Wash as you eat!

A small Japanese restaurant is truly showing an innovative way to run the business.

Apart from the cost of food, the biggest fixed expense for any restaurant is the staff. So this restaurant, Mirai Shokudo,  located in the capital Tokyo’s Jinbocho district, has only one staffer – 33 year old Sekai Kobayashi  who is the cook. The waiters and cleaners are all the customers.

Her concept – no charge for the food you eat is you opt to wash dishes or clean up the place or wait tables. If a person eating at the restaurant wants to pay by working there, he or she needs to work for 50 minutes either taking orders and clearing plates or washing dishes.

Her objective – give the poor in the society an opportunity to eat out as long as they pay their bill by washing dishes! Kobyashi believes in complete transparency, so much so that she publishes the financial details of the business online and also advises others on how to launch a new restaurant.

Isn’t that a great idea for many of these hotels to adopt?