We luckily have a wide selection of Hot Chocolate at Quandts. We have no-sugar added, regular, white chocolate, plenty of different brands, and lots of other hot delicious beverages as well (coffee, cappuccino, tea, etc). I especially love our Paul DeLima White Hot Chocolate  It is the perfect mix of sugar, cream, and chocolaty goodness; add some whipped cream and you have heaven on a snowy day.

A few weeks ago, Richie from Rich’s stopped by to give us some samples of their gluten free pizza crusts.  Now, for the unenlightened, you may be thinking- Hey! Where’s the flour?!  But the truth of this product is in a story Richie told us. There is a pizzeria that uses UPS every week to ship this product to his restaurant. The reason being- his business has doubled since bringing in and advertising the gluten free option.  I’m not sure which is worse- families that stop at your pizza joint and don’t eat any pizza- or worse, those families who don’t stop at all because of a family member with Celiac. Gluten Free pizza crusts come in 10.5 “personal-pan” size and give everyone the opportunity and enjoyment to eat go out for pizza together. Probably the best feature of this product, is that it comes with a thin tin pan that stays with the pizza from freezer right to the pizza oven. This is key because it means that the crust is not accidentally being tainted by touching any flour-covered surfaces. The 10.5” comes in a 24- 7.75 oz pack. The item # is 16305.

Quandt’s will also be bringing in an 8” size in a few weeks, so keep your eyes peeled.  This is available in a retail pack which is another segment of your business to tap into. People can buy their gluten free crusts from you to make at home on the nights they can’t make it up to the pizzeria.

Bonus product! This pizza crust can also be easily folded in half to make meat & cheese Panini sandwiches. As a girl who loves her flour, these even won me over! They were de-li-cious!

Though kids don’t carry the family wallet, they still exert plenty of financial influence in the dining arena. From burger joints and pizzerias to sandwich shops and fast-casual chains, restaurants across the country have clamored for their slice of the kids’ menu pie with targeted offerings and a kid-centric vibe.
Today, the kids’ menu remains a compelling—if not necessary—restaurant program. With attractive dining options and an equally pleasing kid-friendly environment, many operations are wooing families and their influential youngsters through the doors—and reaping profits for their efforts.

“Kids drive decisions and there’s no question our kids’ menu helps attract them,” says Stacy Hettich, brand director at Fazoli’s, a quick-service Italian franchise that commits a lot of attention to its child-friendly atmosphere. “Having a kids’ menu is such a positive attribute for our brand and certainly contributes to our success.”

But creating and maintaining an attractive kids’ menu demands more than a pint-sized meal. Today’s children, products of the Internet age, cable television, and no-score soccer games, are accustomed to interaction, choice, and feeling special at every turn. Parents, meanwhile, focus their eyes on price and health. A kids’ menu that appeases both audiences will do much to spark revenue, boost brand loyalty, and encourage repeat visits.

Know the Target

In 2008, Cosi, a fast-casual chain headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois, focused its attention on kids’ offerings. With a growing contingent of suburban operations, Cosi leaders saw the need to introduce a formal kids’ menu to satisfy the family dominated demographics of its nearly 150 locations.

“We didn’t have a printed kids’ menu, we didn’t package meals, and we just knew this was a missed opportunity,” says Jill Lawrence, Cosi’s senior director of marketing.

In the summer of 2008, Cosi unveiled its first kids’ menu. Young patrons can order pizza or a sandwich, a healthy side (carrots, potato chips cooked in unsaturated oil, or a fruit cup), a cookie, and a take-home beverage cup, which includes a flavored straw for milk orders. Cosi’s revamped efforts triggered an immediate jump in sales.

Knowing the target audience spurred Cosi’s quick success and opened the brand’s eyes to the power of a well-conceived kids’ menu. Still, emerging as a popular brand with kids and parents extends beyond the menu and into the creation of a child-friendly environment.

At Which Wich sandwich shops, kids place their orders at a tot-sized counter, a modest, low-cost design feature that allows children to replicate the adult experience.

“Kids represent about 10 percent of our business and that’s a big enough chunk that we’re going to pay attention to what they want and how they’re treated,” says Which Wich founder Jeff Sinelli.

At one of Sinelli’s other brands, Dallas-based Burguesa Burger, the bag that serves “The Little Luchador (Wrestler)” kids’ meal turns into a Mexican wrestler’s mask.

“You can’t overlook the element of packaging in attracting kids,” he says.

Fazoli’s directs its kids’ menu at the 4–9-year-old crowd, pairing each kids’ meal with a Tony Tomato activity book. At its Tuesday Kids’ Nights, Fazoli’s serves up 99-cent meals as well as a guided arts and crafts activity.

“You have to know your brand well and Fazoli’s has become synonymous with families because of these family friendly programs,” Hettich says. “We’ve done our due diligence and research and it’s paid off.”

Keep It Simple, Not Too Simple

Kids can be finicky eaters, a reality that encourages operators to provide options that will satisfy their youngest clientele.

Fazoli’s hosts a five-item kids’ menu (pepperoni or cheese pizza, spaghetti, meat lasagna, and fettuccine alfredo), though the Lexington, Kentucky–based brand will occasionally add limited-time offerings. The decision to retain a tight, targeted menu rests as much in ease of ordering and preparation as it does in a sturdy sales history.

“Long term, pizza and spaghetti have proven their worth,” Hettich says, adding that consistency with menu, customer experience, and price is just as important. “Parents want to come in and see familiar offerings. They want to know that their expectations will be met.”

Many eateries have adopted a layered ordering platform that has kids pick options from designated categories. At Which Wich locations, kids grab a red crayon and a pre-printed bag to select their sandwich options along with cheese, bread type, toppings, and drink variety. Though choice is provided, the options do not overwhelm.

“Kids’ palates aren’t as big as adults, but you still have to provide a range of options to appease the kids’ tastes,” Sinelli says.

“It’s all about having an appropriate number of options on the menu because kids enjoy the power of choice,” Cosi’s Lawrence says. “That’s one of our things that has proven to be a real hit.”

Package and Price

Packaging the different components of a kids’ meal together isn’t just a best practice because it allows for customization, it also enhances value perception, an important element in today’s struggling economy.

McDonald’s Happy Meal may have set the gold standard for a successful kids’ menu when it created an offering that provided an entrée, side, and drink. The Golden Arches then priced the Happy Meals to sell; not only did the kids love the Happy Meal, but so did parents, who enjoyed the low-price, all-inclusive meal. Value continues to be a selling point in the kids’ meal realm, as the average quick-serve price of a kid’s meal combo in the second quarter of 2009 was a mere $3.60, according to consumer research firm Mintel.

Yet Sinelli, who merely looks to cover the cost of his $3–$4 kids’ meals, says the kids’ menu is about more than profit.

“We’re trying to build our brand with kids, knowing that we’re in this for the long haul,” he says. “It’s a slower path, but it allows the brand to build on experience rather than spending thousands on creating a splash.”

For more information, visit QSRMagazine.com

Super Bowl Sunday – Sunday, February 1: If your establishment has a bar and a big screen TV or several screens, consider hosting a Super Bowl Party. Offer a buffet and beer at a discount to bring in the patrons! Serve wings, subs, pizza, and other traditional football fare and you’ve got a ready-made tailgate party!

Valentine’s Day – Saturday, February 14: Create the ambiance for a romantic dinner for two. Include a fine wine selection and delectable desserts. Consider a special Valentine’s Day menu for that day and include two or three choices of appetizers, salads, entrees, specialty coffees and desserts. Perhaps give a long-stemmed red rose to all female patrons to make the event extra special. End the evening with two mints when presenting the check. This kind of attention to detail earns repeat business!

President’s Day – Monday, February 16: We cannot tell a lie; President’s Day is the perfect day to feature Cherry Pie as your signature dessert. Make it distinctly your own with a glaze and fancy presentation.

Fat Tuesday/Mardi Gras – Tuesday, February 24: Always occurring the day before Ash Wednesday, Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras is associated with food and fun. Promote Mardi Gras in your flyers and promotional emails to remind your customers to come and feast – as is tradition!

Chocolate Lovers Month and National Cherry Month: February celebrates chocolate lovers and cherry aficionados. This is the month to menu your favorite recipes featuring these two great ingredients!

Just one bad decision costs a lot in terms of time and money, but a bad hiring decision will also cost in terms of lost productivity, efficiency, poor customer service and teamwork too.  The on thing a bad hire is guaranteed to give you is more aggravation.

How would you feel if you were robbed of $1000?  And not just once, but 12 or 15 times a year? Did you know that every time a frontline, hourly employee quits or is fired, that the cost to recruit, interview, hire and train a new person will be at least 150 times that person’s hourly wage?

Losing a minimum wage employee in Texas costs at least $1200 while in California it subracts a whopping $1375 from the bottom line — and, as the minimum wage and training costs increase, these numbers are just going to keep going up.

Have you ever figured out how much your store loses each time someone is fired or quits?  Here’s a ballpark example where we assume only eight new hires in a year at only a $7.00 an hour wage.

Calculation: $7.00 Hourly Wage x 150 Minimum Cost to Rehire & Train = $1,050 Lost Each Time Someone Quits or is Fired.

$1,050 x 8 Hourly Hires Lost Last Year = $8,400 Lost Last Year

Let’s look at it another way… IF we assume a 5% net profit, you have to sell $168,000 worth of hot dogs, fries, and drinks just to cover your yearly cost of turnover.  And, if your average ticket is $8.00, it means you have to do 1,500 transactions per month to cover these costs.

In today’s world it is going to be a lot easier to reduce turnover than to increase customer counts.

So don’t focus on trunover focus on retention.  Turnover is number based.  Retention is activity based.

Last month Boston Market became the latest chain to advertise menu items—11 in all, including rotisserie chicken with sides, a chicken salad, and a chicken pot pie—priced at $5. The offer follows similar efforts by other chains, such as Subway’s $5 Footlong, Quiznos’s $5 Deli Favorites, and Pizza Hut’s (NYSE: YUM) $5 Pizza Mia.

But why has the five spot suddenly become so hot?

“The $5 price point is an important part of the new vernacular in the restaurant industry,” said Judy Cantrell, Boston Market chief brand officer, in a statement when the chain debuted its $5 menu. “It’s become a price point that consumers respond to.”

But Rafi Mohammed, a pricing consultant and author of The Art of Pricing, has a different theory.

“I don’t necessarily think $5 is that significant of a number,” he says. “It’s just the certainty of a number which is very important.”

Disposable income dropped 1.7 percent in July after taking a plunge of 2.6 percent in June, and Mohammed says as a result customers are cutting back on expenditures such as eating out. By advertising menu items at a set value, chains are letting customers know up front how much they can choose to spend inside their restaurants.

“They’re putting the stake in the ground, drawing a line in the sand, and customers are thinking, ‘Now I know I can get out of there for $5 plus tax,’” Mohammed says.

The $5 choices are also meal-sized, whereas lower-priced dollar- and value-menu items are more snack-like. This, Mohammed says, puts purveyors of the $5 options in position to take advantage of trading down from casual dining restaurants, where meals typically run closer to $10 or $12.

“Consumers are willing to pay $5 for a meal as long as they think they are getting a good value,” says Tony Pace, CMO for the Subway Franchisee Advertising Fund Trust (SFAFT).

A Florida Subway franchisee started the $5 Footlong promotion just before Thanksgiving in 2007, and national advertisements began running this past March. Since then, the offering has become a staple of Subway’s menu in many markets.

Pace declined to provide specific sales numbers but says the items have succeeded in both driving traffic and increasing check size. He says competitors would have been satisfied with one-sixth of the success the chain has seen from the $5 Footlongs.

Franchisees, often the first to cry foul when corporate starts promoting discounted items, also seem happy.

“This is the best promotion we’ve ever seen,” says Tom Mulligan, a national board member of the North American Association of Subway Franchisees (NAASF), owner of two units in West Palm Beach, Florida, and board chair for his local SFAFT. “Our customer counts skyrocketed and so did sales.”

He says his stores alone saw a 50-percent increase in sales when the national advertising debuted, and now, a year later, he’s still in the 30-percent range. Some stores, he says, saw sales rise as much as 75 percent.

Not all franchisees have seen that kind of success, though, says Diane Wehr, board chair for the NAASF.

“We didn’t have the surge that some other markets did,” she says of her seven Birmingham, Alabama, stores. “Nevertheless, we did great.”

But the numbers were not consistent across the board, she says, adding that stores with captive markets, such as those on college campuses or military bases, probably didn’t fare so well.

“There are people in Subway thinking $5 was not the right number,” Mulligan says. “Some say we should have started at $5.99.”

In Mulligan’s hurricane- and recession-battered south Florida market, $5 seems to have been the magic number. While some Subways only offer a few sandwich varieties at the $5 price, Mulligan’s store charges $5 for any footlong, no matter what type. He acknowledges that means some sandwiches, such as the Chicken Bacon Ranch, are discounted more than others but says it’s worth it.

“I’m very happy with it,” he says.

Mohammed says the best way to take advantage of a $5 price point, however, is to incorporate it as part of a menu that’s tiered by price.

“What’s important about Boston Market is that they have choices above $5,” he says. “They can get people to trade up. So you get the price-conscious people, but you also have more options for people to spend more at your [restaurant].

QSR Magazine

With that thought, let me share a conversation that occurred after a recent Maximizing Sales session at a Minneapolis restaurant.

One of the class participants came to me after the program to share her exuberance for the event. She was thrilled that her employer cared enough about the guest experience that training was ongoing, relevant and timely. The service professional was clearly demonstrating an attitude of gratitude and was excited to get to share this learning with her guests. The discussion advanced, and I asked her to share with me her goals for 2008. Her answer?

“I will earn $100,000 as a server!”

Yes, you read that correctly. Of course, this conversation led to more questions, such as, “How much did you earn last year?”

With great pride, she responded, “$92,000.”

And no, she was not working more than 40 hours per week. It should also be said that the Minneapolis restaurant in which she works is definitely upscale, but not fine dining. Still, $92,000 last year, with a goal for $100,000 in 2008? What does a server do to earn that level of compensation? Her answer:

“I write 17 to 25 personalized, handwritten ‘Thank You’ notes every shift that I work. Over 70 percent of my tables on a given night are repeat guests who I have developed a relationship with. My employer even mails my ‘Thank You’ notes for me and puts on the stamp, and we also enclose a bounce back card!”

• From this conversation, some questions for all restaurateurs to ask themselves are:
• What is this frontline employee worth to this restaurant?
• Based on a 20 percent tip factor, what sales dollars need to be generated to earn this return?
• How many $100,000-a-year servers do I have on my team?
• And, finally, perhaps the most important question: What would you do to keep this server representing me?

From FoodserviceNews.Net