So every week I go to my neighborhood Chinese restaurant for take-out. It
is around the corner from the office making it very convenient for the night
I stay late. About 2 months ago it changed owners. While the food has
remained consistently good, the new owner has difficulty understanding
English. The last couple of times I ordered my order was wrong; today I
didn't even get that far. When I tried to order she kept repeating back to
me something else, so I pointed at pictures on the menu, still she repeated
back something else but closer to what I wanted at least. Every time I
corrected her and told her what I want, she wrote up the item and treated it
as another item I was ordering. When she got to three items ordered (I
wanted one), with none of them right, I cancelled my order and left the
restaurant. It looks like now my weekly take-out meal with either be
Quizno's or take-out.

As a side note I did notice that each time I have gone in, since the change
in ownership, the number of customers is less and less. Today was no
different.

What a shame. No doubt in 6 months they will try and figure out what went
wrong and might not clue in it is because the person taking the orders can't
speak English.

Interesting story, but you should be over at yelp.com giving a review, if you haven't already. I used to frequent a place in Eugene, OR which served the world's absolutely best stuffed french toast. It was to die for. (And I don't even like french toast.) Then new owners came in, and guess what they did. Yes, they messed up the french toast recipe that I came every week to eat. I stopped going entirely after putting up with the bad french toast for several weeks.

The new owners of a local bagel store killed the near perfect chocolate covered donut that was made by the old owners. It was a once a week indulgence. That bagel store was out of the way, and was worth the detour. Not any more.

What do you eat with red wine now?

Our favorite hole in the wall Chinese place "changed owners", and assured me the food was "much better now". I told them I lived the old food, which is why we ordered once a week. The original owner delivered it! But.. It seems he has been regulated to a backseat, and the new improved food is terrible. I told the, to contact me when he is back in charge and the food is again edible.

In Toronto, we kill restaurants by resurfacing the streets for our streetcars. While the streetcar tracks are being upgraded, there is no parking as the streets are reduced to single lane at best and the public transit is disrupted. Result is hey presto, the restaurant folds.

I agree that if you're going to work at a restaurant where your job requires that you interact with the public, you really ought to be able to speak the language of the country you're in. A couple of weeks ago, we went to a Nando's in London. We were seated downstairs, however, it was really cold in there so we asked if we could sit upstairs. The young woman's response? "You make fun of me?"

A more accurate title IMO would be �How Restaurants Kill Themselves�.

Slightly different:

Inexpensive but good quality Indian restaurant down the street closed for "remodeling". It reopens a month later with minor updates to the inside and the same menu but now all the items are priced higher. Less business and now it's closed.

Which one?

Bagel Power over at Golden Horseshoe at 5 corners in Scarsdale.

It was my dentist that tipped me off to their chocolate donuts 20 years ago.

Oh the irony!

That's a way to drive the dentist's own business, in addition to supporting another local business.

Interesting. Probably better for me that I didn't know about their donuts, as we like Seven Woks' food from that plaza and it would have given me even more reason to go over there. I have been a sucker for Gallaway's in Scarsdale/Eastchester, though, so I'm already going out of my way for donuts.

Perhaps, but if this is a hard and fast rule, one is going to miss out on loads of GREAT Chinese food (hence I think the popularity of order by numbers in so many places) - not to mention that of other countries, though IME it's mostly been Chinese places that have had this issue.