As the recession drags on, restaurants in particular and the hospitality industry in general continue to come up with creative ways to fill tables and rooms. Whether it’s half-price wine nights, reduced-price tasting menus, or free birthday dinners, restaurant chefs and managers are wracking their brains in order to keep cover counts up. To my mind, discounting has a downside though. Discounts are so widespread that it begs the question of whether or not customers will ever be willing to pay full price again. As a consumer, I’m often suspicious of steep discounts, afraid of the catch hidden in the small print.  I never purchase, or offer in my restaurant, discount lobster, shellfish, or sushi. The diner’s perception is that I need to unload some old fish that might just be hazardous to their health. The other problem with discounting is that it gives the impression that the product is not worth full price. I’ve never seen a discount on a Rolls-Royce. If you want to lower the price, just lower it, don’t call it a discount.

Customer loyalty is a valuable commodity in this economy. With other resorts and restaurants bombarding the customer with offers for free nights and meals, the customer that keeps coming back should be rewarded. In that same vein, the loyalty of the front- and back-of-the-house staff should be rewarded as well. Restaurant workers are generally a mercenary bunch. If they think the grass is greener elsewhere, they’ll take flight. Eventually, we’ll come out of this recession and quality restaurant staff will once again be hard to find. I plan on keeping mine until that happens. In order to do that, I’ve become flexible about their scheduling. If a staff member wants to go home early to check on his sick spouse, I’ll work his station, or we’ll double up. I’ve recently organized some classes and field trips for my staff to keep them motivated and engaged. Since business has slowed enough to take a breath, we might as well learn something! I’m taking a group to visit an up-and-coming local winery tomorrow.  One well-known area restaurant has been offering special, low-priced tasting menus for service industry employees. Several of my staff have taken advantage of that opportunity to dine in a restaurant that they ordinarily could not afford.

How to best reward customer loyalty is something that my front-of-the-house manager and I have been discussing quite a lot recently.  We operate in a casino, where many of the guests are comped.  A free dessert doesn’t mean much if the casino is picking up the check.  Many of our regulars have cut back on the number of visits per month or the amount spent per visit, except when it’s a birthday, anniversary, or other special occasion. We thought that would be a nice opportunity to reward those regulars for their loyalty and for having chosen our restaurant to celebrate their special day. To that end, we are in the process of putting together gift boxes containing some locally made specialty chocolates, a specialty baked item such as a Madeleine or an especially decadent brownie, along with a recipe card from me. We are also working on a plan to use our multi-million dollar demonstration kitchen to host cooking classes and VIP dinners. Making our regular guests feel that they are part of an exclusive club is exciting to them, and having them in a small group where we can exceed even our own stellar service standards is a rare treat is today’s service industry, where the service is often forgotten. 

The most difficult part of the loyalty issue that we are dealing with is the question of how to reward our regulars’ loyalty while at the same time offering an incentive for them to bring some friends on their next visit. One of the challenges that we have at our property is that we are located in eastern San Diego County, which is removed from the tourist areas of San Diego and is accessible only by a twisting mountain road. The food has to be good in order to make the trip worthwhile, but I have heard some variation on the following from many of our regulars: “We love coming here and we tell all our friends about it, but they don’t want to make the drive.”

I have been thinking about a discount coupon for our regulars providing that they bring two guests with them. Maybe a discount for both the regular and their friends. Perhaps I can get promotions to offer some free slot play for both the regulars and their guests. I’m just thinking aloud here. I’d also like our regulars to share their love of our restaurant with their online “friends” through Facebook or Yelp.  Can I ethically offer them some incentive to do so? If you have tried a loyalty program that has worked well for you in the past or is working well for you now, please share it here. Then come to my place for dinner. I’ll take care of you.