Takeout (along with delivery) is an absolutely massive market. And it’s only getting bigger by the year. According to a study from CHD Expert and Off-Premise Insights, it is projected that by 2023, off-premise restaurant sales are set to race past $300 billion. There’s no reason that your restaurant shouldn’t be getting in on the action.
Today, we’re going to be examining a few easy ways that your restaurant can help increase takeout sales. Let’s take a look.
- Promote your takeout business in-store. Most people tend to assume that they can get takeout from wherever they darn well please. Improving your takeout business means taking things a step further. Customers need to associate takeout with your restaurant, so that when they decide to order takeout, your restaurant is one of the first that comes to mind.
- Have a takeout counter. It doesn’t have to be much, but if it’s visible on the way in, customers will remember that for future reference. It’s also very useful to help ensure takeout orders are picked up smoothly, rather than have customers standing around, wondering where their food is.
- Have parking spaces reserved for takeout customers. People will see these on their way in. It’s an immediate association with takeout. Again, it makes things a lot easier for takeout customers, and will encourage repeat business. Time and convenience are essential qualities in takeout. Therefore…
- Prioritize time and convenience. If you want to succeed with the takeout crowd, you need to be functioning on the customers’ schedules, not just your own. This means ensuring that you have the capacity to receive and prepare takeout orders from your kitchen in a timely manner. If you’re telling people that their food will be ready in fifteen minutes, it needs to be packed and ready-to-go by then, regardless of how busy you are.
- Serve handheld and takeout-friendly options. You might want to even consider a takeout-specific menu. This can be particularly useful if not all of your meals are ideal for sending home. Furthermore, the Grab-and-Go market is becoming quite popular. Having a few ready-made selections prepared for walk-in customers (e.g. cold subs, packaged sushi, etc.) can help attract customers who don’t even have the time to order ahead.
- Brand your packaging. Anytime you send something from your restaurant into the outside world, you’re going to want to make sure it’s got your branding slapped on it. The customer could be headed anywhere, and who knows who they’ll be eating with. Whether they’re going home, to work, or a friend’s house, branded packaging presents a key opportunity to advertise your takeout services.
- Create appealing takeout-centric specials. Another key part of any takeout business is providing a good value. Try introducing a set of daily specials to incentivize repeat visits throughout the week (e.g. $2 off sub combo on Monday). Provide a full meal for one neat price, including the main dish, a side, and a drink.
Boost Takeout Sales With CoGoBuzz
Wish there was an easier way to build awareness for your takeout brand? As it turns out, there is, thanks to CoGoBuzz, our state-of-the-art digital marketing service. We’ll digitally promote your takeout services directly to customer mobile devices.
Leveraging state-of-the-art WiFi, SMS, and Email solutions, our service promotes your restaurant both in-store and out. Through a one-time login to your in-store HotSpot, CoGoBuzz displays an interactive landing page on customer mobile devices. For every single one of those logins, we create a full profile, integrating them with your favorite marketing list. Segment your audiences and selectively target customers to promote your takeout business!
On top of that, CoGoBuzz even comes packed with a fully digital text-based loyalty program for your restaurant. Send automated messages at specific times, run contests and polls, and promote your takeout services with just a simple text.
Want to learn more about CoGoBuzz? Check out the rest of our website!
—
What does your restaurant do to promote its takeout services? Let us know in the comments!