2025 Restaurant Industry Trends, Challenges & Goals
November 11th 2023
With the rise of technology and new developments regarding labor shortages and inflation, we're feeling optimistic for the year ahead!
Inflation is expected to be lower, yet still present throughout 2025, offering unique opportunities to the restaurant industry. Use AI technologies and innovative solutions to your advantage to set your property up for success. In this article, Prospera Hospitality explains the latest restaurant industry trends and offers unique insights to prepare restaurant owners for 2025.
Use Inflation to Gain & Maintain Customers
Problem: Inflation – Opportunity: Reduce operating costs & create customer loyalty
Inflation impacts every industry, but the restaurant industry can especially face big challenges as a result of rising prices. With the cost of living continuing to rise, consumer behavior dictates fewer ‘luxury expenses’ such as going out for dinner or spending the night at a hotel.
Although fewer people may be traveling, those who do are searching for high-quality experiences. Prospera’s proposed solutions for the challenges of inflation on restaurants include:
- Optimize your menu: Build a menu that optimizes operations and ingredient usage. For example, reuse ingredients in various dishes, use scraps and leftovers for alternative meals and prepare meals in a way that saves ingredients, time and workload. This will help reduce food waste and could decrease inventory and operational costs:
- Simplified inventory of ingredients
- Streamlined recipes
- Less electricity to store unused food
- Less costs towards waste management
- Simplify your supply chain: Save costs by ordering more items from fewer suppliers. This can often help reduce shipping costs, decrease costs for buying in bulk and receive discounts when ordering multiple items.
- Prioritize customer loyalty efforts: Keep your guests coming back with seasonal menus, special discounts and rewards. Think of birthday discounts, a stamp card for the 10th coffee for free or discounted meals for in-season produce.
- Use technology for data & automation: Streamline your accounting, inventory, invoicing, ordering and more with smart POS systems and dedicated accounting software. Introduce customer service robots to elevate the customer experience, help streamline operations, and reduce operational costs. 76% of restaurant operators in the United States believe that technology can give them a competitive edge. Are you ready to invest?
Sustain Your Restaurant With Green Initiatives
Problem: Demand for sustainability – Opportunity: Sustainable, long-term business practices
Invest in the long-term vision for your restaurant with goals that consider the sustainability of resources, operations & workforce.
- Manage food waste: Adjust your menu to your guests’ needs, ingredient prices and seasonal produce. Not only will this help reduce overall costs, but it will also be an important step away from unnecessary emissions and waste.
- Use estimation software: Let technology support your calculations of guest demand, expectations and numbers. Accurately predict the amount and type of guests you’ll have to purchase the right ingredients, taking into account dietary needs.
- Recycle (and make it easy): Recycling initiatives can vary per county, so if your restaurant already offers recycling options, make sure they’re easy to use. Use images to show staff and guests what should go in which bin, and make cooking oil recycling bins easily accessible to your staff and the pick-up crew. And if you don’t have recycling bins yet, get on it!
- Offer ‘green’ food options: Include plant-based options in your menu and serve your food and drinks on ‘real’ plates, cups and utensils. Stay away from single-use items as much as you can (this has multiple benefits that we’ll get further into later).
Sustainability Demands & Expectations
Although sustainability isn’t a new concept, it is becoming an increasingly popular demand (and must-have) for guests seeking out a place to dine. In fact, 36-50% of younger people (Millennials + Gen Z) are willing to pay 20% extra for a sustainable meal vs. a non-sustainable alternative.
Ready to go green?
Find and Retain Quality Employees
Problem: Staffing shortages – Opportunity: Improve employee productivity and retention
Staffing shortages continue to be a challenge in 2025 and labor costs are on the rise. But instead of increasing workload and burning out your employees, Prospera suggests a unique solution to support lean teams while elevating customer service: technology!
Technology solutions to help with staffing, training and employee satisfaction and retention include:
- Recruitment software: to help attract, screen, interview and train candidates
- AI technology: to optimize staffing, scheduling and operations
- Handheld labor tech: for faster service with mobile payments and ordering
- Training resources & incentive programs: to retain staff
- Food service and cleaning robotics: to support workers
Reduce workload with smart scheduling, employee benefits and technological initiatives. Let AI help manage your schedule and let robots perform tedious tasks so that your staff can focus on what’s important: your people!
Position Your Restaurant to Thrive in 2025
Stay ahead of the curve with the latest technology and turn challenges into opportunities for your restaurant. Whether you're looking to retain existing guests and loyal staff, implement sustainability initiatives or take the customer experience to the next level with robotics, our team would love to help.
Your restaurant is unique and we would love to hear all about it! Contact us now to schedule your consultation.
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