Autumn in the restaurant: how to adapt your business to the new season?

During the summer season, restaurants operated at full capacity — with terraces, tourists, and parties. September brings new dynamics. With the change of season, guests’ food preferences, staff schedules, and business priorities also shift.

In this article, we will look at what autumn means for the restaurant business and how to adjust restaurant operations for the autumn-winter season to maximize profit.

Changing weather and customer food preferences. What do people eat in autumn?

In September, people return to routine, the weather gets cooler, people spend less time outdoors, work more, and choose restaurants for lunch rather than parties, so:

• Demand increases for business lunches, quick meals, and food delivery.

• Customers arrive earlier, and the demand for morning coffee rises sharply.

• Fewer evening reservations, more for lunchtime and working hours: lunches, business meetings. Peak hours shift to 12-15 and last until 19-20.

• In summer, people bought soft drinks, ice cream, and salads during the day, and alcoholic drinks in the evening. In autumn, demand for cold dishes and alcohol decreases, while demand for hot meals, tea, cappuccino, and coffee increases. 

Tip: update the menu, add seasonal dishes, adapt offers to the office rhythm.

Ideas for marketing

• Use posts with cozy photos, seasonal dishes, autumn landscapes.

• Offers for parents: «While the kids are at school — it’s time for coffee»

• Promotions on business lunches.

• Weekly, monthly, yearly lunch cards. 

• Food delivery to workplaces.

How to create the most effective schedule for employees?

Restaurants, pizzerias, and cafés employ people of very different ages. Some are university students, some are parents, and some are grandparents. Therefore, the beginning of the school year strongly affects people’s ability to work. 

Set 2 shifts

Morning and evening. Students usually prefer only the evening shift, parents — only the daytime.

Make the schedule flexible

It is better when employees can swap shifts when needed. Let them agree among themselves about replacements. The main goal is to always have enough staff. A loyal schedule has a positive impact on business. 

Why is this important?

Imagine this. A student always works the second shift, but is scheduled for a retake exam in the evening. The employer doesn’t allow absence. What should the employee do? Lose the job or the education? Another case: a mother works the first shift, but tomorrow her child has a parent-teacher meeting at school. What should she choose — skip work or ignore the meeting? In both cases, she will appear irresponsible. Constantly having to choose where to be responsible and where not creates tension and leads to employee burnout. 

Also, shift swaps help build a friendly atmosphere in the team. It’s simple — employees need to maintain good relationships so that colleagues are open to exchanging hours when needed. 

Employee motivation

Employee motivation is important at any time of the year:

• Develop a clear system for receiving bonuses and rewards. Explain to employees how they can earn additional financial incentives. 

• Unite the team through common good deeds: fundraising and purchasing equipment for the Armed Forces, collecting items and food for citizens affected by war, rescuing animals in affected areas. For example, catering establishments often have leftover food. Instead of throwing it away, they can arrange with volunteers to pass it on to feed animals in need. 

• Teambuilding, meetings, corporate events. Currently, due to war, there are fewer options for teambuilding, but in such emotionally difficult times it is especially important for employees to periodically relieve stress. You can hold online meetings for casual communication, or even organize a group session with a psychologist who will conduct training and psychological games.

Logistics and supply in autumn

Since restaurant menus differ in summer and autumn, procurement plans need updating. 

• Conduct product inventory and place supplier orders according to the updated menu. 

• If you have agreements with suppliers for constant deliveries of summer products, inform them in advance that purchase volumes will decrease or that deliveries will be paused until the next summer season. 

• Implement an accounting system that allows you to track product movement in real time.

 

Useful links:

Buyer psychology in September: why it is important to communicate in the language of care

Autonomous power supply for business: solutions overview

Where to find electricity outage schedules: official websites list

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