The restaurant business is cutthroat – you probably already know that. But if you’re willing to constantly optimize and iterate your approach, you can consistently increase sales and grow.
4 Tactics for Increased Restaurant Sales
If you’re in the restaurant business, you’re ultimately in the margin business. Every dollar and dime count – particularly when you multiply them out over weeks and months. But in order to move your margins in positive directions, you have to focus your efforts on the right areas of the business. Here are some specific tactics we recommend:
1. Optimize the Menu
It’s time to take a close look at your menu and identify areas where you can increase revenue. This is primarily done in two ways:
- Step 1: Focus on High-Profit Items. As you know, some menu items are more profitable than others. Some of the most profitable menu items include fountain drinks, alcoholic beverages, pizza, soup, dessert, children’s menu items, and breakfast items.
- Step 2: Choose the Right Menu Layout. Your menu’s design and layout play a significant role in visually guiding people to certain high-profit margin items. If, for example, you know that omelets are one of your most profitable items, there’s no sense in hiding it at the bottom of the last page. Featuring a prominent picture near the top of the menu will result in more orders. (Online services make printing menus very easy and inexpensive – so feel free to make frequent changes until you zero in on the right version.)
If you do these two things, you’ll increase sales almost overnight. Best of all, you’ll start to track what items people are ordering and which ones are not very popular. Based on these insights, you can optimize even further.
2. Expand Services
Always look for ways to expand your services using resources you already have. If you run a dine-in restaurant, low hanging fruit includes takeout, delivery, catering, and event hosting. In many cases, adding these is as simple as letting customers know that you’re now offering the service. Delivery and catering are really the only ones that require additional infrastructure.
3. Sell Complementary Items
Getting a customer through the door is the toughest part. Once they’re in your restaurant, you know that they’re going to buy something. Now your goal is focused on volume. The more you can sell to this customer, the higher your revenue. One way to drive volume up is to add complementary items to the menu.
“Appetizers, deserts, mixed drinks, signature brews, or any other drink or plate that doesn’t involve an entree can be seen as complementary,” entrepreneur Candice Landau notes. “Your approach to how you use these items will differ based on your entree pricing. You may offer some appetizers for free or at a discount if they purchase a drink or even multiple entrees. Or it may make sense to create a combo that can be purchased at a discounted price.”
You’ll have to decide how to structure your complimentary items. If you’re a low-cost restaurant, combos work really well. But if you’re more of an upscale establishment, a tapas menu and/or lots of appetizer options work well.
4. Increase Speed of Service
Improving your speed of service does a few things. First off, it theoretically increases the number of people you can serve on a given day. (Just watch how efficient Chick-fil-A’s drive-thru line is compared to a company like McDonald’s or Wendy’s and you’ll see this in action.)
Secondly, increased speed of service leads to a better experience by the customer. This makes them more likely to return in the future. It may also encourage them to recommend the restaurant to their friends.
Increasing the speed of service is all about having the right processes, hiring the right people, and training those people to embrace your processes.
Get Ready to Grow!
If you optimize your menu, strategically expand services, begin offering complimentary items, and speed up your service, your profits will grow – that’s a fact. The key is to take things one step at a time. You don’t have to do everything at once. Start with your menu, for example. Once you’ve optimized it, maybe you add a couple of complementary items, and so on. It may take time, but you’ll see results.
