by Kristen Wile

After a few weeks in operation as a lunch pop-up, Meshugganah chef/owner Rob Clement made the decision to halt the Jewish deli’s lunch service and instead focus on catering. Despite its highly publicized return, Meshugganah wasn’t seeing enough business to continue operations as intended.

“I was struggling to do enough business without catering to sustain my bills,” Clement says. “I only did three weeks worth of data but I don’t see something all of a sudden happening where it was going to get crazy busy or any sort of increase. It just wasn’t just wasn’t working as a ghost kitchen, and then I had an influx of catering opportunities come in which are just a lot more profitable honestly and they’re safer from a financial standpoint.”

Based on the amount of media coverage of Meshugganah’s return, Clement prepared for sales of his popular items such as his pastrami sandwich based on his busiest weeks at Joan’s Deli, the Rare Roots Hospitality concept where Meshugganah products were available. However, Clement said he found himself tossing food after selling only around half of what he anticipated. He considered adding meal deliveries, but didn’t think the additional orders would make up enough revenue to meet expectations.

At the same time, more catering opportunities opened up — a much safer business model, as you’re getting paid in advance for the product and you know exactly what you need to prepare.

“If I transition my focus to catering, I feel like there’s opportunities to hire a team and have help to be able to take on more projects.” he says.

Clement believes swapping from a pop-up to set hours in a single location may have taken away some of the urgency that brings people to a pop-up, which is how Meshugganah launched. The limited hours of 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. also were difficult on the business, as it was busy during prime lunch hours but quieted down after 1 p.m.

 “I can’t shorten the hours from like 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and be open 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. three days a week; it just doesn’t even make sense,” he says. “It’s just kind of a logistical nightmare, trying to manage it, and rather than keep beating my head against the wall and try to fix something that’s clearly broken, I just decided, let’s just move forward with catering and try and expand on that, tackle events, do things of that nature. I still want to cook and I want to cook well.”

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