Restaurant Reservations; Why Timing is Everything
Have you ever been to the doctor or the dentist? You arrive a couple of minutes before your appointment only to be greeted with a smile and told that there has been a bit of a delay and you’ll need to wait for your appointment. Or you could come back another day. And you’re only the second booking. Well, the same is true in most restaurants. There is only a finite number of employees both on the floor attending to guests needs and in the kitchen to prepare the dishes. So, when a couple of tables turn up late or early, or a couple of guests monopolise the time of…
Runner, Server, Host. What’s the difference?
There are thousands of books and blog posts written about being a waiter/waitress or server in a restaurant. These range from tips on how to do the job, to how to excel, to mistakes to avoid, to job descriptions, through to training resources of all different types. These are all good, but can often be dry and impartial. So I thought I would outline a more aspirational set of guidelines to help you achieve and deliver more to the guests you are looking after. Your employer will be happier, and you will be too. Even if it’s not your career or you may be doing it to get through college, the guest…
Another Year, Another Restaurant Scam
In the restaurant business, we learn about hospitality. We learn about finance. We learn about marketing. We learn (a lot) about operations as there are so many variables. But we learn - often the hard way - about fraud.
Why we left Quandoo
Quandoo was born in Germany and set out to ‘disrupt’ the restaurant reservations space since competitors like Open Table were charging a fortune for the service. That’s what they told us when we signed up shortly after they launched in the UK. Having recently read Blue Ocean Shift I now understand what it truly means to be a disruptor versus developing new business ideas to (Blue Ocean) Shift the business into a completely different dimension. ‘Disruptor’ is, sadly, an overused word meaning “doing the same as other people with a small twist”. Quandoo’s Disruption? Quandoo’s angle was to charge differently. You had a smaller monthly license fee plus the standard cover charge…
State of the UK Restaurant Market (2017)
This has been based on the excellent piece on PwC about the restaurant sector at the end of 2017, with additional commentary from me based on developments in 2018 and my view of the market from the inside. Food for thought PwC: The restaurant sector has performed well in recent years with market growth underpinned by long-term demographic and consumer trends. But market conditions have become more competitive, consumers are facing pressure on their real incomes from rising inflation and cost pressures are increasing. A more cautious outlook on the sector is justified. Me: Recent high-profile chain closures and restructuring including Toys R Us, Prezzo, Barbecoa, Jamies Italian, Strada, Byron and…
The Employers’ Problem: Some Hospitality Staff Just Don’t Care
I’ve been running restaurants for a little over 10 years now (at the time of writing) and employees have always been a fickle bunch; here today, gone the next. It’s a sad fact of the industry that employees, especially the more junior ones, hop between jobs. Sometimes they are just doing the work to fill in and earn some cash before their next real gig comes along. Sometimes they are just lazy and go back to claim benefits rather than work for a living to improve their situation over the long term. But over the last year, and especially this year, the new recruits-cum-leavers have been the worst I have ever seen.…
If you want better service in a restaurant, respect these five unwritten rules
Answer by Maxwell Arnold, former sous chef, restaurant manager, waiter, and busboy, on Quora: The relationship between a server and a customer can feel like an adverse one at times. Quite often, this is because the two parties simply misunderstand each other. I benefit from the experience of both working as a server, and being someone who dines out on the regular – so I understand what the dynamic is like from both sides. For customers who get the most out of the dining experience, they understand the many nuances of the restaurant business to include several unwritten rules that they have to go along with whether they like it…
The Top 35 Restaurant Etiquette Fails
According to the Telegraph, these are the ‘top 35 most irritating restaurant faux-pas’. They go on to say … If you’re reading this while dining at a restaurant, well, you’re beyond help. But the rest of us can take note: pollsters have identified 35 of the most inexcusable eating-out faux-pas, and, bloody hell, Brits, this is shameful stuff. Number one on the list? Clicking fingers for the waiter’s attention (rude). Two: talking with a full mouth (gross). The third on the list is “being too loud and raucous”, which at least suggests that someone – if not the poll’s joyless respondents – is having fun, but we can all agree…
The “Affordable Restaurant” Apocalypse
Likening the rise of food halls in America to Singapore’s hawker stalls, David Chang told a crowd of urbanists this week that he foresees fewer restaurants in the middle of the market. “You’re gonna see the mom and pop restaurant in New York City not vanish completely, but it’s gonna be way more difficult,” Chang said during a panel at The New York Times Cities of Tomorrow conference in Manhattan. He predicted the market will skew toward more affordable dining at food halls on the low end, and expensive, luxurious restaurants on the high end. The types of independent, one-off restaurants where dinner costs $40-$50 per person are becoming harder for…
Hospitality industry’s rapid growth under threat without Government support
The hospitality industry’s stellar growth since the financial crisis could be halted and start to fall by 2021 if the Government continues to overlook it, a new report has suggested. Research by Ignite Economics carried out for the British Hospitality Association, has predicted the sector’s workforce could begin to drop by 2021 with the contribution it makes to the economy also falling as cost pressures from wages and business rates bite alongside a potential labour squeeze once the UK leaves the EU. Any weakness in the industry would be a concern given it employs almost 10% of the entire UK workforce and has grown its contribution to the economy faster than…
MISADVENTURES IN THE RESTAURANT TRADE
