F&B in entertainment centers

Over recent years, restaurant business in Russia has become far more advanced than it used to be. In many cities, people have increasingly higher expectations for the quality of service. Some time ago, parents would take their children to amusement parks for sheer amusement, seeing food as a secondary thing. Now, people are starting to prefer the format of a decent restaurant with children’s room.

Parents won’t buy low quality overpriced hot dogs and fries anymore. They want to see at least a basic children’s menu with cereals, soups and natural juices — or better yet, a full-scale cuisine. If you want to attract more families, respect their expectations and meet latest requirements for F&B.

Now, people are starting to prefer the format of a decent restaurant with children’s room.

Whatever’s on your menu, you have to satisfy people’s basic needs. It’s obvious what Guests expect on the part of your F&B: products should be fresh, meals should look good and taste even better, and they should be served quickly and properly — hot meals should be hot, cold meals should be cold.

Whatever’s on your menu, you have to satisfy people’s basic needs.

First off, you’ve got to decide who will write your menu. You can do it yourself, basing on your personal preferences, or you can delegate it to your chef.

Here are several approaches to writing a menu:

Focus on high-margin meals with low production cost. The typical example here is cotton candy. People tend to think 100 rubles is a fair price for this treat, unaware that it’s production cost is about 5 rubles. Other examples are flour-based products (pizza, pasta, buns) and water-based beverages (berry and fruit drinks, homemade lemonade).

Focus on high-margin meals with low production cost.

Conduct a marketing research: survey potential Guests and write a menu with consideration of their personal preferences. Or you can look what an average restaurant menu in your city offers and incorporate its most popular positions: if everyone serves the Caesar, cappuccino and rolls, you’ll probably want to serve these too. On the other hand, you can do the opposite: set up original cuisine instead of serving the mundane Caesar hundred times a day.

Conduct a marketing research: survey potential Guests and write a menu with consideration of their personal preferences.

There are no «right» or «wrong» methods and approaches. Honestly, I used to think that owner shouldn’t write a menu himself. But then I visited Katya Bokuchava’s restaurant, and was amazed by her menu. Before opening a business, she had traveled a lot, and decided to share gastronomic experiences collected in the course of her journeys.

I’ll give you another example: owners of the restaurant chain Ginza Project visited a restaurant in Georgia and loved the cuisine so much that they invited the chef to Saint Petersburg. There, they established a restaurant and trusted the chef to write his own menu.

So, there are many opportunities… provided you put your life and heart into your work.

You can find more about F&B and other aspects of entertainment business in Fantastic Park. Entertainment Centers: From Projects to Happy Guests by Pavel Timets.