By Mildred Delgado, Contributor
Opening up a restaurant is a major undertaking, regardless if it’s your first or tenth. You must find a suitable location you believe will be appropriate, acquire the necessary investment funds, and be prepared to endure some troubling times in the beginning.
Still, opening up a restaurant is a dream for many people.
Unfortunately, the success rates for new restaurants are quite low and most close after only a year of being open. Because of this, it is important to properly plan and do the best to ensure success.
Here we will look at eight critical considerations anyone should take into account when opening up a new restaurant.
What Will Your Restaurant Theme Be?
When people decide they want to go out for dinner, the very first question they ask is “what kind of food do I want?” Therefore, picking the right theme for your restaurant is important.
For example, it may not be wise to decide to open an Italian food restaurant if there are already numerous successful Italian food options in the area. It would be better to choose something that is not offered but is desired. This would give your restaurant an advantage of filling the demand of your local market.
Choosing Your Restaurant’s Kitchen Size
Deciding what size kitchen your restaurant needs is also an important factor to consider. Having a kitchen that is too small can result in long wait times and a poor experience for your guests. People generally do not want to wait over 25 minutes for their food, and the entire group should receive the plates at the same time.
Having too large a kitchen can result in minimized floor space and fewer profits. There is no need to have a kitchen that is over-equipped relative to the number of customers one can serve at a time.
You also need to consider if your restaurant’s kitchen will handle just in-house orders or also deliveries. Also, are you considering running a ghost kitchen inside your restaurant, too? These decisions will affect what size kitchen you’ll need.
Getting the Right Restaurant Design
For most people eating out is a social occasion. It is a time for enjoying the company of friends and family. A great restaurant encourages social interaction with its floor design and decor. It is also worth considering that sometimes people want to enjoy a nice, romantic dinner, and the design should accommodate this as well.
This heavily ties back to what your restaurant theme is and what sort of gusts you expect to get and the type of experience you want to give them and that they want. Running a customer persona on your clientele is a huge help in making figuring that out.
What’s that Smell?
No one likes to eat where there is a foul odor or unpleasant scent. The same can be said for the other extreme, eating when there is a strong smell of artificial scent can also be off-putting. A restaurant should try and be as odor as neutral as possible to allow the customers to enjoy the quality of the food.
The key here is making sure both the air quality in your kitchen and dining rooms are fresh and clean. Insulated ductwork, air scrubbers, humidifiers, and air purifiers all help with keeping your restaurant’s air in the positive.
Should You Put on Tunes?
Should your restaurant play music? For sure, some of your guests expect to hear music when they go to a restaurant. And, for the most part, guests want the music to be loud enough so that they know it is there but not so loud as to impede conversation at all. Remember, restaurants can get quite busy if there are many groups of people present. Music should not add to the noise but rather help establish the environment.
If a restaurant is themed-based on an ethnic food or region it is an obvious choice to pick music from that area. Likewise, if you’re running a sports-themed restaurant or bar, it may be better to play audio of the main game you’re showing.
Accessorize Your Restaurant with Plants
Plant life placed around a restaurant helps your business appear alive and inviting. Areas devoid of any plants can often come across as being sterile and uninviting. While this is true it is also easy to overdo it. The line between too many plants and not enough is very fine. As a restaurant owner, you should try various arrangements to see which one feels most natural.
What’s Your Restaurant’s Capacity?
Deciding on the right amount of seating can be very difficult. While having more tables means potentially more profit, it can also deter guests who may feel as if the floor plan lacks any sense of personal space and intimacy. Too few tables may offer the separation customers desire but mean too few customers can be seated at once resulting is lower than acceptable sales.
The size of your restaurant will also put a max cap on how many people you can legally fit into your restaurant, too, so it’s important to know what that figure is when making decisions.
What’s Your Restaurant’s Local Purpose?
A restaurant should show it has some tie to the local community, even if the theme is from some distant land. Paying tribute to local heroes, monuments, or landmarks is one way to achieve this, though the connection is purely superficial.
Another good option for community representation is to make real-life, strong human connections. For example, use locally-sourced ingredients where possible to support local farmers and show you care about the local economy’s well-being. You may also consider sponsoring youth sports or cater local fundraisers. The goal is to find a purpose for your restaurant that goes beyond making a profit. When one supports their community, they can expect their community to support them.
About the Author
Mildred Delgado is a young and responsible marketing strategist at Academic Brits and PhD Kingdom. She works closely with organizations to develop fully-functioning websites while keeping the organization's brand image in mind. She has created many marketing proposals, many of which can be found at Academic Paper Help.