Start a Restaurant

It would be impossible to get away from the doom and gloom that may or may not be our current economic situation depending upon which station you watch or which blog you read. It’s different for everyone. What we do know is that we all have two options: (1) quit or (2) press on. The question for many restaurants and bars is how do I stay alive, and in fact, grow my business in a down economy?

Here are 5 things you can do to market your restaurant in this economy:

(1) Evaluate What You’re Spending Now on Restaurant Advertising.

Print advertising has been the mainstay of restaurant and bar advertising since the two began, and is difficult to determine value because it’s largely based upon “hope”. You hope the ad is written well, you hope the consumer picks up the paper, sees your ad and wants that steak sandwich combo platter RIGHT NOW. Evaluating your current print advertising is the first place you want to look to trim or redeploy costs. You might consider reducing the size of your ad from ¼ page to 1/8 of a page, but keep in mind the first rule of print advertising: you have to do it consistently and regularly, and you want to always be in the same place. (more…)