Hospitality

With the summer season upon us, the demand for venues with outdoor spaces is at an all-time high. A quick glance at the search volume surrounding ‘outdoor pub’, ‘outdoor restaurants near me’ and ‘best rooftop bar’ reveals a significant shift in consumer preferences. It's clear that people are actively seeking establishments that offer an inviting and comfortable outside area. As a pub, bar or restaurant operator, capitalising on this seasonal trend presents a golden opportunity to attract more visitors and enhance their overall experience.   

Our friends at DesignMyNight and our online booking software specialists here at Access Hospitality know a thing or two about highlighting and promoting your venue’s USPs. We help hospitality venue operators highlight their unique strengths and promote venues to hundreds of hospitality-hungry consumers in UK cities.   

In this article, we will delve into effective strategies for optimising your outside space and explore innovative ways to promote it, ensuring that your venue becomes a top choice for customers seeking the perfect summer destination.  

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As customer demand increases during the summer, you need more staff - and you need to attract, recruit and train them as efficiently as possible to get you ready for the season. The nature of seasonal hospitality businesses means that often you are utilising a young and inexperienced workforce or perhaps you are recruiting staff with very specific skills, and they often move on at the end of the season – meaning you have to do the whole thing again next season.     

And that is a whole lot of time, cost and resource for your operation – every season. But don’t worry, the Access Hospitality team are here to help. Our scheduling and training software is already trusted by hundreds of businesses in the seasonal hospitality sector, from hotels to theme parks and activity-led venues.   

In this article, we reveal our top tips for managing seasonal recruitment – where to find top staff, how to onboard them successfully, and how to set yourself up ahead of the next season.

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The rise of online bookings has transformed the restaurant industry and today over eight in 10 consumers, a whopping 86%, prefer to secure their table with a few clicks rather than calling in. This shift presents a golden opportunity for restaurants to not only capture reservations but also shape the customer experience from the very beginning.

A restaurant confirmation email – the first and critical touchpoint, bridging the gap between the online booking and the actual dining experience – acts as more than just a formality and if crafted carefully, is an opportunity to reassure guests, boost excitement, and set the tone for a positive visit.

But an optimised email for restaurant reservation can do even more. Restaurants that strategically craft these touchpoints often see reduced no-shows, increased opportunities for upselling, and an overall boost in guest satisfaction.

Here at Access Hospitality, we work closely with operators, helping them leverage the right reservation technology and maximise these customer touchpoints. Our systems are trusted by thousands of restaurants, bars, pubs and hotel operators, improving their enquiry to booking conversion by 24%, generating 14% more bookings and saving over 1000 hours each year through increased efficiency.

In this article, we'll deep dive into how a well-crafted confirmation email becomes an essential part of your success strategy and we'll share the insider tips and strategies to turn your reservation confirmations into powerful tools that enhance your business, whether you're a multi-site business operator or an owner of a single venue.

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Every time food spoils in your fridge or too large a portion of a side dish is prepped, you're not just throwing away products – you're throwing away potential profit.

The average restaurant sees a significant chunk of its revenue disappear due to food waste. In fact, a staggering 21% of that waste comes directly from spoilage, while another 45% results from preparation inefficiencies, as reported by WRAP. These are areas where smart inventory management can make a massive difference.

It's something we hear a lot at Access as a familiar challenge for many businesses in the hospitality industry. With the right tools and strategies, restaurants can streamline their inventory, gain control over waste, and unlock hidden profits, which is what we will focus on in this article.

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The dream of a bustling restaurant that fuels many aspiring restauranters usually consists of happy customers, delicious food, and a thriving business. Yet, focusing solely on the big picture can lead to overlooking essential components, such as a well-designed menu, efficient inventory systems, staff training, and a well-managed kitchen.

Restaurant kitchens are notoriously demanding, and a recent study found that 25% of UK chefs cite poor kitchen management as a major contributor to burnout and high turnover. Since the industry is already plagued with staff shortages, operators must focus on keeping and hiring skilled kitchen managers to ensure the well-being of their staff and the success of their business.

At Access, we've spent more than thirty years helping hospitality businesses improve their workflows and achieve their full potential and we understand that effective management is a core pillar of success.

Kitchen management is a skill that can be learned and mastered, and in this article, we'll dive into the essential strategies to optimise your kitchen and achieve your business goals.

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If you spend much time reading news reports and opinion pieces on how the cost of living is impacting hospitality, you might be growing tired of seeing the word ‘resilience’.  

After several challenging years, hospitality owners and operators are looking for signs that the time is coming when they aren’t just stubbornly surviving. But is recovery and growth possible in a world where the cost of living continues to rise, customers are more conscious than ever about how they spend their money, and retaining quality staff is becoming increasingly challenging? 

In this article, we’ll tell you why we’re confident that the answer to that question is ‘yes’, and we’ll share practical guidance on the measures you can take to protect your hospitality brand from the challenges imposed by the rising cost of living in 2024.

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Staff onboarding can be a complex process, and in hospitality, it presents an unique set of challenges with many legislative areas that need specific areas of training – such as serving alcohol, allergens, and food safety as well as the majority of hospitality workers being in deskless roles. Add to that the fact that staff turnover in the hospitality industry stands at double the UK average (30%), and it’s clear to see why proper onboarding is something that hospitality operators should focus on. 

Here at Access, we’re familiar with the onboarding process. Through our accessible LMS we are delivering hospitality training courses to thousands of new hospitality employees daily, and we have helped companies such as Namco BNAE to develop and implement custom induction programmes to help get their new starters onboarded. It’s fair to say that we’ve picked up a few tips and tricks along the way. 

So, why is an effective and consistent staff onboarding process critical for hospitality businesses, and what happens when you don’t have one in place? In this article, we’ll examine the importance of getting it right, share our top tips, and look at some of the common mistakes to avoid. 

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Running a restaurant business in 2024 isn’t easy – rising costs of food and energy, staff shortages, supply chain issues, the cost-of-living driving customers to tighten their belts, and unpredictable economic factors throw curveballs at businesses of all sizes. To thrive in this environment, savvy marketing is no longer a luxury, but a survival tactic. Now, more than ever, your restaurant marketing strategy is the key to attracting customers and staying afloat. 

But where do busy restaurateurs start? In a competitive market, how do restaurants make themselves stand out from the crowd? How do new restaurants get noticed? And how do the little guys level the playing field when competing against the big brands?  

Here at Access, we frequently talk to our customers who are passionate about their restaurants but unsure how to navigate the complexities of marketing. That's why we've compiled the most effective and up-to-date restaurant marketing strategies adaptable to businesses of all sizes and budgets. At the end of this article, you'll be well-equipped with the knowledge and tools to create a restaurant marketing plan that drives results. 

But first things first, let’s look at the basics and understand why marketing is so important to your restaurant.  

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No-shows are the bane of every pub and restaurant owner's life, accounting for anywhere between 5% and 20% of bookings. At best, no-shows can mean a re-organisation of tables right in the middle of a busy service. And at worst, they can cause a serious dent in a business's bottom line. 

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