COVID-19 Archives

Restaurant Industry Update: UK Edition 2021

We don’t yet know the long-term impacts of the COVID pandemic on the global restaurant landscape. And, in the UK, the bruised and battered industry is being hit by a second, potentially much bigger wave: Brexit. We checked in with our London-based Managing Director...

Episode 4: Restaurant Consumer Drive-thru Behavior & Loyalty Programs

Restaurant Consumer Trends in Dining 2021

2021 Forecast: Cloudy with a strong chance of in-home dining Product developers and differential calculus buffs have a term: forcing function. The term refers to a function in an equation or system that forces conscious attention upon something. In calculus, it...

4 Tips for Managing Consumer Expectations and Staying on Top of Restaurant Trends

Last time, we reported on a December webinar that laid out what investors are thinking for 2021. This week: what’s top of mind for consumers. Senior Food and Drink Contributor for Forbes.com Alicia Kelso hosted the panel discussion, which invited Nicole Miller Regan,...

What Consumers and Investors Think About 2021: A Power Panel

Back in April, a month into COVID restrictions, collectively we imagined that things would return to normal in a few short weeks. Like an overstretched rubber band, we thought we’d snap back. We weren’t quite right. What has stretched? Our creativity, our tech...

Restaurant Update from Asia

In April, RMS reported on the state of restaurants in Asia. Now, seven months later, it’s time for an update. For the sake of this article, we’ll focus on Korea. Unlike the U.S. and Europe, Korea has not had any mandatory shutdowns of restaurants during the pandemic —...

Episode 3: Power Panel – 2021 Consumer Trends & Investor Questions Restaurant Brands Don’t Want to Miss

Episode 2: How Automation Can Help You Understand Your Data

Episode 1: How Brands Are Using Data to Create Recovery Strategies to Survive the COVID-19 Crisis

Predictive Analytics and The New Reality

At the recent MURTEC Restaurant Next event, RMS Chief Strategy Officer Joel Davis shared his views on using data to enhance customer service, loyalty and revenue. Davis, who leads RMS’ analytics and data strategy discipline, shared insights on WHY and HOW data...

2021 Planning: Financial Data will Repair the Cracks

In a recent TED Radio Hour episode on resilience, Esther Perel stated, “a pandemic, a disaster, highlights the cracks. It will also reveal light shining through.” While she was speaking to interpersonal relationships, her analogy also applies to our business, which is...

Should your restaurant be considering a subscription program?

More than six months into the COVID-19 pandemic, the restaurant industry has been put to the test — and achieved previously unimaginable evolution at a previously unthinkable pace. Operators have coped with a complete revamping of day parts such as breakfast and...

Temporary disruption or here to stay? 5 restaurant trends to include in your recovery plan

To stay alive during the pandemic, brands, owners and operators have had to adapt. Many restaurants found it necessary to kick long-term plans into immediate action, such as adding drive-thru, while many made changes no one ever would have anticipated — fine dining...

Restaurant Pricing in the Time of Corona

“Should I take price?” has been the primary question from our restaurant clients of late. Our answer, surprisingly, remains the same now as it was pre-COVID: “That depends.” We remain in the midst of the greatest challenge the restaurant industry has ever faced. Yet...

More take-out & delivery, hold the breakfast. How singles and families are dining today.

COVID-19 has had a lasting impact on families, and particularly on how, what, where and when to eat. Whether it is the decision to have a meal delivered or pick it up through the drive-thru, eat breakfast at 8 a.m. or 11 a.m., try out the neighborhood restaurant’s new...

News from Europe: What does the restaurant industry look like now?

In June, RMS Managing Directors Philipp Laqué, based in London, and Nicolas Bordeaux, of Paris, shared the state of the restaurant industry in Europe and the UK. We checked back in with our European outposts this month, with additional insights from Rosa Blanco-Vegas,...

Reduced restaurant menus offer opportunity for profitability and simplicity

Q&A with RMS menu engineering expert on top 7 reasons to reduce your menu The analogy may be obvious, but as with any successful recipe, a sustainable and profitable restaurant also comes down to using the correct mix of ingredients. Now that most everything we...

Update from the United Kingdom: Restaurants Receive Boost from Government

Normal is still a far way off for United Kingdom restaurant owners and operators, but July did bring about a few bright spots amidst a tough first half of the year. On July 4, restaurants and pubs opened. A few days later, borders reopened for travelers from...

Dispatch From Asia: What Does Restaurant Dining Look Like Now?

In April, RMS Managing Director Winny Daud shared her insights on Singapore’s response to the pandemic, based on her experience as a restaurant analyst, client partner and Singaporean. We spoke to her again this month to see what’s changed in the restaurant industry...

Finding New in the Old: The Rise of QR Codes during the coronavirus pandemic

When it comes to restaurant cravings these days, limited contact is what’s on the menu. In fact, “avoiding contamination” has replaced “food quality” as the most significant consideration when deciding where to dine. According to our survey of 1,200 U.S. customers,...

Consumer preferences have changed. These insights will help your restaurant recover.

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European chains face a mixed bag of recovery

When it comes to COVID-19 recovery, countries across Europe have one thing in common: doing their own thing. As a result, pan-European brands face different rules and regulations by country and, in some cases, even among in-country regions. What does this mean for the...

How to Make Sure Your Restaurant Brand Survives

From immediate response to resolution and recovery, maneuvering a crisis with any sort of certainty can be challenging. With COVID-19, “challenging” is an understatement. Brands had to think quickly to respond to the crisis, without any real historical precedent. As...

What Should Restaurants Measure Now?

Historical and comparative data and information guide us, informing both near- and long-term actions. But in these times without historical precedent, we are left with the question: what should we measure now? Information enables conversations—and solutions. RMS CEO...

How fast casual PDQ continued to serve quality to customers

Before March 2020, new menus could take a year to launch, with every item in every medium checked and rechecked. But the pandemic changed everything. Fast casual chicken concept PDQ launched a new menu just days after the WHO announced the pandemic, deleting certain...

Restaurant CEOs on Leading Their Brands Now and Beyond Coronavirus

On April 29, Revenue Management Solutions and EZ CERT supported Franchise Times’ lively webinar discussion with Peter Cancro, Founder and CEO of Jersey Mike’s Subs, Joe Koss, President and CEO of Culver’s Restaurant, and Chris Newcomb, Co-Founder and CEO of Newk’s...

Sense360 Briefing with Dora Furman

Recently our own vice president, Dora Furman, fielded questions from the Sense360 audience about the state of the restaurant industry. Watch the...

Pricing Post Crisis: What Should Operators Consider?

RMS’ Chief Strategy Officer Joel Davis leads our analytics and data strategy discipline and serves as a strategic consultant for many of our customers. He’s been asked a lot of tough questions lately about how to move into recovery – and what to do about price. Below...

Field Report: How is Singapore Responding to COVID-19?

If there’s one thing that’s been consistent across the globe during the pandemic, it’s how differently each country is handling restaurant restrictions. It shouldn’t come as a surprise. After all, there’s no handbook — government, corporate or otherwise — to help...

Your Coronavirus Response Recovery Depends on Data

We’re in a time of great opposites. On one hand, you’re required to engage in the quickest thinking of your career as we rapidly change course to meet the needs of the day. On the other hand, the COVID-19 crisis will begin to subside, and that time will require a very...

It’s a disaster. But will disaster insurance cover it?

Circumstances well outside operators’ control are forcing closures, loss of revenue and, in some cases, permanent shut downs. We can all agree that this is a “disaster,” but most business insurance policies only cover catastrophes of the physical kind, and will...

Piper Sandler invites RMS Chief Strategy Officer to share restaurant industry insights in the face of coronavirus

In a recent Key Opinion Leader conversation with investment bank and institutional securities firm Piper Sandler, RMS’ Chief Strategy Officer, Joel Davis, shared his thoughts about the current state of restaurant sales and consumer spending trends in the face of the...

Industry Notes: How restaurants can survive

These days are truly like none other. When Waffle House, notorious for its record of staying open during natural disasters, closes nearly one-fifth of its restaurants, you know it’s not good. But that’s precisely what’s happened amid the coronavirus pandemic. So what...

Building carry-out and delivery sales

It is understandable that there is a sense of panic in the restaurant industry. However, you can do things now to mitigate the effect on your restaurant(s). Our partner, Norton Creative, a restaurant marketing and design agency, has shared a number of initiatives that...

How to manage operations in this delivery-only time

For most restaurants, there have always been three ways to serve guests and make money: dine-in, takeout and delivery. Now that government authorities, in an effort to help flatten the coronavirus curve, have required all dining rooms to close, you’re left with only...