Despite a drop in employment in the food services business both in the past few months and from a year ago, area caterers say they are getting far more calls heading into the holiday season, and hope that will serve as a springboard into 2011.
At this time last year, business was off by a full 25 percent for David M. Grant Caterers, a Shelton company that is the largest caterer in Fairfield County as ranked by annual events disclosed to the Fairfield County Business Journal. Owner David Grant Sr. said while business bounced back about 10 percent this year, it was not enough to recoup the losses from the year before.
He was forced to downsize the company through a combination of layoffs and capping working hours, and is thankful he had lines of credit lined up at the height of the last business cycle before things went south.
Even as business has recovered he has been conservative in hiring, instead awarding more hours even if that results in paying higher overtime wages.
“My whole feeling was that if I can maintain things through this recession and not close the doors or anything drastic, ”¦ I am doing OK,” Grant said. “It”™s a holding pattern until this recession”™s over, and now it”™s starting to creep up.”
That is particularly the case for weddings, which accounts for the large part of David M. Grant Caterers”™ social business making up half his total revenues with corporate events the other half.
“Back in the day when things were running good, I would have people come in with budgets, especially on the corporate side, and after we had gone over things they would say, ”˜Well, we need to spend a few more bucks,”™” Grant said. “This year, I am starting to hear that again.”
Earlier this year, more than three in four members of the National Association of Catering Executives (NACE) reported an increase in both weddings ”“ a reversal from the summer of 2009, when just 24 percent of caterers nationally enjoyed an increase. Despite more couples heading down the aisle, however, less than a third of caterers reported an increase in expenditures per event ”“ though that in itself was an improvement from the previous year when 90 percent of caterers saw spending ebb on weddings.
This year, people have also been booking weddings on shorter notice, according to NACE ”“ with more than a quarter of respondents reporting they are scheduling wedding events within three to six months, a possible sign of people rushing to the altar upon word of landing a job.
Another possible reason is that couples are having to scramble to find a new caterer or banquet hall after their original choice went belly up, according to Rich Stytzer, vice president of Antun”™s of Westchester in Elmsford, who has noted the same rush to schedule short-notice weddings.
Perhaps no one will be in a better position to take the industry pulse than Stytzer, whose Antun”™s of Westchester hosts next month the holiday winter event of the New York State Restaurant Association, with many NYSRA members active in catering corporate holiday events themselves.
“We are actually doing very well with the upcoming holiday season,” Stytzer said. “Last year, we had longtime customers who were saying, “Look guys, we just laid off 30 people, we just can”™t do it this year.”™ This year, they have been booking earlier ”“ they wanted to nail the date down.”
