The Death of Dine-In? How Off-Premise is Reshaping Restaurants
The catering and food-at-work movement represents a major opportunity for restaurants looking to diversify revenue streams and reach new customers. Erle Dardick, host of "The Catering Cage" podcast, sees catering as a critical business-to-business channel that many restaurants are still struggling to fully capitalize on. While most restaurants now offer some form of catering, truly scaling and optimizing this channel requires significant investment in technology, training, and dedicated sales teams.
According to Dardick, the efficiency of catering operations is the next frontier for restaurants. This includes implementing standalone order management systems separate from point-of-sale systems, as well as exploring automation and robotics to streamline food production. The goal is to be able to profitably fulfill high-volume catering orders alongside regular in-store operations. Suka predicts we'll see more restaurants essentially becoming food manufacturers to serve multiple channels efficiently.
The podcast discussion touched on how economic pressures may drive more companies to provide meals for employees as a perk, potentially expanding the corporate catering market. This trend harkens back to the early 1900s, when many companies fed workers on-site due to low wages. As young consumers face housing costs and other financial strains today, employer-provided meals could see a resurgence.
While some major chains like Panera Bread and Jason's Deli have strong catering operations, Dardick believes there's still huge untapped potential in this space for many restaurant brands. He's hosting a catering workshop in October to help operators develop strategies around building out their B2B channels. Key focus areas include sales team structures, technology implementation, and operational workflows.
The conversation also explored how ghost kitchens and retail product lines (like Wow Bao's frozen offerings) represent other B2B opportunities for restaurant brands to leverage their intellectual property. These strategies allow restaurants to reach new customers and diversify revenue streams beyond traditional dine-in service.
Overall, Dardick sees catering and other B2B channels as critical growth avenues for restaurants facing headwinds in their core dine-in business. While building out these capabilities requires investment, it allows brands to fully monetize their food production capacity and brand equity across multiple sales channels. As consumer habits and economic conditions evolve, optimizing these off-premise revenue streams will likely become increasingly important for restaurants' long-term success.