What Would You Do?

This post is about the restaurant. We started it back in March of 2010.  I will say in the beginning we were putting supplies and food on a credit card, but we quit doing that within the first few months of the store being open and just go paycheck to paycheck.  Our hopes were to bring in an extra grand or two a month to help pay for the costs of having a new baby.  I will admit there haven't been too many weeks that we were able to pocket much money.  In the beginning we were because JJ was the only one working, we didn't have labor costs.  We did however have a monthly apartment rent payment but that wasn't much.  Then as we got closer to my due date, he spent less and less time there, and had hired 3 employees to work.  Now he's down there two days a week, but he just stays in the kitchen cooking - he always has another employee there actually running the restaurant.  So what it boils down to is we are paying approximately 68 hours at minimum wage in MO which is $7.25, so that comes out to approximately $500 a week.  Then we spend anywhere between $500 and $800 a week on food.  So those two combined (on the high end) equals $1,300.  Now going into the winter months, we are going to be lucky if we break even every week.

• Here are the key things to think about.  The drive is about 180 miles round trip, so the miles on our cars are quickly adding up
• Gas alone driving down and back is roughly $35
• Each day the sitter watches Chloe, it's $30

At this point, we feel like we have three options, and I'm just not sure which one is the best.

Option 1: JJ could be down there three days a week instead of two. Two of those days he would work alone so that would save us $145 a week in labor.  That's the good.  The bad is those would be REALLY long days for him.  He would have to be out of the house by 8 (which is unheard of for him), and he wouldn't get home until 10 at night.  We would have to pay $35 for gas and $30 for the sitter.  So all said and done we are really only saving around $80.  Also, the winter months are when JJ's likelihood of working at the railroad increases.  So that puts a wrinkle in things too.  Is it worth it?

Option 2:  Close the restaurant down during the winter months.  Like I said before, the winter is when JJ has to work more.  He hasn't actually gotten called into work for months, but that will all change once the weather gets cold and it starts to snow.  Also, we've already seen a decrease in sales at the restaurant because a lot of people walk to the store and they don't want to get out in crappy weather.  The good is that we wouldn't have to worry with driving back and forth in crappy weather, and possibly coming out of pocket some weeks when sales are low.  The bad is that we could, and most likely would, lose our employees.  So when we would open back up in the spring, we'd be starting from scratch again. 

Option 3:  Close the restaurant down for good.  It really has been fun, and JJ really does like to cook.  But I know on multiple occasions he has gotten burned out.  Whether it was being away from home, dealing with employee drama, not having enough food to keep up with business, etc.  I think it would be a huge stress reliever for him.  I know he will miss going down there though and the friends he's made, as will I.  It's been fun to "have a restaurant" for the past year.  And it's not like we would be missing out on the extra income; hell it would probably SAVE us money in the long run.

I don't mean to make it sound like we've already decided which way we are going to go, but it kind of sounds that way as I write it all out.  What would you do in this situation?  I'm open for all suggestions!