Six months into his reign as Drywite Young Fish Frier of the Year, Jamie Russo is focusing on making Redcloak Fish Bar in Stonehaven, Aberdeen, busier and safer while also looking out for his community and his staff
In the last few months, we’ve started to get more involved with our community. It’s something we’ve always done but I really wanted to pay back the community for all the all the help and support they gave us throughout the awards process.
Last Friday, we teamed up with our local RNLI crew and donated £1 per fish supper sold. We rounded it up to £200 which went to help fund their activities and make sure that the crew have the equipment and resources they need to go in and save lives safely.
Recently, I was invited back to the secondary school I attended to speak to the students who were leaving and going into other pathways. It was a great opportunity to share my story and explain how, although I went to university, I still came back to my childhood job. We provided the leavers with lunch and afterwards I was invited back to socialise and network with them and answer any questions they had. It was nice for them to get that reassurance that although a lot of people’s paths tend to be university or college, they are not the only options; there are other paths that can work equally well – or better even.
I’ve invested quite a lot in the shop recently. I’ve just installed a self-service kiosk which I think will be a good addition. It’s not going to replace anyone, but it should help increase our efficiency behind the counter so I don’t have someone that’s pinned to the till. We will still take orders through the till, but it frees up that person to go and help out with putting chips on or anything else like that. It will hopefully speed things up from our side and help get more food out faster.
From some of the stats that I’ve seen with app ordering, orders tend to be higher value where people have the luxury of looking at the menus themselves and taking their time to go through it. I’m hoping that will be replicated with the touchscreen ordering kiosk because customers don’t have the pressure of having to answer to someone asking what they want. Customers can just scroll in their own time, have a look through everything, and hopefully add a few extras – sauces and sides – and push the value of the orders up.
I’ve also had a fire suppression system retrofitted on my range, partly for insurance purposes, but also to ensure that the shop is safer. I was a bit apprehensive about having it retrofitted because I thought it was going to be hard to work around and clean, and that it would be an absolute eyesore. But, within the first week, I realised I could live with it and it was not the big burden that I first thought it would be.
I’m hoping I’ve just spent five and a half grand on something that I will never use – something I never thought I’d ever say – but it’s peace of mind that if a fire breaks out, it will be shut down quickly and I’ll be able to reopen the next day.
As a newly opened business, I have debt and I have expenses but it’s still important that I invest in my shop. And not just the equipment but my staff too as they go hand-in-hand. I’m just about to lose a good number of our staff to university and college so I thought while we have people coming in, we should sit down properly and put a plan in place to ensure all our staff are performing just as well as we were at the start of the year. So that’s my next job!
