I know someone who actually did this, or tried to do this. The result is less than great for many reasons including some mentioned above. The bottom line is yes one can do it if one wants it bad enough, but without the proper preparation, knowledge and skills, the restaurant will either fail quickly, or the owner will just try to fix things as they go and it lingers unprofitably for many years.
Agree with this. In my experience, restaurants don't fail all of a sudden without first showing signs of trouble. The problem is owners rarely see their own trouble while others can. And many problems exist even before the owners actually start to process of building their restaurants.
That's why I do what I do to help owners, but in all cases the owners must recognize that they need help themselves. It's admirable the OP asks the question but without providing more specifics about his/her situation, I don't think anyone can reply with anything useful, except maybe "don't do it" based on the info provided.
