Status Update: 3/27/2018
Wow. Just wow. It’s really been an insane three weeks.I hope this clears things up and once again, thanks to all of you for your support.
-Ami
Status Update: 3/5/2018
Before our official grand opening tomorrow (yes, tomorrow) I want to clarify a few things about the Holy Chow GoFundMe campaign which took place last fall. Over the course of the last few weeks I've had several people contact me after finding out that they would not be able to use their initial GoFundMe prepay credit during the soft opening and I figure now would be a good time to set the record straight regarding when prepayments are redeemable, how they can be redeemed and why they can't be redeemed immediately. Please understand that there was no ill intent with this campaign. We weren’t trying to be underhanded, deceitful, misleading or trying to pull a "bait and switch".I hope this clears things up and once again, thanks to all of you for your support.
-Ami
Status Update: 2/26/2018
[SOFT OPENING IS NOW CLOSED - STATUS UPDATE BELOW IS FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY]
Following through on my promise to be as communicative and transparent as possible I wanted to clarify a few things. Two weeks ago (to the day) I made a Facebook post (see link below) asking people to verify their email addresses we had from the GoFundMe campaign in the spreadsheet I created. Of the ~260 people in the spreadsheet, about 50 people reached out to me with their email addresses. Our plan was to send out invites to the soft open in phases to avoid overwhelming our kitchen staff, work out the kinks and get some good feedback in a controlled manner. The first wave of emails were sent out Saturday night to about 30 people (of which 8 responded by early Sunday afternoon). We requested that those 30 people get their orders in on Sunday and choose either Monday or Tuesday night to pickup their food. The goal of this approach was to give our staff about 24 hours to prepare for the first batch of orders. When we only got 8 responses, I made the Facebook post last night at around 6:30 PM asking people to check their email. The reason for posting on Facebook as opposed to sending out another email was because I figured that if people didn't respond to the first email then maybe they didn't see it or it went to their junk/spam folder -hence the FB post. We decided to send out a second wave of emails last night to the next 30 people telling them that they could order for pickup on Tuesday or Wednesday. The following morning a whole bunch of people who didn't respond to the first email sent out Saturday night, apparently saw the FB post and then all at once decided to submit orders for this evening. At the same time the second group of people we emailed last night all started putting in orders for today, tomorrow and Wednesday. Whew! Anyhow, at the end of the day we got all the orders finished -albeit late (some very late) and the response so far has been pretty positive. I personally want to thank everyone for being so patient and supportive and am really, really, really happy we stuck to our guns about doing a soft opening despite the pressure to open immediately because... :) For those of you who participated in the GoFundMe campaign and have not yet had a chance to place orders please don't fret. More emails will be going out over the next few days so everyone has a chance to get in on the action. Again, I apologize for the confusion and am truly, very sorry if I disappointed anyone. That was the last thing I ever wanted to do. Cheers. Ami GoFundMe Facebook Post #2Status Update: 2/12/2018
[SOFT OPENING IS NOW CLOSED - STATUS UPDATE BELOW IS FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY]
As we get closer to launch date we wanted to reach out to everyone who participated in the GoFundMe campaign to confirm their email addresses so we can notify you when our online ordering website goes live. Unfortunately GoFundMe does not provide donor email address info for privacy reasons which is why we need you to confirm it so we can send out the invites to the soft opening. This post was originally made on our Facebook page and while we understand that not everyone uses Facebook or hasn't yet "liked" our Facebook page, this was really the only way we could notify people since we didn't have everyone's email addresses. Over the last few weeks my wife, myself and even our 12-year-old son spent many hours going through synagogue directories, the "Good Book" and lists from local Jewish day schools in order to try and populate the information ourselves to avoid anyone missing out. But unfortunately we didn't have time to notify everyone and Facebook was the best/only option there was. If you remember participating please email info@holychow.me and for those who aren't sure please take a look at the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet in the link below and then email us so we have your address. Please make sure to include your name in the message body of the email and use the subject "GoFundMe - Prepay". Thanks. GoFundMe Facebook Post #1 NOTE: For those of you who have privacy concerns about listing names and contribution amounts, the GoFundMe page makes that information public anyway (see screenshot below). The primary reason we are providing the spreadsheet is that we didn't want y'all to think we lost your info.
Status Update: 2/12/2018
Over the course of the last few weeks (OK, months) we’ve had quite a few people asking us if we could give a ballpark estimate as to when the DC area might finally get a chance to feast on kosher Asian cuisine without having to trek up to Baltimore. There’s been a lot of activity happening both inside and outside of Holy Chow HQ and trust me -we’ve been very busy bees. With that being said, I figured it might be a good idea to post a brief status update just to give everyone an idea of what we’ve been up to over the last 3 months. These are in no particular order.I’m sure that I’ve missed a few items, but I think I covered the most important ones.
Another question people have been asking is “What’s the hold up?”
Here’s the thing: Back in November I made a rookie mistake. I told people that we’d like to be open by December 25th and that was waaaaaay too optimistic and I obviously did a poor job managing people’s expectations because I was “hoping” it would be open by Christmas too. The truth is that although it might seem like the opening date keeps getting delayed, in all honesty, it’s really, truly right on schedule. We have taken exactly as much time as it should take to open a new restaurant based on where we started from and there hasn’t been a single week that’s gone by where we haven’t completed some kind of major milestone that gets us closer and closer to opening our doors.
Starting a new business -especially a restaurant, takes a tremendous amount of time, dedication and money. It’s something that I personally never had a chance to fully appreciate until now and I have a newfound respect for anyone crazy enough to try it themselves.
So when exactly are we opening?
Soon. Very, very soon.