1. Successful Independents work ON not IN their Businesses
Almost without exception, highly successful independent restaurants today are owned by people who spend most of their time managing their business versus running the restaurant. This trait can be summed up by one successful operator who said “I don’t cook. It’s my job to work on the systems.”

2. Successful Independents Build a Customer Database and Use it for Marketing
Restaurants today – even ones with outstanding food and service – must actively market their restaurants to be successful. Many highly successful operators market using a customer database. Then they use this database to promote many different types of events and offers to their guests.

3. Successful Independents Send out a Customer Newsletter Every Month
This marketing activity is related to the use of a customer database discussed above. Many operators claim that the most effective way consistently to increase their guest counts, sales and profit has been through a monthly, mailed customer newsletter. Sending out a physical newsletter each month appears to increase the odds that a restaurant stays “top of mind” and gets remembered and therefore chosen more often. Customer newsletters not only keep a restaurant’s name in front of its customers, but it can help create personal connections with them, too.

4. Successful Independents Know Their Numbers
Almost without exception, the most successful independent operators today not only deliver a quality dining experiences for their customers, but also keep a constant watch on the financial performance of their restaurant. In other words, “If you don’t know your numbers, you don’t know your business.” Stated another way, one operator said “If I waited until the end of the month to know how my restaurant was doing it would be too late.”

5. Successful Independents are Good Bosses
While operating a restaurant is about dealing with food, finances, marketing and a host of other factors, fundamentally, the business – like many – is about people. In restaurants, the frontline staff has 99 percent of the customer contacts and performs 99 percent of the functions that cause a guest to either have a great dining experience or a lousy one. Sharp operators recognize this fact and many go out of their way to create a positive working environment in which everyone is respected and employees feel good not just about their jobs but about the people they work for, too.

6. Successful Independents Grow Profits Before Growing Units
One of the most seductive occupational hazards of owning one successful restaurant is to assume that the easiest way to double your income is to simply open a second one. While this isn’t always the case, premature or ill-conceived growth has led to the downfall of many successful single-unit independent restaurants that began to struggle or even fail after opening a second restaurant. When you consider the time, resources and financial exposure that comes with opening a second restaurant, many operators should first ask themselves if they are already doing all they can to maximize the sales and profitability in their existing operation.

7. Successful Independents Keep a Running Inventory on Key Products
There are endless ways to lose money in the restaurant business and one of the most vulnerable areas for squandering big dollars is in dealing with food. Potential profits are lost due to spoilage, theft, over-portioning, waste, unrecorded sales and a host of other reasons. Most highly successful restaurants recognize this and are very deliberate and diligent in making the most of their food cost dollars, and one of the best ways to do this is by maintaining a perpetual, running inventory of certain, key products.

8. Successful Independents Engage in a Prime Vendor Relationship
Research has shown that prime vendor programs, the practice of buying a large portion of food and certain supplies from one broad line supplier, is much more common in more highly profitable restaurants than it is in marginally successful ones. While one-stop shopping, as it’s sometimes referred to, is no panacea, in most cases consolidating the majority of purchases with one supplier tends to offer the opportunity to lower ‘overall’ food prices and costs, among other things.

9. Successful Independents Make Hospitality the Goal, Not Just Good Service
Customer service deals primarily with the mechanical aspects of getting customers what they want. Instead of just delivering good customer service, your goal should be to provide “hospitality.” As one successful operator put it, “You can get serviced from a vending machine, but only caring people can deliver hospitality.”

10. Successful Independents Don’t Compete on Price
The best run restaurants typically don’t compete on price, they compete on quality and value. While most operator are sensitive to their customers’ desire for a good deal and value, the most successful realize that price is rarely the No. 1 criteria people use to choose a restaurant. After customers leave your restaurant, they rarely remember exactly what they spent, but they do remember whether they liked it.

Excerpted from Jim Laube, The 10 Common Practices of Highly Successful Independent Restaurants

If you are a restaurateur thinking about ways to increase sales, increasing marketing, making capital expenditures, or otherwise investing in your business and looking for a restaurant loan, try Advance Restaurant Finance, LLC (ARF). ARF has been making short term business loans to restaurants for almost a decade. Despite the economy, ARF never stopped making business loans to restaurants, and ARF makes restaurant loans up to $1,000,000 per location. If you are looking for a restaurant loan, ARF is one of the first calls you should make. ARF is made up of hospitality experts with financial products tailored to fit your needs delivered by your own personal banking team with no surprises and with over 10 years in business, you know we will be here when you need us.

Tip No. 6: Start A Late Night Menu
What kind of business are you doing late in the evening?  If you are like most operators, the answer is probably, “Not much.”  How about developing a late night meal segment to turn those wasted hours into increased volume?

A successful example of developing the late night trade comes from Sunset Grill in Nashville, Tennessee. The owner, Randy Rayhurn, implemented a late night menu that has come to exceed lunch as a source of revenue.  Best of all, he has accomplished this without expending a penny in advertising!

His late night menu consists of some lower food cost entrees off his regular menu and any items he wants to run out.  These entrees are offered at half price from 10:00pm until 1:30am during the week and from midnight until 1:30pm on Saturday night.  Desserts, coffees and beverages remain at full price.

His late night sales mix is equally divided between food and beverages.  Because of its structure, the late night menu only runs about four points higher in overall food cost than his regular menu.  A large percentage of Randy’s late night market has become restaurant people looking for a bite to eat in different surroundings when they get off work!

Tip No. 7: Change Your Menu To Spark Customer Traffic
New menu products offer the greatest potential for restaurant traffic increases.  But changing the menu must be handled properly if operators are to realize the full potential for expanding sales and profit.

For example, the dining public in Florida is older, better-educated, more nutrition-conscious and more drawn to convenience than in the past.  These shifts create promising areas for light or nutritious foods, regional taste experiences, foods not easily prepared at home and take-out/delivered foods.  Each can offer an advantage to the operator willing to exploit it.

Here are seven steps that will enable you to multiply the success of new menu items almost exponentially.

1. Consumer Research
2. Product identification
3. Product development
4. Consumer testing
5. Test marketing
6. Analysis
7. Communication/launch

These steps will keep you on the new product path to business expansion.

Tip No. 8: “WOW” Your Sales: The Zork Interview
Have you ever heard of a ZORK? Probably not. A ZORK costs $250,000 and looks a lot like a ball-point pen. It is your job to sell it to a group of executives from the largest companies in the world.  Does that sound like a tough sell?  Perhaps, but if you apply for a job on the service staff at Old San Francisco, be prepared to convince my managers that the ZORK is an invaluable asset, worth every penny.

The reason?  If you can generate enough enthusiasm to sell a ZORK for $250,000, we are confident you will easily make the sale on a $20 bottle of wine or a five- dollar order of Bananas Foster.

The items on your menu are like the imaginary ZORK.  Guests only know what you tell them, so your ability to build sales depends on your servers’ abilities to sell what, to customers, are intangibles.  Demand that our staff “Wow” guests with their description of that bottle of wine or the Bananas Foster flambe.

The ZORK interview reinforces one simple truth: if you love people and are not afraid of an audience, you will be great, whether you are selling Cherries Jubilee… or a ZORK!

Tip No. 9: Wine Sales for Dummies
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to sell more wine in your restaurant!  Good thing, since most of us don’t have too many of those on the service staff, anyway!  But there are not any trade secrets, either. To sell more wine, you just need to do four basic things:

1.  Make sure everyone is comfortable with (and skillful at) opening a bottle.  Buy a $10 bottle corker and a gross of inexpensive, new corks.  Recork your old bottles and require every server to open at least 100 bottles before you turn them loose on your guests.

2.  Assure that your wait staff knows how to pronounce every wine on the list.  Run through the wine list at pre-shift meetings, with each server pronouncing the next wine on the list.  How about a “Trivial Pursuit” challenge for servers where they match food items with the wines on your list?  They should also be able to match wines with appetizers and desserts.  ”Which wines would you suggest with Rack of Lamb?”  ”What entrees go best with Robert Mondavi Fume Blanc?”

3.  Be sure your service staff has tasted the wines you offer.  Since wine is most often consumed with food, have them taste wine with menu items.  For example, try a Pinot Noir and a Chardonnay with the salmon special and note how different the food tastes with each wine.  Educate your staff so that they can educate your guests.  The easiest way to encourage suggestions is just to have servers recommend their two favorite whites or their two favorite reds – but first they must find out what their favorites are?

4.  Finally, let your guests know that you sell wine!  Put the wine list on the dinner menu – or at least your 20 most popular wines. Suggest a wine under each food item (entrees, appetizers, desserts).  Pre-set tables with wine glasses and perhaps a full bottle of wine.

If you will make these four simple efforts on a daily, consistent basis, you should grow wine sales by 20-25%. What have you got to lose?

Tip No. 10: Pick A Signature Item and Grow For It!
This is the story of how a simple Chinese Chicken Salad accompanied by freshly baked zucchini bread built a restaurant, a banquet business and became the famous Dianne Salad of Pasadena.  The tale starts in 1978 at the Greenstreet Restaurant in Pasadena, California when Dianne, a friend of the owners, developed a knockout dressing for Chinese Chicken Salad.  When they introduced the salad, everyone at the restaurant fell in love with it and shared their excitement with other guests.

The popularity of this item grew with the ladies at lunch and the businessmen watching their waistlines.  The owners christened their new star the Dianne Salad and added freshly baked zucchini bread to the dining experience.

The press got wind of the salad from Greenstreet’s fans and the subsequent stories increased the salad’s following and reputation.  As a result of the exposure generated by the Dianne Salad, Greenstreet was voted the best lunch restaurant in a popularity poll.

In 1992, the restaurant added a pick-up window so that Dianne Salad addicts could quickly satisfy their habits.  As the convenience grew so did the large orders and soon the Dianne became a party favorite.

So what does all this mean? The Dianne Salad, directly or indirectly, was responsible for approximately 30% of the restaurant’s total sales!  The next goal is to take the Dianne Salad, the secret dressing and the zuccihini bread into retail production.

This shows what can be done with a signature salad.  What is your restaurant famous for? What are you going to do with it?

Excerpted from 50 Proven Ways to Build Restaurant Sales & Profits from Hospitality Masters Press

If you are a restaurateur thinking about ways to increase sales, increasing marketing, making capital expenditures, or otherwise investing in your business and looking for a restaurant loan, try Advance Restaurant Finance, LLC (ARF). ARF has been making short term business loans to restaurants for almost a decade. Despite the economy, ARF never stopped making business loans to restaurants, and ARF makes restaurant loans up to $1,000,000 per location. If you are looking for a restaurant loan, ARF is one of the first calls you should make.

Tip No. 1: Marketing: Keep it in the Neighborhood
Imagine a circle around your restaurant with a radius of three miles. Now, imagine that everyone outside that ring disappears. You would hardly notice the effect on your business!

Research shows that nearly 80% of restaurant sales – whether a one-store independent or a member of a major chain – come from within the three-mile radius that represents your neighborhood. Are you directing 80% of your marketing efforts toward that critical area? Or even 50%?

The mass marketing myth that the more people you reach, the more business you will attract just does not work for neighborhood businesses like restaurants. The battle for the heart, mind (and pocketbook) of the local patron must be won block-by-block, store- by-store and purchase-by-purchase through what we call neighborhood marketing.

Tip No. 2: Get Flexible, Get Cozy, Get Wealthy!
Guests are no longer willing to sit in dining rooms that are less than half full and deadly quiet. (Ever notice how everyone ends up in the kitchen at parties?) Please your guests with guaranteed cozy dining and your sales will grow as a result.

You cannot control the number of guests who arrive, but you can control how full the room looks and how cozy the guests feel. It takes a willingness to re- organize your seating, the wisdom to change service policies, and the ability to reconfigure the dining areas to match your volume of business. It will not happen with huge open dining rooms, rigid seating policies or by using the dreaded “This Section Closed” sign.

Tip No. 3 Expectations and Guest Satisfaction
Hospitality is a business based on expectations. The more a consumer spends, the greater expectations he or she will have. Meet those expectations and you will succeed; exceed them and you will prosper.

Let’s say you eat out and your meal costs $5.00. What are your expectations? You expect a “no-frills” experience – ready quickly, the food hot or cold enough, probably wrapped in paper and handed over a counter to be eaten with disposable utensils in an environment dominated by plastic.

If these expectations are met, a sort of unspoken contract has been fulfilled between the customer and the restaurant. The value received corresponds with the price charged. The expectations have been met. The guest is satisfied.

Now consider a $20.00 meal. Your expectations will be both different and greater. This time you will probably expect a china plate, a tablecloth, glassware, metal flatware and personal table service. Make sure you are meeting (or exceeding) the customer’s expectations.

Tip No. 4: Pre-Shift Sales Briefing
In full service operations, one opportunity to build volume lies in increasing sales through improved selling skills at the table.  There are virtually hundreds of tactics to assist the waiter or waitress in selling more. But to really make a difference, today’s operator must focus on selling strategies that unfold within the restaurant’s four walls, from the time that a guest crosses the threshold until leaving the building. A realistic goal is to improve communication between management, the kitchen team, and the server/salespeople who are actually talking to the patrons.

The better prepared servers are to explain, promote and merchandise food items – whether the core menu or specials – the more they will sell. Tips will be incrementally higher, add-on sales will build, and extra profit will be banked.

The approach is to create an environment conducive to selling, replete with information and data about what is being served. This can best be accomplished by developing an effective pre-shift sales briefing. Most operators have a short meeting with the wait staff before each meal to relay the specials and describe the fresh or in-Season menu items, so this should be no big deal.

Tip No. 5: Build Sales through Environmental Enhancement
Did you ever think that the position of your entrance, cash register or range could impact your sales? Surprising as it may sound, the layout of your operation may position you for profound success or endless struggle. How does it work?

What we call environmental enhancement derives from the ancient Chinese art of object placement. Over 3,000 years ago, the Chinese discovered how your working environment acts as a mirror of yourself and your life’s circumstances. Challenges such as financial debt, poor morale and difficult staff relations can often be traced directly to the surrounding energy imbalances.

By tracing the flow of energy through the space, an environmental enhancement expert can locate the areas of your environment which correspond to such important issues as finances, relationships, health and career.

When the energy in these physical areas of the environment are obstructed or missing, the environmental enhancement consultant may recommend changes in the position of objects in the room, the correct application of color and much more to eliminate the problem.

Excerpted from 50 Proven Ways to Build Restaurant Sales & Profits from Hospitality Masters Press.

If you are a restaurateur thinking about ways to increase sales, increasing marketing, making capital expenditures, or otherwise investing in your business and looking for a restaurant loan, try Advance Restaurant Finance, LLC (ARF). ARF has been making short term business loans to restaurants for almost a decade. Despite the economy, ARF never stopped making business loans to restaurants, and ARF makes restaurant loans up to $1,000,000 per location. If you are looking for a restaurant loan, ARF is one of the first calls you should make.