Local resto chain positive with new spot at Terraces

Despite apprehensions from most businessmen to undergo expansions and new development efforts in today’s economic crisis, a restaurant chain based in Cebu remains confident that their new location at the Ayala Center Cebu’s Terraces will be a positive development for their company.

Sister companies Café Laguna and Lemon Grass are now located in their new respective locations at the ground floor of the Ayala Terraces together with other mall locators.

In an interview, Jill Urbina Viado, Café Laguna manager and franchising director said that this new move shows their company’s confidence with the Cebu market which seems unaffected by the recent global crises.

“Cebu is very competitive now a days. Restaurants are everywhere and now Ayala has opened Terraces which is something new in Cebu and a perfect place to go to not only for shopping but for leisure so going to the mall will be a totally new experience,” said Viado.

She said that they are very positive with the development of Ayala and they are also confident that they will continue to gain consistent sales because most of the client-base of the mall is not hit by crises.

Viado said that there has been a slowdown in spending but they did not notice a drastic decline of patrons especially that their restaurants’ markets are among the higher-end segment.

“In terms of client traffic there is no drastic slowdown especially that we already have established clientele and most of them are not much affected with crisis,” she said.

Café Laguna has been in operation here in Cebu for 14 years already and it was one of the first locators inside the mall.

Now the restaurant chain has grown with new locations and a sister company Lemon Grass, a Thai and Vietnamese concept that was established last December of 2005 offering authentic Asian cooking.

Café Laguna has two branches in Ayala, the other one is the Laguna Garden Café while other branches include its latest in the SM City Cebu’s Northwing and a franchised branch in Cagayan de Oro.

Viado said that this year, they have been concentrating on renovating their existing restaurants and expanding on a new location and so far they are still on the right track of developments.

And they have also retained their Filipino concept despite the modern times by taking a lot of research and calculated risks on their development efforts, said Viado.

Next year, the company is planning to focus on their franchising efforts as they have already been receiving quite a lot of interests for both Café Laguna and Lemon Grass.

“We think that we still have not saturated the Cebu market yet but we cannot postpone franchising any longer because there are already clamour for us to establish in other areas such as in Iloilo, Davao and Manila,” said Viado.

However she stressed that in looking for a franchisee, their company requires dedication to the business and not only capital and a good location.

“We don’t just sell our franchise because it’s our own reputation that is at stake so we carefully choose our franchisees and not just go for anyone who has the money or the perfect location. They should also have the same passion for the business just like our family,” said Viado.