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Profitability Plus
This month's Point of Profit--The Six Steps
for Increasing Sales.
Keep in mind that the Five C's of Customer
Service must first be firmly in place (for a review of the Five
C's click www.ronyudd.com/pop020730.htm) and
it goes without saying that your food and service must be
significantly unique and separated by excellence from your
competition before you can begin to think about building additional
sales. With this said we can then explore the
following Six Steps for Increasing Sales:
1. Turn Your Managers Into
Detectives-Unit mangers must be constantly investigating
the needs, wants and desires of their guests. This means talking to
guests tableside, in the lobby, on the sidewalk and everywhere else
the guest goes! Listening skills first and then follow up skills
must be applied as part of this step. There is pure magic
when a guest sees that something they suggested to a manager becomes
reality on the next menu or is featured as a special.
2. Create a Process to Follow Up
or Reconnect with Your Guests After Their Dining
Experience. This is about building relationships with your guests.
Email newsletters, hand written notes, post cards, birthday
greetings are all examples of post visit follow up techniques.
People appreciate a personal touch and being connected with a
business in their neighborhood.
3. Visit Your Check Average
Figures. Keep in mind that the easiest way to increase
sales is to sell more to the guests you already have. Take a look at
your appetizer sales, sides, desserts, after dinner drinks and see
if their are opportunities. Build real and immediate incentives
for staff to do a little more selling. As an example to get you
started--calculate the average number of appetizer sales per guest.
Is it 1 out of every six guest, one out of every four guests? Take a
look and set some goals and share the info with staff.
4. Make Your Guests
Partners-Include them in unit level activities (no--not
taking the weekly inventory in the freezer or counting the banks out
at closing) When you are working on new menus, or rolling out a
new wine list think about including your guests as part of the roll
out or tasting. Look for other ways for guests to participate as
partners or internal consultants.
5. Reward Your
Regulars-You may think this is corny--but our guests
still love to be rewarded for being regulars. The old
punch card or make x visits and get the next one free are still
appreciated. Find a reward system that fits your style and give it a
try. If credit card
companies can reward their customers by giving
back a percentage of their purchases to a college savings fund we
can think about how we can reward our regular guests and
their families.
6. Take Care of Your
Employees-Employees love to talk about their jobs.
If you make your place the best place to work--all of a sudden
you will find yourself hosting all the special events in the lives
of your employees. This seems to also have an effect in other
areas as well. All of a sudden community groups want
to have their regular meetings and special events in your shop. Keep
in mind that employees often sell more outside
the restaurant than they do while working on the
floor. | 
