7 Ways To Increase Revenue For A Bar Or Restaurant

20 November 2024 - Inn Express

Here at Inn Express, we understand the challenges of operating a hospitality business successfully. We have collated our top 7 ways for you to increase your revenue, whether that be attracting more customers, or upselling your current patrons. With business costs skyrocketing and the surge of people deciding against alcohol consumption, the industry is as tough as ever. These are just a couple of the many reasons why a bar or restaurant must think outside the box to not only be successful but survive.

Craft Your Menu For Profitability

Creating your menu with profitability in mind is otherwise known as ‘menu engineering’. This is a term rising in popularity, even being reported on by the BBC and other big news channels. It takes into consideration the human psychology behind reading a menu and how you can capitalise on this for more revenue and sales. We have a whole blog on the ins and outs of menu engineering here.

However, the main point is to drive customers to buy a lot of your star products. Your star products are easy to identify because they’re the things that give you the best returns and highest margin.

Loyalty Programmes

Loyalty programmes are a great way to encourage repeat custom, as well as creating a loyal customer base that keep coming back. There are now many digital options where you can set up a loyalty programme as well as the more traditional loyalty cards with a stamp.

This is an easy, cheap way to increase the chance of a customer returning!

Happy Hour Still Works

Happy hour may be seen as a thing of the past, but when you drill down and work out whether it’s viable, you’ll see it’s well worth it. Why not use your high margin items in your happy hour deal. You could pair discounted drinks with a high margin food item for example.

Two real-world examples of happy hour being a huge success are Turtle Bay and Las Iguanas. If you walk into these venues during happy hour, expect to be standing at the bar. They offer 2-4-1 cocktails in service hours that are traditionally quiet. The food sales they must make during this time (at full price) as well as having a packed bar when the happy hour ends are two real wins from their happy hour strategy. Why not give it a go!

Train Your Staff

Of course, we don’t want your staff to sound pushy. However, with the right training and knowledge they can genuinely help the customer have a positive experience. For example, the customer may have chosen a main course that pairs well with a certain cocktail. Suggesting this (preferably high margin) cocktail would be good for the customer and good for your pursuit of increasing your business’ revenue.

Leverage Local SEO

If you’re unsure what SEO is, it stands for search engine optimisation. In layman’s terms, it’s being found on Google for the things you want to be found for. Local SEO involves appearing on searches such as ‘bars near me’ or ‘restaurants in London’. Google will show ‘local’ search results to your location, or the location you have specified.

Your ‘Google My Business’ profile is where you need to be putting in the work to appear for these types of searches, get found and get more customers. Complete it in as much detail as possible, get as many (positive) reviews as you can and attach plenty of high-quality pictures and videos. These are the basics when optimising your profile, don’t miss out on the opportunity to be found!

Scarcity Provokes Decisions

Scarcity is used by businesses across all industries; however, it works brilliantly in the hospitality world. Nobody wants to miss out on a social occasion. Scarcity creates urgency. If you hold an event at your bar or restaurant, many locals will think ‘I might go’. If you put out a message that there’s only 10 spaces left, that may be enough to get the customer to commit, caused by the fear of missing out!

Alternatively, take a note from the most successful restaurant in history… McDonald’s. You don’t have to hold an event to create scarcity. Why not emulate what McDonald’s do with limited menu items. People will want to try certain things, the best thing about this technique is that if they really like that item, they will return, before it has gone off the menu. Alternatively, if you get really positive feedback on an item you could make it permanent.

Delivery or Takeout

In recent years, people have been choosing to eat and drink at home more than going out. You have a choice between accepting that or moving with the times and offering yourself as a viable option for this market.

• Food led business? Get on apps like Deliveroo and JustEat
• Drinks led business? Offer takeout cocktails, great in the summer!

We have a customer that is a cocktail bar yet sell cocktail kits for home. This gives them a separate revenue stream aside from their sit-in premises.

In conclusion, there are many ways to increase revenue for your bar or restaurant. Many of these points we’ve made are either free to do or involve minimal cost. Why not give them a go, increase your revenue and max out your opportunities.