When guests visit a restaurant, the staff should treat them like their friends visiting home. For restaurant business owners, it is essential to treat the guests with care and concern to make them comfortable and let them enjoy a great meal. In this article, we will discuss some basic aspect of restaurant management which will help both restaurant managers to plant heir strategy and the service takers to assess the quality of service.
Quality of service
Restaurants have plenty of competitors. So, to stand out from the rest and outperform, one should ensure exceptional quality. The customers visiting a restaurant now are more concerned about the quality aspects of not only the food but everything related to their restaurant experience. The guests are looking at the value they get in return of their money, so they tend to weigh the value of whatever they see, touch, and taste and see if these provide them with an exceptional experience.
Quality of food
No doubt that, among all the other things, food and beverages are probably the top indicators of the quality of a restaurant. Different customers may value different things in terms of the ambiance of the place or the friendliness of the waiters etc., but all are primarily concerned about the quality of food.
For someone who owns a restaurant, food quality is not just important in terms of the customer impression, but also for the health of the customers as well. The guests’ health and well-being shouldn’t be compromised at any cost. Even though not all the restaurants around the city can boast of the quality of food they serve, one can surely ensure to take adequate measures to store and prepare the food safely. Some basic protocols to meet to ensure food safety and quality include:
- Ensuring the proper flow of First In, First Out (FIFO) with preparing and serving food products.
- Label and date all food products and ensure all ingredients are current and safe to use.
- Don’t use experienced ingredients and never serve food which has expired.
- Prepare the dishes safely and healthy. Be aware of the possibility of cross-contamination and also dangers of bacteria and the possibility of cross-contact with other types of allergens to eradicate such possibilities.
- Those who handle it should thoroughly wash their hands before and after getting into contact with any food products.
- Prepare food in a safe and proper temperature and also serve adequately.
- Ensure that safety and quality internal audits are conducted from time to time to ensure that all the employees are sticking to the set protocols.
- Try to collect feedback from the customers also about the quality of food and cuisines served like Uzbek food Brooklyn, and also various aspects of serving it rightly.
Maintain a quality atmosphere
As we have seen above, while guests enter into the restaurant, at the first point itself, they must get a feeling that they are in a very special but comfortable place. Creation of a good atmosphere and ambiance is a necessity. Some suggestions for the restaurant managers in this aspect are:
- Try to make some innovative choices with the lighting. Stick to an ideal theme or concept and makes sure the combination and strength of lighting suits to the tone you wish to establish.
- Be careful in choosing the type and volume of music you play. The volume should be kept audible, but make sure it isn’t distracting. Music can help create a mood, so keep a fair collection of it.
- Decorate the premise appropriately. Appropriate decoration will provide the given space a special feeling, but make sure you don’t overdo it. Also, ensure that the decorations you plan from time to time suits to the season or the occasion. It is also possible to plan for customized decoration on group booking for any special events to be held at the restaurant.
- Ensure that the restaurant is kept spotless. Even the busy quick-service type of restaurant has to ensure high standards of hygiene and sanity for the customers to feel good.
- Maintain appropriate indoor temperature, which is acceptable to all. Many of the restaurants feature a centralized cooling or heating system, so make sure it goes well for all. Usually, 70°F is considered to be a commonly acceptable indoor temperature to maintain. Try to minimize any hot spots or drafts from the lights also to maintain the right temperature effect.
Offer a memorable service
Above the quality of food, one thing customers tend to remember is the quality of service the received from a restaurant. This contributes largely to the overall customer experience and starts from the very moment they enter the premises to walking out of the restaurant. During busy hours, the restaurants may thrive in sales, but the managers need to ensure that the sale never comes before customer’s needs if you want to maintain goodwill.
In any service environment, the primary thing to consider is how the service-givers speak to the customers. This has to be properly trained to the waiters, waitresses, chauffeurs and whoever involved in first-hand customer interactions. The interactions needed to be done friendly with courtesy and respect.
Serving and clearing food
The serving etiquette may vary based on the serving types of various restaurants and cuisines. The premium finds dining restaurants need to take extra care of it. The managers need to train the servers and cleaners about the appropriate table etiquette in order to make sure that they do it the right way. Some points are:
- The server in proper order, for example, in a fine dining environment for banquets, the protocol is first to serve the guest of honor, then female guests, and next men. In lesser formal events, it is acceptable to follow just women before men.
- Another key aspect is to be on the left-hand side of the customer while serving and clearing food. Some formal restaurants follow the practice of serving with the left hand. As most diners tend to be right-handed, serving from left is accepted as the best practice.
- However, to pour wine or beverages, it can be best done from the right-hand side of the diner. This is where the glasses are usually set on the dining table and serving from the right makes it less clutter.
- Always serve at the correct order. The food runners and servers need to have a protocol to follow in order to identify which plates may correspond to which guests.
Apart from these, the speed of service and caring for an upset or irate customer everything counts when to come to assess the overall quality of the restaurant service. Assessing your restaurant with the above pointers may lead to a profitable and successful business.