With so many accommodation options out there, hotels need a hospitality experience worth booking—and that includes dining. Providing crave-able dishes, along with buzzy atmospheres and the kind of memorable dining experiences that keep guests coming back again and again (whether they’re staying or not), can help your property stand out.
Don’t think of your hotel restaurant as just another amenity. It can be a major revenue driver (and award winner) that can shape your reputation while enhancing guest satisfaction and helping to attract locals for a taste of the action.
Quick links:
- The elevated dining experience
- Diversifying revenue streams
- Attracting local diners
- Setting culinary trends
- Operational best practices
- Case studies: get inspired
The elevated dining experience
Hotel guests crave convenience and an elevated experience across every aspect of their stay. That’s what an exceptional hotel restaurant delivers in one fell swoop.
Rather than forcing travelers to navigate unfamiliar areas, hunting for quality dining each day, hotels can provide convenient, exceptional food on their own premises that exceeds expectations. A pleasant setting, creative menus developed by acclaimed chefs, and a level of hospitality that makes guests feel like VIPs are the kinds of touches hotel restaurants provide.
Diversifying revenue streams
While wowing guests is reward enough, hotel restaurants crucially provide properties a valuable additional revenue stream beyond just room fees. And as visitor demand shifts between high and low seasons, these food and beverage profits become even more important for balancing earnings.
How big of an impact can hotel restaurants make? Research shows that a well-run hotel with a restaurant can see its eatery account for about 20% of revenue—a significant number that contributes to the bottom line.
It’s not just captive guest spending, either. Unlike hotel gift shops or in-room dining programs, restaurants can effectively market to locals and travellers to drive consistent non-guest covers. That requires restaurants with creative concepts and strong marketing.
Properties that treat their hotel restaurant operations as true revenue generators rather than amenities can significantly increase guest spend across the board.
Attracting local diners
Speaking of drawing non-guest diners. Effective hotel restaurants use strategic marketing to position themselves as must-visit dining destinations that attract a steady flow of locals and other travellers in addition to overnight guests.
OpenTable’s vast network of verified diners and booking capabilities makes it easy for hotel restaurants to get their names out there. Properties can promote everything from happy hour specials to lavish tasting menus through custom-tailored email campaigns and Experiences to give guests unique and memorable dining moments.
This integrated marketing approach combined with a creative hook is incredibly powerful for driving major awareness and repeat visits from locals and visitors alike. Maybe it’s Michelin-starred chefs or innovative cuisine celebrating regional flavours. Or perhaps it’s weekly themed events, special holiday menus or an aesthetic setting like sweeping waterfront views.
Regardless of the specific angle, hotels can make their restaurant a true calling card that brings sophisticated diners to their doorstep again and again. Not only does this tap new revenue sources, it enhances the property’s reputation as a must-visit hospitality destination.
Setting dining trends
With the right backing, hotel restaurants have major flexibility to be creative and experimental with their cuisine. From trailblazing new genre mashups or championing emerging ingredients to avant-garde presentations, there’s no reason why a hotel restaurant can’t provide the perfect platform to set the trends.
One potential example could be a plant-based cuisine and menu celebrating locally-grown seasonal produce. As conscious consumption and sustainable sourcing go mainstream, a hotel restaurant could be at the forefront elevating these concepts with innovative tasting menus and a renewed focus on agricultural storytelling—especially if the menu reflects the hotel’s core values around sustainability.
Even simpler trends like themed dessert tastings or zero-proof craft cocktails often find early adopters and major acclaim within forward-thinking restaurants willing to set the tone for future dining habits. There’s no reason why a hotel restaurant can’t adopt a similar trend.
The hotel restaurants committed to charting new territory are the ones being celebrated by media outlets and industry insiders. And that kind of influential buzz drives tons of value for the property.
Operational best practices
Of course, those praise-worthy movements and innovative dining experiences don’t emerge without steadfast operational fundamentals and seamless integration with the larger hotel operations.
Here’s a quick checklist for hotel restaurants to optimise their offerings:
Staffing and training
Attracting and retaining top talents is priority number one. From lucrative career paths and benefits packages to rigorous, standardized training for delivering consistently excellent service—hotel restaurants need to invest in their people to succeed. Success is underpinned by the day-to-day staff.
Technology and systems integration
Running a hotel restaurant needs a management platform that looks after everything from reservations and table management to marketing campaigns, guest data, and service analytics, all while integrating with hotel operations. It should also integrate seamlessly with your other systems.
Menu and concept strategy
Menus should be designed by chefs and consultants with an eye toward seasonality, local flavors, and even unique themes. Offering suite menus and amenities for in-room dining is also a smart choice thanks to its potential to boost revenue while enhancing the guest experience.
Marketing and promotions
With a standout dining concept and menu program in place, integrated marketing has a central role to play in promoting your restaurant and letting outside guests know they can book a table.
Reporting and analytics
Hotels should use restaurant analytics tools to forecast dining revenues, optimize promotional cadences, and identify guest behavior trends. If you have someone who stays at the hotel regularly, using guest data can make their experience even better when they stay and dine.
Adherence to brand standards
Maintaining pristine presentations and a service that’s reflective of the hotel brand’s standards across all restaurant operations—from uniforms to plating to personalized hospitality—is non-negotiable for building guest loyalty and long-term value. Tools like guest profiles and pre-shift reports help maintain consistently excellent service.
Case studies
Ready to see hotel restaurants effectively putting all these strategies into action? Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants uses dining to enhance the guest experience across their properties.
Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants
Kimpton stands out for its commitment to operating exceptional restaurants across 73 locations in 49 cities throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. The group prioritizes creating “ridiculously personal experiences” while using smart technology to achieve consistently high service standards at scale.
A partnership with OpenTable allows Kimpton to maximize reservation channels, analyze guest data for personalized service, and execute creative marketing promotions across their portfolio of unique restaurant concepts.
As Joyce Cremin, former Senior Director of Marketing & Strategy at Kimpton noted, OpenTable helps them “know preferences ahead of time and share vital information across the group.”
By using OpenTable, Kimpton manages everything from local menu updates to special experiences, while maintaining oversight at the corporate level. The group particularly benefits from OpenTable’s reputation management and reporting capabilities, which help them understand guest feedback and track performance across all locations.
“OpenTable has really listened to our specific needs for both the corporate and local levels of our business,” said Cremin.
A strategic tech integration, combined with Kimpton’s dedication to hospitality, helps them create memorable dining destinations that delight both hotel guests and locals alike.
Learn more about Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants story
Hotel restaurant power-up
Whether embracing cultural heritage or championing emerging trends, hotels that successfully transform their restaurants into buzzworthy dining destinations elevate themselves to new levels of prestige and profitability.
That requires consistent creativity, meticulous execution, and taking advantage of technology like OpenTable to streamline every component from reservations to staffing to marketing. For hotels that get it right, the payoff is an unbeatable edge and full dining rooms.
