As a restaurant owner, you juggle multiple tasks, from running a kitchen to managing staff to servicing customers. This leaves you little time to focus on the bigger picture—growing operations to the next level. The New Year presents a fresh opportunity to reexamine goals and set priorities. Here are 4 resolutions that will ensure steady growth into the coming year:
- Increase sales during off-peak hours. Does your restaurant service revolve strictly around breakfast, lunch, and dinner? If so, you could be cutting your revenue dollars short. According to the National Restaurant Association, 48 percent of consumers snack twice a day, and restaurants that adapt to this trend have seen incremental increases in revenue. Off-peak service add-ons for the new year could include:
- Small food items like fruit and cheese plates or bagels during brunch hours.
- A scaled-back, late-night menu.
- Expand with catering. 2015 is booking quickly with corporate events, birthday parties, and wedding receptions, and catered meals are a big part of that equation. If you don’t offer catering, doing so can increase sales and attract new customers to your establishment. The great part is you need only commit to the level of service that suits your restaurant’s operational style.Want to start small? Test the waters with boxed lunches for local businesses, or dedicate a space in your restaurant for on-site catering. Then, consider diversifying with full-service, on-site catering.
- Improve customer service. There’s no way to get around it—a great customer experience always hinges on the quality of service they receive at the table. So, no matter what else you do to improve operations, continue to invest in the customer service aspect of your business. Make it a priority to schedule staff meetings, regularly walk the restaurant floor, and utilize social media to reach out and encourage feedback.
- Reduce food waste. Restaurant diners leave about 17 percent of their food uneaten, according to the Washington Post. This amounts to about 150,000 pounds of food waste per restaurant each year!
Make it a resolution to cut back on waste and keep costs under tighter reign this year. Offering half-sized portions at lower prices will help minimize waste in the dining room. In the kitchen, it’s critical to manage every aspect of your inventory. For instance, when you discover which ingredients are being wasted, this can help you devise a cross-utilization plan, implementing those ingredients into other dishes. Revel’s iPad POS Management Console calculates waste loss percentages automatically. With this and other intelligent reporting features, you can make more informed decisions for positive results in 2015.
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