Ms. Blau

Food & Beverage

The Fourth Meal Period: Creating a successful brunch in your 3-meal restaurant

By Elizabeth Blau, Founder/CEO, Blau & Associates

Co-authored by Tim Martin, Senior Research Analyst, Blau & Associates

Sunday Brunch: it has a certain cache to it, a sense of excitement we all get from calling our friends and arranging to “get brunch”, to rehash the events of the weekend, spend some quality time with family members, quietly nurse a hangover, or recharge before the coming work week.

A good brunch can be the perfect finish to a weekend for guests and a great revenue generator for operators. Additionally, it can be an excellent demand generator for walk-in traffic and locals; while providing an easy, profitable, signature meal period for your three-meal restaurant. At our restaurant, Simon at Palms Place, in Las Vegas, Nevada, we were able to create a successful and signature brunch out of a previously dinner-only concept by focusing on four key factors:

• Maximize available space
  
• Provide variety and choice
  
• Involve the guest
  
• Establish a clear and distinct service style

Brunch provides a unique and fun opportunity to establish a concept within your regular concept, and build the ever-important word of mouth about your restaurant.

By applying these principals to your existing restaurant you can also create a successful brunch that transcends your regular service and offerings.

When we moved Simon from a dinner only hotspot at the Hard Rock Hotel to a three-meal restaurant in the newly built Palms Place, we were confronted with the task of developing a new signature meal period. Traditionally brunch in Las Vegas is dominated by large casino’s “destination” buffets. We felt that brunch presented a great opportunity for us because we could offer a unique atmosphere and service, but we were limited by our space. While Simon is a beautiful David Rockwell designed room, it is set up as a traditional full service restaurant. We did not have the necessary equipment or space to build a traditional brunch buffet, and our regular breakfast service was a la carte, so we had to figure out how to make brunch work. We decided to create a hybrid buffet and a la carte service offered to guests for a fixed price.

Simon at Palms Place Hotel & Spa in Las Vegas

In creating our new hybrid we felt that it was important to offer a solid buffet experience but also utilize our existing space. Our restaurant features a beautiful sushi bar and we felt that the counter provided the perfect location for our buffet. In addition we were able to use the existing stations to offer interactive buffet items, having a sushi chef making rolls for guests, turning the tempura station into a Panini station, and offering fresh smoothies and protein shakes made to order. We loaded the guest facing side of the counter with cold or ambient offerings such as house made pastries, miso soup, childhood favorite cereals, raw bar, and smoked fish and bagels.

To compliment our buffet we developed a menu of a la carte hot items designed to be shared among the entire table, whether it was for one, two, or twenty. We approached this by asking ourselves what our favorite brunch categories were, and then expanding each category into fun and playful offerings. For example we built an entire benedict section with a choice of 5 different types, ranging our extremely popular lobster Havarti, to a play on steak and eggs, to a chicken cordon bleu. Our cuisine is generally focuses on fun takes on American comfort food, and we included a “White Trash” section to cover all of the diner classics, chicken fried steak, biscuits and gravy, etc. Our guests were encouraged to order a variety of the hot items and to help themselves to the cold buffet while they waited for the items to come out.

In addition to the buffet and menu items we offered two signature drink services: bottomless mimosas and a make-your-own Bloody Mary bar. The Bloody Mary bar was built on the regular bar taking advantage of the corner space in between the service bar and the patron seating and featured a wide range of condiments, pickled items, skewer accouterment, and hot sauces. Guests who ordered the Bloody Mary bar were brought a tall glass with ice and their choice of Vodka, and were then invited to help themselves to all that was offered. This not only saved our bartenders a significant amount of time, but introduced a key element of customization into the guest experience, with guests creating elaborate and exciting “Bloodies” just they way they wanted.

Tying our whole brunch experience together was our decision to offer service with the wait staff in pajamas. The “Pajama Brunch” became our signature calling card and created a fun and relaxed atmosphere appropriate for Sunday brunch in what during the week, was typically a more formal restaurant. We gave our servers T-shirts, Paul Frank pajama pants and Converse shoes, and outfitted out hostesses in oversized dress shirts, mini shorts, and high heels. Additionally, we encouraged guests to wear their own pjs if they wanted, again helping to contribute to distinct, defined, and fun ambiance.

Our brunch has become one of our most singularly popular weekly meal periods and drives a considerable amount of revenue through the restaurant. Additionally it provides a key differentiator for us from other three-meal casino and hotel restaurants in town, and has helped to generate valuable positive word of mouth buzz. The lessons learned through this process can be applied to many dining outlets if you consider the four key factors of maximize your space, provide variety and choice, involve the guest, and establish a clear and distinctive service style.

Maximizing your space. I often say when it comes to establishing a demand generator it is important not to feel you have to reinvent the wheel. There are many options for configuring brunch and it is important to take advantage of the space and equipment you have available. Not only will this help ensure smooth service and easier training for your front of house staff, but it will also help ensure increased revenue. Private party rooms adjacent to the main dining room can make for excellent buffet areas. If you utilize cart service for desserts or cheese, offering tableside selections can be a great use of this equipment. Look for under utilized spaces in your room that could be set up as fun stations, such as our Bloody Mary bar. It is important to consider service flow when choosing these areas, but maybe you have a central server station that is not in use on Sundays, with a little effort this can become an anchor and totally shift the feel of your room.

Providing Variety and Choice. Brunch can be a temperamental meal for some diners, not quite breakfast, not quite lunch, it is hard to decide what to eat. It is important to provide a variety of options and choices for your guests. Having both hot and cold items, breakfast items, and lunch items is obvious, but look at your concept and your menu and think if there are things you can offer your guests that they would not have otherwise thought of. Differentiate yourself in the breadth and creativity of your savory offerings, the sophistication of your sweet offerings, or the comforting nature of your specials. You have a lot of flexibility here with your concept, and providing a more casual, or a more sophisticated interpretation of your cuisine can be a differentiator and a welcome variation for your guests and staff. This can also be an important and inspiring creative exercise for your kitchen staff and an excellent way to utilize leftover or scrap product from the preceding week.

Involve the guest. Whether it is the basic choose-your-filling omelet option or a more involved build-your-own menu feature or buffet station, it is important to provide interactive and customize-able offerings. Guests respond well to interactive options and the sense of ownership created by the act of choosing, crafting, and building an item in a restaurant can help develop a strong sense of enjoyment, as well as encourage repeat business. Additionally, interactive and customizable menu options provide excellent material for word of mouth, as guests regale their friends with recaps of their creations, whether it be a unique breakfast sandwich combo (think Elvis here) or an insanely spicy Bloody Mary.

Establish a clear and distinctive service style. Your brunch service will define the meal period as much as the food, and far too often brunch service is lackluster. Find a theme or differentiator to focus on. This can be a great time to field recommendations from your servers, and incorporate their opinions. Brunch is a unique meal period, and it is okay to stray a little from your normal SOP. But whatever you choose to do, commit to it, and make sure it can be executed in a way representative of your standards. Brunch is a fun meal, a relaxed weekend treat, and the service should reflect that. Create an atmosphere that welcomes and embraces your guests and you will be rewarded with their loyalty and appreciation.

Brunch provides an enormous opportunity for many three-meal restaurant operators, especially in the hotel environment. It gives you a chance to allow your staff to flex their creative mussels, to provide a break in the routine, and to develop a signature meal period that can expand and improve your brand identity. For hotels especially it provides an opportunity to build demand and interest in the local community and increase walk-in business.

This article was co-authored by Tim Martin. Mr. Martin began his culinary career with an internship with chef Bobby Chinn while studying abroad in Hanoi, Vietnam. After graduating from Hobart College with a duel degree in studio art and social theory he moved to Telluride, Colorado where he continued to develop his passion for restaurants, spending several seasons as sous chef at the Bluepoint Grille. He recently graduated from Cornell University Masters of Management in Hospitality program with a concentration in restaurant development.

Elizabeth Blau’s impressive food service career spans nearly three decades. Widely credited with transforming Las Vegas into a world-class culinary destination, she continues to lead the industry with her innovative and fresh approach to hospitality. Deftly distinguishing fad from trend, irrelevant from significant, Ms. Blau’s skilled touch defines her work in Las Vegas and around the world. Ms. Blau parlayed her extensive experience and expertise in the restaurant industry to found Blau & Associates in 2003. She adeptly assembled an impressive team of experts and turned the firm into one of the foremost restaurant development companies in the field. Blau & Associate’s client list reads like a Who’s Who of hospitality: Celebrity Cruises, Destination Hotels and Resorts, the Kor Group, One and Only Resorts, Montage Resorts, Paragon Gaming, the Ritz Carlton Hotels and Resorts, Trump Casinos, Viceroy Hotels and Resorts and Wynn Resorts, among many others. Ms. Blau can be contacted at 702-256-1665 or elizabeth@elizabethblau.com Extended Bio...

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