What happened to Alley Cats Pizza?

Who mentioned that where? It’s the second time you’ve brought it up.

The restaurant business is well-known for instability. You can find pizza anywhere now so it’s not surprising that it could become unprofitable or less profitable than other ventures.

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A restaurant can go from being profitable to making a loss in a matter of weeks. The mid range restaurant market in the UK was massacred last year due to high rents, weak pound higher imported ingredients costs, and over-supply.

It happened across the board to many chains. I have no idea what happened to Alleycats, but it wouldn’t surprise if it got hit with sudden increased competition.

This is interesting. Somebody upthread said that the original owner was also involved with daily operations in each branch.

It sounds like things were approaching McDonalds-level replicability (approaching, as in that was the direction even though not achieved) yet others say the quality varied wildly among the branches.

I realize it’s none of my business, but the reason for their downfall remains unclear. Most who ate their speak of their quality, so maybe a better style of pizza came along and they couldn’t adjust. Not clear yet to me, however.

He wasn’t the original owner. The original owner was Alan. Another guy bought it off him and expanded it into a chain .
When Alleycats launched there were basically no pizza joints. Its hard for people to imagine now but just fifteen years ago or so Taipei had very few Western options even for something like Pizza. Allleycats was successful from the first month…There simply was no real competition. Even then though it was a big risk , because locals only really knew Dominos and Pizzaahut and Taipei wasn’t full of instragrammer hipster local and ABC types like it is today.
I remember Alan saying he had some sleepless nights and thinking he was crazy . I thought the odds were about 50:50 at best (I’d seen restaurants crash and burn before ). He built the oven himself (never having built one before )sourced the stone from Hualien , did almost all the interior decoration and fitting himself. The real hero was his wife though who put up the funds, scouted a super cheap but brilliant location and supported him with all the operations.
The name Alleycats had a personal story connected to it…

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Belgian_Pie wrote:

So was the current Alley Cats owner Mark ever connected in business with the founder?

There were more people that had invested and got burned.

He seems to be a nice guy indeed. Although probably he’s doing very well and maybe that’s why he might sound a bit cocky:

I’ve traveled across Taroko Gorge more than 50 times, visited Kenting National Park even more. I’ve driven every single road and ridden every single path on the island multiple times . I’ve trekked the highest peaks, walked along wild rivers, taken boats and airplanes to the outlying islands, encountered wildlife, felt dozens of earthquakes, hiked in typhoons (stupid I know), dealt with the police, government and mafia, had 5 motorbike accidents, jumped from bridges, cliffs, and waterfalls, climbed trees, made a fool of myself (both drunk and sober) in public far more often than I’d like, and even became quite successful in business during this mad adventure.

In 2011, I opened a restaurant with my wife in Taichung, it was an instant success, and we currently have 19 locations all around Taiwan.

https://www.taiwanese-secrets.com/why-taiwan/

I doubt he has taken every single road in Taiwan, leave alone the several times bit. There was a time I claimed the same haha.

For some strange reason I have this feeling that he might be the foreigner who was driving a jeep (or a 4x4) like crazy all the way up road 122. Or both have the same amount of hair left and similar interests (drive mountain roads).

Anyway, probably he’s a cool guy, and I wish I would be doing as well as he does!

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He’s living the dream. Well done. I remember the first restaurant he opened in Taichung I think. It’s not my style, I thought he overcharged and didn’t provide water for free which I thought was greedy…So I never went back. Lots of people disagree though :). Seems very popular with university students.
He has done well in the underserved vast hinterland of Taiwan that most folks in Taipei are not familiar with.

We are all guilty of this syndrome if we stay a long time and travel the island a lot. Now it’s easier to see a lot of the country from Taichung it has to be said.
No he is not that other guy who thinks he is James Bond lol but should be careful not to develop similar delusions. :joy:

Burned is not scammed. They wanted in on a success story and got their money burned.

What other guy?

There were several (ex) Forumosans that had an Alleycats, as a group or independent. And yes the dough and supplies were centralized, don’t know about staff.
I’ve been to several of them and quality varied on some food offerings, pizzas where OK. So, after a while you knew what not to order.

You don’t know James Bond?:sunglasses:
He still pops in here now and then. Pretty sure he has a Jeep as well haha.

Great story. What an accomplishment ! Kudos to him. An achiever !

the trick now would be to keep all the stores humming. Taiwanese are very faddish. If its just a fad, a passing phase, the stores may start to become unprofitable.

I think him keeping locations small and having that “something different” is great. If he keeps the overhead down he should be able to maintain the businesses if and when they are not packed.

he can even be like starbucks and close some stores while opening new ones in different places if and when the need comes.

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What other location is there besides Huashan?

There’s still one listed at Q Square, don’t know if its running.

That’s right, I think I passed it recently.

Originally he was planning to open a burger joint, but than it became an Italian place.

Where they ever good? Did it vary chain by chain? It was so overpriced for what it was. Even if it was good, hard to justify those prices compared to other places these days.

Well, Taipei in 2019 is flooded with western eateries with western ambiences. Back in the day Alleycats was a good place to go for a more relaxed meal away from drunken businessmen or classmate reunions. Maybe the pizza wasn’t world beating (I don’t even have an opinion, I don’t eat pizza) but the music was good and the beer was on tap.

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The quest for pizza in Banqiao :smiley:

But the prices man. I’m not cheap ass when it comes to food. But I hate feeling like I paid too much for what it is. Did it go up or something? I remember I went 2 times and each time i spent like 1200-1500 alone to be full walking out. That’s like a good restaurant here in Taiwan.