The marketing materials you include on your café or restaurant’s tables can have a huge impact on the amount that each customer or group of customers spends each time they visit.
A bare table might look stylish, but it can often reduce the average customer’s total spend and leave your restaurant at a financial disadvantage compared to a more full table with numerous different marketing materials.
One of the best ways to increase the amount of revenue your restaurant generates per customer is to include a variety of different marketing materials on each table, giving each customer a great range of dishes and dining options to choose from.
From drinks lists and menus to less straightforward ideas such as a list of the daily specials, read on to find out which five marketing materials you should include on your restaurant or café’s tables.
Dining menu
It’s the obvious choice, and it’s one of the most important. Make sure your dining menu is always available at each table so that customers fully understand which dishes are available for them while they’re in your restaurant.
If you’re aiming to maximize your revenue-per-customer, keep the menu close to the table – or better yet, in a menu holder on the table – so that customers are free to look at other dishes and upsells while they dine.
The more opportunities customers have to view your menu, the greater the chance of them ordering a second dish or choosing an extra from the menu while enjoying their existing meal.
Drinks menu
If your restaurant serves a lot of drinks or acts as a restaurant/bar after dinner, an excellent way to increase your revenue-per-customer is to offer a drinks menu with a full list of the drinks your restaurant offers.
Many restaurants, bars and cafés make the mistake of using a short drinks menu in which only a few staple drinks are available. Customers are then required to order other drinks off the menu by asking the staff.
The longer and more comprehensive your drinks menu is, the more choices people fell as if they have. Offer a comprehensive, detailed drinks menu and you’ll increase the likelihood of customers ordering drinks along with their meals.
Daily/weekly specials
Does your café or restaurant offer daily or weekly specials? Listing your specials on a board might be the classic way to advertise your daily offerings, but it’s nowhere near as effective as listing them on a menu that customers can easily reference.
Prepare a daily or weekly specials menu – it needn’t be as detailed as your full menu – that you can keep in each table’s menu holder. This lets customers check the daily or weekly specials while they dine without looking across your restaurant.
Many people order special dishes on an impulse because they stand out from other dishes on the menu. Make your specials menu easy to find and even easier to read and you’ll maximize the number of people that order special dishes.
Desserts and extras
If your restaurant or café serves extras such as desserts or digestifs, it’s a good idea to list these on a separate menu from other dishes. This gives your service staff an additional opportunity to present the menu to diners and ask if they’re interested.
By maximizing your service staff’s interaction with customers through using several different menus, you increase the level of awareness customers have of your dishes and subsequently increase the average number of customers that order extras.
From desserts to post-dinner cocktails, adding your most popular extras to a menu that’s independent from others is a great way to increase the amount that customers order and create an additional upselling opportunity for your staff.
Dinner or lunch sets
If your restaurant serves a high volume of customers during dinner or lunch, one of the best ways to simplify your kitchen’s workload and increase average revenue per customer is to offer a range of dinner or lunch sets.
Set menus are easier to prepare than a large range of a-la-carte dishes and allow you to offer an additional option for customers. There’s no need to only offer a set menu; a set menu can be a complement to your usual range of lunch or dinner dishes.
By offering lunch and dinner sets, your restaurant gains an additional way to market its food to customers. Adding a set menu to each table streamlines ordering and gets more of your dining options in front of each customer.
