When you think of a good restaurant, a lot can come to your mind – with food being on top of the list.
Several factors add to the overall restaurant experience, which is why some restaurants get more repeated customers than others.
While cuisine and personal preferences do play a role, multiple other variables make the restaurant unique, and worth visiting.
Everything from marketing online, food presentation, ambiance to professionalism and unmatched customer service plays an important role.
A good eatery needs to keep in mind what variables help in the sustainability of the restaurant and work to improve them to grow their business further.
It’s important to know what makes the restaurant great, isn’t the food itself, but the chef behind it.
Similarly, the thing that makes a restaurant service exceptional, is the employee handbook that ensures a smooth transition of the workforce.
Hiring the Right People via an HR Employee Handbook
An employee handbook ensures that all employees of the company understand their role and its significance in the company.
This leads to a smooth hiring process and effective management after onboarding.
If the employees are well familiar with the job duties, the performance and review process, timekeeping and wages, benefits, workplace etiquettes, and employee conduct – uniformity and transparency help ensure a standard of performance is maintained.
Having an employee handbook is the first step towards making a reputable restaurant with structure and guidance embedded in its core.
Creating an Experience Over offering a Service
Another distinguishable quality of a good restaurant is that they are focused on providing a memorable experience.
In today’s age, most eateries are overly fixated on maintaining a service, and ensuring that food reaches the customers on time.
However, there’s more to being a good restaurant than putting food on a plate, and simply greeting the guests – it’s about creating an overall experience.
Everything from seeing the restaurant online, booking a table, staff hospitality, food quality, to time management counts in the experience.
Find your restaurant’s touchpoints and see what can be improved.
Showcasing a Concept
The foundation of any company is the mission, vision, and core values it adheres to.
However, when we’re looking at the restaurant business, the boundaries become a little blurry and the core concept isn’t actively showcased.
To be an effective restaurant or virtual restaurant, the concept should be considered while making any decisions related to the restaurant. It could be a dedication to an idea, an atmosphere, or even different cuisine.
Similarly, it needs to be showcased in every area of the business, this concept should fuel your unique selling proposition and it should be mentioned in the employee handbook so all employees are on the same page.
Focus on Food Quality and Price
A good restaurant knows the importance of providing quality food that’s priced correctly.
Prices need to accurately reflect the quality of the dish itself, the ambiance, and the service level.
With dozens of restaurants around at every corner, it is important to make sure that you aim for the right amount to be charged from the customer, any higher or lower can cause your customers to churn.
After all, customers will not be paying for bad management and average food twice.
Or pay for extremely cheap food which can raise a question about the quality of ingredients and hygiene.
Find the middle spot, and focus on providing an experience over maximizing profits. Restaurants that instill value for money propositions further themselves in the market.
Practice Good Hygiene and Cleanliness
While this quality seems like a no-brainer, there’s always a question about general hygiene and cleanliness.
Restaurants that have mastered the art of cleanliness get more and more customers because of their attention to detail.
This means cleanliness is practiced from clean kitchen, floors, cutlery to sanitized tables, doorknobs, and seating arrangements.
Prioritize maintaining the cleanliness of all areas of your restaurant, including the restrooms, and around the restaurant as well.
The customer experience starts from the moment the customer steps in the door.
Train Employees for Customer Service
Plenty of restaurants are targeted because of their customer service, and how the manager had to step in last minute to keep things from going south.
Because of such cases, successful restaurants know that customer service training is to be given at all levels of employment, be it the manager, chef, or the wait staff.
Train your employees to handle actual customer concerns and special cases, allow them to be firm but also accommodating – create guidelines to ensure that everyone knows how to handle a distressed or a tricky customer.
Good restaurants add a section in their employee handbooks or conduct demonstrations to make sure all the staff is well aware of the situations.
Evaluate the touchpoints and pain points of your restaurant to see which qualities you lack, and how to overcome them.
By focusing on the experience rather than the service, you will see areas that can improve all together.