How to Get Your Restaurant Ready for Summer

Where days above 20 degrees are cherished, UK restaurants that know how to prepare for the brief yet sweet summer season have a greater chance at boosting their bottom line and continuing along the line of success.

Amid the current cost-of-living crisis, Brits have had to tighten their belts. And yet, despite placing immense strain on the hospitality industry, there’s a glimmer of hope on the horizon, with a third of Brits opting for UK staycations for their summer getaways-a green flag for our hospitality and tourism sector.

 Explore our complete guide on how to ready your restaurant for the warmer months, where you can find more information about: 

• How atmosphere and comfort attract more customers
• Get ready for al fresco dining 
• Craft your summer menu 
• Market your restaurant for summer success 
• The importance of staff training

How atmosphere and comfort attract more customers

As the summer season encourages guests to spend more on dining experiences, it’s important to ensure that your restaurant’s ambiance is welcoming. Consider this step as the initial phase of your spring cleaning regimen—an opportunity to address maintenance and repairs, fine-tune temperature regulation, and refine interior details. Of course, this doesn’t mean you need to entirely refurbish your restaurant, but rather refresh and streamline your space for a fresh atmosphere that matches the warmer energy. 

Regulating your restaurant’s temperature, and creating the perfect summer ambience can sometimes be challenging given the fickle nature of British weather.  Consider investing in outdoor heating solutions, fine-tuning indoor temperature settings with AC systems, and rectifying drafts affecting various tables. You’ll find as you continue refreshing your restaurant, prioritising temperature control can be the difference to returning customers all summer long, or sending your guests home uncomfortable in the summer stickiness. 

Get ready for al fresco dining

If your restaurant can offer outdoor seating, whether it’s terrace-dining or street-side seating, thorough preparation for outdoor service is essential.

We know that preparing your restaurant for outdoor dining involves more than just rearranging furniture and setting up umbrellas. That’s why we’ve delved into every aspect, from the legalities of pavement dining to optimising floor plans, in our complete guide, Going Al Fresco: A Guide to Outdoor Dining.

You’ll need to ensure your service remains consistent and smooth as your guests flock to outdoor seating, too. QR technology can offer an ideal solution for optimising service efficiency. With Lightspeed’s Order Anywhere feature, your staff can handle payments and turn tables faster using the streamlined scan-and-pay process, making it easier to manage the rush. 

Want to see Lightspeed Order Anywhere in action? Read what Staycity had to say about QR code ordering with Lightspeed.

Craft a new summer menu

As temperatures rise, seasonal produce such as asparagus, berries and wild garlic makes its way onto the scene. With environmental concerns and sustainability taking centre stage in many diners’ minds, opting for local ingredients aligns with their values and betters your restaurant’s eco-efforts.

Lightspeed Advanced Insights is a valuable tool for supporting menu optimisation throughout the summer months. With seamless menu alteration enabled directly through your ePOS system, coupled with insights into the most sought-after dishes, you can effortlessly adapt your menu to satisfy the cravings of guests and efficiently manage your kitchen’s inventory based on demand. 

With 63% more people visiting pubs and drinking establishments during the summer months, it’s also a perfect time to upgrade your beverages menu. From non-alcoholic tipples to innovative cocktails, quenching your customer’s thirst with the promise of seasonal drinks is another simple yet effective method to capitalise on the warmer weather. 

Market your restaurant for summer success

From menu promotions, seasonal events, or even boosting your restaurant over Instagram, there’s a variety of ways to market your restaurant during the summer season.

Use the warm weather as a way to host special events that can be held outside. Whether this is with live performances from local musicians or one-off chef pop-ups, you can organically market these events while encouraging guests to spend time in your establishment. Through Instagram and other social media platforms, as well as with flyers and word of mouth, use the weather to your advantage and bring more traffic through your doors. 

It’s known that Instagram users love to consume media that shows not only the food on offer at restaurants, but also the general insight into how dishes are made, how staff interact with the place as well as organic reviews from visitors. With the sun shining, the menu changing and the general energy of restaurants blooming in the summer, using Instagram to promote seasonal content is another great method of using summer to your advantage. 

With integrations like TheFork, marketing your restaurant and increasing your reach becomes easier. TheFork manager platform integrates seamlessly into your Lightspeed ePOS, and from there you can promote your restaurant to thousands of restaurant-lovers looking for their next dining experience. Plus, with the ability to easily show menu promotions and deals, you can tailor your offers to the summer season and again, increase footfall through the door. 

The importance of staff training

Your restaurant success is driven by your staff and their abilities. Whether you’re looking to add al fresco dining, introduce new dishes, or promote events organically, the result of these actions can only go so far if your staff aren’t trained and therefore happy and confident to serve. 

A huge element of preparing your restaurant for summer should be centred around informing and thoroughly teaching your staff on how you would like your restaurant to be presented.

If your operations or ordering systems change with the introduction of al fresco dining, or if you’ve altered your menu and want waiters to upsell, it’s important to communicate the new changes to your staff. With Lightspeed Restaurant, everything from our user-friendly interface, to our iPad ordering devices, is tailorable to your restaurant operations. You can focus on the human side of serving, and not have to worry that your ePOS will confuse staff or waste time. 

With the past years putting a huge strain on the hospitality industry, it’s time to use the natural elements as well as the changing behaviours of the general public to bring more happy faces into your establishment. Through marketing, menu optimisation and more, your restaurant can boost its success with the warming season of summer.