Inside Hospitality

The 10 Best New Restaurants in America

Posted on 19. Aug, 2010 by Gary Tripp in Industry News

Once again, we ate our way across the country in search of the best new restaurants. These 10 fantastic spots–from casual places with communal tables to high-end, white-tablecloth affairs–prove that the American restaurant scene is alive and well, and more delicious than ever.

Check out the top 10 by clicking here!

Next in line: Young restauranteurs in St. Louis

Posted on 27. Jul, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Inside Hospitality

Running  some of St. Louis’ most popular restaurants.

When you are running a restaurant, you truly participate in every role from chef to cleaning staff. Learn how seven restauranteurs are running their restaurants and why they think St. Louis is a great town to set up shop. We interview these young professionals who are ready to take on the family business, run the restaurant from the kitchen and others who started the business from scratch.

Read full article from St. Louis Metromix by clicking here!

Introducing our latest Guest Experience Measurement Solution | ClubAudit.com™

Posted on 25. Jul, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Inside Hospitality

One size fits all solutions don’t work. Every segment in the hospitality industry deserves it’s own solution. Our club solution is ClubAudit™

We are excited to officially announce today our latest guest experience measurement solution, ClubAudit™.

ClubAudit™, the industries first and only club focused mystery shopping guest feedback measurement program.

ClubAudit™, our industry-leading evaluators focus on the most important elements of your business – service, entertainment and cost control. Our reports are threefold; they ensure that your guests are being treated well, that they are entertained, and that your staff isn’t stealing money.

Truly outstanding guest service, hospitality and bartender integrity are keys to success in any bar. Using ClubAudit™ is the unique way to measure the guest experience, drink pouring, cash handling, suggestive selling and of course, ringing of all drinks and bartender ethics.

Click here to learn more about ClubAudit.com™

Cracker Barrel: Success comes from ignoring discount mania.

Posted on 22. Jul, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News

Deep Discounting Doesn’t Work.

Michael Woodhouse, president and CEO of Lebanon, Tenn.-based Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, is proud of how the chain of 594 restaurants has weathered what’s being called The Great Recession.

In a speech at this morning’s Nashville Business Breakfast at Lipscomb University, Woodhouse credited the company’s success partly to what it hasn’t done to weather the storm — slash prices, something competitors have been eager to do.

“Once you devalue something, you’re digging a big hole and it’s (tough) to get out of that,” said Woodhouse, who succeeded Cracker Barrel founder Dan Evins as CEO in 2001.

Cracker Barrel made $14.4 million in last quarter, up more than 20 percent from a year earlier. By comparison, Nashville-based O’Charley’s lost $4.3 million, blaming its troubles in part on its recession-inspired value menu. O’Charley’s CEO Jeff Warne resigned a few weeks later.

Instead of getting “caught up in price warfare,” Woodhouse said Cracker Barrel focused on one of the central tenants of its brand, honest value.

“We’re not depending on anything happening in the economy, other than the day-to-day business of treating our guests right,” Woodhouse said.

Such efforts have been recognized by patrons and the restaurant industry. A recent consumer survey conducted by Technomic, Inc. rated Cracker Barrel at the top of the list of 10 national full-service restaurants. In the study, 4,000 respondents rated Cracker Barrel more favorably than competitors like Applebee’s, Olive Garden and Red Lobster, among others.

Can A ‘Pay What It’s Worth’ Menu Work Longterm? No.

Posted on 15. Jul, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Mystery Shopping

This is a pretty interesting story we have been following for the last few weeks. Vancouver, BC, based Rogue Kitchen and Wetbar has come up with an interesting approach gimmick to restaurant marketing. Allow customers to “Pay What You Think It’s Worth”.

Has it been tried before? Yes.

Has it ever worked? No.

The restaurants claims this is a success, this restaurant opened on June 11th. (34 days ago to be exact) this isn’t a success. It’s a gimmick, a crap shoot that will backfire. This is not a long term  (or even a short term) marketing approach.

It’s just a bad idea.

Restaurant Tells Customers to ‘Pay What It’s Worth’

Proving there is honour among rogues, Rogue Kitchen and Wetbar announced today it is extending its groundbreaking “Pay What You Think It’s Worth” program indefinitely.

Customers take the Rogue Oath: “I promise to pay the fair market value for the food I am about to eat.” The menu suggests prices but patrons can pay less if they think the fair market value of their meal is less than the menu price – and are honour bound to pay more, if they believe it’s worth more.

When Rogue opened for business on June 11, 2010, it introduced the program on a trial basis only. It received much initial attention and scepticism from the mainstream media (National Post: Can a pay what you want restaurant break even? Salon: The bold “pay-what-you-want” restaurant experiment). Many wondered whether Rogue would be repeatedly stiffed by unscrupulous freeloaders. Either the program would fail or Rogue would go broke.

“We really weren’t sure ourselves if the program would work,” says Marnie Burnett, Rogue’s director of business development. “We serve a lot of different types of people at Rogue, especially because we’re located in Vancouver’s main transit hub, Waterfront Station.”

“But tour customers have taken the Rogue Oath seriously, and to our utter amazement, the amount of people paying more than the stated menu price has almost exactly equalled the amount where people have paid less.”

Read full story at Restaurant News Resource by clicking here!

OpenMenu – Welcome to the team.

Posted on 14. Jul, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Inside Hospitality, Operations

We are consistently on the lookout for solutions that we can pass along to our Clients that solves a real world need.  We have been following  the work of OpenMenu for several months and really love these folks are doing. The Open Menu solution is both genius and desperately needed in our industry.

Inside Hospitality is excited to welcome them as a strategic partner.

One menu to maintain, in one location, shared everywhere.

Open Menu has created a standard that will change the way restaurants store and share their menus over the internet by standardizing the menus’ structure and format.

By providing a single, controlled specification for restaurant menus Open Menu™ will ensure that restaurant menus can be easily shared and used by others. From Restaurant Locators based on a menu items to tools for finding restaraunts based on what you’re looking to spend, Open Menu™ will provide the foundation for such tools.

Visit Open Menu by clicking here!

To visit our Partnership page please click here!

Your Guests are mobile. Your engagement need to be as well. Introducing Mobilality™

Posted on 01. Jul, 2010 by Gary Tripp in Industry News, Inside Hospitality

We are thrilled to officially announce our latest Guest Experience marketing & measurement solution, Mobilality™

Hospitality Mobile Guest Engagement. Simplified.

Mobilality™ is a leading edge complete mobile marketing, guest survey program that is more effective than any other marketing program you could employ, in helping you measure and improve the level of real guest loyalty.

Sign up free by clicking here! or visiting http://www.mobilality.com

Restaurant & Hospitality Focused Social Media Bootcamp | Chicago June 21-22

Posted on 28. May, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Online Reputation Management (ORM), Social Media

Enough with all this theory talk. Let’s talk about application.

Join us in Chicago on June 21st. & 22nd.  for the Restaurant & Hospitality Focused Social Media Marketing Bootcamp.

“Early Bird” registration and additional information can be found at http://RestaurantSocialMedia.com

“Jeffrey provides a level of professionalism that is a cut above the rest. Because of Jeffrey our members are now better equipped to be competitive and survive these tough economic times.” ~ Gabe Munoz, Director of Sales, Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Greater Kansas City.

“Our goal is to give operators the tools and knowledge they need to “kick it up a notch” or two or three. You won’t get this information from any other event or source. It’s that impactful.” ~ Gary Tripp, President, Inside Hospitality

Day 1 – General session of all attendess. We will talk about what exactly Social Media Marketing means for you and your business and how it can be utilized to grow loyalty and profitability. ***Limited to 100 attendees.

Early Bird Day 1 Tickets – Limited to the first 10 people to register.

Bring A Friend – Day 1 – This is for those who have purchased a full-price Day 1 ticket & want to bring a friend or colleague with them.  There is no limit on how many people you can bring with you from your company.

Day 1 Dinner – Charity Dinner. We will travel to one of the areas best restaurants for dinner on the evening of Day 1 with only the first 10 people to register and pay. This is a great event and the networking and professional opportunities make it a “can’t miss”. All dinner ticket sales go to the event charity – The Children’s Miracle Network.

Bring A Friend – Day 2 – This is for those who have purchased a full-price Day 2 ticket & want to bring a friend or colleague with them.  There is no limit on how many people you can bring with you from your company.

Early Bird Day 2 Tickets – Limited to the first 10 people to register.

Early Bird Day 1 & Day 2 Tickets – Limited to the first 10 people to register.

Bevinco + Inside Hospitality Partnership

Posted on 25. May, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Inside Hospitality

Over the past several years we have worked with worked with hotels, restaurants and bars that utilized the Bevinco service.  We have watched first hand how their service and expertise have helped numerous clients control costs more closely, minimized leakage and ultimately increase beverage profits from top to bottom.

We are excited to partner with this great organization in 2010.

More Information on the partnership  Chick Here! or visit www.Bevinco.com

To learn more about our Bar focused Mystery Shopping program, BarStoolie™ Click Here!

Some hotels checking out online reviewers

Posted on 17. May, 2010 by Inside Hospitality in Industry News, Online Reputation Management (ORM)

By Christopher Elliott

Hotels want to know who you are, especially if you’re reviewing them anonymously.

An increasing number of image-conscious properties have begun connecting the dots between unbylined write-ups that appear on such popular travel sites as TripAdvisor or Yelp, and your personal information, such as your loyalty program preferences.

If you write a positive review, you might expect a reward from the hotel — a gift basket or a discount on your next stay. Pan a property, and you could get a concerned e-mail from the general manager asking you to reconsider your review. Or even a black mark against you in the chain’s guest database.

John Baird, a lodging consultant in Jacksonville, Fla., says that hotels now use locations, dates and usernames that appear online to triangulate a guest’s identity. Once they find a likely match, the review is added to a hotel’s guest preference records, next to information such as frequent-guest number, newspaper choice and preferred room type.

“If the post is positive, I can give them a gift basket when they return,” he said. Negative? That can generate an e-mail inviting the guest back for a free stay or offering frequent-stayer points as an apology.

“I think matching reviews with guest names is a great idea,” he added.

But travelers aren’t sure. After hearing about one international hotel that retaliated against travelers who slammed the property, Helen O’Boyle, a Seattle-based computing consultant, is troubled by hotels that name-match. Once identified, she said, the travelers were tagged as “problem guests” in the hotel chain’s reward program.

O’Boyle is careful not to reveal any information that might help a hotel identify her online. “Let’s just say that I’m glad my ratings site nicknames don’t look like my real name,” she told me. “And now, if I’m writing a bad review, I fudge the dates a bit and don’t mention any particular calamities that might be identifiable with what the hotel knows I experienced — just in case.”

Online review sites such as TripAdvisor don’t forbid the posting of personally identifiable information. Unregistered visitors can access details about any user, including an age range, gender, location, “travel style,” whether they travel for business or pleasure and even who they travel with. Registered users can send another reviewer a private message through the site. Although TripAdvisor has an extensive privacy policy, the site readily admits, “No Web site can guarantee security.”

April Robb, a spokeswoman for TripAdvisor, said the site considers any effort by a hotel to pressure a guest to remove a negative review to be “fraudulent.” Whenever a hotel owner attempts to contact a guest who has posted an unflattering review, a warning appears: “TripAdvisor may penalize owners who attempt to remove reviews through inappropriate threats or coercion,” said Robb.

But privacy policies aren’t the biggest obstacles for hotels trying to connect the dots. Rather, it’s a hotel’s inability to match a name with absolute certainty that makes this exercise more art than science, according to Barry Hurd, the chief executive of Seattle-based 123 Social Media, a reputation management company that works with more than 500 hotels.

“It’s hard, because the review services try to anonymize the reviews and the data. They want people to just tell the truth and to assure them there won’t be any repercussions,” he said. “Hotels, on the other hand, want them to put a name on the review — so that they know who you are.”

Both Hurd and Baird, the Jacksonville analyst, say that an overwhelming number of hotels want the information for the right reasons: either to reward a nice review or to reach out to a negative guest to patch things up. And that may be true, for now.

But Hurd says that technology is evolving so fast that in the future, every hotel representative could have a toolbar on his or her computer that reveals everything about a guest at the click of a mouse — every review, guest preference and even the likelihood that you’ll be positively or negatively inclined toward your stay.

There’s no telling what hotels could do with that information.

O’Boyle’s advice works for me, but I’d offer a few additional recommendations. Don’t use your real name when you review a hotel, and make sure that your Internet handle doesn’t give away anything about your identity. Don’t give your geographic location, and wherever possible, don’t answer profile questions such as “I travel with” or “My travel style.”

And never, ever, include any information that could identify you in the review itself. That’s one dot you probably don’t want a hotel to connect with another.

Christopher Elliott is the ombudsman for National Geographic Traveler magazine. His column runs weekly at seattletimes.com/travel and occasionally in print. Contact him at celliott@ngs.org.