Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It’s also the best because you kickstart the day with food. For the most part, it can make or break one’s morning. Gone are the days when you would wake up to elaborate breakfasts made at home, mostly by mothers. There’d be aloo puri, paranthas, rava dosa, idli, vada, uttappam and what not! Gradually things changed around the urban Indian household. Corn flakes filled the bowl instead of upma, juice from a tetra pack replaced the tumbler of freshly made hot chai or coffee.

In metro cities, people are too busy to stop for a bite these days, let alone cook a breakfast and eat at a leisurely pace. Restaurants that serve breakfast have been playing a crucial role to help their diners get started with their day. More so since the rise of start-up companies, young working professionals want their breakfasts to be quick – to be served and to be consumed. More and more food establishments are leaning towards breakfast service because it’s an extra stream of revenue without the madness of a lunch or dinner service. To make it even better, by only adding a breakfast delivery service option works like magic when done right. Let’s look at a couple of things before you can put up a board that says “open for breakfast!”, shall we?

Do you fit the bill?

A cafe, QSR, fine dining, casual dining, pub or a bar? Does your kind of food fit the requirement of a breakfast meal? Is your location ideal to serve and deliver breakfast? You need answer all these questions before going ahead with the idea. Commonly, besides fine dining restaurants the others mentioned previously have the required infrastructure to start a breakfast service or delivery, simply because they can be flexible in their styles. A fine dining, not that they can’t, but the other factors like location and cuisine don’t make them seem fit for a delivery service. A casual dining restaurant—let’s say serving north Indian food—can serve parathas, aloo poori, lassi and the likes for breakfast. They will certainly have an audience for it. On the other end of the spectrum are pubs. A few years ago, pubs began to open their doors early to serve breakfast. And that turned out to be a huge hit. From appams and stew at the local watering hole to eggs Benedict at a posh pub, breakfasts in nightlife spots have become a weekend favourite.

Service or delivery?

Breakfast service works perfectly well during weekends. Everyone’s relaxed and walk into a cafe or a pub for breakfast at leisure. It’s also a great time for diners to catch up with friends and family and spend time with them over food. But on weekdays, busy office goers don’t have the time to spend 30-40 mins in a restaurant the first thing in the morning. But they do need breakfast. If you connect the dots here, you’ll know that it reads ‘delivery’. You don’t even need to open your restaurant’s doors for service. Just get the kitchen going and the delivery staff ready. Ideally, people get to office by 9 and between then and 11 AM is your breakfast window. If you’re going the delivery way, make sure the food you’re sending out is suited to be delivered. For instance, egg dishes are great, but not something like egg Benedict. That’s ideal to be served in the restaurant.

What’s cooking?

If you’re going to do this, get your breakfast menu ready. Sit with your chef and chalk out what can be done for breakfast in short time. If you’re a casual dining restaurant serving American style food, it’s a no brainer for you to serve omelettes, pancakes, waffles, sandwiches and the likes. They’re low on cost and high on value. On the other hand, Indian style breakfasts like idli, parantha, poori, kachori need a lot of time in prepping and cooking. But again dishes like poha, upma and vermecelli are the ones that wouldn’t take as much time to prep and cook. As mentioned in our older post about effective menus, keep it short and crisp so the options are clear and the customer won’t need to waste time browsing the menu. What you’re looking to serve is quick to make and quick to serve dishes that are delicious yet not elaborate. Which means low cost and high value.

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Considering your location is ideal for either a dine in service or delivery, and that your competitors are not serving similar food, you’ll be fine. Before you go all out with breakfast service, do give it a trial run to see if the neighbourhood warms up to you. Invite a few people in, send out breakfast sample deliveries to your loyal patrons and get some feedback so you can improve on it even before service begins.