I love restaurants! I love great food! Oh, I might as well admit it: I live to eat. I enjoy trying a new restaurant more than anything in the world. (well maybe not more than anything, but it’s right up there) And when I find a new place that has great food and superb value, I visit them often. I tell my friends about my fantastic find and I encourage them to try it. (My friends love food, too!)
But not every restaurant I try makes my list of favorites. Some restaurants get “86′d” after only one visit. Or at least it will be a very long time before I return. Probably long enough for them to be under new ownership. What causes me to react that way and be so final in my judgment?
The biggest reason is that there are so many restaurants that I don’t need to give anybody a second chance. Like they say, “You only get one chance to make a great impression.”
The list of what causes me to eliminate a restaurant is not long. But it is amazing how many establishments allow one or more of these to effect the impression of a new guest.
- Slow service. Really not so much the actual speed of the service but its quality. If the wait person lets me know how things are going, I am very willing to wait for a busy kitchen to catch up. A complimentary drink or appetizer would be nice but not essential.
- Bringing the courses out too fast. I don’t want my appetizer and my salad and my entree within 3 minutes of each other.
- Cold food or someone in my party not getting their food at the same time as the rest of us. Come on, don’t you watch “Hell’s Kitchen”!!
- Over-priced food. I don’t mind paying top dollar for great food. But you can’t charge $22.50 for a steak and have it be tough and tasteless.
- Then my own personal favorite: a vegetable medley that is 95% carrots. And not even well-seasoned. Serve that to me and I’m gone!
So the moral of this story is this: if your want your restaurant promotions to be successful, make sure that your new customers receive the kind of service and value that will make them want to recommend you to their friends.
What is your restaurant pet peeve? http://bit.ly/7O2bn via @addthis