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Restaurateurs serve up youthful optimism

By Karen Palmer
Special to The Examiner 10/4/08

Owning an eatery in The City is a consuming task, yet young entrepreneurs with fresh ideas, such as Dylan McNiven of Woodhouse Fish Co., are cooking up ways to keep their restaurants from perishing. Mike Koozmin/Special to The Examiner

» More Photos SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco diners are notoriously fickle. It might explain why 10 percent of the approximately 2,500 restaurants in The City close their doors every year, according to the Golden Gate Restaurant Association.

Add in multiple financial and logistical challenges, and you have a recipe for disaster for many a restaurateur.

Opening a restaurant in San Francisco is no easy task: Competition for spaces — and diners — is high. Permitting issues in The City can be more than pesky and hold up a restaurant opening for weeks, if not months.

Keeping the doors open for business can be daunting, too. San Francisco’s minimum wage has topped $9, while The City’s notoriously high rental rate is always a burden. And a federal appeals court panel recently upheld a measure that requires small businesses with more than 20 employees to pay for health insurance for employees who work more than 10 hours per week. It’s an initiative that many owners agree with in theory, but it puts a strain on an industry that makes an average 4 percent to 6 percent profit yearly, according to the National Restaurant Association.

Additionally, food costs have been on the rise, forcing many eateries to raise menu prices or rework offerings while the economic downturn has people across the nation pinching pennies. Put it all together, and it’s easy to see why both large dining meccas and small mom-and-pop eateries are stretched thin.

On a more personal level, none of the statistics take into account the actual physical demands of working in the service industry. For owners, a social life is often defined by which of their friends drop by the restaurant on a given night.

The Examiner spoke with young entrepreneurs who choose to invest their blood, sweat and tears in this volatile — and mostly financially unrewarding — industry.

The owners, all of whom are 35 or younger, own six restaurants. They dish out what drives them, inspires them and challenges them — and why they’re all still hungry for more.

Dylan MacNiven

Age: 29
Restaurant: Woodhouse Fish Co. on Upper Market Street
Opened: June 2006
Biggest challenge: “The economics of owning a restaurant can be really tough, because The City is so expensive. Some places have to compensate for the high cost of living by raising prices.”

One might think that in this town’s tricky restaurant industry it would pay to be trendy. But according to Dylan MacNiven, who opened the first location of Woodhouse Fish Co. just more than two years ago and is set to open a second in Pacific Heights in early 2009, it’s exactly the opposite that’s his recipe for success.

“San Francisco is always about the hot new restaurant, but I’ve tried to stay away from the trendiness factor,” MacNiven said. “It’s just not me.”

A visit to Woodhouse Fish Co. can back that up: The cuisine is classic New England seafood with a fresh California twist, such as fish and chips, fried-clam sandwiches and artichokes stuffed with the likes of fresh crabmeat or shrimp. Even the décor — which MacNiven and his father, Jamis, constructed and installed mostly themselves — is simple and clean, with lots of white tile, red accents and a raw bar.

It turns out restaurants are actually in MacNiven’s blood. His parents opened Buck’s of Woodside 18 years ago, and these days, his younger brother, Rowan, is also a manager at Woodhouse.

“We’re a family business — this is what we do,” MacNiven said.

The combination of golden pedigree and a fairly no-frills menu hasn’t precluded his share of challenges, from figuring out how to run the kitchen to figuring out how to pick up business on slow nights.

MacNiven is looking ahead to the second location, which will have a broader menu. And, despite the expansion, he still plans to stay true to his roots.

“The idea was always to open a few restaurants,” he said. “But we never set out to open huge restaurants — we’re all about the neighborhood spots.”

Jessica Boncutter

Age: 32
Restaurant: Bar Jules in Hayes Valley
Opened: November 2007
Biggest challenge: “In opening the restaurant, the most difficult thing was coordinating everyone and constantly making decisions about every single detail. And staying within budget is impossible.”

Having cut her chops at such renowned restaurants as San Francisco’s Zuni Café and London’s River Cafe, Jessica Boncutter knew exactly what attitude she didn’t want when she opened the quaint-but-chic Bar Jules.

“There’s an attitude of preciousness here about food, but it really doesn’t have to be that serious,” she said. “You can cook delicious food and have fun and laugh at yourself.”

At Bar Jules, she combines a highly seasonal, limited California-Mediterranean menu and strict environmental practices with a more lighthearted, collaborative feel.

“We don’t have an executive chef,” she said. “We all really collaborate. There’s really a lack of ego here.”

Despite her clarity of vision, Boncutter admits the process — from opening to maintaining a restaurant — is difficult, especially in San Francisco.

“You’re consistently making decisions and you have to make them quickly,” she said. “Plus, it’s expensive to own a restaurant. Nobody’s getting rich here.”

Boncutter points to rising food costs as another challenge: “It’s amazing how high my vegetable bills are,” she said. “We really have to use every single bit.”

She’s heard a few complaints about menu prices, but Boncutter is thankful for a clientele of educated diners.

“I was afraid with the limited menu that we might have some problems,” she said, “but we’ve got regulars who are young, hip and who really get it.”

Cody Robertson

Age: 34
Restaurant: Lingba in Potrero Hill
Opened: September 2001
Biggest challenge: “The competition for restaurants here is really fierce, and The City can make things hard for small businesses.”

When it comes to career choices, Cody Robertson is one lucky guy.

“I really love my job,” he said. “I probably work 65 hours a week, and I never feel like I don’t want to go to work.”

Robertson opened Lingba, a Southeast Asian restaurant and lounge in Potrero Hill, seven years ago after several years working as a computer programmer, both in Seattle and in The City. When the owners of his then-favorite bar, Lilo Lounge, decided they wanted to sell, he took the plunge, taking out a Small Business Association loan to buy and remodel the space. He later bought the restaurant next door, and did a full remodel of both spaces, reopening in 2006.

He never had difficulty with permits or logistical issues, although he admits, “The competition for restaurants here is really fierce. And, The City is really hard on small businesses, between the minimum wage and health care initiatives.”

These days, Lingba draws a neighborhood crowd on the weekdays and becomes more of a destination on weekends, especially for its creative cocktails. The development process is something Robertson holds dear: “I really enjoy working with the chef to create new dishes, and coming up with new cocktails,” he said.

Boris Nemchenok

Age: 28
Restaurant: Uva Enoteca in Lower Haight
Opened: April 2008
Biggest challenge: “Working out the kinks and finding our consistency was a challenge, with everything from service to the flow of the restaurant.”

Although owner Boris Nemchenok grew up working in San Francisco restaurants, the story of Uva Enoteca really begins in New York City about four years ago, when Nemchenok began working at celebrity chef Mario Batali’s Otto.

“I just fell in love with Italian food and wine,” Nemchenok said. “I also loved the enoteca concept, where you can just drop in for a glass of wine and a snack, or a full meal. San Francisco didn’t have many options like that.”

It took Nemchenok a whopping four years to open Uva, from finding his Lower Haight location to struggling with city permitting issues. He partnered up with chef Ben Hetzel, formerly of The Dining Room at the Ritz-Carlton, to fully conceptualize the restaurant.

Even Nemchenok’s friends chipped in, helping to build the cabinetry and install the marble bar.

Uva offers an all-Italian wine list and Italian food in a casual-but-chic setting. The restaurant bustles regularly with a neighborhood crowd.

Nemchenok still looks back to New York City as a model: “The Lower Haight kind of reminds me of the Lower East Side in New York City,” Nemchenok says. “We’ve had a great response; it’s the kind of place where you can actually come and eat for $20 or $25 a person.”

Dennis, Dan and David Lee

Ages: 28, 27 and 25
Restaurant: Namu in the Richmond
Opened: December 2006
Biggest challenge: “Getting permits and doing construction are the hardest parts of opening a restaurant, because you can’t do much about it and you just never know what the result was going to be.” — Dennis

Dennis Lee almost missed his first big break.

Two years ago, he’d come up with the idea to start serving gourmet sandwiches and sausages from old-fashioned food carts in Golden Gate Park. He decided to do a little research — and found out applications for the contract to serve food in the park were due the next day.

“I wrote the business plan the night before,” he said. “I was shocked when I got the call that I’d won the
business.”

Hence, Happy Belly was born — and still serves visitors to Golden Gate Park

Namu, which he had conceptualized around the same time as Happy Belly, opened just a few months later. Lee, along with his brothers Dan and David, grew up in a restaurant family in Boston.

Their parents have owned and operated Korean restaurants there since the 1960s — but when it came time to conceptualize Namu, Lee decided that he wanted to combine his heritage with a more upscale, streamlined feel.

Namu serves contemporary, elegant cuisine inspired by Korean and Japanese ingredients.

“The flavors are a melting pot of Asian cuisines,” Dennis Lee said. “It’s just the food that I liked and that made sense to me.”

Mike Pierce, Scott Youkilis

Ages: 35 and 32
Restaurant: Maverick in the Mission
Opened: July 2005
Biggest challenge: “When we opened, we got a lot of buzz, but then it became, ‘What are we going to do for the next six months?’ Keeping the buzz going and keeping your name out there is tough.” — Scott Youkilis

When manager and wine director Mike Pierce and chef Scott Youkilis decided to open their own restaurant, both had worked in restaurants for years, most notably at Laurel Heights favorite Sociale. That didn’t necessarily make the process any easier, though.

“Opening a restaurant in San Francisco is kind of a chicken-and-egg thing,” Pierce said. “You can’t find a location without investors.”

After working tirelessly on a business plan and raising money from investors, the pair took over their Mission location from the owners of Limón and opened Maverick in the summer of 2005. The spot has since become a favorite for its regional American cuisine, all-American wine list and decadent brunches.

Their secrets to success? Hard work and authenticity.

“Anyone can write a menu, but actually executing it and making authentic is what we do,” Pierce says. “We’re constantly changing it and trying to make it better.”

Still, don’t expect them to venture far from what they do best.

“Sure, we could serve Japanese or Italian food, but we wanted something that represented us. We’re two guys from New Jersey and Ohio,” says Youkilis. “It translates into a lot more passion for what we’re doing.”

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