Customer loyalty is key to any successful restaurant start-up

Customer loyalty is key to any successful restaurant start-up

Business Finance, News

If you’re planning a restaurant start-up or have already launched your new business, you should take time to consider ways to retain and increase customer loyalty. Ultimately, customer loyalty will be one of the main factors driving the success of your new business, so it’s important to get it right from the outset. Here we look at ways to build customer loyalty for your restaurant start-up.

Ways restaurants can increase customer loyalty

It’s not usually too difficult to attract new customers to restaurants, but there are so many competitors that it can be difficult to retain clientele. In general, you should strive to provide the best possible customer service to each and every diner in order to stand the best chance that they return to your establishment.

Constant menu updates

One way to attract new customers and repeat diners is to constantly update your menu. It won’t take too long for you to work out which dishes are popular, so switching out the less popular dishes means your customers have reasons to keep returning. Another option is to jazz up menu items that prove popular, you can add complementary sides or alternative veggies to encourage greater diner loyalty.

Set up customer loyalty incentives

You may also want to look at the benefits of setting up your own customer loyalty or incentive programme for your restaurant start-up. Giving discounts or freebies to regular diners is one way to keep your clients coming back for more! Using a mobile app for your rewards programme gives you more opportunities to keep in touch with regular customers, alongside regular reminders about the incentives they’ve earned. With a mobile app in place, you can get in touch with regulars each time you launch a special offer or meal deal at your restaurant.

Launching a mobile app can be an expensive solution for any business, particularly start-ups. However, it can truly fuel business expansion, one way to finance high tech business solutions is to utilise alternative finance methods for key business equipment and this is an area in which Tower Leasing specialise.

The customer is king

There are bound to be problems and mishaps in your restaurant start-up, so it’s important to train all your team to handle customers and deal with complaints. Very often, a well-handled complaint can make all the difference and create the regular customers you need. For example, offering a free meal with drinks to a diner complaining about an experience in your restaurant is sure to mean this customer will return on at least one more occasion!

Once your restaurant has developed a local reputation for fine food and great service you could well be fully booked on a regular basis. So take all the time needed to build trade and return customers from the very outset of trading. It will pay dividends in the end.

Restaurant start-up – where to find out more

If you’re starting up or expanding a new restaurant business, you may need to purchase new equipment and furniture. We can help you obtain funding for asset acquisition or leasing, to help with your cashflow.

Read our Aurum Lounge restaurant case study, for whom we secured funding to help purchase the required equipment, running into the tens of thousands, over a 3 year term to keep the repayments as low as possible.

Please get in touch with us if you’d like to discuss your alternatives for financing your restaurant start-up or expansion.

Image: Japanese woman having a coffee by Rawpixel Ltd licensed under Creative Commons 4.0

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