SANTA MONICA Calif. Monday nights used to be dead at JiRaffe, a Cali-French outpost here owned by chef Raphael Lunetta. While diners scrambled for one of its 80 seats Thursday through Saturday, on Mondays “they wouldn’t come near us,” Lunetta says.
With a $65-per-person check average, Lunetta knew price was part of the issue, so he considered how to increase value for customers without killing profits. The result was Bistro Mondays, a night when JiRaffe’s white tablecloths are replaced by butcher paper; when the kitchen rolls out a prix fixe menu of two appetizers, two entrees and a dessert for $35 a head; a night servers once dreaded but now love because of the simple menu and high table turns.
“A few years ago, Suzanne Goin wanted to bring more people in on Sundays at Lucques,” Lunetta began, speaking of Goin’s highly acclaimed West Hollywood restaurant. “She started doing very simple, family-style dishes like whole roasted chicken, and people really started coming out.”
Lunetta twisted the idea into one of his own by making the semi-formal JiRaffe a bit more relaxed. Operationally, the limited menu forced the kitchen to be creative with new dishes while modifying others from the regular menu.
One recent bistro menu offered a choice of Caesar salad or herb gnocchi with rock shrimp for starters, marinated pork loin or pan-roasted striped bass for entrees, and pear and chocolate brioche bread pudding for dessert.
“We priced it aggressively, about 40 percent less than they’d pay regularly,” he says. “This is a value, and it’s really what people want right now with the economy like it is. We know everyone can’t afford to eat at regular JiRaffe prices, so we want to make it fair.”
But does it make money?
“It makes a little bit,” he says, “but of course, that’s questionable now given what food costs these days. … Where we do better is when people buy wine or cocktails.”
Lunetta insists that filling the restaurant on an otherwise slow night is the goal, and he’s accomplishing it. A busy restaurant on a Monday night gives passersby in the heavily foot-trafficked area the sense “that the place must be good,” he says. Plus, all sales help pay the bills, which is crucial with the pricey rent on his Santa Monica Boulevard location.
“It also keeps staff motivated and enthusiastic,” he says. “In a sense, I think it keeps the restaurant sharper and fresher. We all want a rest and need downtime (like slow days), but in the restaurant business, you’ve got to stay stimulated and moving.”
Jay Denham, executive chef at Louisville, Ky.’s Park Place on Main, has rolled out streamlined and arguably bargain-based menus at his fine-dining restaurant. With prices similar to JiRaffe’s, Denham saw early-week specials as a way to draw customers on days they might otherwise stay home.
For example, Thursday evenings feature a Farmers Market Family-Style Meat and 3 Dinner. For $20 per person, customers get a choice of one of a few entrées, plus three sides served family style. Since Denham’s menu depends heavily on locally grown produce and animals, he doesn’t know what will arrive at the door until that day. Only then does he plan the special menu.
“That’s the way we did it when I grew up on the farm,” says Denham, a native of Maysville, Ky. Deciding what to do with his mystery basket is a good challenge, he adds. “What we ate depended on whether something was ripe or whether we just had a steer slaughtered. It was always fresh.”
When the program started in the first week of June, Denham offered smoked pork chops, seared bison skirt steak, peppers stuffed with grass-fed beef and lamb and buttermilk fried chicken for entrees. A slew of sides included: mixed greens, pickled beets and goat cheese; Kentucky blue cheese mashed potatoes; roasted potatoes and spring herbs; and grilled asparagus with hollandaise.
Despite its success, Lunetta says Bistro Mondays have not come without challenges. Customers sometimes complain that they can’t switch items on the prix fixe menu, and that forces him to stand his ground firmly but kindly.
“People are going to want to deviate and ask for special things, so how do you say no when you’re in the service business and you’re not supposed to?” he says. “But when you do something like a Bistro Monday, you can’t make substitutions because it becomes a money-losing night.”
One solution that has helped was to use JiRaffe’s Web site and regular e-mails to train customers to know what’s offered and that the menu is fixed. E-mails containing Monday’s menu are sent out on Thursdays.
“People get perturbed if don’t we get it out right then because they’re excited about it,” says Marje Bennets, JiRaffe’s publicist, who handles the weekly campaign that includes more than 1,000 users. “This gives them a chance to see if they like what’s on the menu and an opportunity to make a reservation. They need that on a night when we sometimes do 170 covers.”