Creating a Recipe for Success

  • Insights

Opening a successful restaurant or bar is daunting for both new and experienced restaurateurs. Jay Coldren, Streetsense’s Managing Director of Eat + Drink, sat down with industry experts Derek Brown of Drink Company, and Colan Vance of The Indigo Road to talk about the anatomy of a successful restaurant and bar, and to look at the trends we’re currently seeing in the industry. Here’s what they had to say:

Recipe for Success: Embrace The Experience Economy

A successful restaurant or bar is all about the experience. With good food available everywhere, the deciding factor for winning customers’ dining dollars comes down to who can provide the best experience. Design is and always will be important to the success of a restaurant. Heavily affecting the dining experience, every little detail is important — from how many inches are between tables to the brightness, temperature, and angle of the lighting. Derek Brown worked with Edit Lab at Streetsense to create an intimate environment in Columbia Room. The team strategically arranged the bar to minimize interruptions that distract and detract from the drinking and dining experience.

A Trend We Hope Will Stay: Sustainability

More than a debate about plastic straws, sustainability comes in many forms in the food and beverage industry. Anti-waste brand Trash Tiki is changing the beverage industry’s attitude towards food waste by creating pop-ups and education platforms focused on reusing items that would typically be thrown out — like turning citrus shells into citrus cordial. In rural Atlanta, Green Circle Farms feeds chickens a diet of surplus vegetables from markets and commercial kitchens — bruised, unattractive, and unsellable, or scraps from cuttings and peelings — that otherwise would have been thrown out.

A Trend We Wish Would Go Away: Premature Reviews

To avoid losing the inside scoop to other news outlets, food critics are reviewing restaurants closer to opening day than ever before. Most restaurants follow a cadence of reworking the dining experience — concepts, menus, and service — for months before everything falls into place. Instead of waiting weeks or months for restaurants to reach their full potential, we’re seeing critics attending restaurants and bars as early as opening night.

Did you miss The Anatomy of a Successful Restaurant + Bar trend breakfast? Check out our Eventbrite to view all upcoming Streetsense events, including our next trend breakfast — The Experience Economy + Multifamily.

 

For Streetsense updates, follow us on social media or sign up for the Word on the Street newsletter.

 

BACK TO LATEST

You’re in!

"Thank you for choosing to receive updates from across our global creative collective of placeshapers, brandbuilders, and storytellers. Learn more about Streetsense."

submitted!
close
be in the know