Why Even Fine Dining Restaurants Need to Be Open to Delivery During COVID

COVID-19 has created such financial uncertainty in a great many industries around the world. As the country struggles with disease control, many businesses have had to adapt to a new way of conducting business. The restaurant industry has been one of the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020.

Restaurants employ more than 15 million skilled workers across the country who have had their lives and income turned upside down because of the coronavirus disease. While there are relief programs in place aimed at helping restaurants recover from the pandemic disaster, almost 16,000 restaurants have closed permanently due to the COVID-19. If restaurant owners want to survive, they have to be prepared to adapt their business model. With stay-at-home orders and social distancing restrictions in place, restaurants have been empty or significantly less busy for many months now. If struggling restaurants are to survive this trying time, even fine dining establishments will need to be open to delivery.

Switch to take-out and delivery.

Even if your restaurant is fine dining and has never had a booming take-out or delivery business, new regulations and social distancing might have changed that. People all over, including your customers, are now relying on delivered goods and services to minimize the spread of infection through close contact. This includes their food. You can continue to take orders through popular delivery sites, such as Doordash or Grubhub, but if you really want to take advantage of the potential for more business, consider offering free delivery through your restaurant’s own site. This might allow you to utilize staff that you would otherwise have to lay off and provide you with additional business. Also, some customers might not trust that strange delivery service guy and will feel more comfortable with someone from your restaurant. Even if you aren’t used to delivery or take-out, it might be worth exploring, at least temporarily, during this time. Make sure that your employees maintain the guidelines and have a cloth face covering or other mask on at all times to keep your customers safe. Also, keep them home if they show any symptoms or COVID-19, even mild symptoms.

Take all the orders.

Since your customers may be just as stressed as you are, make it super easy for them to place and pay for an order with your restaurant. Offer in-person ordering along with phone and online ordering. If you are not set up to take online orders, now is the time. Cuboh can offer you advice and the technology you need to move your restaurant easily into the online order business. During this time, your customers are finding it very easy and comforting to order dinner online, and consume it from the convenience of home. Offering this has to be your new normal. Making the change now will not only help you survive in the short-term, it will help you thrive in the long-term.

Cuboh allows your to combine all the delivery apps you may be using for online ordering into a single tablet, and has a dashboard that can keep you apprised of all online orders in real time. This is a huge relief, as it allows you to stop trying to remember who ordered on Caviar and who ordered on Doordash. With one POS (point of sale) and new features that keep your delivery orders organized, Cuboh is making things easy for restaurateurs who are shifting to providing delivery due to the COVID-19 pandemic for the first time.

Change your menu.

Your restaurant might be known for its gourmet food and fine-dining experience, but if you want to survive during this COVID-19 pandemic, you may need to change things up a little. You likely have limited kitchen staff, so focusing on a few things you do well, instead of your entire ten page menu, might be the way to go. You can also create dishes that use what you already have on hand as suppliers might not be able to deliver as often. Finally, create or modify items that travel well. This will simplify your new take-out and delivery options.

Communicate to survive.

As the COVID-19 pandemic worsens, people are going to be even more scared, stressed, and isolated. For some, having food brought into their home from an outside source like a restaurant might be a risk they aren’t willing to take right now. To put these customers’ minds at ease it might be a good idea to communicate your cleaning practices and the precautions that your restaurant is taking. Show them that you make sure your employees are wearing a face mask at all times, and that you’re on top of any symptoms of COVID-19 they may be presenting, such as body aches or fatigue. To go a step further, you might utilize the services of a laboratory service and health care professionals to have all staff members routinely tested for COVID-19. Taking these steps and communicating them to your customers could help build trust and boost lagging sales.

Also, don’t just rely on social media to communicate with your customers. Reach out to them with personal letters, emails, calls, and texts. Let them know you’re open, that you have safe practices, and that pick-up and delivery are safe options. If you own a fine dining restaurant, your customers might not know that you are offering delivery. Since they might not want to come out, letting them know that you deliver could help drum up some business.

This is a difficult time for everyone. As a restaurant owner, you know that your restaurant can be a source of positivity and consistency in your community. Remember that this is temporary and you can get back to offering food your way soon. Until then, just be flexible and take every opportunity that you can to succeed.