“I was on the road for at least 12 hours daily,” says the chef-turned-hawker who saved $30K within a year as a delivery rider. The money went into opening his new Japanese rice bowl stall, Ichidon.
No part of this story or photos can be reproduced without permission fromIn order to save up quickly, the soft-spoken hawker says that at one point, he wasfor at least 12 hours daily without any days off. “During that period, I was making about $8-9K a month,” he shares in mandarin. Elwin says the amount was more than double his salary as a kitchen supervisor at Ichikokudo’s Hillion Mall outlet, where he worked for two years.
Despite the increased income, Elwin was reluctant to continue working as a delivery rider. “It was very tiring and I hardly had time to see my family. It was also dangerous to be on the road for such long hours. I nearly had an accident when a taxi driver almost crashed into me while making a U-turn,” says the hawker, who is married with an eight-year-old daughter.
Additionally, the former chef asserts that he has always wanted to open his own hawker stall. “It’s something I’ve been thinking about for years. With the pandemic, I saw an opportunity [to earn more as a delivery rider and save up for my biz] and decided it was time to act on my goal.”Elwin helms the stall daily, which operates from 10am to 9pm, on his own. He hires a part-time assistant to take orders on weekends.
The first-time hawker says business has been “okay”, though “not as good” as he initially hoped. On a good day, the stall serves around 70 orders of donburi. “I chose this location as I used to deliver food to this area and noticed quite a lot of new HDB blocks here. The homeowners have started to move in so I’m hoping business will improve.”There are a total of 18 types of rice bowls here – pretty impressive for a one-man operation. Prices range from $6.
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