Transitioning your hotel’s dining room

NATIONAL REPORT from ISHC - Hotels are starting to give up. We hear some hotels are ripping out restaurants and kitchens, installing co-working spaces and allowing guests to receive their food delivered in boxes. Hotels take a small cut and race to the bottom to capture the first and the last drink.

Bars are more cost-effective than kitchens, but who benefits from this? Does this concept work for certain hotel demographics? Yes. But does it lose the art of what a hotel has always offered: a personal service? Also, yes. Dissolved responsibility will affect your brand. It puts other brands in the driver’s seat of your guests’ experience.

When it comes to your hotel guests, are you satisfying their mealtime needs? Is room service kept busy? And do they bypass your dining room to eat out? If they do, why is that? Someone else might be capturing their other mealtimes. So, you have to make decisions to turn that around.

Asking these questions is a worthwhile exercise: Why does your restaurant exist? Who is it aiming to serve? And what are you trying to achieve? The outdated, large, open hall-style dining rooms are a thing of the past. The foundation of forming a decent F&B strategy for your brand and concept is in creating a transitional space and putting your customers at the heart of it.

Explore the different journeys your hotel guests have. Think about their purpose for the stay and what they need at different mealtimes — from an early functional breakfast and rapid check-out to a large group of friends catching up over brunch at the weekend or even a slow afternoon tea.

Luxury hotels are now creating multiple destinations to serve different types of guests in much smaller areas. There has to be something for everyone.

From business guests, leisure guests or family guests to couples and singles, each type will have a different purpose for the F&B offer at your hotel. Have you walked your F&B space in their shoes through the various mealtimes of the day? 

The keys to making your dining space transformative for guests and for the different times of day and seasons are: 

Make it independent: If you lease the F&B space out to an external partner, they will make it work. So, have the mindset to attract your hotel guests and the local community. Make sure you have gravitas to passersby and the neighborhood.

It has got to feel like home: From the entrance and approach, seating options, lights and lamps to the candles and plants, these details, done properly, are transformative on their own. At Brasserie des Pres, a modern yet classic brasserie in Paris, they have used fantastic props and styling to engage their guests so they feel comfortable at breakfast, brunch, or dinner.

Variety of seating: Pay attention to the seating: from larger communal tables that are multi-purpose to the selection of soft seating (sofas and chairs) and comfortable chairs with coffee tables at the right height for munching eggs or joining a Teams call. And, of course, don’t forget about customers who want a dining table and a private table for two or four.

Changing the setting: You can use screens, sliding doors and pop-out walls. Your dining space has got to be a place that can apply transition elements. An example is using a screen in the lounge when it’s a tea ceremony, so the hard liquor is hidden from view behind the bar. I’ve also seen walls and doors used to flex the space and change the atmosphere throughout the day, making dining areas smaller, closing off large tables for private dining areas and separating the bar from the main dining area. 

Each part of the day needs a story: Whether it be the narrative behind an afternoon tea or the inspiration behind the brunch, every menu needs to be considered a sub-brand of the F&B offering. It needs to pull your hotel guest, or even tourist or neighbor, in to be treated beautifully by you. Films, TV shows, the season, or a special holiday can inspire menus. There are many ways to surprise and delight your guests; beautiful storytelling around each time of day could be key.

Striking the right balance between formal and informal: Whether it’s for function and comfort or low tech and high tech, you need to consider the journey of each guest and their requirements of you as a hotel; in terms of F&B, consider what needs they need fulfilling. In terms of technology, it goes beyond a nearby plug socket. It’s WiFi or quiet work zones. 

My concluding thoughts for how you can create a transformative setting go beyond what I’ve listed here, but hopefully, it gets you thinking and asking questions. The cost of eating out and staying in hotels, as a consumer, has increased so much over the last few years. And so, more than ever, guests need to be impressed and brought into the heart of your brand and purpose. They need to become your biggest ambassador. Walking honestly in their shoes, aligning your brand strategy to surpass your target customer’s expectations and having the right design aesthetic are the keys to F&B success.

Mark Bithrey, ISHC, is the founder of B3 Designers

The views and opinions expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Hotel Investment Today or Northstar Travel Group and its affiliated companies.