The keynote at the inaugural Bar & Restaurant Expo Texas, “F&B Excellence and Brand Success,” featured a conversation with Chef Steve McHugh, a six-time James Beard Foundation Award finalist and the founder of Cured, a San Antonio restaurant that showcases house-cured meats and Texas-sourced ingredients in a gastro-pub setting.
During the presentation, McHugh shared strategies he uses in his restaurant to control costs and maintain a loyal customer base.
Understanding the Customer Base
At Cured, McHugh says he closely monitors customer demographics—especially whether they are locals or tourists—and adjusts the menu accordingly. One of the biggest menu shifts occurs between convention season and the summer season, when more families are visiting.
“We're in convention center season right now. From now until the spring, our menus get a little bit higher end,” says McHugh. “[In the summer], everyone's out with their families and having a good time, so our burger becomes a little bit more prevalent. And on our dinner menu, we do things that are a little bit more children-oriented, pastas and things like that.”
By gearing his menu toward his customer base, he is able to meet their wants while also providing the level of value they are looking for.
Menu Fluidity and Flexibility
Aside from customer changes, availability of certain products and produce also help to dictate the menu at Cured. This allows the team to keep the dining experience fresh and interesting for repeat customers while also helping to cut costs.
One way McHugh achieves this is by fostering strong relationships with farmers, ranchers, and other providers. Rather than writing his menu and then searching for the items he needs, McHugh first talks to his providers and builds the menu out based on what they have available.
This technique also allows him to save. First, by using items that are in season and readily available from local suppliers, he can take advantage of lower prices. Secondly, he will often purchase excess or underutilized products that suppliers are looking to offload at a discounted price.
“For me, it's a lot of phone calls, texting, and emailing back and forth with a lot of different people— from cheese to olive oil to beef to radishes,” he says. “It's constantly figuring it out.”
Preparation Techniques
Cured’s focus on in-house full animal butchery, pickling, fermenting, and other preservation methods also helps them to cut costs while utilizing a wider variety of ingredients.
McHugh cited the example of pork chops. If he buys just pork chops from a farmer for $15 a pound, he would have to charge $65-70 a plate. But when he buys an entire pig at about $3.50 a pound, he’s now able to charge significantly less for those same porkchops and pass on the savings to the customer.
The process of full animal butchery is also more sustainable as it requires less packaging and no waste as McHugh finds a way to use all of the parts whether its through braising, pickling, grinding, smoking, or making a sausage or pate.
“I'm able to help a rancher sustain themselves, and I'm able to sustain my own business,” says McHugh.
McHugh acknowledges that there’s a bit of guest buy-in and training necessary when running a restaurant with such a fluid menu. “It's difficult because you do have those people who want to come in and have that same thing every single time. But we do have a lot of our customers, local and travelers, that really appreciate it's different every time they come in,” he says. “We have to have customers that understand that we don't always have pork chop on the menu.”
An Exceptional Dining Experience
Of course, so much of a restaurant’s success has nothing to do with what’s on the menu, but rather, what type of experience is provided to a guest.
With this in mind, McHugh tells his staff to focus on “understanding the expectation,” “We always say, ‘Your job is to exceed expectations, and you can't do that unless you know what the expectation is.’ So you have to talk, you have to have to have conversations [with the guests]: Why are you here? What are you in for?”
The answers to these questions, the expectation, helps to dictate the service, menu recommendations, and more, which all culminate in a dining experience that sets Cured apart and builds customer loyalty.
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