MARKETING: How to Prep Your Sports Bar for NCAA Spring Games
It’s March and spring doesn’t feel very close, but we’ve got an idea about how to warm it up. Why not promote some NCAA Football? What? NCAA Football? It’s not August. Actually, the spring is one of the most entertaining peculiarities of NCAA Football — the Spring Games. There’s a bunch of fun rituals that surround the games and if you are a fan club location, this game is essential for driving some cheap traffic in April or May.
The post also includes a free schedule download of the NCAA Spring Games, compliments of the SportsTV Guide.
DID YOU KNOWS…
The Colonel Get POPed!
Funk POP!, the popular oversized head collectibles, has released a KFC Colonel Sanders edition. The Colonel is dressed in his standard white outfit and carrying a bucket of fried chicken. And yes, it’s officially licensed by KFC, a company that just keeps finding interesting ways of marketing and marching itself to guests.
The Richest People on Earth
A million seconds are close to 12 days, a billion seconds amount to almost 32 years. According to Forbes, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has accumulated a net worth of some 131 billion U.S. dollars. If the 54-year old started spending a dollar each second (without accumulating further wealth and the dollar not inflating or deflating), his riches would last him over 4,150 years -- at least until the result of his divorce becomes clear. In 2018, his wealth would "only" have lasted him 3,600 years.
The AAF Gets More Televised Games
The Alliance of American Football (AAF) is continuing to find some TV success. Turner Sports announced this week that they’ve picked up two further AAF games for TNT. Their deal was originally for one regular season and one playoff game, so this is big for the new football league. The pick-up comes after recent AAF games beat some NHL and MLS broadcasts. Be sure you’re a SportsTV Guide subscriber to know when all the AAF games are on TV and streaming. And for more on how sports bars can leverage the AAF with NFL fans, check out our blog here.
WHAT IS YOUR HQ?
Why it matters to you: Let Danny Meyer’s philosophy show you a road to hospitality success through picking the right people.
Our industry has a lot of celebrities that profess to also be great leaders, but they are rarely seen in their own operations. Which is why when a successful leader who is also a celebrity offers their insight, everyone should pay heed. Enter Danny Meyer! You know him originally from his Union Square Hospitality Group restaurants like Grammercy Tavern or Union Square Café. However, he is equally well known as the creator and executive responsible for Shake Shack. What you may not know about Danny Meyer is he’s also an accomplished manager of humans. In fact, he has identifies six traits he believes make for a successful player in our industry and he calls their aggregate affect the hospitality quotient (HQ).
The first and foremost characteristic that increases a candidate’s HQ is empathy. If you can put yourself in the shoes of the person you are interacting with, then you have a much better chance of delivering them a valued experience in your restaurant. His best practice for employee recruitment is to find people that are optimistic (1), curious (2), view each day as an opportunity to learn (3), have an amazing work ethic (4), self-awareness and empathy (5) and integrity (6). Sure these may sound obvious, but that’ doesn’t make them wrong. We strongly encourage you read this entire blog on Meyer’s philosophy of evolving a culture in your business. His thinking makes sense, his philosophy is proven, and his best practices make it impossible to ignore.
[Source: Toast POS]
SCHEDULE THIS!
Why it matters to you: Your schedule is like your game plan. You need a great one to win!
Most operators would concede the most contentious management task they address daily is staff scheduling. That’s why having a strategy to better write great schedules is an essential best practice in our industry. For example, simple steps like looking at your past sales and recent sales trends help you better forecast your labor needs. Sure that sounds intuitive, but so many of you are just copying and pasting your schedules weekly. When it comes to labor cost mitigation, try staggering start times to more accurately staff towards volume. You won’t likely need all five servers in your dining room at 5pm. By having a server that comes in later, you also make it easier to identify your closers as well.
Of course, discipline is a crucial aspect of scheduling. This requires you enforce clock in and out times for our staff. The cost of early or late time punches can mount into thousands if you aren’t diligent. To that end, you also want to make sure your full-time employees aren’t being overworked (and getting overtime) and your part-time staff is delivering their full potential of hours available. Also, appreciate the strengths and weaknesses of your staff is a powerful way to ensure you aren’t just staffed, but you are staffed with the best team to meet your volume.
Some of the most important scheduling best practices don’t include scheduling at all. For example, cross-training as many of your staff as possible, translates into you having far more flexibility in how and who you schedule. Given that Millennials and Generation Z’ers are seeking a work environment that helps them grow and crave flexibility themselves, cross-training is a win-win. Remember, the schedule is like your game plan for the shift and you can ask any champion how important game planning is to them. You’ll find out quickly it’s the only thing that matters.
[Source: FSR Magazine]
