all you can eat

lunch for me used to be alot of construction guys… now theyre not as busy or not around, I was thinking of an all you can eat salad/ stix/ soup combo. Anybody ever try this? like olive garden style, mostly have schools,doctors or dentist offices around so lots of ladies but none coming for pizza. Teachers and nurses have limited time. I was thinking this would be quick, I just have a feeling that I am not thinking of some of the downfalls. Have seating for 30, soup warmers already have, warmer for stix and make salad per table. Anyone can fill me in on the negatives??

I have the same demographics as u kay, so please lets here a response, my lunches r not even worth being open for.

Hi there, im from auss, not sure were your from but thought i would let you know how i go with all you can eat. Some days i will fill my resturant, other days i will set it all up have every thing out and ready and nothing happens, but i also do take aways during the day. I would sugest you try it, give it a go and if it doesnt work well at least you tried it. I would suggestyou do some advertising first to let every one know your opening for all they can eat. Here all you can eat is like the lastest craze, every one is doing it and a lot of people wont go out for lunch or dinner unless you have it. Hope this helps. Sorry to any one ready, my spelling is awfull today.
Cheers. Brad.

May I discourage the use of texting in your replies. Complete words are such an affordable luxury these days. :lol:

Checking out the competition (ALL lunch places around here), the consensus is that the lunch crowd needs very quick service. The only lunch diners here are hourly workers who get 30 minutes to eat. It is imperative that we have something in front of them 5 minutes or less from them ordering. Otherwise lunch is dead. They simply cannot wait 10-15 for service and still make it back on time. We are considering ready salads, soups, and say, three types of pizza that are always making their way through the oven. For hot sandwiches, we are thinking of setting one of our conveyors up for high heat, short time impingement cooking to melt the cheese.

The key is that we MUST CONSISTENTLY have them eating in 5 minutes AT THE LATEST. However, we have quite a way to go to design the items and processes to achieve this.

Do a search in past threads for this. In order to make it a profitable venture, it requires volume . … . lots of customers. Without adequate traffic, the concept tends to struggle to overcome waste and food cost for often lower per customer pricing. I think the conversation with GobPile (a former member here) is a classic thread I can remember that discusses issues for succeeding doing a buffet line with repeat trips.