RESTAURANT BUSINESS IN CRISIS CONDITIONS: PROBLEMS AND DIRECTIONS OF DEVELOPMENT

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to analyze the theoretical foundations of managing the sustainability of enterprises in crisis conditions and their practical application in the restaurant business. Improvement of methodological approaches and development of recommendations regarding marketing activities of restaurant enterprises to overcome existing problems in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. In the article, the authors, using the methods of induction, deduction, and theoretical generalization, clarified the essence of management in crisis conditions, the application of design thinking and approaches to building a marketing innovation strategy; observation, cause-and-effect relationship, description, specification, formalization – to analyze the problems of restaurant enterprises in crisis conditions; dialectical, modeling, generalizing – for developing recommendations and conclusions. The crisis can be seen not only as decline and bankruptcy, but also as new opportunities for creating business innovations. For this, restaurant industry enterprises need to be inventive and adaptive, apply design thinking techniques and marketing innovation strategies. The results of this study are of interest to restaurant enterprises that are engaged in the management of financial stability in crisis conditions. In addition, they will be important in cases when entrepreneurs decide to continue operations or better to preserve the restaurant for the period of crisis, how to organize food delivery, when choosing which strategy is better to apply in conditions of uncertainty. The work highlights features, new opportunities and substantiates the main ways of solving problems related to the activities of restaurant enterprises in the conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The main trends that affect the restaurant business in modern conditions are considered, in particular, food delivery and takeaway cooking, digitalization and automation in restaurant operations, reduction of menus, creation of a mono product, rejection of imported products in favor of local ones, minimization of food stocks and rejection of large areas It is suggested that restaurateurs seek new forms of cooperation, deepen and develop relationships with third parties, and exchange resources for mutual benefit and competitive advantage.