Call it Gerry’s

A new concept, redecorated interior, and a new name are part of the rebranding strategy of the 26-year-old Gerry's Grill. Emerging from the 'nightmares' of the Covid-19 pandemic, the girl and boy's night-out place will transform into a family-oriented restaurant and will now be called simply Gerry's.

In an interview, Gerry Apolinario, the president and CEO of Gerry's, said he wanted his rebranded enterprise to be the business that has emerged from the Covid-19 pandemic.

"We are now a family restaurant, better than ever. We are back from the pandemic. This is the new look we wanted to give our customers from the previous one, which was open air, dim, and a party place. Now the lighting is more inviting, brighter, and fully air-conditioned. Right now, the emphasis is on family," Apolinario said in an interview.

He pertains to the rebirth of his main branch of the former Gerry's Grill in Tomas Morato in Quezon City, which was recently reopened with a new look, and renamed Gerry's. It is now open for family gatherings and events.

From the signature Gerry's Grill with a bar in the middle, he said all physical stores in the country would be transformed into a cozy and relaxed restaurant, but still offering delectable crispy pata and sisig, with additional offerings on the menu that are kids and family-friendly.

"In the past years, customers have come here for drinks. Now, we have infused more cuisines, and drinks are just secondary. We will launch our new menu that is all Filipino by January 2023," he said, adding that he has worked and collaborated with an architectural firm to alienate the looks of Gerry's from its party-place image.

Apolinario said all the renovated restaurants of Gerry's would be filled with plants, and the interiors would all be wood so that customers would feel like they are dining in the comfort of their homes.

Pandemic memories

"The pandemic hitting us was bad. Our nightmare during the post-pandemic is that our branches will not make revenues. And then it happened in one snap, and even our international branches in the United States and the Middle East shut down. I think no one in the entire restaurant business thought that this would happen. The effects are so massive," he said but did not elaborate figures of lost revenues.

But he said that even though other restaurant personnel were terminated due to their restaurants' closure, he let his personnel have a furlough but were immediately called back when the situation eased in 2021.

"The skeletal crew remained because we can't afford zero, although we are earning very little. That's business," he said.

Staying afloat

But Apolinario treats the contagion as a blessing in disguise, as they have pivoted to online selling and conceptualized more products that are now being sold online and in supermarkets.

"We concocted our Gerry's iced tea, kare-kare sauce, and packaged sisig that are now available in groceries. That's our refuge during that time and until now that the pandemic is nearing its doom," he said.

Further, he said they count on digitalization after launching their social media team to handle digital and social media affairs, which he touted as "the learnings of this global health crisis."

Apolinario said before the pandemic, the revamp of their stores was already in the pipeline, as rebranding takes years of conceptualization and planning.

"The renovation of Tomas Morato branch of Gerry's took more than two months, and we launched it in the latter part of November this year. The original plan was to renovate this in 2020, but the pandemic struck, so it was halted," according to Apolinario.

He said they would be opening 12 more branches in the next few months of 2023.

"Despite losing 20 stores in 2020, we will reopen about 16 new Gerry's stores, including the four restaurants that we have already opened this year in Panglao, Bohol, San Fernando, Mexico in Pampanga, and Sierra Valley in Marikina. I hope everything will get normal this 2023 to recover the losses," said Apolinario.

The damage to the Philippine food industry caused by the contagion was immense, particularly the micro, small and medium enterprises that are 99 percent of the country's entire enterprises.

The Department of Trade and Industry in 2020 reported that 26 percent of businesses were forced to close their doors due to various reasons, such as bankruptcy, low number of customers, and lack of means.

The government said that bars had no reason to open their shops in 2020 unless they sold food, so they were forced to sell food and deliver it to survive the pandemic.

Also, 2020 recorded the most significant decline in sales of cafes and bars in the Philippines, dropping to an estimated P50 billion from the combined sales in 2019, amounting to P225 billion.