Representación

If your business is to be successful, and provide you with the best quality of life possible, then it needs to be generating money during every moment of the day. This means going beyond the basic ‘sandwich bar’ concept, and con- sidering every possible business opportunity, in order to maximize the output of the space you’re renting and the staff you’re employing. Here are some con- cepts you could consider.

OFFER A CATERING SERVICE

There is a huge demand for catered food for office meetings and parties, and if your sandwich bar is situated within a town centre then this is an obvious business expansion route for you.

There are two huge plus points in offering a catering service. The first is that the service is really a natural extension of what you’re doing anyway; the second is that it will allow you to maximize the ‘dead’ mid-morning period and generate revenue when otherwise you’d be twiddling your thumbs.

To do it properly you should consider the following:

Your menu. Create a separate catering menu listing the sandwiches,

drinks and extras you’ll offer. Research other cafés’ catering menus; what style do they use, how do they list the options on offer?

Your service. Be clear about the level of service you want to offer

customers. Do you want to cater for wedding buffets on a Saturday night, or would this be too far beyond the normal working hours of your

business? What about a hot breakfast butty spread for an 8am office meeting? Think about how you want this new service to fit into your business, and your life. Don’t be scared of saying no.

Display. How will you display and serve the catered lunch? A range of

platter options is available, ranging from plastic trays and lids through to stainless steel serving platters. What’s right for your image and budget? Pricing. The price you charge for your catered lunches should be

calculated to reflect the basic price of the produce but also consider production, delivery, display, service (if you’re including plates and napkins, etc.).

Marketing. Have a poster created and position it in a few prominent

places in your shop, and window. Have copies of the menu available in the café for interested customers to take away with them. Perhaps email or

write to local businesses, introducing your café and the service. Consider advertising on Yell.com. Form links with other local businesses. For example, if you intend to cater for wedding buffets, perhaps form an alliance with a wedding dress shop and ask them to advertise your service within their brochure.

Taking orders. Have a simple ordering system in place, to ensure that

customers are dealt with quickly and professionally. I suggest you develop a pro forma order form, with space for all the important and relevant

information. We’ve found it best to encourage customers to place orders via email. That way you can set aside 20 minutes each day to check through incoming orders, and you have the original order in writing in case of any disputes later.

Payment. Business customers will expect to be invoiced for the lunch

they have ordered rather than pay in cash on the day. Be organized. First check the validity of the business customer before you allow them to have credit from you. We request a copy of the company’s letterhead, and then do a quick five-minute search on their website to be sure they are

legitimate. Second, prepare a pro forma invoice for each order booked, each with its own individual invoice number. I suggest you do this on the

computer on Word, and save electronically. Keep track using a basic Excel spreadsheet of the invoices outstanding, and when payment is due. Make it clear on the invoice what the customer’s payment terms are – in the case of most businesses 30 days is expected. Third, keep on top of payments. You need to keep cash flowing, and so as soon as a payment is overdue make contact. If a business repeatedly pays late, and you find yourself spending more and more time chasing payment, you’ll need to decide whether the business is worth it. Perhaps reduce their payment terms, or place their account on a ‘cash on delivery’ status.

Pick the ‘low hanging fruit’ when it comes to marketing your platter service. The majority of your regular lunchtime

customers will work in local offices, and obviously enjoy your food, or they would not be your regular customers! Tell them about your new service and provide them with a menu. This is how we first began to grow our platter business.

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OFFERING A PRE-ORDERING SERVICE

If your sandwich bar is constantly busy at lunchtime then you may need to think about ways to serve more people, in the short space of time. One of these ways might be pre-orders. This means that you can be preparing sandwiches late morning, before the lunchtime rush, and then customers can collect them from an ‘express till’ in the shop. This ultimately helps you to increase the number of sales your café makes, without increasing the size of your premises, or the number of staff you have working through lunch.

To provide a pre-order service you’ll need to develop the following: Menu. This could be your usual café menu, or it could be a refined,

simpler version accessible on your website, or pinned on local office noticeboards.

Ordering. In the past many sandwich bar firms would use a fax back form

to enable customer to place orders. This is rather outdated now, and in our experience it’s far simpler to use email. Customers can simply email from their desk, and you are able to reply to confirm that their order has been placed. Ensure that you have an ordering cut-off time, and regularly check the order email address to monitor orders being received.

Production. You may need to have a member of staff dedicated to

producing the pre-orders between, for example, 11 am and 12 noon. Have a set process for orders being produced, labelled and stored.

Collection. Clearly signpost what the customer collection process is. If

you’d like them to jump the ‘made-to-order’ queue and head straight to the till then state that on a shop sign. Have the pre-orders stored in an

organized way in the nearest fridge.

Alternatively you could deliver the pre-orders to the individuals, meaning they don’t have to leave their desk. This is quite a logistical nightmare, though, and would not be financially worthwhile unless your café was receiving multiple orders per day, and a delivery person could carry out a single delivery round encompassing many offices.

PROMOTIONS

Another way to maximize the naturally quieter times of the day is through pro- motions. Consider a breakfast offer, grouping a hot drink with toast, for a special price. Or perhaps a ‘coffee morning’ club, offering half-price coffee to those sit- ting down to a slice of cake between 9am and 11am. Or what about a ‘ladies

who lunch’ promotion, designed to encourage customers into the café on quieter days of the week, such as Monday or Tuesday.