The well-known English writer H.G. Wells famously wrote, “Adapt or perish, now as ever, is nature's inexorable imperative.” This has been the lived reality of many hospitality businesses the last few years.
A new law that many of the affected people have never heard about becomes effective July 1, 2022. It all involves liquor licenses from the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (“ABC”) and persons employed by such licensees to serve alcohol to patrons.
Here’s the harsh reality: one in three restaurants will fail within their first year of business, according to the National Restaurant Association. There are many reasons for this low success rate – too much competition, not enough experience, and particularly right now, economic downturn.
The concept of buy-online-and-pick-up-in-store (also known as “BOPS”) is not new. The pandemic just pushed more restaurants and consumers to use mobile ordering for curbside pickup services.
Fruits and vegetables are up 50% in some territories. A decent steak has a wholesale cost that results in a $90+ retail. The labor market is tight and its prospects for improvement are dismal, certainly in the near-term. So, what is your F&B director going to do? Price elasticity being what it is, at a certain points customers stop coming in favor of eating at home and saving their money.
Easter is here and with it comes the breaking of Lent and the tradition of eating chocolate eggs, bunnies, … in fact chocolate anything. Chocolate often features in our lives as "treat", "a pick-me-up", a gift on special occasions. In brief, cocoa is a unique food ingredient associated with stimulating joy, energy and delight. In an attempt to find out more about this intriguing food stuff, here we share some unusual chocolate secrets, along with an exciting new chocolate recipe from one of our top EHL dessert chefs.
Facebook converted all of its apps and technologies into a new company and brand called Meta in October 2021. Metaverse resurfaces as a new buzzword. People want to know if we will soon live in the metaverse.
In early February, New York City Council’s two committees that oversee zoning and land use voted to favor zoning changes for permanent outdoor dining. This is the first step for NYC to have a permanent al fresco eatery program. Another vote by the entire 51 members of the Council is scheduled for February 24. Why do we need outdoor dining? Prior to the pandemic, restaurants in NYC were operated in narrow districting zones. An emergency Open Restaurant Program was introduced during COVID-19, allowing restaurants to use sidewalk adjacent and curbside roadway space in front of their establishments for outdoor dining. Outdoor dining was estimated to save about 100,000 restaurant jobs during the pandemic. What is the timeline to make outdoor dining permanent in NYC?According to the city's website, legal actions will take place between fall 2021 and fall 2022, including an amendment to zoning text, changes to local law, rulemaking, design, and application details. Then, the permanent program application is scheduled to open in winter 2022 before it launches in 2023. What are the pushbacks for outdoor dining? Opposers to the permanent plan cited that sanitation, noise pollution, pedestrian safety, designing, accessibility, and enforcement were the primary concerns. Yet, both restauranteurs and customers want outdoor dining. A survey reveals that 95% of NYC restaurant operators believe outdoor dining was “very important” to their survival over the past two years. Moreover, 91% say permanent outdoor dining is “very important” to future survival. NYC is not aloneFrom San Francisco to NYC, restauranteurs nationwide want outdoor dining to stay after the pandemic. Some places like San Diego issue permits for outdoor dining for a fee. Outdoor dining is also known as “al fresco dining” or “dining alfresco.” The word “al fresco” is borrowed from Italian. Although “al fresco” actually means “in prison” or “spending time in jail” in Italian, outdoor dining is trendy in Europe, especially during the summertime. Do you want outdoor dining to stay permanent in the U.S. too?
There are many instances where a couple or group of two or three diners each want just a bit more than a glass of wine yet not a full bottle. The two of us refer to this situation by its scientific name of a ‘midweek lunch’, but others clearly have more on their proverbial plates and seldom have the time to sit around pondering life while slowing sipping down the entire 750 milliliters (25.4 ounces for those readers in the States, Liberia or Myanmar).
Developing a brand strategy that bases itself on a meaningful purpose can lead to a deep, emotional connection with your clientele - one that ultimately counts more than luxury decor and a fancy menu. A sense of purpose that a guest can buy into brings an added and distinctive dimension to the overall customer experience and should not be overlooked.
What the travelling majority wants today when staying at a hotel is, simply put, an effective way to order what they want and when they want. Today’s hotel customers have already highly adopted to the mobile world.
With all the hype throughout 2021 concerning blockchains, cryptocurrencies, nonfungible tokens (NFTs) and the dawn of the metaverse, now is the time for hotels to reflect on how these rapidly growing trends will come to impact our industry. How can they enhance the guest experience? When’s the right time to act? And above all, will these help grow revenues or asset values?
Anyone who follows the hospitality industry likely has a firm understanding about the impact of the pandemic on the sector: the ways in which businesses have been affected, how they have adapted, and what individual businesses did to survive.
Veganism is not just a diet, it’s a lifestyle that is increasingly influencing the choices vegan tourists make in terms of the destinations they visit and hotels they stay in.Vegan trend is driven by diverse target groups. From the pure vegans to the ‘flexitarians’ (people who actively seek to reduce their consumption of animal products without banning them from their menus altogether). These last are the growth segment with the highest potential: estimated at 10-30%. Almost one-third of Americans have reduced their meat and dairy consumption, and consider themselves flexitarians.
We all speak about expectations, customer expectations. They can be reasonable or extreme, and sometimes achievable or bizarre. But usually, they are appropriate. As a customer, I expect a basic minimum such as:
On one hand the critical goal of the operation is to promote alcohol sales so the business can be as profitable as possible. Operators also want to promote a good time so guests will feel happy being there and continue to consume alcohol and spend money.
My first restaurant opened in Hoi An three decades ago. At the time, Hoi An was an old trading village and Vietnam was cut off from the western world thanks to a trade embargo designed to invert the result of what we call the American War. But us Hoianese persevered, and shortly after I served my first meals, a small group of New Zealanders trickled in for dinner. Australians and Europeans soon followed. By 1995, the United States was allowing trade between our countries to resume and our “Ancient Town” began to blossom into the major tourist destination that it is now.
When Muslims from India and Pakistan began arriving in the United Kingdom in large numbers in the 1960s, they imported two anxieties common to immigrants: what to eat, and where to pray. The new foreigners, usually men, sought places of worship and a dependable supply of nutrition associated with their homelands. This included ‘halal’ food – meat and poultry killed in accordance with Quranic guidelines derived from the teachings of the prophet Muhammad. In cities such as Leeds and Manchester, where mosques weren’t available, Muslims prayed on factory floors or worshipped in converted flats. Halal food was harder to come by. Many urbanised Muslims sought out the services of agricultural workers who had resettled in the UK after the convulsions of empire. Men would buy chickens from farmers, former Asian farmhands or imams, who would render the food halal.
Opening a restaurant, especially in the current pandemic context, can be a very daunting task. Not only does it become more difficult to raise money due to the dependency on customers going out, but more importantly, because food and beverage operations have a great complexity to deal with compared to any other business in the retail sector.
Besides helping a hotel restaurant become profitable, the broader, less quantifiable goal, for is to satisfy hotel guests in such a manner as to halo positively back onto the guestroom product. People want to stay at hotels that are known for their food or having a fun spot to dine at.