Download Five Ways to Grow Your Off-Premise Catering Sales

Five Ways to Grow Your
Off-Premise Catering Sales
A Catering Institute Original Essay
by Erle Dardick
For any restaurant operator looking to layer a
catering program on top of their existing business,
they must first make room for organizational
growth by understanding how an increase in
catering sales will impact the big picture of the
company. The decision to be in the catering
business must be deliberate and controlled. This
demands the implementation of a sound business
strategy for mixing catering into the current and
future manufacturing, delivery, sales, accounting,
IT and marketing components of their existing
restaurant operations.
The way I see it, there are five pillars required
to grow and leverage any successful restaurant
catering operation, whether you have one location
or thousands of locations across the nation, or
even the world.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Leadership
Centralized Services
Sales and Marketing
Operations
Delivery
As the first key requirement, catering business
leadership is crucial to scaling and sustaining
a healthy catering revenue channel. Once the
business leader understands the logic behind
catering as its own business, they then need to
sell the vision internally and externally within the
four walls of their brand. It’s a top-down thing. As
in any business, there needs to be a key person
driving the passion and vision of the services being
offered to the consumer. Ultimately, this catering
leader must receive support from the overall
company management team, and all stakeholders
need to be engaged and aligned with catering as
part of the overall strategic plan for the company.
Catering is a serious business!
The second element required is a cultural shift
in the company’s DNA to service the off-premise
catering channel properly. Because of the
complexity that this new revenue channel will
bring to your organization, centralized services
such as sales, marketing, order entry, accounting
and IT need to be in place.
By having central points of contact and control on
these elements, a restaurant operator will reduce
the transactional pressure at the restaurant level.
Centralizing these tasks will relieve the transaction
pressure faced by your individual restaurants so
that they can focus on better order execution from
prep, cooking, assembly and distribution. Think of
these centralized services as the bridge between
your catering business, your restaurants and your
customers.
When you add catering to the mix of sales, you
can imagine that your off-premise business is like
an airport. Baggage handling, different gates,
passengers, takeoffs, landings all happening at
the same time. Imagine what that would look like
without air traffic control. Your centralized services
for all things off-premise will up your game!
Once you have committed to leadership and
centralized services, you can now consider scaling
your sales plan and your marketing plan. Allow
me to point out here that these are two different
plans, although they complement each other
and work closely in sync. Sales people execute
sales plans. Hard numbers. Knocking on doors.
Telephone calls. Onsite meetings. Presentations.
Marketing plans position products and services.
Your sales team will use your marketing assets to
sell. Think about product variations, packaging
and how you use your four walls to market this
new business. Once you have the four walls
considered, move on to the outside walls. Then
think of the marketing plan for the next four blocks,
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Five Ways to Grow Your
Off-Premise Catering Sales
and four miles. The plan needs to focus on the
buyer segments for the off-premise service channel
and occasion based feeding opportunities.
With your leadership team, centralized services
and sales and marketing plans in place, let’s
discuss how to fit the catering manufacturing and
distribution into the overall operations of your
restaurant.
Active training of all your restaurant and catering
employees plays a large role in your catering and
off-premise business success. People are still the
most important asset you have when looking to
grow this revenue channel.
The language you use in your company to
differentiate services both inside and out will
become very important as you scale these
services. Your menus need to be considered, costs
looked at, manufacturing lines studied and the
entire sale to cash cycle is completely different
than your in-restaurant business that you currently
excel at. Expect the off-premise strategy to change
the unit economics of your restaurant in a good
way. So, get ready.
I always suggest that delivery/distribution is the
last key element, and many of the decisions made
here will depend on your menu. Delivery adds
a dynamic into the daily transaction cycle that
increases stress, complexity and speed of service.
Delivery of your product to catering customers will
make or break your catering program. Invest in
safe and reliable vehicles. Invest in showcasing
your brand on those vehicles and purchase
catering-specific equipment where you need to.
Furthermore, for professional deliveries you have
to consider packaging, hold times, signage, extra
supplies and of course, driver recruiting. You only
have two points of contact with the off-premise
catering transaction: one at the point of order
entry and one at the point of delivery. Don’t cut
corners on either!
Let’s talk catering.
About Erle Dardick
Erle Dardick is a 15-year
catering veteran, business
turn-around expert and
author, and is best known
for
helping
multi-unit
restaurant
executives
create successful catering
revenue channels. Erle
founded MonkeyMedia Software to provide
catering solutions to multi-unit restaurant operators.
He also is the author of “Get Catering and Grow
Sales! A Strategic Perspective for The Multi-Unit
Restaurant Executive.”
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©2013 MonkeyMedia Software. All rights reserved.