, labor, and cash flow decide the outcome, so spend most of your questions there.
Mistaking a Full Dining Room for Profit
Busy restaurants close regularly, because volume at the wrong margin or on the wrong lease does not accumulate. Ask about prime cost and rent before drawing conclusions from a queue at the door.
Treating One Owner's Experience as the Industry
A fine dining room, a taqueria, and a brewpub have almost nothing in common in labor, margin, or hours. Talk to several owners in the format you actually care about before generalizing.
Asking for Free Consulting
An owner explaining their business is doing you a favor, not reviewing your plan. Keep the visit to what you asked for, and if you want a plan critiqued, offer to pay for their time.