The "food" is terrible. Which is why compliance is so difficult. And when they swear off the junk food they try raw vegan, which makes things worse, especially in the protein and fat categories. And it has a special sting in the tail for weight loss. Either it's a different kind of junk food or it's real food but in unbalanced quantities. Either way, there's no satisfaction because the body will be signaling its displeasure.

I also think, for civilians, "meatless" is a hard sell with restaurant dining, especially when it comes to the main course. Vegan restaurants can offer frankenfoods which taste worse over time. This is why vegans online are selling so many new products. They get desperate for something that satisfies but it's protein and fat that their body is begging for.

But even a real sub, like broccoli florets instead of real chicken, in whatever they bread and dip in sauce, has drawbacks, and we're still at appetizers. Honestly, what kind of elevated side dish feels "worth it" compared to getting turkey with real cheese in the mac and cheese?

In every case, it feels like overpaying. Which is how Meatless Mondays didn't become Wildly Vegan Weeks. Everyone knows what people give up for Lent, even if they aren't of that practice.

Even before vegan restaurants became a minefield of lab products, I'm not the only one coming away from that "pure and healthy meal" with gut issues. The more they eat this way, the worse things can become.

Hard sell!

Before anyone opens a vegan restaurant, they should realize that they are appealing to a very small number of eaters. Vegans can usually get vegan meals at other restaurants that also have non-vegan foods.

'


What's ridiculous about this is that at it's peak, apparently only 10% of the population was vegan or vegetarian COMBINED. That means that if there's a group of 10 entering the restaurant, it's likely that only one of them is vegan. There might be a couple more in that group who are willing to have or try a vegan meal. The rest will be horrified at the idea of paying meat prices (or higher) for fake meat, fake cheese, fake eggs, fake milk...

Now the vegan numbers are down to 5% of the population, so even this scenario quoted in the article is going to be increasingly rare:




And yet they're saying this?



I understand the concept of niche businesses (for instance a beading supply store is a very small niche business) which only attracts a certain type of customer to begin with.

But it's a bit different in the restaurant business where you need to provide a menu that has food which will appeal to everyone who enters the restaurant.

I can't see how they did not realize that with 90% of the population not interested in either vegan or vegetarian diets that somehow when groups came through the door, it would be very likely that most of them would not be interested in a vegan menu.

It's a common fallacy that has lead to countless business failures over the years -- the owner assumes that because THEY like something, that there must be others that like it just as much AND that they will come and buy it from them. This gets compounded when there's some kind of "social buzz" about something -- plenty of people see it as a permanent trend that will somehow be sustainable over time, largely because THEY like it so much that they can't imagine it not "catching on" long term.

The Low Carb scene saw this a number of years ago, with many (even most) restaurants jumping on the craze and adding low carb sections to their menus (not all of which, however, were actually low carb). You even saw some dedicated low-carb restaurants open up. Around here, I'm not aware of any that survived and try finding a low-carb section on a menu these days. It's back to the norm where you are hard pressed to figure out how to create a single low-carb meal from what is offered.

Niche businesses only work when the only way to satisfy demand in that niche is by going to a niche business. As the article said, you can walk into just about any restaurant and have plenty of vegan selections to choose from, so patronizing a vegan-only restaurant is more about snob appeal than anything else, unless that restaurant manages to establish that it has particularly great vegan dishes that are NOT available most places. But, even then, you are relying on people that dine in ones and twos -- a group of much more than that is not going to be willing to all go there except on a lark.

I had hoped that some restaurants that had a low-carb focus would have survived the death of the LC fad -- and I would have had no problem with them offering extensive non-LC offerings to attract a larger crowd. But, at least here, that didn't seem to happen.

I've had people tell me over the years "Oh you could go into business selling/teaching/doing XXXX!"

I even had a realtor tell me one time "We should have been looking for a retail location for your crafts instead of looking for a house"

Uh no... The various crafts I made over the years (even those I designed) took so many hours that there was no way people would be willing to pay the kind of money I would need to charge if I sold them at minimum wage for the number of hours involved. What people are willing to pay for handmade crafts usually amounts to little more than the cost of the materials involved.

My mother loved to paint. People oohed and aahed over her paintings and wanted to buy them. The problem is that when these people made an offer on a painting, they were barely willing to pay the cost of the canvas and frame - forget the number of hours and talent involved in the painting.

And yet like you said, people open all kinds of businesses based on what they like, thinking surely everyone else will like it too. It's usually not just the person opening the business though - they're usually being encouraged by someone who thinks they could make a lot of money at it, but doesn't have any idea how much time and materials are involved, or that the actual interest in it is very limited.

^I agree with the previous observations.

My bold. An important point about a vegan restaurant is the nature of the substitutions. It's not like, say, a really successful Middle-Eastern/Mediterranean restaurant chain here in Ontario called Osmow's. Their food is great, and the meats are Halal. I bet most customers don't care, but if that theoretical group of people is looking for a restaurant, your Muslim friends/family/coworkers would. Based on my observation of grocery store prices, there's probably only a marginal price increase because of the Halal certification. (ETA - they also have vegan options.)

OTOH, when you replace meats with soy, gluten, corn, legumes and other plant products, that's a real no-go for people like me. A lot of us are tuned in to allergens these days. There's a reason almost all chain restaurants have a .pdf on their website telling you what ingredients are in which of their foods. I don't care if my chicken is Halal or not, but I sure care if I'm eating seitan or a random corn/legume brick. The walk-outs aren't just walking out because they're 'not that into' vegan food.

Wow, the fanatics are punishing him.

https://www.theguardian.com/food/20...lan-bad-reviews

Combine that with the next post about the death threats and 1 star reviews because the vegan restaurant owner has dared to add meats to his menu - I think this is the whole vegan-restaurant problem in a nutshell:

The middle eastern restaurant is catering to their middle eastern clientele, but not in a way that excludes everyone who is not middle eastern or doesn't eat halal. Those who do not require halal will gladly eat there too, because the food is downright GOOD. The halal meat is an extra feature of the restaurant, not something that excludes 90% of the population. By offering vegan options too (which are also ok for muslims to eat) it's a win for everyone who enjoys Middle Eastern cuisine.

If the vegan restaurants had not labeled themselves as a vegan/plant based restaurants and had simply offered a menu that consisted of fruit, veggies, nuts, grains, and beans, seasoned and served in creative and delicious ways (without fake substitutes for meats, cheese, etc), I doubt there would have been nearly as much backlash when they started adding meat to the menu. You can do a lot of creative things with the edible parts of plants that don't involve using animal products or trying to make them look or taste like animal products. There's so many things they could have on their menu that are naturally vegan and have always been vegan (such as peanut butter, tomato soup, fruit salad, etc) - they just weren't specifically called vegan until recent years because people simply thought of them as the normal version of that food.

Of course if a restaurant offered all vegan food but didn't advertise themselves as being plant based or vegan, the hard core vegans would probably give them one star simply because they weren't screaming that they were vegan. So I don't know - I don't really think they can win, especially since they've already labeled themselves as vegan, and are now backing off on having a strict vegan menu.

In some of my local stores, Halal chicken is on sale for less than regular chicken at competing stores.