SOMETIMES retirement is simply the subsequent stage of life. This has confirmed true for 62-year-old retired banker David Foo and former SMK Assunta instructor Tan Lee Lee, who run a meals enterprise from dwelling.
Lee Lee shared: “I was supposed to go into tuition and a friend of mine who runs a tuition centre actually invited me to help out. But because of MCO, the tuition idea did not kick off and there I was, thinking of what to do next. Around the same time, David suggested we do something instead of idling around.”
David defined: “The idea has been in my mind for over 20 years as a retirement plan. As age caught up, I thought of going into a sustainable business and I thought it would be a money making machine, but times have changed.”
Inspired by his mates who appeared to get pleasure from cooking and sharing footage of their dishes to their mutual Whatsapp teams, David started to pitch his concept for a enterprise. Lee Lee was the solely one that instantly jumped into motion and helped set issues in movement.
Having no F&B background, the two needed to put in some further work. They began off with location analysis.
Describing a quiet place for people to take a seat down and luxuriate in meals, their stall located in a Chinese meals store alongside Jalan Dato Mahmud 11/4, Petaling Jaya, ticked all the packing containers.
When it got here right down to advertising and marketing, they relied on phrase of mouth, pamphlet distribution, social media, and the store proprietor who helped unfold phrase about their meals to passersby.
The duo deliberate every little thing in lower than a month. David describes it as “not requiring special planning and it felt like a natural flow”.
The enterprise kicked off on July 15, 2020, and the humble menu has grown from tong sui (desserts) and lightweight meals to an upgraded one as a consequence of requests from prospects. Both of them painstakingly rotate their menu and put together a rice dish of the day each day. Think yam rice, black pepper rooster rice, candy bitter rooster rice, and Thai basil rooster.
Malay prospects additionally frequent the place, and it’s a type of uncommon gems in Petaling Jaya the place these in the neighborhood freely drop by to eat and mingle with none fear about the halal standing.
David added: “We decided to stick to five of the more traditional tong suis for our menu and we wanted to include at least one savoury dish and a light meal. We decided to go for something a bit different with our tomyam beehoon and it has proven to be very popular.”
Serving bubur cha cha, purple bean, black pulut, gandum, and barley with ginko nut and beancurd, the largest problem to date has confirmed to be sourcing recent santan (coconut milk).
“Our tong sui depends on fresh santan. We have been to a number of sources and discovered that some santan just cannot last the day and we had to go back to only one source. Even though it costs a little bit more, it is the only place we can trust. To make things even harder, markets are closed on Mondays and our source is from a wet market. We have to really check the santan before serving it,” stated David.
“It took a lot of trial and error. We experimented and improved based on suggestions of customers,” Lee Lee chimed in.
Their dense, flavourful yam cake sells like scorching desserts right here (pun meant). “It’s fifty percent yam and some customers even tell us we should cut down on it to increase our profit! But no, it’s all about the quality”.
The well-loved tomyam beehoon is served with a touch of aromatic chili sambal.
“Making the sambal itself takes us four hours, and that’s excluding the buying process. We handpick every chili to make sure it is fit for consumption,” stated David, including that prospects typically request for the sambal to be bought by the bottle.
Food high quality shouldn’t be the solely promoting level right here. The low costs are an extremely interesting facet as effectively, given that almost all full meals now value upwards of RM10 in the metropolis.
“In the shop where we operate, customers can get chee cheong fun (steamed rice noodles) for only RM1 a piece so in some way, we feel obliged to keep it that way,” stated David.
Given that they’re situated near the University of Malaya Medical Centre, in addition they thought of that sufferers and their households would drop by for a fast chunk, and felt they need to have the choice of getting a fairly priced meal. Both admit that their revenue margin is low, however clarify that working such a low quantity enterprise additionally implies that growing their costs wouldn’t be worthwhile both.
“We put so much effort into preparing our food so it’s really not about making money. We feel satisfied each time a customer compliments us, enjoys the food, and returns again. We have made many new friends from this business,” Lee Lee stated, her sense of satisfaction displaying by way of.
David added on that the focus has advanced into extra of a buyer relationship-based enterprise as an alternative of a money-making one.
The two of them additionally defined that they by no means anticipated to place in virtually 16 hours a day into their enterprise, at the value of sacrificing household time. Waking up at 7am each morning, they start meals preparation and are able to load the meals into the automobile by 11am. By midday, the retailer is able to function.
“Everything is done in the house,” David stated of the meals preparation and the washing up. Upon arriving dwelling at 8pm, they take a break earlier than having dinner. “Then, it’s time to start washing – a big chore,” stated David.
“It takes more than two hours,” Lee Lee chipped in.
Immediately after, they started cleansing and making ready elements which require marination. The lengthy, onerous work goes on till 2am, after which it’s time for sleep.
Some of their common prospects additionally place bulk orders from them to be distributed to underprivileged communities. Although it leaves them little time to relaxation, the duo purpose to please.
“I have to acknowledge the tremendous gratitude we have for the support of our many friends who come from places like Klang, Kajang and even the outskirts of Kuala Lumpur. Despite not having spoken for many years, they suddenly appear at my stall and it warms my heart very much,” David concluded.
