Failure pushes couple to succeed
They failed in their first venture into the steakhouse business. But a car salesman and his wife continued to pursue their dream to become successful entrepreneurs and again invested in an improved version of their first failed business.
Raul and Joan Baron opened Carlito’s Way Diner in October 2011. The diner is a reinvented version of their steakhouse Carlito’s Way, which they closed in 2009.
“We realized that there is not much market for a place that offers purely steaks in his menu here in Cebu so we decide to shut it down for a while,” said Raul of Carlito’s Way, which was then located in A.S. Fortuna, Banilad, Mandaue City and moved to Paseo Arcenas in Banawa, Cebu City.
The couple said that they set up Carlito’s Way in 2006 to give Cebuanos an alternative place to enjoy steaks at affordable prices.
“It was conceptualized as a specialty steak house that’s not intimidating to the customers. It’s ‘homey’ and unpretentious. It used to be in that area where Pen Bank is now located,” said Raul.
He started with at least four people including him as the chef to help run the steakhouse which he named after a movie popularized by his idol Al Pacino.
In fact the place used to have a lot of pictures of Al Pacino to fit the ambiance with the name of the store.
“Unfortunately, the business failed but we held on to the dream to become businessmen in the industry”, Raul said.
He said in business there’s always that risk to take and that every failure isn’t an end to the dream of becoming a major businessman someday.
And so last year, the couple reopened Carlito’s Way Diner at Persimmon Plus, the commercial strip of Aboitiz Land, Inc’s condominium project The Persimmon in Mabolo, Cebu City.
The diner now offers not only steaks but also 60 dishes in its expanded menu and the location has a lot of traffic.
“We see this place has a lot of promise with the area occupied mostly by residential houses which is just a comfortable walking distance to many commercial establishments as well,” said Baron.
In his menu, Baron still included four of their best steaks which include Carlito’s Way Steak, US Angus Skirt Steak, US Angus Top Sirloin Steak, and US Angus Rib Eye Steak.
He said that they still offer these products because some of their clients in Carlito’s Way asks for them.
According to Baron, in the past they only see two people or single individual coming in their place back in 2006 to 2009. Now, however, they’re seeing a lot of families and groups of people coming to dine at their place.
“It’s good and it only means that the decision to include other dishes in the menu is effective to really drive more people into our place,” said Baron.
At present, the Barons have eight people working in the diner with them.
“I still cook and work with other chefs we have here who are all my classmates,” said Raul.
The couple said they make sure that the prices of their dishes are still affordable.
“Cebuanos are price sensitive so when we decide to include a dish in the menu, we always consider the price points first,” said Raul.
This year, they have many new dishes in the pipeline for introduction so that their customers will find more reasons to keep coming back at the diner.
One major business decision that they are also looking at is offering partnerships or franchising.
“I think the partnership will come first before the franchise. We got a lot of proposals already from would-be partners who are interested to invest in our brand,” said Raul.
He said he and his wife would consider at least one partnership and hopefully open another branch this year.
Raul said he is happy with the many proposals for partnership barely a year since reopening the business.
He said the brand, Carlito’s Way Diner, had eventually made its mark in Cebu.
“We are happy with the feedback and we are looking forward to growing our brand from a local home-grown brand to a major national brand with presence in major cities in the country,” said Raul.
