- Home
- 4 Tips To Organize Thanksgiving Dinner In Your Restaurant
4 Tips To Organize Thanksgiving Dinner In Your Restaurant
- By Greg Garner
- Published 04/23/2012
- Unrated
Greg Garner
For more information please visit our Restaurant Accounting website.
View all articles by Greg Garner
Thanksgiving Day is a harvest festival typical in the USA held in November. It signals the start of festivities which generally lasts until January of the next year. Traditionally, it has been the day to celebrate with friends and family with people generally eating at home. Elaborate home cooked dishes used to be the norm all of which needed great time and expertise to cook. But with complex modern life, and busy city life, people often find it difficult to cook such elaborate meals in their homes. That is why there is a growing demand of having Thanksgiving in their favorite restaurant.
If you are a restaurant owner, and until now your holiday season began with Christmas week, it is time to change your thinking. With people looking for traditional Thanksgiving meals in restaurants, you have a chance to win over some dedicated customers. If you can impress them with your take on traditional Thanksgiving dinner, chances are, they are going to become a regular to your place (if they weren’t already)! So here are some tips on how to get your customers to choose your restaurant for their Thanksgiving dinner this year:
1. First of all, the preparation should start weeks before if this is the first time you are going to host it. The dishes that are typical of the event are often not cooked regularly in any restaurant. So you need to perfect those dishes before your kitchen is ready to serve them. You can always try variations to the recipes considered to be the traditional Thanksgiving meal. An example of this would be if your restaurant is Indian, you can keep the option of Turkey
kebab with cranberry chutney instead of roast turkey with cranberry sauce. But all these experimentations should be done weeks before the actual day.
2. You can hold a Thanksgiving week instead of just celebrating the day, which is the last Thursday of November. Decorate your restaurant with an autumn theme like dry leaves (artificial of course, you don’t want the smell of rotting leaves in your restaurant!), pumpkins, squash and other such Fall items. If budget is not a problem, you can create new dresses for your staff in 17th century fashion since this was the era in which Thanksgiving was held for the first time!
3. Start advertising for the event a month before and make it a strict “by reservation” only event. People who reserve for Thanksgiving dinner mostly show up, so don’t overbook. This will give you an estimation on how much turkey and other food items you will need. Always order these items in advance, as they will become scarce during the Thanksgiving week.
4. As for the event, you can go for buffet, three-course meal or a five-course meal. If you are holding a buffet, make sure you have a different price for children, as families will be your predominant customers during this period. For sit-down dinners, you can keep a non-turkey option on the menu for those few who don’t like the bird. As for the five-course dinner, make sure there are plenty of choices in the entrée and dessert section.
While holding Thanksgiving dinner, don’t forget your regular menu; though for better service, you can reduce the number of specialties you offer during this week. Your restaurant’s reputation depends on these signature dishes; so make sure they do not suffer due to your Thanksgiving week.
If you are a restaurant owner, and until now your holiday season began with Christmas week, it is time to change your thinking. With people looking for traditional Thanksgiving meals in restaurants, you have a chance to win over some dedicated customers. If you can impress them with your take on traditional Thanksgiving dinner, chances are, they are going to become a regular to your place (if they weren’t already)! So here are some tips on how to get your customers to choose your restaurant for their Thanksgiving dinner this year:
1. First of all, the preparation should start weeks before if this is the first time you are going to host it. The dishes that are typical of the event are often not cooked regularly in any restaurant. So you need to perfect those dishes before your kitchen is ready to serve them. You can always try variations to the recipes considered to be the traditional Thanksgiving meal. An example of this would be if your restaurant is Indian, you can keep the option of Turkey
2. You can hold a Thanksgiving week instead of just celebrating the day, which is the last Thursday of November. Decorate your restaurant with an autumn theme like dry leaves (artificial of course, you don’t want the smell of rotting leaves in your restaurant!), pumpkins, squash and other such Fall items. If budget is not a problem, you can create new dresses for your staff in 17th century fashion since this was the era in which Thanksgiving was held for the first time!
3. Start advertising for the event a month before and make it a strict “by reservation” only event. People who reserve for Thanksgiving dinner mostly show up, so don’t overbook. This will give you an estimation on how much turkey and other food items you will need. Always order these items in advance, as they will become scarce during the Thanksgiving week.
4. As for the event, you can go for buffet, three-course meal or a five-course meal. If you are holding a buffet, make sure you have a different price for children, as families will be your predominant customers during this period. For sit-down dinners, you can keep a non-turkey option on the menu for those few who don’t like the bird. As for the five-course dinner, make sure there are plenty of choices in the entrée and dessert section.
While holding Thanksgiving dinner, don’t forget your regular menu; though for better service, you can reduce the number of specialties you offer during this week. Your restaurant’s reputation depends on these signature dishes; so make sure they do not suffer due to your Thanksgiving week.
