We had dinner at one of the seafood restaurants in a fishing village last weekend. There are around ten restaurants along that stretch of main road in the village.
My children were hungry when we reached there. To avoid waiting too long for the food, I went to the restaurant that had the least cars in the open car park . From the car park, I could see only few tables occupied and there were few workers standing by the tables.
As usual when we went to seafood restaurant, we ordered for prawns, crabs, fish. The taste of the food was acceptable but the size and freshness of the seafood was below par.
It was at this time our conversation led to these points :
1. The restaurant with the least customers / business will get smaller, less fresh seafood supply as compared to the rest. All of the restaurant operators may be getting their supply from the same supplier.
2. The restaurant with bigger crowd / sales will get bigger, fresher seafood supply and get more customers, better sales.
3. The seafood supplier will give the bigger customer bigger, fresher supply as he can order larger volume.
4. The restaurant with bigger crowd / better sales will keep getting bigger, fresher seafood supply and further improve on his sales while the restaurant with least customers / business will keep getting smaller, less fresh supply and his business will not improve much if it does not get worse.
The pattern of how things take place like the one faced by the restaurant operator are also faced by other businesses. The vicious cycle must be broken or rather avoided. So, if business is not good, don't wait for things to happen. Make things happen. Or else things will move in cycle, dictated by the pattern.
This is one trap to avoid so that one doesn't fall into the vicious cycle which has a high degree of predictability if not a certainty which is.......sure-die.
