Investors eye this second city where competition still hasn't caught up with the "Kyiv jungle"
s = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office”/>KHARKIV – The normally bland Kharkiv restaurant scene is finally getting some flavor, aided by the addition of four new international eateries.
The trend seems to prove the adage: “If you build it, they will come.”
Managers at the new restaurants say they were drawn to Kharkiv by the simple fact that the city previously lacked international-style eateries, and residents were hungry for some variety.
“It’s really difficult to make money in the restaurant business. But you can’t go wrong with fast food,” said Sam Martirossian, manager of Waltsam’s, a pizza and donut joint on Kharkiv’s main drag.
And in a university town of 2 million, there is no shortage of students ready to wait tables with a smile. Plus, given that Kharkiv is just catching the wave of development that Kyiv has been experiencing for a couple of years, competition isn’t too tough yet.
“Our investors chose Kharkiv because there isn’t much competition here,” said Alyona Homenko, director of Florencia, an Italian haute cuisine restaurant.
And the sheer novelty of foreign food is a big draw in Kharkiv, especially combined with a food culture that differs greatly from the home-grown variety.
With two Kharkiv locations, Baskin-Robbins is unique. The bubble-gum colored furniture, friendly uniformed staff, 35 flavors of ice cream, not to mention banana splits, milk shakes, floats, and cakes, is exotic for locals and just like home for ex-pats.
In this market, it’s a bit expensive for the average Ukrainian pocketbook. At Hr 5.50 for one scoop, and Hr 51.50 for a cake, Baskin-Robbins ice cream is out of the reach of the average family.
But, as manager Svetlana Andrechuk explained, the quality of the ice cream is superior to the local variety. Produced at the Moscow factory as a U.S.-Russian joint venture, the ice cream is imported to Ukrainian cafes in Kharkiv and Odessa. And passing through customs is what puts the price up, she said.
This month Baskin-Robbins is trying a series of promotions to attract Kharkivans into the shop. First they are offering a 20 percent discount, which makes a scoop one hryvna cheaper than before, and they give 10 percent discount cards to their regular customers. Birthday parties, clowns and kids’ drawing contests are all aimed at children, while the addition of some alcoholic beverages makes the idea of ice-cream a little more palliative for the older generation.
Waltsam’s is also playing on the idea of a kids’ cafe, and is serious competition for McDonald’s in Kharkiv.
“We wanted to make a place for children,” Martirossian said. “There’s a beautiful park here, and we’ve made a playground for the kids. There’s a floor just for birthday parties with a clown, and on the second floor there are video games, which cost only Hr 3 for an hour of play.”
Located beside the city’s Gorky Park, parents are happy to sit on the Waltsam’s patio and shoot the breeze while their kids play on the slide or in the computer room.
And like Baskin-Robbins, Waltsam’s decided to break its no-alcohol rule, and introduced beer on the outside terrace for the summer months.
However, prices and the availability of the right products are the challenges these eateries face. Dmitri Vasilyiev, director of the French Bakery, said they can’t use just any flour.
“We buy the best Ukrainian flour we can, but sometimes the best is not good enough,” he said. The taste and quality of the bread changes according to the harvest and the season. One good-seller, a whole-grain bread called “kampagran” had to be discontinued temporarily because the grain, which is imported from Austria, is unavailable at the moment.
The French Bakery manages to keep their prices in the same range as the big bread factories that sell their “batonchyky” at kiosks, but doing so cuts into their own profits. Vasilyiev says that plans to sell frozen dough to supermarkets who will be equipped with the French Eurofour ovens to prepare the bread on site, should overcome this difficulty by increasing the volume of sales.
The store is also planning to open an adjoining sit-down cafe, where they will be able to tempt customers to have a drink with their pastry.
Florencia imports its olive oil, vinegar, wine, sauce, parmesan cheese and prosciuto ham directly from Italy, to make sure that the dishes prepared by the Italian chef taste really Italian. But the novelty will cost you, as a dinner for two could run between Hr 110 and Hr 150.
Prices make this a place students will avoid, but Florencia has been open only six months, and management is hoping that advertising will lure wealthier Kharkivans through the doors. Meanwhile Florencia is catering bigger events such as weddings and a ballroom dance competition to help spread the word.
The restaurant is located in the Kharkiv Hippodrome, which is the venue for horse races, as well as regional and national motor racing. The building itself, although overlooking the rundown racetrack, has been completely renovated. The dining room can fit 150 guests at circular tables, and has a vaulted ceiling, one half of which is made of opaque glass, flooding the hall with natural light in the daytime, and painted with panoramic views of horse racing on the opposite side.
A beer patio out back, and plans for a cafe above the stands take advantage of the surroundings, and may attract a few extras to the Sunday horse races.
However, all these renovations, made before the restaurant even opened, are costly and it will take time before the venture turns a profit.
When asked how business was recently, one waiter said, “So-so. The problem is people in Kharkiv don’t have a lot of money.”
For some, novelty is worth paying for, but this is Kharkiv, not Kyiv or Moscow, and for now such restaurants are fighting an up-hill battle.
