'I was the biggest customer': Shane Pow warns against hosting friends at own F&B business

For food and beverage (F&B) business owners, this is probably one of your biggest questions: When your friends come over to your establishment, do you treat them or do you let them pay?

In local actor Shane Pow's case, he treated them and ended up spending more than he earns from his business.

The 32-year-old, who owns Korean cuisine business Gogiyo, was recently a guest on radio DJ Kenneth Chung's podcast Kunversations with YES 933 DJ Jeff Goh on Aug 30.

Speaking about the business, which he started with a few of his childhood friends, Shane said: "Our concept was to bring good and affordable Korean food to the neighbourhoods. Our original plan was to open 10 stalls and a restaurant later, so we went on with it and realised that it was working because it was during the Covid-19 period and people don't go out often and have limited food options… but once the restrictions are lifted, it's the end."

He shared that they had four stalls at one point, but only one is still in business now.

Shane added that people would generally go to a Korean barbeque place for gatherings and would prefer to go to a restaurant with air-conditioning for "just another $20 to $30".

He also shared the difficulties in operating a food and beverage business in Singapore.

"If you want to own a F&B business to earn a living, it can be done. It depends on what you sell… If given a chance to start a business again, I think I would sell chicken rice or bak chor mee or cai fan," he added.

Kenneth asked Shane if it would be more competitive if he started these businesses instead and the latter said that people would still go for these common local foods in hawker centres rather than Korean food.

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Shane added that he'd always wanted to have his own restaurant to host friends but realised that he spent more in his own business than what he actually earned.

He dished out some advice to listeners: "If you are interested in operating a F&B business and have a lot of friends and a lot of socialisation to do, do not ever bring them to your own place."

He explained that it is still manageable if he is the sole business owner, but he has business partners and wouldn't be able to let them "absorb" the costs, so he would pay out of his own pocket.

"When I looked at my credit card bill every month, I realised that I was the biggest customer [of my own business]," Shane shared.

In addition, Shane also shared that he and his partners have decided not to give discounts to ease the accounting process, so if he treats his friends, he is actually paying full prices.

"So if you are interested in starting a F&B business, never bring your friends over and never be at the stall when they come over," he jokingly added.

Kenneth also asked Shane about employing staff for his business, which the latter shared that it is hard to employ waiters in Singapore, so they generally hired students.

Shane said: "They are mostly available during term breaks, but not after that. Some also said that they feel tired after working for a few days as they still have to wash the dishes and face difficult customers."

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He added that he had even hired some of his fans when the business first started but they left after a while because they realised that Shane did not appear at the stall often.

"When I am at the stall, I am usually quite busy and will not have time to chat with them. Maybe they realised after a while that their contributions did not equal the rewards," he said.

Shane also spoke about starting a business with friends.

He shared: "I think it depends on friends. The friends that I started this Korean cuisine business with, I have known them since I was young. We all have our own jobs. This is our side-line, and that is probably the reason why it is not doing that well because we do not have much time to manage it.

"We are not really calculative about money. We agreed that we would all invest and earn money together or fail together. If we earn money, then it's good for all of us. So these are the people that I can start a business with, I trust them 100 per cent."

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