Even though you are a newbie, you are brave. Open your mind and see the history of 10 restaurants that turned the crisis from Covid into an opportunity to own a restaurant business. To be a guideline for running a restaurant business and send encouragement to all new restaurant owners. Fight!

From the owner of Beehive Phuket Old Town Hostel, when the first wave of the COVID crisis hit in 2020, Phuket Island was ordered to close in March. There were zero tourists. At first, I was still in good spirits, so I cooked food to share with others in need. I tried making clips, becoming a YouTuber, and making surfing clips to kill time. I thought the crisis wouldn't last long. As the high season neared at the end of the year, I invested in renovating the hostel accommodation to welcome New Year's tourists. Then, on December 20, 2020, the government announced the second closure of the island. All customers disappeared, and all the investment was gone as well.

Khun Nueng-Manosit Jaengjob said that because he loves eating noodles to the point that he could eat noodles 7 days a week, he tried making noodles. At first, he made them at home and posted them on Facebook until his friends asked him about them, ordered noodles for himself, and for his employees. Many people confirmed that they were delicious. So he started selling delivery from January to March. He earned tens of thousands of baht, enough to cover his expenses and pay his employees. He kept adjusting the noodle recipe until it was right. After that, the island was opened for a short period during Songkran 2021, and there were some tourists and Thais staying there. The hostel became lively again for a while, but it didn’t take long for the island to close again.

The day the island was ordered to be closed due to the third wave of COVID-19 was the day that the “Jinhu” noodle shop was opened. The highlight is the homemade noodles, organic noodles, no preservatives. Developed the recipe by asking for help from a friend who graduated from Cordon Bleu to help with kneading the dough and adjusting the taste. Plus, the design and branding skills from the hotel business made Jinhu noodles well-known in no time. Until now, people are addicted to it. There are regular customers, both ordering delivery and eating at the shop. Sales have doubled every month. And planning to open more branches, along with developing the organic vegetable business, which is currently receiving so many orders that we can’t deliver in time. And planning to expand the smart farm to grow organic vegetables to support the upcoming vegetarian festival.

Khun Nueng, owner of Jin Hu Noodles (Jin Hu is Hokkien Chinese and means “golden tiger”, which comes from his father’s name), left some thoughts and encouragement for those who have started their own restaurant business or those who are still confused about how to proceed during this crisis. Many people are still waiting for tourism to recover, but he wants them to have a backup plan. COVID-19 is likely to be with us for a long time and may continue to mutate. If we rely solely on the government, it will be difficult. We should probably turn to finding additional jobs. We have to find a way to establish ourselves. Whatever we like and have knowledge about, we have to do it first. He wants to encourage everyone to try to get up and do it. You may find something better than before.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/jinhunoodle

Because of COVID, his wife's tour company had to stop. The family lost income. Continuing to work for a company in a safe zone was not enough income. And the baby was just born. Borrowing from anyone is difficult at a time like this. Mack-Natthakarn Kingpat decided to resign from her position as an engineer in a private company to open a southern curry shop. Go all out. Because she is a person who loves to eat and likes to travel to eat with her friends in the gang who eat a lot, so she named the shop "Khao Kaeng Kin Keng". But before opening the shop, she had to study and find information, prepare for 2 months, practice cooking according to recipes and YouTube, but still did not like it. It was not like the authentic southern curry that she had eaten before.

Decided to return home to Nakhon Si Thammarat, consulted my mother to take me to the source of southern curry paste and searched for southern food with the same taste as when I was a child. Then I came back and adjusted the recipe to be my own until it was perfect, so I started to open a shop. The highlight of this shop is authentic southern curry, unlike anyone else. In addition to rice with curry, if anyone wants curry or food made to order, they can order more and they will make it fresh right away.

Mack said that opening a new shop was like going to a new school. He didn't know what to do yet, so he tried to learn, study, and solve problems continuously. He had to learn to post on social media, practice running ads so people would know him, and post on delivery platforms to increase his customer base. It took 3 months to become well-known and to gain more customers. One reason was that the reviews on the app were so good that people wanted to see the real shop. After they tried it, they recommended it to others until they eventually became regulars at the shop. Currently, the shop has sales before expenses in the tens of thousands per day.

Mr. Mac, owner of the Southern restaurant “Khao Kaeng Kin Keng”, would like to encourage new restaurant owners and those who are still struggling, saying, “I used to be in the dark, but I had to think and encourage myself to keep fighting because if I didn’t fight, things would get worse. But if I fought, there was still a way out. Then we would know the answer ourselves as to what we had to do. The next challenge would come continuously. First of all, we have to have a goal. Everything will go well.”

For those who are thinking of starting a restaurant, don't be afraid that there are already a lot of restaurants. Don't be afraid that you won't succeed. The most important thing for a restaurant is 1. Taste. It must be delicious and unique. 2. Appearance of food. It must be delicious. Take a picture and send it to social media. It must be delicious. 3. How to make customers order again. Therefore, you must maintain the quality of the food.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/KhawKaengKinKeng

It started with a son who loved traveling, hiking, and eating steak. He gave his mother a challenge: how could he cook steak in the forest without wasting it and using the least amount of equipment? From his experience as a butcher and having known many chefs, he studied everyone's steak sauce recipes and compared them, then developed his own steak sauce recipe. Once he had the recipe, his son suggested that since his mother, "Khun Walaiphan Okwichai", was planning to retire at the end of 2020 anyway, he might as well start a food truck to sell steak after he retires.

By going out to sell on holidays, it is a family business after retirement, named "Steak Kon" Kang "Jaeng", emphasizing the concept of steak that does not require a lot of ingredients, can be eaten anywhere. After finishing the car and testing the booth Food Truck on Christmas Day 2019, the sales were over ten thousand baht. The son was very happy. After that, he did not sell any more because it did not coincide with the holidays. Until the unexpected happened, the son died from an accident on January 5, 2020.

Ms. Walaiphan said that at that time she was very sad. She admitted that she was very upset. She didn't know what to do next. But because she was still working full-time, she went to work as usual. Until COVID came in March, the company had a policy to reduce employee salaries because the company's main customers were hotels, which were affected by COVID and had to reduce their meat orders. This also affected the company severely. When she tried to calculate the income, she found that it was not enough to cover her expenses. So she decided to resign and sell steaks full-time to fulfill her son's dream and earn money to support herself and her family.

Starting from driving a food truck and parking it on the side of the road in front of the alley, the first day sold 300 baht, but the second day sold over 3,000 baht. Even during COVID, there were still many customers and the response kept increasing. Today, entering the second year, earning hundreds of thousands of baht per month, it is considered a success. There are 2 more food truck franchises, starting to sell the "Khon" Steak franchise, and most importantly, he has successfully fulfilled his son's dream, so he started sharing with others by teaching how to make steak for free, teaching how to do marketing without charging, cooking and giving food to those in need during COVID, or even giving advice to open steak businesses until many people were successful.

Khun Walaiphan leaves a thought for those who think about getting up and opening a restaurant: Loss is a natural thing. At that time, I was also upset, but how long will we be sad? We can be discouraged, take a break, and then get up and keep fighting. Today, we still have a business. We don't have to be rich. Just have enough money to eat until we die. Throughout the 40 years that I've been working, I've always thought of myself as an owner. The company taught me to have a sense of belonging. Today, I'm a real owner. I've made a lot of profit for the company. Why can't I do it myself?

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/steakkonkangchaeng

The hotel business has been directly affected by the COVID crisis. Almost all hotels have had to adapt to survive. Many have laid off employees, while others that are still able to survive have negotiated a salary cut to support their businesses. Mr. Dax-Natthakrit Sangthong, Assistant Sales Manager of a famous hotel in the center of Bangkok, is one of them. He used to have a salary that could survive without any hardship, but after having his salary cut by 50%, it started to be insufficient because the expenses in the capital city were still as high as before, and even higher during the period of having to work from home. In addition, his family was worried because the COVID situation in Bangkok was getting worse. So he decided to return home to Trang Province and opened a breakfast restaurant, "Rom Mangosteen", which was open from 6:30 to 10:30 a.m. using his own house under a mangosteen tree, which is the origin of the shop's name.

Mr. Dax-Natthakrit Sangthong said that he had noticed the eating habits of Trang people, who often eat several meals a day. There were no breakfast restaurants in his area, and his experience in running a hotel made him know what customers wanted. He had to create a comfortable atmosphere in the restaurant, develop the restaurant's menu to have special features, such as mangosteen umbrella eggs, fried eggs, etc., and most importantly, the prices were affordable.

The first day of opening the shop was April 20th. The response was very good. People were impressed. Customers spread the word by word of mouth. There were reviews on social media until there were customers coming in regularly. And started to have more customers from other districts. The sales on weekdays were around a thousand baht and jumped to 2-3 thousand on Saturdays and Sundays. During the period when sales were very good, it was necessary to add more tables. Originally there were 8 tables to sit at, rotating throughout the opening of the shop. Until now, there are still sales in the thousands per day. And still adjusting, thinking of new menus, adding more drinks, tea, coffee, and desserts.

Mr. Dax would like to encourage those who are new to the restaurant business or those who are unemployed and want to try selling food to look to Mr. Dax as an example. When we have to change, we have to look at the area and society that has changed. We have to have a business plan. We have to do our homework well first. We have to be diligent. Don't be careless with what is happening. Be mindful. At first, we were afraid, but we had to fight first. We can use all the experiences from our previous careers with our restaurants.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/RomMangkhud

“Nat The Voice” started out as a night singer at a pub in Chiang Mai, doing events and voiceovers for 10 years until the COVID-19 pandemic caused all her singing and event work to disappear. She hasn’t had any work in the past two years. She couldn’t wait for the situation to improve. Luckily, her boyfriend’s father had a roti recipe, so she tried making her own signature roti recipe and selling it as a delivery during the first wave of COVID-19 until the second wave. Sales were surprisingly good.

Part of it was because people still liked the idea of ​​“Nat The Voice” selling roti, so people wanted to support him. But then, with the third wave of COVID, people started to be able to leave their homes, and people’s behavior changed. Delivery orders decreased, so they thought it was time to open their own shop because people wanted to sit and eat at the shop. They focused on regular customers, not tourists anymore. They could start a sustainable personal business because they couldn’t just wait for music anymore.

Nut-Natthaphong Sincharoen decided to use his savings to open a roti shop with his girlfriend, Hasina, who was also affected by COVID-19 because she works in events. They named the shop “Hasina Roti Shop” after his girlfriend. They developed a menu of roti with various toppings, such as banana, cheese, Nutella, and also chicken-beef mataba, chicken-beef curry set, and a variety of drinks to serve customers.

In the first 2 months of opening the shop, sales were surprisingly good. After that, it started to stabilize. There were some months when sales were not good. We solved this by developing a new menu and joining a delivery app to increase sales channels, while still maintaining quality and not raising prices too high. Now the shop is starting to stabilize, with a profit of thousands a day. Even though we can't spend lavishly like when we were a singer, we can survive without any hardship. We still accept singing and voice-over jobs whenever someone hires us.

Khun Nut left a thought for people in the same profession that if there is anything you can do right now, do it first, even if you have no capital. Try starting with saving the rest to use as capital. It doesn't matter how much. Go for it. Get up and do it. Then we will know what we can and can't do. If we can do it, go for it! Especially people in the music industry or organizers, they may have been discouraged for a long time. Be strong and don't give up. Don't wait. We will get used to COVID ourselves. We have to live with it. Always think that the world has changed.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/Hasina-Roti-Milk-Tea-101430248753447

The tour guide profession is another profession that has been directly affected by the COVID crisis. Mr. Kantpasit Damrongsittinon, owner of “Krua Pladao Seafood”, said that before, he was a tour guide on the Andaman coast, where there were many tourists, especially foreigners. When COVID hit, all the foreign tourists disappeared, and there were few Thai tourists because they could not travel. In addition, being a tour guide is a freelance profession, so it is no longer eligible for government assistance, even though tour guides are a profession that helps stimulate tourism, and is like a gateway for Thai tourism. At that time, I was not sure how to continue my life.

Everywhere we looked, the shops were all closed because there were no tourists. We decided to turn the crisis into an opportunity. If other shops closed, we would open one, going against the current. We noticed that there weren’t many fresh seafood restaurants in Trang town. If we wanted to eat fresh seafood, we had to travel far to the seaside. That’s how “Krua Pladao Seafood” was born, with the concept of bringing the sea to you. You don’t have to go all the way to the sea. We bring fresh food to the city. We used our expertise in seafood and being a child of a fisherman on Libong Island, which made us very familiar with where to find seafood ingredients.
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When I first opened the shop in May, people didn't dare to come out to eat at the shop, so I added delivery and focused on building my presence on social media. I kept selling and preparing for the high-Sea Day opportunity in October. As I kept selling, I started to get regulars. Now I can't close the shop. The income is quite good. Even though some months it's a little bit high, I can support my employees and keep the shop going and have some money left over. But what I really gained is the experience and the name that customers will remember, so that I can wait for a new opportunity when the situation improves in the future.

Mr. Kantpasit left a thought that being a tour guide teaches us to be patient, tolerant, and to go through everything, pressure, sleepless nights. You can get through it. Use your speaking and negotiation skills. Tour guides will know how to create their own selling points, and we have a service mind. Tour guides like us know what customers want. So, think about how far we can go if we start our own business. Many tour guides have already become business owners. We have to fight to survive. For example, “Krua Pladao Seafood” restaurant took the opportunity when all the other restaurants were closed, but our restaurant was open, and made it a highlight. It emphasized the advantage of receiving fresh products from fishermen to sell, and used that opportunity to market it well. In the future, they plan to have their own cages and open a seafood farm to expand their seafood business.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/pladawseafood

Another tour guide who was affected by COVID-19 caused the tour to disappear. Previously, there were millions of tourists from China and Taiwan visiting Thailand each year. When he lost his job and had no income, he had to find something to do. Mr. Atthaphon Sae Jang told us that when he was studying in Taiwan for more than ten years, Taiwan had very famous products, which were Taiwanese tea and frog egg jelly. He believed that frog egg jelly had very good properties for the body. It helped with excretion, lowered cholesterol, relieved internal heat, quenched thirst, and was rich in magnesium. It should be suitable for Thailand's hot weather. So he ordered "Iyu" seeds from Taiwan to try selling frog egg jelly. Then he came up with a new tea flavor that Thailand didn't have, which was fragrant tea of ​​100,000 miles. He opened a kiosk selling them under the name "The Frog Prince Aiyu Natural Jelly". He used high-quality tea without artificial colors or flavors from the 101 tea plantation as the main ingredient, since his girlfriend came from a family that already runs the 101 tea plantation.

In Taiwan, frog egg jelly is a popular product. It is made from a fruit called aiyu, which is a type of fig. The processing method involves cutting open the seeds and drying them. Then, wrapping them in cloth and kneading them in water will produce collagen mucus. It will set itself naturally without adding anything. Taiwanese girls who love beauty often use this frog egg jelly to control their diet.

Mr. Atthaphon also told us that during the first wave of COVID, sales were very good, selling over a hundred cups a day, to the point that people asked to buy the franchise. Although sales started to slow down during the second and third waves of COVID, the income was still going. In the future, he will open a franchise, waiting for the situation to improve. He also plans to sell ready-made frog egg jelly.

Finally, Mr. Atthaphon left a thought that during a crisis, there is an opportunity. Everything has a solution. Be patient and fight it. Everything will get better. This year is the hardest. We have to fight for the family that we have to support.
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/sikadeer958

From selling grilled food at the Ratchaphruek Market in Phitsanulok Province, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, fewer people visited the market, and during certain periods the market was closed and sales were prohibited. Plus, they had to stop selling because they had to take care of their family members. This made Joy-Channikan Pichitpiriyakon and Chanankan Pichitpiriyakon, her older sister, have to think about what to do to generate income during this situation. In the end, they settled on Khanom Jeen Namya because their aunt had a southern-style Namya recipe. So they started learning how to make Southern-style Namya with their aunt and improved the recipe to be their own. They invested in renting a space at an old restaurant across from their house to open a Khanom Jeen Namya in a clay pot and named the shop “Khanom Jeen in a clay pot” near Dong Pradok Intersection. They mainly sell Khanom Jeen Namya and add to their menu with Khao Soi, Yam Khanom Jeen, and other dishes.

When the shop first opened, sales were very good because there was media to help promote it and social media was always posted. The shop sold so well that they started planning to open a second branch. But when the second wave of COVID hit, they had to stop selling for two months. When they reopened, sales had dropped by more than half. The number of deliveries also decreased because the shop was far away and shipping was expensive. So they decided to move the shop, canceled the lease, crossed the river and renovated the front of the house, which was a car repair shop, and continued to open a Khanom Jeen shop until today.

Joy said that until now, the shop is considered halfway done. It is much better than before. After the lockdown was lifted, there were more customers coming to eat. It is recovering little by little. If there is no second wave of COVID, we will be able to open more branches and go further. But we are not discouraged. We have to keep fighting. We chose to move the shop to sell in front of the house. We reduced the size of the business. We are going steadily. We are doing it slowly and expanding the shop. We are not hiring more employees. We are doing it as a family business for now. Finally, I would like to tell everyone that I want you to get up and fight again. Don't let your guard down, but you have to work. Live a self-sufficient economy. Nowadays, we have to survive. There is some government assistance, but we have to survive. I would like to encourage everyone because I am also a businessman. But I will not give up.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/KHUNNAI4289

Two young men, Mr. Non and Mr. Tom, owners of Non Coffee Moka Pot & Burger Home Made in Ang Thong Province, told us that Mr. Non used to be a welder because his father was a contractor as a ship welder. When COVID hit, there was no work coming in, so he had to find something to do. Since he himself loves drinking coffee, he opened a Moka Pot coffee shop to sell coffee, tea, cocoa, and various mixed drinks.

While Tom was a coffee shop employee who also lost his job due to COVID because the coffee shop was closed, when he saw Non open a coffee shop, he consulted about what to sell together. In the end, he decided on burgers because he received an old stove from a relative in Bangkok. After renovating the stove to make it better, Non had the idea that he should sell burgers. He had never thought about selling food before. He had to search for recipes on the web and YouTube to try and adjust the recipes for about two weeks until he found his own recipe. He started selling burgers alongside the coffee shop, selling only at the shop or ordering through the contact channel and then coming to pick up at the shop. He didn't sell delivery yet because no delivery service had reached him.

Opening a new shop, sales were not that good because not many people knew about it. When they started promoting it on social media, posting on a Facebook group for buying and selling food in Ang Thong Province, sales gradually improved until they couldn't keep up. They had to buy a new burger fryer and also buy coffee that was selling well. At present, they think the shop is not in place yet. During the Lock Down, it was a bit bad, but sales are going steadily. They still need to improve the shop. They are making the shop with seating and improving sales in the future.

Khun Khun Non and Khun Tom left a final message for those who are going to start selling food that even though this period is difficult, many people are unemployed, starting something is difficult, but we have to fight on. Whatever it is, we have to do it first. Do what you like, try and make mistakes, you might find what's right for you.

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/Noncoffeemokapot

From being a Chinese chef in a famous restaurant in Chiang Mai Province, earning over twenty thousand baht, when COVID came and Chinese tourists disappeared, the restaurant could not bear the burden and asked to reduce the salary continuously until finally they could not hire anymore and had to quit their job in March 2020. Chef Wan-Siwan Suksabai told us that after quitting she did not think about what to do because she had never been unemployed and never thought about pushing a food cart because she was embarrassed. It was like this for about a month, but when she came to stand and wait for the rice that was handed out in a kilometer-long line, she felt even more embarrassed.

Finally, I realized that I had to fight. I had responsibilities, such as my children and grandchildren. I had to pay for my car and my house. Even though I earned a little money, it was still better than standing around waiting for food to be distributed. If I didn’t struggle, I didn’t see any future. So when I received 5,000 baht in compensation from the government, I used it to buy a second-hand food cart. I repaired and decorated it, and then I started selling food. I only sold three types of made-to-order food: kale with crispy pork, fried rice, and stir-fried pork with holy basil. The food was sold in boxes for 25-30 baht. At first, I was a bit embarrassed because I had never been unemployed and had never pushed a food cart to sell.

The first day, I pushed it to the new city market. The result was good! Many people came to buy, so I couldn't keep up. But it wasn't without obstacles because someone went to report the city officials for making a mess, so they chased me away. But later, the mayor of the sub-district administrative organization came to inform the city officials that they were allowed to sell because it was to help people who lost their jobs during this COVID period. At first, I sold it alone and couldn't keep up. Later, my daughter came to help, and things got better. I only sell in the evening from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. During the day, I prepare my ingredients. Sales are over a thousand baht per day, which is considered a monthly income. Later, the queue became very long and I had to hand out queue cards. Reporters started to come to report the news, which gave me more encouragement. Currently, I have expanded my business into the Ton Pho restaurant by Chef Wan, COVID-19, which also sells delivery food.

Chef Wan also left a message for everyone: We must struggle for our livelihood, we must fight. Since we have the skills, we don’t have to be afraid of going hungry. It’s the same with selling. Because we need to eat. We can’t focus on just one job. We have to adapt to the situation. In this COVID situation, if we don't help ourselves, who will help us?

Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/TonPObyChefWan/