Preservation, Beau Soleil plan to merge businesses

Published 10:00 am Tuesday, March 3, 2020

Teche Area gourmands were excited to see the opening of Preservation Bar & Grill in the former Clementine’s space last year, but the dining crowds were not robust enough to make things economically feasible for Matt and Lex Indest and their family.

One day while dining at the restaurant with Rebecca Holleman, owner of Beau Soleil Café, patriarch Eldridge Indest broached the idea of combining the two restaurants.

The result of that conversation is a merger that the two restaurants hope to complete in June, bringing members of both staffs under one roof at the Beau Soleil location.

Eldridge Indest took a few minutes from planning that move to talk to The Daily Iberian about the process and the industry in general.

How did the idea of a merger come about?

Well, I have a relationship with Rebecca Holleman. Her mother is my first cousin. Plus we have had events where people have gone from our restaurant to theirs and back. There has been some competition, but not in a bad way.

How did she react to the idea of combining forces?

Her eyes kinda went up. I figured she was feeling the same thing we were feeling on this end of the street. The main reason we decided to do something was that we weren’t strong. We are still in our first year. I had a hunch they may be in the same position.

How will merging the two operations help?

In the niche that Preservation and Beau Soleil are in, it’s going to be difficult in the New Iberia market. The real key is that we have to have a very robust catering side, plus better utilization of resources.

Will the catering side make that much of a difference?

When we had the catering mix into our restaurant, we were breaking even. But we weren’t very good at marketing it. We have to be much more aggressive with the catering side of things.

Beau Soleil was more successful on the catering side than we were. So we are eliminating the competition and combining efforts.

What sort of economic benefits come with the move?

Well, one of the misconceptions is that it is going to be two separate businesses. It isn’t. It’s going to be one business, and neither of us are going away. Rebecca, Matt and Lex are going to run it. Matt will be in the kitchen, Rebecca will be focusing on lunch business and Lex will handle the catering side. Also, that building is owned by Rebecca’s dad, James Holleman. So there are no lease issues and a very favorable deal until we can become profitable. Everything is pretty new in that building. We will bring in all the restaurant equipment. That will also help us to do better service off site.