UPTOWNflavor

For anyone who ever wants to get into the business of a buffet, allow me to share with you a couple tenets that must be followed to ensure some modicum of success. Number 1, make sure you are able to get back the cost of the meal plus a decent profit for each plate you sell. This means calculating how much food & drink on average a person will eat (given the motivation of “all you can eat”) and calculating from there which price will cover you.

Number 2, make sure your price is low and easy to remember. This makes word of mouth a cinch.

Number 3, while your food does not have to be super tasty (or gourmet or “artesanal”) but you have to have a wide spread of selections so that the customer has the illusion of unlimited combinations of food even if they are really going to eat from only a couple groups.

Number 4, make sure your food is well stocked and VISIBLE! There’s a reason places like McDonald’s and Burger King have those glossy pictures next to each value meal. Your customers need to be salivating at the thought of eating all that food! They want to see different colors, experience different smells and different textures…from spicy to sweet to tangy. The mere assault on the senses will have already done most of the work for you.

That being said, I am sad to announce that Pizza Party Buffet has failed miserably on all counts. This is terribly hard for me to say because I usually go into any new restaurant/bar/lounge with an extremely open mind. I also take into account what things need to be tinkered with before one could offer a true assessment of a new business. That’s why I waited a couple weeks before walking in. First let me mention the good. The place is spacious. It actually looks like a college cafeteria it’s so big. That’s it. I’m sure that when the owners/investors got together they must have had an image of hordes of people breaking through the doors to capitalize on all-you-can-eat pizza, pasta, and salad for $10. The premise is fool proof it would seem. Who doesn’t like pizza? Who wouldn’t be obliged to challenge a buffet for just 10 bucks? I know that when I saw the signs posted I said to myself, ‘This is genius! They’ll make a killing!’

When I stepped inside, however, I was in for a surprise. The pizzas were laid out across 5 platters. All of them quite thin and looking,sort of like half eaten leftovers. The “buffet” consisted of a steam table full of lid-covered pans. The labels only provided a small clue as to what was cooking inside of them. From the beginning I said to myself ‘How are you supposed to convince me to want to eat any of this if I can’t even see the food!’ And sure enough, the labels alone weren’t enough to get me hungry. I had a couple of slices of what looked like cheese and tomato sauce toasted on communion wafers. The edges were crispy and the center was soft and doughy…just like my microwaved pizza. Someone had commented on another website that the justification for the sub par pizza was that this is supposed to be geared to children on account of the Harlem GEMS site next door. But, come on! This is a joke!

On a practical note, if you get anything less than the buffet meal price, you’re already losing money. Those thin slices go for $2 a piece. All they had for the buffet selection was a pan of ziti, a pan of spaghetti, meat sauce, tomato sauce, chicken wings, and rice and beans. That’s it! That’s your buffet! I was in shock. But it’s not all downhill.

Pizza Party Buffet being the new kid on the block still has plenty of room for potential. Perhaps they are afraid of putting more food out there for fear of no one buying any and having it go to waste. But that’s the catch isn’t it! Unless it’s appealing to the senses, people won’t go for it. Marketing 101. You need to add at least 8 more items to that buffet.

Second, someone needs to start cooking the pizzas better. I’m not expecting Ray’s pizza, but you have to make sure the pies are at least evenly cooked. And stack a couple more pies there so that people can get into it! I had high hopes for this place. I really want them to do well but the current formula isn’t going to cut it. Changes need to take place before the rest of the community bites…literally.

Related: Yelp.com

Pizza Party Buffet
381 Lenox/corner of 129th St.
(212) 828-8040

Updated January 1, 2009