3 Tips For Packing Your Restaurant This Holiday Season

The holiday season is here! With less than a month to go until Christmas Day, business owners of all kinds are currently vying for the attention of holiday shoppers. Restaurant owners are most certainly among them. Especially because of the toll the pandemic has placed on the industry, restaurateurs should be working extra hard to entice customers to visit their eateries in the weeks to come.

Here are three tips for packing your restaurant this holiday season:

1. Create a special holiday menu.

This one probably should go without saying, shouldn’t it? It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Have a menu that reflects the joys and traditions of the season. Spruce up your menu with holiday-themed designs. More importantly, rename some of your dishes (or create slightly revised ones) in order to offer meals that are exclusive to the holidays. Sarah Bricker Hunt of Constant Contact encourages restaurateurs to promote limited-time holiday menus.

“It’s up to you to decide if you’ll replace your standard menu with your holiday menu or offer a short list of additional holiday specials,” she writes on their website, “While this restaurant holiday promotion idea takes a bit more planning and prep, it can be just the thing to get customers who haven’t been around for a while to stop in just to try what’s new or what’s only available for a limited time.”

2. Accommodate holiday parties.

Needless to say, some strict adherence to COVID-19 safety protocol will be needed here. For the most part, Canadian restaurant owners are required to check for the vaccination statuses of their customers. Be sure to consider the proposed limits on holiday parties before advertising that your place of business is available to host them. But make no mistake about it. People definitely want to celebrate this year! Carve Real Estate urges restaurant owners to be open to booking last-minute holiday parties.

“In the past, most companies would book their holiday parties months in advance,” notes their website, “However, during ‘uncertain times’ and with many companies operating remotely, the holiday parties have probably taken a back seat to more pressing logistical issues. Expect to see some companies booking ‘last-minute’ holiday parties this year, as changing restrictions made it difficult to plan far in advance. The more accommodating and flexible you can be for these last-minute parties, the better.”

3. Offer free gifts with your meals.

Who doesn’t like getting something for free? After all, this season is all about giving, is it not? A free gift with each meal won’t just impress the pants off of your patrons. It will work wonders in encouraging them to give your restaurant their loyalty. Hunt notes that including a bonus gift as part of your holiday promotion is a generous gesture your customers will appreciate during the season of gift-giving.

“One of the most effective restaurant holiday promotion ideas is to offer a small bonus gift certificate with the purchase of a larger gift certificate,” she writes, “The smaller certificate entices the buyer to come back to your restaurant at a later date — when they’ll likely order more than the certificate covers by itself.”

Could you make use of some business funding to help promote your restaurant this holiday season? To learn about how our unique merchant cash advance program can help you, please don’t hesitate to call Synergy Merchants at 1-877-718-2026 or email us at info@synergymerchants.com. You can also apply online for a free, no obligation quote!