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Good Idea - Bad Idea?


Lee & Elin
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We are considering moving over to France in the not too distant future and would like opinions and feedback on our idea.
Usually with Gites they usually occuped during the summer season with about 10 people. For the holiday makers to have a night off and enjoy a meal being cooked for them, I would say would be quite pleasant.
My husband is a chef (has been for 15 years) and wondering whether there would be a call for offering his services, i.e. Preparing a meal, from a set menu at a cost per head. Or even a curry night, BBQ's or take any meal request. We are fully aware that this would only be seasonal work through the summer months. Advertising through leaflets in the Gite and word of mouth. Your honest opinion would be appreciated. As we have family in the Haute Vienne this is where we will probably settle but he is willing to travel to other regions.
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Do you mean that you would supply this service for your own gite, or for other gites, as it doesn't seem clear to me.

From a personal point of view, of a potential gite customer, I guess I might use this service on occasion, but in truth would be more likely to go to local restaurants.   Then again we are a couple with no children, so might feel quite differently if we had to drag a bunch of screaming kids  into the car and then try to contend with their antics (or they may be perfectly behaved children of course!) in the restaurant, or worry about them getting over-tired and having to leave restaurant early.   Thus, if I had kids I would be much more likely to use a service like this.   So, again only as a personal view, if it were for your own gites, I would consider it more feasible if you had large gites, ie which could hold a couple of families, lots of kids, or a party of people together, who may not want to go out and worry about not drinking if they had to drive.   Would also depend on the location I guess.   I am in Haute Vienne and it can be quite some distance in some parts to drive to a nice restaurant.

If you are thinking of offering this service to other gite owners, then you may prefer to post the question in the gites section.

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We offer to prepare a meal for our gite guests on arrival. I think about 99% take us up on the offer (they do practically all have kids) after a potentially very long day in the car they're usually grateful for someone else feeding them! They eat with us in the garden, we don't give any choice as to the dishes, but i ask them to tell me in advance if there's anything they don't like or want, and wine is included. I have to say though that we don't make any money at it (we charge 28€ a head for adults) but it's pretty good fun getting to meet everyone!

We have occasionally been asked by potential guests if we can recommend a chef who will provide meals / catering for them in their gite.

Suzi

www.patiras.com/trinite.htm

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That's great that you provide a meal the day they arrive. After such a long and tiring journey the last thing you want to be doing is standing over a hot cooker.  Most people don't tend to make it to the shops until the following day for their groceries etc.  When holidaying at my parents gite, having two small children it can be easier to stay in the gite and prepare meals,than dragging them to a restaurant and not enjoying our meal knowing that any second they will start to play up and get bored and run around the place.  Hence a lot of picnics and BBQ's and meals at the gite.  So to target families holidaying together in large gites is qppropriate, and people who wish to stay in have a meal with friends but nobody wants to drive.  We'll do a few trial runs with family and friends that own gites to get their recommendations.  Have put this in the gite section also. Thanks for your replies.
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We also offer a four course meal on arrival for 18 Euros per adult and less for children depending on age. We find that most of our guests are keen to sample the local cuisine or are happy to cook for themselves in the fully fitted kitchen or use the BBQ that we provide.

If guests wanted to have  a meal cooked for them it is a service that we would be happy to provide ourselves.  There is a lot of money to be made in catering !!!

 

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[quote user="Claire"]

There is a lot of money to be made in catering !!!

[/quote]

Only if you can benefit from economies of scale and wholesale purchase etc. There is a topic on another forum where several B&B owners are giving up providing evening meals because of recent price hikes at supermarkets. You have to factor in your time, energy costs etc when doing it on a regular basis rather than just as an occasional favour. Mind you it probably depends where you are. 18€ is what you may pay from the set menu with a reasonable choice at a good restaurant for an evening meal in our part of France; a little over half of that for the four-course table d'hote at lunchtime. And 28€ is getting close to gourmet menu territory...

 

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Yes you are pobably right Will. I don't factor in my time or any other costs so am probably running at a loss. However, I do enjoy cooking for our guests and being able to sit and chat with them. I am lucky in that the gite is more of a hobby that has to pay it's way rather than make a huge profit as we do have another source of income to fall back on.

 

www.margerides-gite.com

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You're right, for 28€ you could get a fancy meal at a restaurant, but not with the amount of wine we usually get through! Anyway, our guests generally don't want to go to a fancy restaurant! They arrive hot and knackered, have a shower and then collapse in my beautiful garden with a very large glass of wine while their kids go mental playing with my dogs or on the swings, running off all the energy they've saved up being trapped in a car for hours. We wait on them and sit down to dinner with them, the families from the two gites get to know each other (and decide whether to spend more time together or avoid each other for the week!) and a good time is had by all! The food isn't gourmet, but it's good and everyone eats well and usually stagger away from the table very full and a little tipsy! I honestly don't make any money on the meals, I don't charge for kids under 14 and we buy everything in the local supermarket (except the wine which our neighbour makes). There's always a panic over a hot stove in the 2 or 3 hours between finishing cleaning the 2 gites and sitting down to dinner, (in between welcoming the guests and putting two toddlers to bed) and every time I think "why do I bother? Never again!". Then once the main course is on the table and I've had a large glass of wine, I start to enjoy it - For us it's the best night of the week (if the most exhausting!) and most of our guests say that it makes their holiday - some of them even want to do it again later in their stay so my cooking can't be that terrible!

BUT, to get back to the original posting.... If there were a nice local chef who would come to my house and do all the slaving over a hot stove, I'd probably take him up on it!

suzi

www.patiras.com/trinite.htm

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[quote user="suzi05"]

 I have to say though that we don't make any money at it (we charge 28€ a head for adults) but it's pretty good fun getting to meet everyone!

 

[/quote]

Wow, that must be one hell of a meal if you don't make any profit at those prices! What are you feeding them?

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[quote user="KathyC"][quote user="suzi05"]

 I have to say though that we don't make any money at it (we charge 28€ a head for adults) but it's pretty good fun getting to meet everyone!

 

[/quote]

Wow, that must be one hell of a meal if you don't make any profit at those prices! What are you feeding them?

[/quote]

NOT AT ALL!!!!  We charge 25€ and we're some of those that Will is talking about who are thinking of giving up evening meals this summer.  I absolutely LOVE cooking and entertaining but having recently submitted this year's tax return it meant I was looking at last year's figures for our B&B and we made an extra 1270 by cooking 150 dinners so we made about 8.5€ per meal.  Now that figure is what we "made" after I have taken into account the money I spent on food and wine, because as Will points out, B&B or gite owners don't have the potential to buy in bulk or have vast turnovers so can buy no more cheaply than if cooking for an ordinary family meal and yet, because you are charging those sort of figures you have to provide something a little bit "special".  The 8.5€ per meal does not take into account fuel for the car to go to and from the supermarket or gas and electricity for cooking, for which I think we can easily deduct a further 2 euros per meal, plus preparation time for the meals, and most of all, the 3 or 4 hours that we then spend with our guests serving and eating the meal!  It also doesn't take into account breakages on crockery and glasses, serviettes, flowers for the table...... On average last year we had 4 guests per meal, so that 150 meals equates to 37 nights work at aproximately 6 hours a night (shopping, preparing and serving), that's 222 hours for me and about 150 for my OH, so 372 hours of work for less than 975 euros remuneration; that's a maximum earner of 2.6 euros an hour - for what is absolutely KNACKERING work.  You try doing 22 nights in a row in August and then see what you think to the profit!!!

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Hi Kathy,

We don't serve anything very special, but by the time you add up nibbles, starters, main course, cheeses, pud, bread, juice for kiddies, bottle or two of apero, anywhere upwards of 4 bottles of wine, for 4 - 8 adults (including ourselves) and 4 - 8 kids...... doesn't often leave much change at Champion bearing in mind we take 52 - 168€. When was the last time you had a dinner party for anywhere between 7 and 17 people and bought everything including all the wine for less than that?!  That's not counting prep costs or time. I suppose we usually get a "free" meal out of it, but like I said, we don't do it for the money.

suzi

www.patiras.com/trinite.htm

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Friends of mine run gites and are chefs.  They offer meals for their guests when they want them at a set price but also they do picnic hampers for when they wish to go out for the day.  They also charge a set price for this and it's a really gourmet picnic.  The other thing they do is run cookery classes for their guests if this is what they want to do on their holiday.  On top of that, they also offer take-away food for the freezer or do catering for people's parties.  They have a thriving business and do really well.  All just from the expat community in the Tarn.  Hope this gives you some more ideas.  Good luck.

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