With the economy being what it is how helping would it be to offer other sevices (ex. delivery,take & bake) to a c/o-dine in operation?
I think much of that would depend on your trade area. If your area is pretty dense in population, and there are other pizza places delivering, then I would say delivery would be a good idea. Delivery will of course take away a bit of your dine in and carry out sales, but it will also take away a bit of your competitions sales as well. So over all your sales should go up nicely. I think that would be a win win situation, for you at least! Now take and bake could be good as well depending on your areas demographics, check out the Take and bake thread going on right now, it is full of all the why hows and a bunch of good ideas. Good luck!
Much to consider when adding delivery. Of course, I wouldn’t exist without delivery. There are additional costs, including delivery insurance, added labor, equipment (i.e. bags, car signage), auto expenses. You need to decide if you’re going to charge for delivery or delivery for free. How will you compensate/reimburse your drivers? Can you use your existing staff or will you need to hire drivers? What is your minimum order for delivery? How big will your delivery area be? The bigger, the more potential customers, but it also increases the average delivery time.
As for Take and Bake, I’m a believer that you go with one or the other; not both. If you bake your pizzas, your customers will expect to pay less for a T&B. But your costs are essentially the same, regardless if you bake them or not. I would worry that T&B orders would cannibalize my normally “baked” customers, hence lowering my average check and raising FC%. I know there are some operators doing both successfully, but I personally just don’t see how adding T&B will help things in a slower economy… IMHO.
Food for thought… good luck