Buffets have gained incredible popularity in India over the past few years. After the corporate boom in cities like Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi NCR, restaurants cashed in on the buffet style of meal by offering corporate discounts. Next thing you know, the frequency of families dining out shot up and buffets seem to be the popular choice. As a diner, buffets are inviting because of the variety of food available on a spread. All of that variety comes at a reasonable cost for them. Also, it helps people in a group who want to eat different things.

This style of dining has come a long way from only Indian restaurants serving buffets. Now, every other Chinese restaurant offers buffets to their customers. Five star hotels are known to have impressive spreads of buffets to attract more and more diners. People see value for their money in buffets and for restaurants it means much more. Like any other idea, this one too has its pros and cons.

The good parts

Variety

As mentioned earlier, customers opt for buffets predominantly for the variety they get for the money they pay. If they were to order every dish they wanted from the menu it’d cost them a lot more. As a restaurant, you have advantage over the no buffet restaurants. Since large groups and families prefer buffets these days, it works out great for you. You can rotate dishes as you like according to your inventory and keep customers happy with new dishes every now and then. It also is a great base for marketing your restaurant whenever there’s something special on the menu for buffet especially during festivals and other holidays.

Save on cost

With buffets you won’t have to have most of your staff taking orders and serving your customers. Since the diners have to get their food themselves, you only need a few of your people to monitor the service to check for refills, whether a diner needs anything, just observing how everything goes and such. Buffets are a great way to use up inventory in the kitchen in bulk so you can restock. You also save time and staff effort by skipping the serving dishes since diners hit the buffet directly with plates.

Low fuss

To an extent, yes. Customers know what they’re getting and can’t customize the dishes as per their taste. This helps in relatively smooth flow of operations and your staff can be slightly more relaxed during these services. Diners only expect a wide variety of food for them to choose from and make their own tasting menu of sorts and won’t take any of the staff’s time to alter their food. The food needs to be cooked in massive portions and then laid out in time for lunch or dinner. Get your prep right and it’s going to be a easy service. When diners have a good time at buffets they tend to come back because it becomes a family ritual of sorts.

The not-so-good parts

Wastage

Getting your chefs to cook all that food and to see it go waste will not only make your heart bleed but also your bank account. The thing about buffets is that, you need to keep the spread of dishes full to draw diners further to them. But it’s never a sure shot thing to work. It’s extremely unpredictable whether or not people will flock to your restaurant on any given day. Instead of families and large groups as you’d like, if single or just a couple of tables are filled the wastage of food sure pinches your pocket.

Staff alert

Yes, you won’t need as many people on the floor as mentioned earlier. But the ones who do end up looking after the buffet service have a tough afternoon or night. Not just refilling the dishes, but also maintaining hygiene standards, attending children who are a part of the large family groups and making sure everything runs smooth. In the kitchen cooks are constantly ensuring food is prepared on time and there’s enough to refill. Live station counters chefs have to keep dishing out fresh food as and when diners appear.

Reputation matters

Many restaurants take years to build their reputation. All it takes is one bad experience for a customer to nullify the good ol’ past. Be sure to maintain every check required to put out food in large quantities. Hygiene being the most important one. You don’t want what happened to a few restaurants happen to yours as well. Working with huge quantities of ingredients and other supplies can lead to negligence and carelessness. The owner or manager of the restaurant should monitor each process meticulously to avoid any incident during service.

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Not just a regular all you can eat buffet, you can also introduce sit down buffets where the meal is fixed and will be served at the table. This is one way to control portions to avoid wastage. Most restaurants in five star hotels and some of the up scale stand alone restaurants have the concept of pre fixed menus. A 3-course meal with a beverage. This works great for a corporate lunch. People don’t need to even think about what to order or eat. It’s already decided and all they need to do it show up at the restaurant. These are the alternatives to a standard buffet if you want to change things around a little at your restaurant.