When opening a restaurant and thinking about your customer's
seating, there are several different issues to consider. The first and obvious
is; do you have a layout or floor plan which shows aisles, number of seats,
placement, etc? This is important for many reasons; flow of service, maximum
use of seating i.e.: a good balance of two seat, four seat and larger to accommodate
the maximum number of people most efficiently and one which is compliant with
ADA, fire exits, aisle width, etc. A written plan not only gives you a target
number of seats but also helps determine what type of seating to choose to fit
the space allotted.
Once you have a plan,
ask yourself "what's my style?" Seating should always compliment your
menu. You would not want to put an elegant upholstered booth in a "Fast
Food" restaurant and conversely you would not want to put polypropylene
chairs in a "Five Star" restaurant. Your seating should make sense
with your concept.
How comfortable do you
want your customers to be? If they are taking two to three hours to dine and
running up a $60-$70 check average, you want them to be as comfortable as
possible. If it's fast food and you want to turn your dining room as many times
as possible, comfort is not really as important.
At this point, remember
to be careful not to have "champagne taste on a beer budget." I am
amazed at how many people come to Millennium Seating without a budget of any
amount as to how much money they are allocating for furniture in the front of
the house.