Path to perfection or marketing nightmare?
My recent experience at an eatery in the new 1949 complex wasn't great-and I said so in my review. Some thought we were harsh, especially since 1949 was in its "soft opening,” which got me to thinking about the entire process of giving life to new eateries in Beijing.

"I've never experienced as many soft openings as in Beijing," confided Ralph Ziegenhorn, owner of Q Bar. With endless new restaurateurs in town, many launching virgin eateries, you're bound to have plenty still in rehearsal mode. Some cynical diners wonder: "Are we taste-testers for these restaurants?" As Tina Kanagaratnam from M on the Bund, points out, customers pay the same prices for food that will only be perfected six months down.

Understandably, new restaurants need time to work out kinks. At 1949, Executive Sous Chef Raul Liu and GM Malcolm McLauchlan use their "dry run" to "ask questions, check up at the end of the meal...so we can work on it and get it right." The Saddle Cantina prefers to "make mistakes and learn from them, rather than have 10 soft openings and 2 grand openings," says Nick Ma, the all-knowing GM. Quality and consistency are a challenge, he says, but service is "infinitely harder," so he trains staff a few dishes at a time, adding menu items as the servers become accustomed.

Beijing is a tough market. Expats hold a variety of foreign tastes, locals have their own perspectives: worlds, literally, collide. High turnover makes it difficult for restaurants to establish a permanent niche. Thus, the "soft opening" becomes a time to develop relationships with customers. At Saddle, Ma is aware of word-of-mouth influence and immediately corrects mistakes-he once even gave bottomless tequila to drunken complainers.

"People are extremely generous here," thinks Kanagaratnam. "They'll say 'you know, they just opened; give them a break.'"However, for http://LocalNoodles.com founder Chandler Jurinkafor, "it sounds more like a marketing nightmare." Customers' expectations fluctuate wildly, as do food and service quality. The best we can do is be patient and enjoy the spoils of those restaurants that survive the soft opening. Those that don't will depart, empty-handed.

Manuela Zoninsein