Now that Eat Out to Help Out is ending, restaurants like mine will have to offer far more than value for money

As Rishi Sunak’s flagship scheme for hospitality draws to an end, September will be a very different month for the industry. Without irony, a recent article quoted a Glaswegian woman: “I’m not going to go out at all in September. In September I will be eating at home probably for the whole month.” How I chuckled, then cried, banged my head off a desk and set up an OnlyFans page. Such was the despair I felt at the total short-termism of this hero initiative. The end of Eat Out to Help Out (EOTHO) and the winding down of furlough is a cocktail that, for many, may turn sour.

Yet as we approached reopening our restaurant, the reality of the leg-up for my business against that of friends and peers in Birmingham necessitated a reassessment of sorts. Retail in the city is done for, I think, and the arts are left in tatters. SIFA Fireside – the homeless charity we work closely with – is staring down an unprecedented strain on its resource. I began to reassess the position of chefs and restaurants in all this mayhem.

As a restaurateur, one can’t and shouldn’t ignore the support that has been offered to this point. In March I set up a petition to the government seeking clarity and support. Over the past few months we’ve seen the introduction of multiple loan options, business rate relief, furlough schemes, VAT relief and EOTHO. It’s unprecedented, and none of this is a comment that seeks to bite the hand that feeds. The survival of my own business has been in part thanks to said measures. I merely ask, as we sit on the precipice, where do we go from here?

As the saying goes, the pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple. The measures introduced have been at an eye-watering cost to the country and already the agenda is turning to tax ramifications – lest we believe the government has stepped in as a benevolent agent, it’s clear we are all going to pay handsomely for these emergency measures.

So how should we process EOTHO and its success? Certainly, the scheme has been PR’d within an inch of its life. The government wants us to know it tried to help because it’ll look better when Sunak’s glory days are over. I know anecdotally across the country, it’s given businesses a well-needed kick up the arse for a typically slow month for the industry, even in regular times. Maybe we can applaud its role in bolstering cashflow as we go into the harder, less protected, months to come.

Maybe we should think of the scheme as what it is: a last hurrah for hospitality before we’re on our own. I don’t think one ought to look at any government support as good or bad – there is a price to pay for everything and I know many in less cushioned sectors would kill for the initiatives we have enjoyed. But in spite of any measures, Covid-19 will decimate the industry and I don’t think there’s a government on Earth that can stop that, unless they deliver a whole host of packages to save the economy and therefore the spending power of our diners. Helpful wishlist measures include making the 5 per cent VAT rate permanent, extending furlough and delivering a comprehensive package of support around landlords and renters.

For all the welcome, temporary support of EOTHO, the initiative has also thrown much of the industry into the dark marshland of economic selling – the dreaded cheapening of what we do to persuade guests to come back. If Pizza Express was not a cautionary tale on discount selling, I don’t know what is. We need to now more than ever recognise our worth.

I am seeing many restaurants extend the discount scheme, ie paying for it out of their own pockets. It becomes a spiral that is incredibly hard to break when the primary reason diners are out is the good value for money.

So this is my call to arms to stop looking backwards, and don’t look to government to stick around – this six-month fling can’t and won’t last. How can we plot a path to normality, until we return to, you know, normal business? I think we need more than ever to focus on the experience rather than the price. City centres are unrecognisable, and venues must become a reason to pilgrimage to the centre. Venues that entice via the quality of product, their uniqueness, and their concept. This could be a chance to reinvent and reinvigorate the industry – if we don’t fall into the simplistic trap of offers, deals and stripping the soul out of our venues in pursuit of survival at all costs. Restaurants and bars could and should be the start of the fightback to rebuild ghost towns.

I believe that’s why, as a nation, we’ve thrown everything but the kitchen sink at hospitality, and I believe that’s the exciting challenge ahead for us. We need to stop asking for more – we’ve had six months of diverse and, to varying degrees, effective short-term plasters but enough is enough. The return of restaurants is going to be made or lost on our role in community and us taking a seat at the proverbial table in the far bigger fight ahead – saving our city centres and public spaces.

Our time in the government spotlight is ending. It’s time to prove that all the public money we’ve invested in hospitality was worth it, and for us to become central to the places we occupy. The lifeline we’ve been thrown has stopped many of us from sinking, but we must not forget that now it’s our job to swim to shore. I hope my peers will swim with us.

Alex Claridge is the head chef and owner of The Wilderness in Birmingham. On reopening on 2 September, The Wilderness will reduce each customer’s bill by £10 and donate the funds to a local homeless charity called SIFA Fireside