Guests arriving at the restaurant of their choice, should make them happy. Typically they are ready to get some quick food or spent a fair amount of time at your place for a more extensive lunch or dinner. Depending on the service level your establishment would like to offer, greeting your guests can be done in a variety of ways.
Very important when greeting people at your restaurant:
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Be hospitable, you are their host and they are your guests.
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Warm and friendly tone of voice, address them according to time of day(morning, afternoon, etc).
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Offer to take a jacket when you provide this service, and even if its not the company standard you might feel like doing an extra step once in a while.
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Ask about reservations and table preference.
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If you are showing them a table, always lead the way. Perhaps surprisingly but your guests probably get confused when you tell them to ‘sit at table 7, over there in the corner’.
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Its common courtesy to help ladies out first. Take their coats first. Pull out a chair for them. Nowadays some people might be offended because of all gender-neutral talk. But more often than not, you are scoring bonus points when doing so.
Just do the basic restaurant stuff, nothing fancy or upscale
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The principle of greeting people at an establishment to eat, is the same
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Make the difference, especially when your company is not aiming for Michelin-stars you can really win
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If no other places around provide a good welcome, that doesn’t give you the right to not do it as well
Personal note:
It is such an underestimated part of the dining experience, the ‘welcoming ceremony’ as I like to call it. While most restaurants will have a host who welcomes you, this welcoming starts and ends with: “Hi, do you have a reservation?”. Other times there is not even a staff member in sight and you just wonder around the place, trying for the other patrons not to see you being clueless as to where to sit or go.
I truly believe it’s a shame when no other effort is taken to start off any dining experience. If you think about it: the first seconds you form an instant opinion of a person and a place. If you nail this simple first 30 seconds of a visit, your guest will be happier from the start making the rest of the job for you and your co-workers definitely a lot easier.
Sincerely,
Den The Man