The British love affair with food and restaurants shows no sign of abating. TV shows such as Masterchef draw audiences of millions, while our appetite for eating out has shown renewed growth: a recent survey by the Office for National Statistics shows that UK households now spend around £45 per week on restaurants and hotels. Much of this goes on the casual dining sector. In the year ending June 2016, casual dining outlets did £5.07 billion in sales, an increase of nearly 35% on the figure for June 2010.
New restaurants – both independent and chains – continue to open, giving consumers an unprecedented choice of cuisines and dining styles, from Mexican fast food chains such as Chipotle to “slow food” restaurants such as Pizzicotto in London.
It was not always thus. In the decades from the turn of the 19th century until the 1960s, British people rarely ate out. And if they did, it would mostly have been at a chain such as Lyons, whose tea rooms and Corner Houses were a mainstay of the British high street from the Victorian era until they began to fall out of favour in the 1960s and 70s. These offered table service (served by smartly uniformed waitresses famously known as “Nippies”) or self-service teas, snacks and simple meals at reasonable prices.
But what was interesting about Lyons was that, while it was by no means an upmarket brand, the company nevertheless served its customers in stylish and well-designed surroundings. Furniture was simple but elegant, many window displays at the Corner Houses were designed by an artist, Kay Lipton, while interiors – often in the Art Deco style - were designed by the noted architect and designer Oliver Percy Bernard. Lyons was a company that appreciated the importance of style and design. In today’s jargon, it was offering more than simply food; it was selling an “experience”, and good design was an integral part of it.
If you run a restaurant or are planning to open one, you will no doubt have an appreciation of the importance of offering your customers a good, all-round experience. And furniture will be a vital part of this. So here are five tips for buying the right restaurant furniture.
Are they sitting comfortably?
The fast-food industry has a repertoire of tricks to discourage customers from lingering. Research has shown that fast, loud music increases diners’ chewing rate from 3.83 bites per minute to 4.4 bites per minute. Ensuring that chairs are not too comfortable also encourages diners to move on, freeing up space for the next sitting. But, clever as these techniques are, they are more suitable for the fast-moving high-turnover world of fast-food chains rather than the independent sector. For independent local restaurants, the aim is to build customer loyalty and ensure that people will come back, rather than giving them a sore back. With this in mind, comfort should be uppermost in your criteria for restaurant chairs; before you even think about appearances, bear in mind that your customers will need to feel well supported and stable. The Parson chair is an increasingly popular design, offering good back support along with comfortable upholstery. Alternatively, chairs with arms are a more expansive option; they may take up more space, but customers will appreciate the chance to stretch out. Other chair options include bistro chairs with wicker or woven seagrass seating, or wooden spindleback chairs.
Form and function
While comfort is paramount, your chairs – and tables – should also be pleasing to the eye. And they should fit in with the theme or design scheme of your restaurant. If yours is the kind of place that offers formal fine dining, your furniture should offer uncomplicated elegance, as well as comfort – your customers will want to linger over their meals without going numb. Simple white or creamy-white upholstered chairs can be matched by tables draped with white linen tablecloths and napkins, creating a calm, quiet environment.
A more contemporary look can be achieved with clean modern designs, with lots of metal and chrome, though care must be taken here to ensure that comfort is preserved. With furniture design there is often a trade-off between style and comfort; a beautiful chair is not always one that’s easy to sit on. (Swiss designer Stefan Zwicky, for instance, came up with a version of Le Corbusier’s classic LC2 armchair that was made of solid concrete: impressive to look at, less so to sit upon.)
Banking on the banquette
Banquettes, benches and booths are an increasingly popular option for restaurants. Customers like them because they are comfortable and offer greater privacy. Families dining with children often prefer booths, as it keeps parents closer to their children so that they can be on hand to help with ordering, cutting food, etc. For the restaurant, booths and banquettes can be a more efficient use of space; generally, a booth will seat more customers than the equivalent space using tables and chairs – though most restaurants using booths will offer them alongside traditional tables and chairs. For themed restaurants, such as American-style diners, benches can be upholstered in brightly-coloured vinyl or faux leather.
Colour sets the mood
Colour psychology is an area of growing importance, as retailers and designers come to appreciate the role of colour in establishing the “mood” of a brand or a retail outlet such as a restaurant. There are colours that are calming and there are colours that are stimulating. The colours used in a busy, bustling Mexican restaurant are likely to be reds and yellows, while a calmer, more upmarket establishment might use white, neutral shades of blue and green, or perhaps some black, which signifies power and prestige. Your decorative scheme will be vital in setting the mood, and upholstery, furniture and linen will be part of this. Restaurateurs might be reluctant to go to the expense of buying upholstered furniture as they will have understandable concerns about wear and tear and cleaning. But today’s fabrics are more durable than ever, and also easier to clean. With this in mind, your options become wider; fabrics and finishes can be chosen to match your colour scheme. If tables are to be left uncovered, ensure that they are sympathetic to your scheme; dark stained wood will not go well with otherwise light and airy decor.
Be flexible
So, you’ve established your theme and your colour scheme. But the story isn’t over yet. Back in the days of Lyons tea room and Corner Houses, mealtimes were rigid: breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner. Today’s consumers, however, are much less set in their ways. Eating out is no longer such a big deal; it’s something people might do on the spur of the moment, with family or friends. People might want burgers at 11am or Eggs Benedict at 7pm. And they might dine alone or with a large group. So your furniture, like your kitchen, needs to be flexible. Imagine you have six people turning up unexpectedly. Unless you have a free both (see above), to seat them quickly and smoothly, you might need to shunt some tables and chairs together. So, when planning your seating layout and buying furniture, bear in mind that they might need to be moved around; you’ll need a mix of larger and smaller tables. And finally, be sure to leave enough space for customer privacy and for your staff to move freely between tables. A rule of thumb is that each customer will require an absolute minimum of one square metre of space – though this figure is for fast-food outlets; a full-service restaurant will allocate at least 1.5 square metres per customer, while for fine dining it should be around 2 square metres. In today’s restaurant business, the customer is king; if they feel they are being squashed and squeezed, they will go elsewhere.
