Pubs are missing out on serious upselling opportunities compared to fast-food outlets and coffee shops, trade experts told the Tenanted Pub Company Summit, writes Adam Pescod.
Katy Moses, business development manager for research consultancy him! said the average pub customer spends 78 minutes in a pub or bar at each visit. That is compared to just five minutes in a “food-to-go” outlet where the average spend differs by just £1.
“It is worth reminding ourselves of this golden opportunity,” said Moses. “If customers are willing to give us 78 minutes, then shouldn’t we be using them?”
Referring to figures from him!’s pub and bar customer tracking programme, OnTrack, Moses said that out of the 4,000 pub customers surveyed, 87% wouldn’t mind being upsold to, but only 11% were actually upsold to.
“That is a massive disconnect,” said Moses. “If you believe your customers do not want extra items, what about upselling premium?
“People are not looking for the cheapest drink and in all our research it is very rare that we get told that.
“Product and brand loyalty is far more important. Most pub customers do not know the exact price of the drink they have bought there today. Around 20% can get it within 10p.”
The data also revealed that pub customers don’t feel that pubs are the right environment to do work in.
“Only 3% of the people in the pubs where we interviewed were there for work reasons,” said Moses. “Ten times more go to work in a coffee shop than a pub.”
Daniel Davies, chief executive of CPL Training, explained how table service in pubs can drive sales.
“We recently ran a programme where I got the barstaff to go out when they were glass-collecting and ask groups of people sitting around the table “Can I get you the same again?”.
“Over the course of a couple of weeks, they reckon they got an extra round of drinks out of every customer in the pub.”
