Local catering strategies to grow your restaurant

Justin Ulrich
You bet. No, it’s great to get you in here because, as you know, the podcast is focused on local marketing. And, you know, one of the kind of viewpoints that we’ve never really gotten a strong take on, although it’s been sprinkled in a little bit, is catering. So I’m super excited to get you to weigh in on catering. 

But before we do that, why don’t we get started talking a little bit about your background and what got you to start the company Crumbs?

Kelly Grogan
Yeah, you know, I think I’ve had a really exciting journey back from when I was, I think, 14 and legally able to work working within the restaurant space, and was always excited about, can you add extra sprinkles? Can you add bacon? Can you add avocado? And really just the upsell side of things. 

And I swear, the core of it was always, how do you make the most of every transaction? How do you make the most of every customer? That’s whether they’re in front of you or they’re ordering from you. And so my journey has led me through the restaurant space, also through the entertainment space. Fruit and chocolate, you kind of name it. 

I always like to joke that I was pre Mr. Beast Burger. So I was involved in sort of selling virtual brands before it kind of blew up. And really was a thing. And the crazy thing was that in speaking with all these operators, they were always sort of asking the question of, what can I do to get more transactions? 

And this, I think, was a thing even before the pandemic, but more so was escalated during the pandemic, when people were turning towards things like virtual brands, was, you know, I need more revenue inside of my four walls, and where do I go to get it? And where do I go to get it as sort of easily as possible, given the resources that you have. 

And so in my time at Virtual Dining Concepts, it was something where I just had a great appreciation for these operators, that they would do anything and everything to be just cooking one more order and getting one more transaction out the door. 

And so that’s sort of what sparked my passion for Crumbs and what we do is we help local operators and sort of finding more of those transactions, you know, helping set them up for success and really having that one more order or that program that brings 20 guests in or, you know, really having that visibility inside of the local market. 

And, you know, a lot of that is catering. But I think it all, you know, at the end of the day, catering orders stem from, you know, being, you know, visible in the local community and really, you know, honing in on the local marketing side of things.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, 100%. We’ve had some good conversations and points brought up during previous episodes with like, Geoff Alexander and Gregg Majewski around catering, which we can kind of talk to a little bit a little later in this episode. 

But, you know, what’s your take overall on catering? Like, we know, and that’s a very broad question, but we know it’s an excellent revenue stream that may not be tapped into. Like, why do you think folks may not tap into it? What makes it such a good revenue stream? Just what are your thoughts on catering in general?

Kelly Grogan
Yeah, a lot of people right now, it’s a buzzword, I think kind of like AI is everybody’s like, catering and do catering. But where I think operators are sort of struggling with that, you can’t just do catering. It really requires sort of a separate set of attention. It’s a separate business in and of itself inside of your restaurant. 

You need a different sort of process for being able to not only get those orders and have guests place those orders, but also the way that your internal team is sort of handling and executing those orders. When we look at the easiest way to get more catering orders is it’s to do a really great job on executing orders when you do get them, because those will become the repeat customers that continue to order. 

And so for operators in sort of defining what their catering program looks like, it is different than your normal growing delivery sales. It’s different than getting another transaction in the building. You really need to take the time to define what catering means for your restaurant. And I think that’s different across all operators. 

We work with ice cream concepts and dessert concepts. Catering for them is very different than a barbecue chain that’s doing on-site full service catering and can lean into having servers and sternos and white tablecloths and all that good stuff. And so it’s a really sort of personal experience, I think, for the brand. 

And they need to (a) look at their sort of surrounding market and define what that need is, but also define what they can execute within their four walls. And I think it’s a growth process. Day one, they’re not going to be, you know, full scale caterers that have beautiful branded packaging and these enormous menus and every dietary restriction. I think you start small and as your team grows and gets comfortable with it, that’s where your catering program starts to evolve. 

But, gosh, when you look at catering and why it’s important for businesses, it’s just like delivery sales were. A few years ago, Doordash and Uber eats weren’t a thing. And people were like, oh, we don’t need to participate in delivery. We’re not going to need that. And it evolved, and what a crazy world to think that used to exist. 

But when you look at the catering side of things, it’s something where every brand is sort of taking a piece of it and defining what their strategy is. And catering is just such a great way to, I like to call it spiderweb transactions. Right? One catering order gets you access to, you know, 20 new guests. And so those 20 new guests now get introduced to your brand. 

And gosh, when you think about local marketing, that’s a dream for an operator, right? And, you know, catering, if you can get $1,000 in your door before you even open the front door, it’s a really great day from a labor perspective.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, for sure. Yeah. We talk a lot on this show about growing your audience. And many times it’s. Tapping into existing audiences is the fastest way to grow. This is no different. Like you just mentioned, if you’re able to get a catering order placed and you get in front of 20 or 30 folks that may or may not be familiar with your brand, if you could do it a couple times. 

So you provide that awesome catering experience the first time, they reorder, they reorder again. And those folks are going to want to share that experience with all their friends and bring them into your store whenever they’re not working, but looking for something to eat.

Kelly Grogan
And I think that’s right. That’s what local marketing is about. It’s about this relationship, community driven activity. And catering is literally bringing people around a table. Groups of, you know, whether it’s a catering order for some people, consider that five people or, you know, it’s 10 people, it’s 20, it’s hundreds of people. 

And connecting that from a local marketing standpoint, it’s bringing people together around your brand to enjoy it all at once and hopefully go home and talk about it or think about how great that sandwich was over the weekend and then they want to find out where your store is and then they become your next raving fan.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, for sure. Part of what you were saying earlier is we teed up a little bit around, like, just getting started. Like, if someone hasn’t really started leveraging catering as a revenue stream to their org, what are some suggestions you might have for them to do this week to get the ball rolling?

Kelly Grogan
Yeah. If you don’t have a catering menu, the number one thing not to do is to just take your existing menu and multiply it times ten and think that you have a catering program. You really want to take the time to make sure that you’ve got a profitable program, but a program that’s going to be crave worthy. Right. 

Something where the brands are, you know, your food’s going to travel well, the portions are going to be accurate, whether that’s, you know, not enough food or too much food, both of those aren’t a great experience. And so getting an understanding of what does the packaging look like, how am I going to transport, you know, 20 burgers or how am I going to transport, you know, five pounds of mashed potatoes? 

You know, you really want to go through sort of those mock procedures of what your catering menu would look like. Best places to start is to do some research in your area. You know, go online and look at some of those restaurant partners in your local community and look at what their catering menus look like for inspiration around it. Right. 

You want it to be true to sort of your menu, but a lot of operators have done the work to really define what, you know, a catering menu would look like so that it’s best portraying of your brand and it’s something that customers are going to order. I think the beauty of catering right now is that it is this ever evolving program. 

And the catering menu that you have online for corporate businesses is not the catering menu that you’re offering to local sports teams. It’s not the catering menu that you’re working with on apartment complexes. And so it’s really an evolution of defining catering within your four walls, looking at what is true to your brand, what travels well and what you want to be — sort of that best representation. 

Again, going back to, if there’s a table and 20 people are sitting around it, what is the best showcase of your brand and really honing in on those ingredients. It’s not about having the full menu.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, no, it makes total sense. If I’m at work, I’m going to order a sandwich or whatever it might be from a catering menu. But if, let’s say I want to serve real estate agents, you may cater with a tray of cookies or treats or something for them. Less around the full meal experience and more around something just to give a little surprise and delight for folks that come into the house or whatever it might be.

Let’s say, let’s say you have your menu nailed down. What are some ways that you would recommend for folks to then start gaining traction within their community to get their menu in front of folks and get their food in front of folks and start getting those orders coming in?

Kelly Grogan
Yeah, you know, I think the easiest way is talking about it. You know, you already as a restaurant have customers that know and love your brand and because they are in your local community, they probably work somewhere or they’re probably celebrating with their family somewhere. They have a kid that’s on the sports team and so it’s really important to talk about your catering program. 

And it seems so simple, but it is so crazy to me. Some operators, you know, they don’t feature it in their emails that go out. You know, if they’re doing the email marketing on a weekly basis, you can call it out at the bottom, in the footer, up at the top, or even better, have a dedicated one. 

Your SMS programs and really leaning into showcasing that to your existing customers is going to be the easiest way to grow it and get it out the door and really get initial feedback on the program. Once you start looking in the digital side of it and promoting it that way, we work with partners that run enter twin free catering for your office or showcasing photos of your catering program on Instagram and asking your followers to tag a local business. 

And so there’s a lot of ways that you can really sort of showcase your offerings and get it out there to people that already know and love your brand. And that’s the easiest channel. 

And gosh, when you think about the most expensive form of marketing that every restaurant operator has, which is their four walls, the real estate that they have. If you walk inside of your restaurant, where do you see catering? Do you have your packaging displayed? Do you have an ad on the door? Is there a card on the counter? Or your server’s wearing a pin? 

You know, whatever it may be, you want to make sure that catering is readily visible to your partners. And I think that people get really hung up in, well, I’m not a marketer. I’m not a marketer and I don’t know how to market and I don’t know how to, but this is just simply using your four walls. Right. And displaying it. You know, it doesn’t have to be anything crazy. It’s not a, you know, don’t get me wrong, you should have a full marketing calendar. But, you know, you can get started pretty easily.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, for sure. You know, one of the best forms of marketing is yourself and just one to one engagement and interaction with folks, you know, because people don’t buy from businesses, they buy from people. And if you’re able to go out into your community and establish relationships and, you know, maybe you’re highlighting other folks while you’re in the store or whatever it might be, but you’re also giving them a sample and letting them know that you have catering. 

It’s a great way to get in front of folks. Also, I believe both Geoff Alexander and Gregg Majewski called this out. But, you know, if you’re opening a new location area or if there’s a new business in the area, whatever it might be, just bring a catering sample box or whatever it might be, over to their location, surprise and delight them and just let them know that, hey, you know, you’re excited to have them in the community and you just wanted to give them a little welcome gift. 

And here’s a menu for if they ever want to do any catering orders or whatever. And it’s like you’re getting the product in their hand right then and there and you’ve gotten the hardest part out of the way is getting them to try it. Now it’s just a matter of getting them to come back. And roviding that surprise and delight and human interaction experience is going to be super helpful in getting that second trial of your product.

Kelly Grogan
Yeah. And Gregg and Geoff have just done amazing things. When you look at their catering programs. And Gregg, across all of his different brands, each program is a little bit unique and different, but you really nailed it from a community perspective. 

I think during the pandemic, we scaled back on all things community related. It was about hunkering down and sort of staying inside of your four walls and putting up the plastic. And I think we’re at a time now where we have to go back to some of those best practices we had about being visible in the community. 

You know, you don’t want to be just another restaurant that’s on the road that, you know, is open for your standard hours from eleven to eight and, you know, a standard restaurant. What’s setting restaurants apart today are the ones that are becoming visible in the community and doing just like, you know, Gregg and Geoff said, right? 

Going out, shaking hands, making sure people know you, making sure people have an understanding of your restaurant. And so when you look at the catering side of things, I think it’s really intentional. People have to choose to want to talk about catering and want to be visible in the community and wanting to set their restaurant apart. 

And there’s a lot of things that you can do. Again, going back to, you don’t have to be a marketing master to do these things. You just have to be focused on the customer relationship side of things, being service focused and really appreciating those that support your business. That’s what will continue to grow it.

Justin Ulrich
Have you seen any examples of someone who’s doing catering, like, really, really well? And it could be multiple facets of catering, like the marketing of it, the packaging, whatever it might be.

Kelly Grogan
Yeah. Yeah. You know, I think on the catering side of things, again, it comes in so many different shapes and sizes. You know, I work with a franchisee on the McAllister side of things. You know, McAllister’s Deli, their catering program has been around for so long and is so well defined. You know, they’ve got beautiful packaging, but there’s a person on the other end of those catering orders. 

And I think that that’s what really sets a lot of operators that have this full scale catering program apart is that there’s a person that’s calling to follow up on the order. There’s a person calling to say, hey, did you order enough food? You know, there’s a person saying, hey, we haven’t seen you in a while. And, you know, is everything okay? And so I think that that is something that really sets caterers apart in our space. 

On the packaging side of things, Sabrina over at PDQ with her restaurants, she showcases it everywhere. And it’s so amazing to see the packaging and feeding mouths of 500 meals going out the door. And for any restaurant operator, 500 meals, that’s no easy feat. And, you know, it’s a team effort. 

And so looking at their catering program and scaling it up to that point, it’s just so impressive to watch and to see, you know, going from not having a program to suddenly feeding at scale like that, it’s, it. I think it shows everybody that it’s possible, but, gosh, you’ve got to commit the time to it.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah, for sure. What exactly does Crumbs do for folks who are maybe looking to introduce catering into their restaurant.

Kelly Grogan
Yeah. So we support a lot of our partners today, you know, whatever sort of phase they’re in in the catering process. We say we like to focus on the local store marketing side of things. And obviously catering is a component of that. It starts with, you know, looking at your menu and making sure you’re checking all of the boxes to be most, you know, attractive to guests when they’re placing their orders. 

It’s helping to define some of those more specialized programs, like working with, you know, a car dealership or a sports team or a local college, really defining, you know, what those partnerships are, as well as sort of supporting the stores in driving their catering sales. 

So one of our key programs right now is saying, okay, let’s draw, you know, draw a radius around your store and say, let’s talk to every office manager, every administrative assistant, every key decision maker, and get them involved in those live conversations. And that’s so much more than just sending a postcard or sending an email. 

We actually engage with them live, invite them into the restaurant, and treat them to lunch on us, those people that we know are going to be placing catering orders in the future. So we tend to be an extension of a restaurant’s hospitality in really sort of helping them go and scale their catering program to be a visible community partner.

Justin Ulrich
Really cool. Yeah. That’s a good idea to actually invite them in to try as well, and they can get a sense for the whole brand experience that comes along. Coming into the four walls.

Kelly Grogan
Gosh. And then, you know, where the restaurant is. You know, I think as when you talk about sort of restaurants inside of the community, you think back to the excitement when somebody did a new restaurant opening. It’s this buzz, there’s balloons, there’s limes. It’s this energy. 

And a year passes, two years pass, and other restaurants open, and it kind of falls off from a priority perspective. And so what better way to say, I’m so proud of where I work and our catering menu and our experience that I want to host you and a colleague. Like, I want to treat you to lunch, I want you to come in. And I just think that’s hospitality, and that’s where relationships begin.

Justin Ulrich
It is. It is. Years ago, I worked for this company called Avero, and we had, like, a ton of the celebrity chefs in the space, used our product. All the, you know, like 95% of the Vegas strip used the product. It was kind of wild. One of my favorite things was I would do site visits with our account managers and we go into the different, you know, restaurants for, like, union hospitality group or Union Square Hospitality Group. Sorry. 

Or whoever it might be. And every time without fail, it was like we’d sit down and we’d be speaking with the GM, and it’d say, oh, you know, the chef wants you to try something, compliments of the chef. Try this, try that, whatever. And it felt so cool. It felt like you were an insider. 

If you could parlay, like, that experience over to someone that you’re trying to bring into catering, like, for a catering customer, bring them in within your four walls and say, not only lunch is on us, but we want to show you some of the operations or maybe try this or that or give them some samples of some different stuff and make them feel like a VIP. 

Then that really is going to solidify your relationship and build rapport and get them to want to order from you whenever they get the opportunity.

Kelly Grogan
Yeah. Well, and you think about it. If you’ve ever had to place a catering order or feed a group of individuals or you were on the hook for ordering lunch for the office, it’s a stressful situation and it’s a pain. And we could do a whole other hour on that. But when you think about the stress that goes into that, guests that are placing orders, they want to order from somebody, that’s going to get it right, that’s going to get it there. 

And when you’re scrolling through a marketplace or a platform or just trying to decide, you’re taking a big risk. And wouldn’t you rather take a risk from somebody that you’ve shook their hand, you’ve seen the four walls. You’ve seen them carrying bags and boxes out the door without being stressed and running around. And so I think that act of inviting somebody in defines us as that’s key hospitality.

 But that is the number one way to sort of open the door to that relationship so that when they do have to place an order, they’re like, gosh, you know what? Justin just invited me in for lunch, or, you know, who we have to try this time? It’s not a guilt trip, right? It’s something where they want to reciprocate the hospitality and showcase it back to you. 

And so I love that in the catering world, it’s not a formal presentation where somebody’s committing an hour of their day and it feels like, you know, a timeshare, you know, where you’re sitting down. It’s inviting them in for lunch and just introducing, shaking hands and showcasing, you know, everything that you should be proud of as a brand. And that’s what will keep your program growing.

Justin Ulrich
100%. 100%. All right, we’re gonna switch gears for a second. So we had a fun time at, I think it was at RLC, where Troy Hooper and the Pepper Lunch team had a pickleball tournament.

One of the things I called out that you’re a beast in the pickleball court. One of the things I remember is, like, you were really, really good, you and Chrissy Ouellette. Like, you guys were crushing. So I thought it would be fun to take that experience and imagine what it’s going to be like maybe at the next pickleball tournament, potentially FS Tech and show you in full pickleball warrior mode.

Kelly Grogan
That’s my uniform. I’m ready to go. You know, the shoulder pads, I think the way that I’m diving, I think they’re critical.

Justin Ulrich
I was like, I thought it would be funny. I was like, who? Like, there’s no one dresses, like, intensely to go play pickleball. So anyways.

Kelly Grogan
But I don’t know, we might need a helmet for you next time.

Justin Ulrich
We might. If I try to play.

Kelly Grogan
Yeah.

Justin Ulrich
For those who don’t know, at RLC, I was giving someone directions and looking at my phone and ran directly into a tree.

Kelly Grogan
The tree attacked him. It was jumped out of nowhere.

Justin Ulrich
Yeah. Nothing like starting off a contest with, like, a weeping sore in your face or conference. Sorry. Anyways, before we let you go, how should folks follow you? Follow Crumbs?

Kelly Grogan
Yeah, definitely. You know, connect with me on LinkedIn. Kelly Grogan. You can find us at RestaurantCrumbs.com, as well as you can find us on LinkedIn as Crumbs as well. And we love talking about catering, but more so love talking about the local store marketing side of things and helping operators get that one extra transaction. I think it makes a big difference these days.

Justin Ulrich
100%. Yeah. And I’ll just vouch for Kelly. So for those who are listening, her content is incredible. Recently saw a really cool webinar that she hosted with Rev Ciancio. Gold nuggets. Knowledge bombs dropped one after the other for. It was like a half hour, 45 minutes. It was really incredible. Content that’s highly worthwhile. 

So I highly suggest you follow her, check out Crumbs. They do a great job working with folks to try to promote their businesses at a local level. Kelly, it was a ton of fun having you in the lab. Thanks again for joining us.

Kelly Grogan
Hey, thanks for having us. And looking forward to more of these. I love it.

Justin Ulrich
You bet.

As always, thanks for joining us in the Local Marketing Lab. This podcast was sponsored by Evocalize. To learn more about how Evocalize can help you grow your business, visit evocalize.com. 

If you learned something from today’s episode, don’t forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and follow us on LinkedIn and Facebook @Evocalize. That’s Evocalize and on X at Evocalize. 

And remember, keep innovating and testing new things. You’ll never know what connects with your customers best unless you try. Until next time. Thanks for listening.