Recession is stress-testing owners’ plans for start-ups

By Brian Eckhouse

Sunday, April 12, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Opening a restaurant in this town is a dicey proposition even in the best of times.

Adam Gomes, Errol Le Blanc and Rick Pollack have opened their restaurants in the worst of times.

And now they are hearing the refrain: Are you crazy?

Gomes, who is launching a Brazilian steakhouse, and Pollack, who opened a bar and grill, think their restaurants are sufficiently distinctive to survive, even as unemployment grows and people are eating out less. But Le Blanc, who opened a tapas restaurant, worries he may get caught up in the avalanche of restaurant closings.

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Adam Gomes, whose family has restaurant roots in New York City, began planning his Via Brasil Steakhouse 18 months ago. The housing market had peaked but worries of a recession were mostly just whispered.

By the time his 60-table restaurant opened in October, the region was reeling, and his customers were feeling it. People who had made reservations for Christmas parties scaled them back, or canceled.

Still, if Gomes is worried about the recession, he isn’t showing it. The 32-year-old is as calm as the water trickling down a back restaurant wall and behind the bar.

He’s counting on surviving the recession on three counts: He’s not some faceless franchise operation; he has what he believes is a superb location on Fort Apache Road near Charleston Boulevard; and because of his signature menu: all-you-can-eat meals, with meats and fish carved on tableside carts.

Gomes won’t say how much his family invested in the business or how much it is making a month, but allows that revenue is increasing 10 percent monthly and he expects to turn a profit within two years.

About the only concession he has made to the recession is offering a less-expensive, appetizer-based lunch, shaving a few dollars off the price of the other lunch features.

“People say that if we had opened one or two years earlier, we would have been the buzz in town,” he said.

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Economists concluded in late 2008 that the nation was gripped in a recession that had begun in December 2007.

Errol LeBlanc opened his restaurant, RE Tapas Lounge, in March 2008. Ouch.

Still, he says, residents of Silverado Ranch, Anthem and Seven Hills liked his lounge and his menu of Spanish-style appetizers.

Sales at his restaurant, in a strip mall on Silverado Ranch Boulevard at Bermuda Avenue, were reaching nearly $100,000 a month through July. But come August, with the plummeting stock market, LeBlanc’s gross income fell 45 percent, and it hasn’t recovered.

He was shellshocked.

RE Tapas, which required about $500,000 in startup costs, is now making less than $60,000 a month. That’s not enough to support his lounge, Le Blanc says, shaking his head.

“You expect a decline in August. It’s summer,” the 29-year-old says. “But if you’re down at least 30 percent in September or October, you know something’s wrong.

“In my case, it happened so damn fast, you couldn’t adjust for it.”

Le Blanc peeks nervously at the few cars parked in front of the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market. Nearby, a salad shop closed months ago. Restaurants along the Silverado Ranch and Eastern Avenue corridors are closing, he notes. He’s convinced that had he opened one month later, his doors would be shuttered: He would have lost a $95,000 month.

And he’s reached this conclusion: “If you’re opening a restaurant now, you’ll fail unless you’re a McDonald’s or Applebee’s.”

But he’s pushing on right now. Once again, he’s hoping.

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This is why Rick Pollack thinks his restaurant will survive the recession: A customer approaches him and teases that he’s so comfortable here, he’s going to take his shoes off.

That’s the kind of banter you need if you’re going to keep customers coming in, Pollack says.

He opened his bar and grill, The Edge of Town, on March 6, after three years of planning.

Pollack, 49, says he had opportunities to scuttle his plans to open the restaurant after he realized the economy was nose-diving, but dismissed the notion without much thought.

His target market — middle-income customers who like mom-and-pop joints — is loyal, recession notwithstanding, he believes.

Besides, he’s got a life preserver: The bar and its slots are the cash cow that pays for the grill, which is his passion.

Pollack and his business partner, who built the new marketplace on Cheyenne Avenue just east of the Las Vegas Beltway, poured $1 million into this space. The recession prompted them to cut the design budget by about 10 percent — including a little less wainscoting.

He won’t discuss bar revenue but says the 78-seat restaurant is pulling in $3,000 to $5,000 nightly. Pollack hoped it would rake in $5,000 minimum. But he’s not too worried. He says he’s in this for the long term, and his focus appears as much on customer service as the bottom line.

Pollack nudges chef Keith Armstrong in the direction of the friendly customer, who is contemplating how to eat his overstuffed pot roast sandwich. “We need to serve a steak knife with that sandwich,” Pollack says.