‘It was do or die’: F&B business owners revived burger brand during pandemic

SINGAPORE – Ms Joanne Toh, 29, and Mr Shaun Leong, 36, are co-founders of The Hey Co, which operates two Wildfire Burgers restaurants on the Nafa campus and in Keppel Highway, 8 Korean BBQ at Shaw Centre, Lil’ Tiger cocktail bar and restaurant at Robertson Stroll and Maki-San at Kampung Admiralty.

Ms Joanne Toh: Overnight, it was bloodshed at Cluck Cluck, our rapidly-informal cafe at the Nafa campus serving fried chicken and waffles, and pasta. It catered to pupils, who had been no more time attending lessons in university simply because of the pandemic. For the whole thirty day period of April 2020, our product sales was $2,000.

I try to remember really obviously May 9, the day we were presented the prospect to revive the Wildfire Burgers manufacturer, which had been dormant for about a yr. On May perhaps 11, we determined we had to go for it, it was do or die.

In 20 times, we turned Cluck Cluck into Wildfire. We did everything ourselves – no contractors were being functioning. I recall eight guys had to have the 500kg Inka oven into the restaurant. We hung the symptoms ourselves. We painted the brand on to the wall. If you go there, you’ll recognize that it really is egg-formed, not wholly round.

In those people 20 times, we retooled the menu, did tastings, got the suppliers for ingredients. Wildfire’s menu was humongous but we narrowed it down to five burgers and fried hen. We required to do it properly and do it appropriately.

I also wanted to provide Burnt Cheesecake. I was by no means into baking but at the time, I was earning 8 cheesecakes a working day for R&D. I have to have absent as a result of a lot more than 50kg of cream cheese. It was bought out all over the place due to the fact all people was baking. My dad went to a handful of Phoon Huat shops to purchase it for us.

Then we opened for delivery and takeaway only. Other eating places had to pivot to that, we were being the reverse – we had to put together for dine-in when it was allowed yet again.

Organization dropped by 95 for each cent at our Korean barbecue restaurant. The main attraction there is barbecuing meat at the desk. We focused on stews, bulgolgi and bibimbap for shipping and takeaway but it was not the identical. Fortunately, there have been federal government grants we could implement for to support us by.

When dine-in was permitted once more, we had been booked out for two months. Diners flooded into Wildfire way too. Fortunately.

Lil’ Tiger, which we opened in February final 12 months, was the most difficult. Points were very excellent at 1st. But it is really a consuming area, for socialising. With no-songs and diner restrictions, it was like operating with no arms and legs.

We experienced to do deliveries to continue to keep afloat. We bought a canning machine so we could promote cocktails in cans, and we established up a delivery-only brand name referred to as Darjeeling Social to promote Indian food stuff. Why Indian foodstuff? We like the flavours, and curries and biryani are extremely deliverable.

Now, with tunes, and easing of curbs, we’re seeing reservations for even larger teams and people who want to reserve the area for activities.

Mr Shaun Leong: We determined to open up the second Wildfire in Keppel previous October due to the fact we noticed a demand from customers for the foodstuff. It experienced a slower start because there could only be two diners at each individual table at the time. It truly is more drinks-targeted and simply because there was no music, it took for a longer period to create the business enterprise.