Increase Your Café Seating Capacity With Refectory Tables

Refectory style seating, Hackney Picturehouse

Refectory style tables are a great way to increase the seating capacity in your café or restaurant, space permitting, of course. If your average covers are 2-3 customers per group and you are using standard tables, you may be left with empty spaces which other customers may be reluctant to share. They are also great for customers on their own.

See Added value catering article for further details.

Montfort Consultants - Catering Consultancy

Caterer & Hotelkeeper – Wine Advert

Advert from Caterer & Hotelkeeper, October 12 1970 – Mateus Rose

And their modern day revamped bottle and price….

Mateus revamped bottles, April 2012

Price per bottle, April 2012

Microbrewery Catering for Thirsty Shopping Centre Customers

From the people behind The Rake in Borough Market, Tap East in Westfield, Stratford City is a great addition to the restaurants, food courts and take away catering outlets within Westfield.

There are in the region of 150 bottled beers to choose from. In addition, the onsite microbrewery produces a range of pale ales, stouts and ‘experimental beers’. Pub food is also available.

Increase cafe sales with positive marketing

If you sell fresh food cooked on the premises it may be obvious to you but not always to your customers. We really like this fun large sign in Konditor & Cook in the Swiss Re ('Gherkin') building. It reinforces and reminds customers of why the food is so great and can help set you apart from your competitors.

If you're reviewing your cafe, restaurant, visitor or employee catering, don't overlook the obvious. Positive messages = increased sales.

www.konditorandcook.com

Different Cafe Design

Drink Tea Eat Cake, a pop up cafe in Manchester, do more than simply tea but are clearly aware of the increased interest back to tea. The cafe design is eye catching from the outside and it's great to see a confidence in tea rather than coffee.

Alternative Mobile Catering

Part of the Eat St collective, Choc Star is a quality mobile caterer, selling all things chocolate. A great event catering alternative to the usual savoury catering offers found at events and food markets.

See also Eat St article on Montfort Catering Consultants' website. Street Food – Catering for Students, Office Workers, Food Tourists…

Improve Your Visitor Experience with Afternoon Tea

A simple and stylish way to serve preserves and cream with afternoon tea. The Wolsey is a fantastic treat for afternoon tea. It can be as formal or informal as you like but a good afternoon tea with proper leaf tea is a great way to keep your restaurant, cafe or visitor catering busy throughout the day.


Read our previous afternoon tea articles:
Claridge’s Named London’s Best Venue for Afternoon Tea

Men's Afternoon Tea

www.montfortconsultants.com

All Aboard The Big Red

Its not the first time that it’s been done but there always seem to be enough interested people when alternative dining options present themselves. The Big Red, in Deptford, is an old double decker London bus, providing a different setting for food and drink. See below menu.

Also, coming soon, a 40ft lorry body, adjacent to The Big Red, which will serve as a venue for film and cinema, as well as for art exhibitions and presentations.

www.thebigredpizza.com

See also our main catering consultancy site for the following related articles:

Cinema Catering I

Cinema Catering II

Food+Cinema+Art

Retro Café Furniture

The love for all things retro continues. Arnolfini Café Bar in Bristol have combined modern with retro and fantastic food and drink. Do something different to make your visitor catering stand out from the crowd.

http://www.arnolfini.org.uk/

Wine glass chandelier

Spotted in All Bar One – fun and appropriate for the setting.

www.allbarone.co.uk

Laptop lunches

Not everyone wants to use their internal employee catering facilities and there are a lot of office works not fortunate enough to have one. Scarlet in Spitalfield Market are in a great location to appeal to office workers, tourists, shoppers and anyone else wanting a quick healthy lunch. If your restaurant is more evening focused, could you adopt a similar approach?

www.scarletdot.co.uk

The Counter Café

Located on the banks of the Regent’s Canal in Hackney Wick, with views of the Olympic stadium, the Counter Café is run by the same people who operate the Container Café (so called as its made of shipping containers).

The Counter Café do excellent breakfasts and brunches, along with great coffee.

Located in Stour Space, a gallery, exhibition, performance and studio space, it’s a ‘raw’ and interesting space and location. The Café follows a similar theme, with exposed brickwork, retro blue flip-up theatre seats and other ‘reclaimed’ furniture. We particularly liked the ‘hole-in-the-wall’ to the kitchen, which looks like it has literally just been hit with a sledgehammer.

View the below to soak up the atmosphere.

www.thecountercafe.co.uk

Restaurant Outside Seating

You don’t necessarily need a lot of space to have outside seating (but you may need permission from the local authority). S & M’s approach is simple and draws attention to their restaurant.

www.sandmcafe.co.uk