There is an interesting article in today’s Chain Leader on the dining habits of most consumers. The article references a study finding that most consumers frequently dine at only 6-10 restaurants per year. This does not indicate that people don’t try a variety of restaurants; it only refers to those restaurants that we dine at repeatedly. The article focuses on how consumers tend to be creatures of habit when deciding where to dine.
This number makes sense to me. In our consulting business, we are always trying to get our clients to think of the lifetime value of each customer. When you lose a customer you don’t lose just one meal- you lose all of their future meals, and all of the new customers they would have brought with or referred to your restaurant. The best restaurant/retail managers don’t think of their customers in terms of an individual visit; they see a visit in the context of the long term relationship they have with each customer. These managers naturally think in terms of service recovery when something goes wrong. They know there will be bumps in the relationship, but always do what they can to make things right. They never just assume they will do better with the next customer.
This is also a good example of the power of brands. When driving down the road tired and hungry, most people will go to the same restaurant for dinner that they habitually go to. I would guess that the more tired or stressed someone is, the more likely they are to go to a familiar brand. Just look at all the large brand restaurants that cluster around airport hotels.
-Tom McGoldrick
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