As the main point of interaction between the customer and the business, furniture plays a key role in ensuring that the customer receives great service.
Anyone who owns a successful commercial enterprise will tell you that furnishing your establishment effectively is the key to maintaining productive employees and satisfied customers. The right commercial furniture allows businesses to combine style and practicality, making sure that you create an atmosphere which combines great looks and comfort. Providing effective and intuitive units for customers to use is vital for ensuring successful interaction between the user and the business, especially in service-based industries such as retail, food and hotel establishments.
What is Commercial Furniture?
Commercial furniture covers a wide variety of different products. From restaurants and bars to offices and university campuses, every major business or organisation requires a variety of different units such as tables, seating and outdoor facilities. These units differ from regular furniture as they must conform to the demanding specifications of commercial use: products must hold up to daily heavy wear, remain safe, allow for easy maintenance and match the style of the business.
Here at Trent Furniture, we want to provide a comprehensive guide covering everything that you need to know about purchasing commercial furniture for your workplace or business. We look at how to find practical and stylish units to ensure that your business looks great and functions as well as it possibly can.
What Sort of Furniture Does a Commercial Business Need?
Providing a range of furnishings is the most obvious part of running any business but, surprisingly, it’s one of the hardest things to get right.
While the specific needs of each workplace will vary from business to business, all commercial furniture must have one feature in common – it must provide the best experience possible for the customer, employee or visitor. That means that ideal furnishings must deliver comfortable seating, plenty of space and meet the customer’s high expectations.
Visual design is also a major factor – ideally, all furniture will be in keeping with the branding of your business. A well-furnished establishment will coordinate the furniture with the rest of the design to create a consistent and professional style.
Here are some examples of commercial furniture that you’ll need
Commercial chairs and Seating:
You’ll want to ensure that you order enough units to provide adequate facilities for your customers - an establishment without anywhere for people to sit is essentially turning business away. Make sure you are making the most of the available space.
Tables for business:
when providing customers with a surface to eat or drink from, hygiene is key. All table tops must deliver a smooth, wipeable finish to prevent the accumulation of dirt, debris and stains. Nobody wants to eat from a dirty-looking table, so it’s important to get the right finish to impress customers with great presentation repeatedly.
Bar Stools and Tables:
Bar furniture must cater for a livelier atmosphere - tables and stools are usually much higher to account for the fact that most people will be standing in a more relaxed environment.
Outdoor Commercial Business Furniture:
Whether you’re a restaurant offering al fresco dining or a pub with a beer garden, commercial furniture can be specially tailored towards outdoor use in order to provide resilient facilities able to withstand all weather conditions.
Benches for businesses:
Benches provide an excellent cost-effective solution as well as making efficient use of available space. Perfect for smaller establishments, benches offer clear advantages when catering towards large groups of people.
Practical Examples of Commercial Furniture
Commercial furniture must be designed in a way that is suitable for its environment, provides clear directions and serve as an efficient solution for the business.
We’ve broken this section down into each specific business to give you some ideas on how to choose the right furniture to suit your exact needs. This non-exhaustive list covers the needs of different industries and provides some examples of how successful establishments are using commercial furniture to provide a great experience.
Restaurants:
This year, British diners are expected to spend a whopping £54.7 billion on eating out, making 11.5bn visits to restaurants, pubs and other out-of-home food companies. With plenty of potential revenue up for grabs, it’s important that your restaurant provides a great experience. In such a fiercely competitive industry, you need to provide a fantastic experience to ensure that customers continue to dine at your establishment.
Bar+Block, a recently opened steakhouse chain, has opted for a bold, contemporary look with a mix of natural-finished wood and bold primary colours. The combination of bar stool seating, single chair units and circular booths offer a wide variety of options, highlighting the chain’s welcoming and versatile ethos. Trent Furniture’s extensive catalogue features a multitude of similar bar and group seating solutions, making it easy to create a similar look and feel.
For more inspiration, this year’s Restaurant and Bar Design awards demonstrate some of the most cutting-edge interiors currently in use within the industry. From Michelin-starred restaurants to small bars, the awards ceremony goes to show that any business can achieve a great interior with a bit of perseverance and a little know-how.
Bars and Pubs:
One very important consideration for bars and pubs is the fact that these establishments are built for people to relax and unwind. Patrons who have had a few drinks on a Saturday night might not be quite as respectful towards the furniture in a bar as they would be in someone’s living room and the furniture choice must take that into account. This means that stools, tables and outdoor seating must all be able to withstand a little rough usage and remain extra resistant to general wear-and-tear. Something with a concrete base, such as our Rectangular Pyramid Table will help to ensure that your furniture stands up to light damage for years to come.
If your bar or pub serves food, then you’ll also have to take into account many of the same factors as a restaurant would. However, many bars opt for a more relaxed dining atmosphere. Choosing easy-clean tables and chairs for your bar gives customers the opportunity to eat anywhere.
For a more rustic style, The Kings Arms in London is a great example of how to furnish a busy pub. The décor successfully combines sturdy furniture with a great traditional look while still providing excellent functionality.
Thankfully, Trent Furniture offers a range of products covering all different looks and styles. For relaxed drinking and eating, our Shaker Coffee Table provides an elegant solution for any popular establishment. The low height of this design makes it ideal to pair with a sofa or tub chair – perfect for a more casual atmosphere.
Hotels:
Smaller chairs are usually a better choice for hotel rooms – guests will often like the option to move the furniture around the room to suit their own needs. This is especially relevant for rooms fitted with TVs, as different people may have unique preferences or special requirements which mean they must be sat closer to the screen.
A relatively small, lightweight unit such as our Portobello Tub Chair delivers the comfort of an armchair while still remaining easy to move around. The flexible and space-efficient design allows the Tub Chair to fit into a wide variety of different rooms, making it a perfect choice for the budding hotelier.
Wedding Venues:
For a wedding venue, you’ll need something which provides both comfort and the ability to fit any estate or another venue quickly and hassle-free. For these purposes, stacking chairs are a practical solution which can be easily stored without sacrificing quality and comfort.
Our Taunton Stacking Chairs are perfect for weddings at a wide range of venues. The classic gold-framed design delivers a fantastic look while remaining lightweight enough to be easily moved into place.
Reception Seating:
From the moment customers walk in, furniture plays a vital role in ensuring that they are greeted with a welcoming atmosphere. Whether you are providing seating for a hotel, bar or an office, a comfortable sofa makes a great first impression.
The classic Chesterfield sofa is one of the best ways to seat guests as they enter the premises. The iconic deep buttons of the Chesterfield have been a staple of the service industry for over a century, and for a good reason. The unit provides a great, classic look while remaining a cost-effective seating solution for smaller hotels, restaurants and clubs.
The thick leather exterior is resistant to wear and requires little maintenance, providing a comfortable unit which will stand the test of time.
Leisure:
Whether you are operating a leisure facility, all furniture must conform to very specific standards. When used for youth clubs and other activity sessions, furniture must be robust, stain-resistant and able to withstand accidental damage. Tables and chairs in dining areas will inevitably be subjected to dropped food and spillages, meaning that the unit should be finished with a resilient material which is waterproof and stainproof.
Find out more about leisure furniture here, our article offers a wide range of inspirational ideas for businesses involved in the industry.
The Challenges of the Industry
As an integral part of any business, commercial furniture must, in addition to being functional, ensure that no further hazards are created. From wobbly chairs to splinters on tables, each piece of furniture poses its own risks.
Making sure that customers have access to facilities is a key challenge within the industry, with safety and durability remaining as the two core principles of commercial furniture design.
Making Sure Furniture is Safe
Health and safety are the foremost concern for any employer. Nothing matters more than ensuring that all employees, customers and visitors are provided with a comfortable environment free from potential hazards.
All corners, frames and edges must not feature sharp edges, especially if the business is family-friendly. In addition to this, all glass items must be manufactured with shatterproof or tempered panels when used in public locations.
We are proud to hold all our products to the highest standards of health and safety checks and ensure that we deliver outstanding solutions for a safe customer experience.
Delivering Outstanding Durability
No matter which industry you work in, commercial furniture undergoes significantly more usage than units found in the home. Restaurants and bars will see high traffic throughout the working day as various customers rest, dine and drink on commercial furniture units.
In order to remain visually appealing after a period of heavy use, all commercial furniture must provide a degree of durability to resist the wear-and-tear which occurs on standard units.
When you purchase all new décor for your business you want to ensure that it lasts. Trent Furniture offer a one-year guarantee on all new commercial furniture units to make sure your establishment’s new units provide the longevity you deserve.
Where to Find the Right Furniture
Check the website:
When making sure that your furniture is coming from a reputable manufacturer, seller or supplier, checking online should be your first port of call. Reliable websites will provide all dimensions, safety information and pricing guidelines as well as a secure way to pay.
Trent Furniture is proud to offer Sage Pay and HTTPS security as standard on our website. We pride ourselves on being a reputable, well-established and transparent business, going the extra mile to ensure customer details are safe. For more information, check out our detailed guide on buying furniture online.
So, there we have it – a comprehensive guide covering everything you need to know about buying new furniture for your bar, restaurant or other commercial business. The main thing to take from what we’ve covered is that a lot of thought and care goes into selecting the right commercial furniture for each particular business. With the right knowledge and a great understanding of your company’s needs, however, this guide should have provided you with everything you’ll ever need to know about selecting the right commercial furniture to suit your needs.
Still not sure what’s best for your business? Our friendly and helpful team are always on hand to offer expert advice. Give us a call on 01162 867 291, or pop in and see us for yourself at our showroom on Regent Street Industrial Estate, Narborough, Leicester, LE19 2DS.
Trent Furniture is one of the UK’s leading suppliers of high-quality contract furniture. With a proven track record of providing furnishings for a wide range of industries, Trent is more than capable of tailoring something to your needs.
For more specific information about your industry, our archive features advice on a range of different topics.
To request a quote or place an order, please call our sales office on 0116 2864911 or email sales@pubfurniture.co.uk.