Transport Cafe Standards or Grades Considerations.
What can you expect from a Transport Cafe or any other Cafe/Restaurant no matter the price you pay for the food you eat. A Hotel will not be your guarantee of good food nor will a Transport Cafe, Restaurant or any other type of eating establishment.
After the food there is the decor, ambience and accommodation type of the establishment you choose, the truth is that any of the eating establishments can be good or bad or poor, they can vary on a day to day basis, or week to week or long term variations depending on the owner, the management, the Cook or Chef on the day or week or year. The same good cook on rare occasion can get it wrong due to many factors even in the very best and consistent establishment.
We all know from experience that some Cafes or restaurants have a good reputation, in other words we like them and make every effort to eat there.
As the founding Webmaster of this site (With near to 20 years of having my own catering business, plus being a one time white van man & HGV driver (also driver of coaches) in the late 1950's and early 1960's so I have a perhaps unique ability to understand both sides of problems)
I can honestly tell you that I get mail telling me of the bad experience a visitor to this site has had in a particular Cafe, and the next week another will tell me of the good experience, so good they felt they had to tell me.
My first need on getting a bad report is to pass it where possible to the owners or management. My second need is to check the Cafe out myself or with a known driver or cafe user, this takes time and often money!
My advice to owners and management of large operations and multi transport Cafe operations is to jump on a bad report and treat it like a opportunity to create MORE business,,, a sales directors function is to turn a disadvantage into an advantage,,, this can be done with a complaint,,, your objective is to engage the person complaining and attack the problem he or she experienced 100%, making every effort to make sure it cannot be repeated,,, at the same time letting the complainant know you are doing this,,, then make good the loss of a good meal by issuing the person with some free meal vouchers to try and make up for the bad experience,,, in my experience this will not be taken advantage of, (in reality it cant!) and management should not shirk making it up to a complainant on the grounds that it ,, might not be a fair complaint,,, 0r its not true,,, or on the basis that provided you don’t get more than the odd complaint, then all is well and it can be ignored,,,,,,,,,,,,, ,,,,,,, if this last mentioned attitude is employed than I can assure that management that eventually the transport cafe side will suffer and close,,,, it may be a slow process,,, but eventually it will close! bite the dust, because of bad management.
Some establishments may be owned by property companies, or similar, who have no real interest in making the business buzz, they just don’t want it to loose money, or if it does,, not a lot a lot of money,,, so the manager or whatever other name you attribute to the person in charge of running the Transport Café/s wants to make her/himself a good salary,,, and that’s the objective which is more than probably true, and they know it's a limited time involvement. One day the parent company will want cash for another better venture,,,,, and the Transport Café will be liquidated for property development. No love is involved with the business enterprise, just an easy life and sufficient is enough. I would add that part of this is not always the case and the manager can, and I know one who does try very hard, and with decent success for the customers. I congratulate him/her for the achievement under the conditions. It does take a certain type of individual to care beyond sufficient for their salary to be safe!
A Transport Café alone without overnight parking can (and should be) be a thriving enterprise provided its managed correctly, it will provide good profit, but be aware! It must be managed 100% correctly, which means good food always not just sometimes, not just most of the time, but ALL of the time.
Staff also MUST BE MOTIVATED, they must care. Generally staff will respond to good management, any faults will be with management. Management should choose the right people, train them, create a good atmosphere, Management is responsible for the staff and their performance, nobody else!
We should treat any complainant just as we would like to be treated ourselves if we had a problem with a meal, after all we humans are not perfect,, and we all make mistakes. Such treatment will endear a customer and cause him/her to talk about your business with pleasure at the way they were treated,, you will have turned away from the path of eventual self destruction to the path of success,,, provided you pay equal attention to correcting the problem and also pay attention to the detail of food production,,, staff have to have this same good attitude,,, and be concerned about the customer, intelligent concern,,, or you will not be successful,,, and remember the need for consistency, everyone cooking and serving customers needs to be fully concerned and they can be if managed well, and with concern for the staff themselves. Some staff are not suited to dealing with the public and would be better suited elsewhere, whilst they may be excellent in another position with you or outside your organisation,,, serious attention MUST be paid to this very important matter.
Drivers could vote on this site to grade any establishment, but this is open to abuse and needs policing which is more time involved. I could visit them all and grade them myself,,, but that has serious flaws to a degree,,, so we come down to the best method,,, vote with your custom yourself. This means its up to the owner to make sure you are pleased with your experience and will return.
Sections cover good management and what it means, how it affects your desire to return to an establishment, and also how you can help yourself and others.
Attention to detail in a Transport Cafe with traditional food.
For a transport Cafe to succeed it can be helped by position and facility, but attention to detail by the management is more important. A Transport Cafe can succeed even when it is located off route a little because drivers like good food, but especially consistently good food,,, not food which depends on which cook is on duty, such control is a management job,,, The accountants advice is look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves,,, this phrase can be turned for the Transport Cafe or any other type of business, it means attention to detail,,, for every type of food that crosses the counter, that means that a common item that is presented to the customer like bread for example, should be good moist bread, not dry or/and thin sliced, and quality margarine or butter, giving the choice.
Looking at a simple meal like egg and chips or sausage egg and chips we can see if the Transport Cafe is ok or not, if they cant get that right then there is little long term hope. Clean white eggs, not over cooked, nor to fast or to slow with clean oil at the right temperature. In the UK we like eggs with a white top, this means the hot oil in the pan has been flipped over the egg top to properly cook that part of the egg. If attention is not paid to this task then runny white may be present, and that’s a BIG OFF putter for most of us,,, it means the cook has not paid attention to detail, and in so doing has put our health at risk, because all of the egg must be cooked properly or drivers with upset stomachs will quite likely be driving away in a unhealthy state.
For chips clean oil at the correct temperature is paramount, this is so vital, and only chips must use that oil. If you see a cook dropping sausages into the same oil as chips use another Cafe, personally I don’t favour deep frying a sausage, it should be grilled again at the right temperature, (this is a much healthier sausage) at the correct distance from the actual grill, which must be at the right heat level, again the temperature of the sausage when presented needs to be reasonably consistent, getting these things right will attract many many customers who want that meal type from time to time, salads are an important item on the menu also. Another word about sausages, there are cheap sausages and good ones, there are no cheap good ones. A well managed Transport Cafe will pay a lot of attention to sampling sausages, (and every other food personally) cooking each one correctly until finding a quality one,, price is a reasonable indication but a sausage needs the right balance between savoury and meat filling so there is a cut off point.
Chips in their ready to fry mode, can be at different temperatures whilst waiting and this has to be taken into account by the cook and attention to the chip, proper attention not just a glance or casual look, by checking one of the largest or thickest chips. The actual quality of the chip is again vital, some suppliers can provide a good chip some of the time but not all of the time,,,,,,,, such is useless and about as good as a ton of kippers dumped on your doorstep on a hot summers day.
All this is obvious you think!!!!!! I wish it were, the person cooking may know what to do for the best chip, but isn’t that bothered,,, this can easily happen in a large organisation, and with much more difficulty in a small independent especially owner run, so the large operator needs to have very good management and NOT motorway services mentality, Lorry Drivers and white van man wont support poor food,, they will if not at once, eventually find another better place to eat.
Such good quality Transport Cafes are readily available, but are generally independents, the exception does prove the rule and I can recall one to mind that is excellent. Only you the customer calling at that Cafe for food on the occasion you need the facility can judge how good, bad or poor it is. Competitions by voting are flawed, I regret they are NO barometer of the Transport Café, only you can judge with your custom.
Remember the phrase, "Self praise is no recommendation" when looking at advertising. As Webmaster I travel over the Uk quite a lot, and have found many excellent Transport Cafes.
A good Transport Café will readily listen to your comments, and not want you to be the victim of a poor meal, well I have to admit the worlds not perfect, but how do those in charge respond when you get a duffer of a meal! I know how they should respond; you know how they should respond, but do they really care about that one person who takes a meal back, do they have the right mental attitude or do they look at you as if its you who is just plain unreasonable.
In the case of writing to the Café after the event how do they again respond,, but that said I do 100% recommend that you don’t wait and write an E mail, take the problem up at once,,, take the meal back immediately, indeed you may well be very pleased with the response and continue to return for many years never again getting a poor meal, so do try and communicate,,, and this is important,,, don’t be aggressive,,, be calm and speak in a decent and polite manner, such should get a good response, if it doesn’t then use another Café.
Over cooked microwaved meals or foods cooked in the microwave can deliver steak and kidney puds with concrete feet/bases,, this means the cook and management is not up to it if you actually get the overcooked pud , even if something has gone wrong with only that meal it should be spotted and not delivered to the customer, there is essentially NO excuse,,, the staff have failed,,, the exception must of course prove the rule, and no that’s not a contradiction its just that we are all “Human” but it must be a rare exception.
Attention to detail in a Transport Cafe also Healthy food, Vegetarian options!
A plate of salad may not seem the most appetising meal to many people, but,,,,,,,,,, listen chaps if you don’t take on board healthy eating you will more than likely be destined for an early retirement from the human race but hear me out by reading on!
If a Transport Cafe is not offering anything like a tomato sandwich, even apart from salads then they are doing two things wrong. First is putting their heads in the sand and pretending that what they are offering is ok and there is no need for change, and in so doing not supplying the needs of a smaller but good percentage of their potential or current customers.
The second is that this is not a responsible attitude to our society! Over-weight is a serious problem which costs the NHS millions of UK pounds sterling per year, we ALL pay that bill, which can be less if we are all responsible, each and every one of us! Nothing is for free! By supplying healthy food and by eating a balanced diet we save ourselves money and live to see our children grow up and assist them when they need help and guidance. I hope every reader wants to be in the long life group yet still be able to enjoy that cholesterol delight on occasion, which sensibly can be for some The Caviar of Life not Death!
Eventually inconsiderately run Cafes will dwindle, or the numbers of customers wont be anything like as many as they could be,,,, offering a good healthy plate of salad is a must, but it needs to be appetising, have colour on it, and offer a varied choice of constituents and be tasty, it may be tuna or sardine, or a baked potato with various fillings, good decent sized potatoes with nice crisp jackets but not overdone, again attention to detail will attract custom, just producing the jacket potato cooked is NOT enough. Fillings should mainly be done by sourcing them locally and not from pre packed companies; the exception can prove the rule. .
Attention to detail in producing the salad must be paramount, good lettuce leaves in nice condition. A lettuce should be given a wash over with water before placing in a fridge, or a little water sprinkled on the lettuce in the packet to keep it in good condition or revive it from its travel, the outer leaves are especially good and healthy if they can be kept well, this mentioned attention should in most cases do just that. .
A Transport Café or any other that offers low fat options of salad dressings and whatever else is possible is forward looking and will prosper because they are paying attention to detail. (If coupled with everything else mentioned). The owner or company should consider that offering items that might not fit into the accountants guidelines for profitability, because it doesn’t seem to jive with the balance sheet of turnover, should consider this fact, "accountants are not by themselves good businessman" you need entrepreneurial skill, that’s what makes a good business man. I regret that many large companies will bite the dust (for our American friends that means go bust, business dies) or eventually close their Transport Café operation because it’s a drain on their parking business. They may even supply decent salads, but, the food preparation generally doesn’t have enough attention paid to detail. .
I can mention two large operators, who from my visits have impressed me and I hope they will continue to do so. One is The Europa Truck Stop near Glasgow on the M74 in Scotland and the other is The Carnforth in England located on the M6. One is a single operator and the other is a multi operator. In the case of the Europa I can tell that if you get any food that is not up to standard the owner would be fully supporting you and not trying to decry your dissatisfaction. He does genuinely care and require that all customers get good food and treatment. I have always found this on my visits. I hope you do also! And I am sure you will. .
In the instance of the Carnforth, the general manager is concerned to make the business viable, whilst the on site Manager must be fully commended for her attention to detail, this means her staff are well motivated and in turn provide a good service. The whole place is clean and the meals are excellent, as indeed is the Europa first mentioned. .
It could be said that small operators have a better chance of being successful because they are actually often hands on themselves, but again they need that ability to pay attention to detail, every customer is a potential advertiser. I am also obviously aware of some very good smaller providers,, but its you who they should please not me, as is the case with those named.
Today 2006 in the UK we have seen a change in attitudes towards the type of work young men do, you see them working in supermarkets, many are very polite and helpful, they seem to appreciate that on leaving education they have to provide for themselves, and to that end they take many different job types, some which only young women would once take. Many do this before going on to university, some whilst at university. Some will go into catering and can contribute greatly to the quality of meals we can get at Transport Cafes or fine hotels,. If they are well managed they will appreciate that attention to detail is paramount. Young men are now becoming far better cooks than men from my generation before WW2, which is good news. Many men from my generation would not venture into the kitchen (some of these still exist), all that has changed, quite rightly!
The following paragraph is not meant to be sexist against men, but the reality is that far more women than men provide the food at Catering establishments still, some large Transport Cafes like the Channel Tunnel (Ashford International Truck Stop) do have young men learning a skill, some may go on to become famous as we all start somewhere,,, Myself as a young starter apprentice electrician, I often had the job of making the tea and toasting the electricians sandwiches on a cold freezing winters day in the English Welsh Borders, this could be my biggest responsibility, I even built a sandwich toaster out of redundant old type electric fire parts, which the foreman looked sideways at,, no doubt wondering if he should bin it for safety reasons, but we did continue to use it so some respite was granted, the point being we all have to start somewhere, and someone has to do the odd jobs, as a starter be aware that you start at the bottom, get on with it and do it well whatever it is!
Catering is a hard business; it’s a difficult business and requires skilled staff. Don’t underestimate the value of those able to deliver food and services where attention has to be paid to detail. Much stress is involved, far more than the outsider can appreciate without some inside knowledge. The lady who lives down the road from the café and works there most days even part time, can have a home and children to look after, typically she may walk (not drive) down the road with her personal shopping from the local store,,, very much so she can be a very important part of the operation, and her skills can make or break a business such as catering. I commend these ladies who deliver such attention and skill that can go unnoticed!
