Preparing your new restaurant for the opening night can be both a delight and a challenge. There are many different elements to think of and prepare – from your very first menu to hiring the perfect staff. While at times it may seem like a fraught undertaking, following these simple steps should give you the recipe for success so you can make a fantastic first impression on your diners and leave them craving more.
Make Sure Your Restaurant Is Safe And Hygienic
One of the first steps you should carry out before opening your restaurant is ensuring that it is legal, safe, and clean. Good safety and hygiene standards are vital for any eatery that wants to remain in business for the foreseeable future. In terms of the physical premises, make sure the electricity and plumbing are in good working order and that you have all of the appropriate alarms, as well as firefighting tools. Call in experienced professionals, Trade Facilities Services, to provide you with an Electrical Safety Certificate.
An electricity certificate is an important document to have in your restaurant files. When it comes to preventing hygiene violations, it’s vital that your staff are well-trained when it comes to the various essential practices involved in maintaining good food hygiene. This includes cleaning surfaces thoroughly both before and after meal prep, preventing cross-contamination, and keeping different foodstuffs appropriately stored so they cannot spoil.
Create A Showstopping Menu
Developing an enticing menu is one of the most vital aspects of opening a restaurant and making it a success. However, choosing the right selection of dishes can be tricky and requires some extensive research into your target demographic and their culinary preferences. You also need to be sure that you have a solid supply chain set up to provide the ingredients you want to use in your menu. When it comes to compiling your menu, you should also consider including richly detailed descriptions of the different meals available, as this tactic has been found to be very effective.
Advertise, Advertise, Advertise
As you approach the opening date for your restaurant, there are a number of effective techniques you can use to drum up publicity and make sure plenty of people attend. This includes advertising outside your restaurant and on social media, as well as in local newspapers. You can even hit the streets, offering delicious samples from your menu to start tantalising the tastebuds of potential diners.
Hire The Right People
Employing the right people to work in your restaurant is vital, particularly when you’re approaching your grand opening. To help ensure you acquire the ideal staff for every role – from the head chef to the barman and the wait staff – you need to carefully check through the credentials of each applicant that applies. You should also prepare detailed interview questions to help you ascertain whether or not they are really the best fit for the job.
Wow The Crowds On Opening Night
When your grand opening finally arrives, make sure you and your staff do all you can to make a wonderful first impression. After all, the focus should be on your diners, not on yourselves, if you want to make sure they come again in the future. Try and take care of every detail, from the décor to hiring enough staff and ordering in all of the right ingredients, so the whole experience goes as seamlessly as possible, and your diners leave feeling satisfied. Ultimately, you will want them to be hungry to come back for more.