5 Methods Of Ingratiating Your Restaurant In The Local Community

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All physical stores or retail locations operate as part of their community to some degree, even multinational chains will celebrate the local culture and be proud to serve it. That said, those in the hospitality sector will understand this almost more than anyone else. To welcome someone into your services you have to convince them that you’re a business worth checking out, an experience worth having, and a comfort worth relaxing for.

As such, hotels, restaurants, bakeries, bars, and many more businesses like this need to embrace their local communities with open arms. Tourist seasons are instrumental, especially in areas like coastal cities, but it’s the local members of the community who will keep your doors open during the winter.

For this reason, ingratiating yourself in the local community is not just a marketing tactic, it’s an approach that speaks to your very priorities as a firm. But how can someone develop a coherent approach towards connecting like this, without expressing the off-putting “wanting-to-be-liked” marketing irritation many of us feel from companies that misjudge their audience?

In this post, we’ll discuss a number of methods of achieving exactly that:

Get Involved In The Local Food Scene

It’s important for restaurants to serve as true advocates of their local food scene, given how they’re an integral part of it. That might mean spending time at the local food fair or running stalls for produce that you may be selling as an extra to your menu. 

You might also contribute to the local news regarding events going on, celebrate local produce and manufacturers, and keep a website blog dedicated to discussing the food news going on in your local area, centering yourself at the heart of it, or at least adjacent to that core.

This allows you to be seen as a vital and necessary presence in the local food scene, a scene you benefit from but also enjoy contributing to. Over time, this can be nothing if not helpful, because it shows to even patron that you care for the culture more than the revenue.

Locally Source Your Products

Of course, it’s one thing to celebrate your local area, it’s another to invest in it. Thankfully, a restaurant has several reasons to use local purveyors, especially locally grown produce. If you’re looking to gain many contacts in the local food network, simply speak to suppliers and farms and establish quotes for a certain volume or produce each month.

This gives you the chance to learn more about the growing conditions of your local area while also working out fantastic mutually beneficial arrangements with those near you. Perhaps there’s a specialist butcher near you, who can provide you the meat they prepare for you to cook with.

If you’re near the coast, then you have the advantage of fresh seafood around the year. The hustle and bustle of local markets can also make a massive difference to how authentic and local your restaurant concept is. Of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t import any ingredients, nor does it mean that more conventional restaurant suppliers are useless. 

But for the most part, the closer you can abide by local customs and culture, the better your restaurant becomes a representation of it. It’s easier to ingratiate yourself with a community when you’re part of that community from the bottom up, and proud to be so.

Run Loyalty Programs

Loyalty programs are often effective and worthwhile to run, but make sure that they’re not giving discounts for the sake of it.

For example, you might offer that people who come in for three meals have their fourth mains and deserts entirely comped – although wine and other drinks will have to be paid for. If your prices are right, this can incentivize people in the local area to come and visit you more commonly than they might have otherwise.

Loyalty programs benefit those who live in the area, because of course, they have an easier time coming for repeat visits. In the long run, this can be a fantastic means of developing goodwill and familiarizing yourself with those who may live near you, and who could be supporting your business for years, even decades to come.

Consider The Prices Actually Paid

It’s important to be realistic about where you are and what the local residents are happy to pay for. If you’re opening a restaurant in a big city, then you may have the chance to appeal to a larger or higher level clientele, to sell the most expensive wines.

In smaller towns, people are looking for good value. They want fresh food, well cooked, at a reasonable price. Sure, the cost of ingredients, raw materials and labor can be quite intensive to deal with, but that doesn’t mean we should gouge our customers. You can perform market research to see exactly what the average cost of a three-course meal is near you.

This way, you get a reputation for being reasonable, being tasty and good value, and offering them something they may not have seen. Even if you have exclusive methods, it’s still important to price appropriately so people who use your services are comfortable in what you have to offer. This may not grant you a huge swathe of fans, but it will certainly prevent you from alienating your local customer base.

Do Right By Your People

It’s important to make sure you’re a good employer and that you hire locally. By managing restaurant labor costs , ensuring tips are shared evenly, training staff appropriately, and being careful to develop those people who appreciate your business, you can more easily appeal to more people.

Doing right by your people isn’t a trick either, as news of how you run your restaurant and its internal processes can and will spread, not only by your staff but every partner who works for you. If your staff are satisfied, you can bet that will spread to your customers and then your wider community in the healthiest fashion.

With this advice, we hope you can feel connected to your local community and benefit from all the positives that brings.

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