Of all of the cities I’ve visited (and at the time of this posting that total is 450), no other city in the world strikes me as being more of a “foodie” town than Singapore. In fact, on this same trip I flew with one suitcase through stops with glaciers, with deserts, with tropical rainforests, and with skyscrapers that are world-renowned. Paris was even on the list of stops for this suitcase. No other city came close in comparison to Singapore as being as centered-in or revolving-around food as Singapore. If you love food, perhaps the best city in the world for you to visit is Singapore.

As part of a three month tour, I spent two months in Asia with half of that in Phuket, Thailand. Of all the places I’ve been, Phuket was the best for a spiritual renewal. I arrived with empty tanks and left with a new best friend (Lilly the elephant), a new favorite restaurant, an amazing culinary adventure of the island, and most importantly, a glimpse of what life really is all about – valuing experiences over things.

During my month in Thailand, I came face to face with the reality of how many things about American life are not conducive to true happiness.

This is the closest thing to paradise on Earth I have experienced. I wanted for nothing, except possibly a wife to share it with. I will be back. I hope you too will experience the magic of Phuket for yourself.

Any foodie should have Berlin’s KaDeWe high on their list of travel destinations. Opened in 1907 by Berlin merchant Adolf Jandorf, KaDeWe is the largest department store in Europe. Up to 180,000 customers visit daily and make their way through the 7-story shopping paradise. The store is 60,000 sm (approximately 650,000 sq ft!).

The top two floors are dedicated to food. During my trip I spent 3 hours mulling around in fascination. I don’t think I was nearly as amazed as a kid on my first trip to Toy’s R’ Us as I felt to walk around KaDeWe as an adult.

Coca-Cola has on their balance sheet an asset for brand equity, otherwise known as goodwill. It places the value at $50 billion. To put that number in perspective, if you stacked $100 bills on top of each other you would have a stack 3,459 feet high for every billion dollars (a stack of $100 bills 32 miles high). Try fitting that in your wallet.

Surely we can all agree that the real value of Coca-Cola isn’t in the recipe. After 100 years, a better tasting sugar-water could have been invented. The real value is the brand and the bedrock of the brand is “genuine” and “authentic”. Or, as they sum up in a successful campaign “The Real Thing”.

The book The Experience Economy has been around for a while and I’ve long recommended it (we even did a book report on it). The follow up book by the same authors is titled “Authenticity”. It also is a must-have in your personal library.
With 1,000,000 restaurants in the United States alone, differentiation is a key tenant of successful restaurant marketing. At the heart of differentiation is authenticity and being true to what your company stands for.

I found this clip for you of the author of Authenticity and Experience Economy. These principles are essential components of restaurant marketing.

“It’s not the strongest species that survives, but those best equipped to evolve”, Charles Darwin

“The only true disability is a crushed spirit”, Amiee Mullins

Preparing to meet adversity rather than avoiding it is a powerful distinction Aimee Mullins made in a recent speech for the renowned TED Conference. Being born without shin bones she gives a very inspiring talk that I hope you will watch and reflect upon. Her message: Adversity is a shadow that’s always with us, and its ability to embrace adversity that that helps shape who we are. Certainly this is a message that can resonate with all of us in these challenging times.

My mother always told me, “It’s the fire that tempers the steel.” I have to say I whole-heartedly agree with this sentiment. Truth is, the most challenging and difficult times of my life have turned out to be the ones that best helped shape me and instill in me characteristics and values that I wouldn’t trade for the world.

For those of you that have been through The Landmark Forum, you understand the power of language. The language we use is about more than a spoken word and communicating a need or emotion. The language we use is a capsule that encases our values, perceptions and outlook. Our unconscious choice of words can define our conscious beliefs of our own abilities, worth, contribution and most certainly our mood and emotion. This short 20-minute speech gives new depth to the influence of language to shape how we see ourselves in the world and the potential we use or lose.

Aimee’s message is also about the power of opening doors for others. This is a critical concept for the restaurant industry as we consider our approaches to recruiting and retention of the best talent.

If you are typing the phrase “Restaurant Consultants” in to Google or another search engine, you are likely a restaurant consultant checking your search result rankings, or you’re a restaurant owner in need of help.  If you are the former, you may be insulted by what I have to say as I plan to debunk shady marketing and expose wannabe restaurant consultants.  If you are the latter – an actual restaurant company seeking a consultant – I think you will find the below an informative guide for avoiding the quacks.

•    Restaurant Consultants - Aren’t Created Equal – There are so many quack restaurant consultants on the Internet today that it makes my head spin.  Actually, it makes my stomach turn.  I’ve given serious consideration to getting out of the profession all together; or at a minimum, inventing a new terminology.  Abe Lincoln once said, “Associate yourself with men of good quality, for it’s better to be seen alone than in bad company.”  It seems these days there are fewer and fewer restaurant consultants showing up high in the search rankings that I want to be associated with.  Seems there are plenty with just enough knowledge of search marketing to show up high in the rankings but then not sure what do for the prospective clients they actually get to call them.

•    “International” – I’ve seen “wherever there’s a need” as the stated place of business for a couple of restaurant consultants.  It made me chuckle because when you look at their client list, they don’t show any international clients.  Check their passport.  Are their clients paid clients or just website visitors?  You’d be surprised how many “global restaurant consultants” have never even left the country (at least not on assignment – maybe a cruise or something).  Having worked abroad on actually feet-on-the-street restaurant consulting assignments isn’t necessarily a prerequisite of consulting, but it is an indicator of smoke and mirror approaches when someone claims vast international knowledge and experience but doesn’t actually have any.  It should be a red flag.

•    Consultant Versus Employee – Check to see if the experience they reference is actually restaurant consulting experience or if it’s past employment.  One consultant claims to be the “operational mind behind The Cheesecake Factory”.  I’ve consulted at an executive level for The Cheesecake Factory (the entire senior staff of The Cheesecake Factory) and can tell you first hand they aren’t the kind of company to turn over the reins to Johnny-come-lately restaurant consultants.  It’s more likely this “consultant” worked as an employee for The Cheesecake Factory in an operations capacity, which is far different than working in an executive consulting capacity.  Being good at your job doesn’t make you a good consultant.  There is a technical skill required to be great in restaurant operations, but you need that requisite knowledge and an additional skill set in executive-level consulting to be considered top of class in the world of restaurant consultants.  It’s like the difference between being a good waiter and being a professional wait-staff trainer.

•    Portfolio – Ask to see a portfolio of completed restaurant consulting projects.  It’s one thing to drop names of big restaurant companies; it’s another to show the actual completed work.  Sure, there may be restrictions on showing some work due to confidentiality agreements with the client, but I am surprised how often restaurant consultants show off big company logos as clients but didn’t actually complete meaningful work for them.  You’d be surprised how often the logo they use and experience they have was working as a waiter for that big company, not serving as an executive-level consultant to them.

•    Full-Service or Limited-Service – There are many restaurant consultants on the web that have niche experience, but not exposure to a wide range of complex restaurant industry issues.  There are restaurant operations consultants, and restaurant marketing consultants, restaurant social media consultants and restaurant franchise consultants – it goes on and on.  There are a lot of types of restaurant consultants.  Not only are there distinct disciplines, there is the exposure to different cuisine types and boots-on-the-ground exposure in different markets and geographies.  Even if your restaurant chain is regional, restaurant consultants with a global perspective can be worth their weight in gold; especially for the aspiring restaurant chain.

•    Quality – Another thing that cracks me up and is a sure giveaway of wannabe restaurant consultants is poor website design.  There are more than a few groups out to claiming to be top restaurant marketing consultants and design advisors, but with websites that look like it was created their nephew.  Common sense says that if the corporate website and professional marketing materials are less than quality, so too might be the firms advice and capabilities.  If a restaurant marketing consultant isn’t able to produce a WOW website for themselves, how can they produce wow results for your restaurant marketing efforts?

•    Not all Restaurant Consultants are Quacks – Admittedly, I am venting some frustrations I have with the shady practices of some unqualified restaurant consultants; quacks can give a bad impression of an entire industry.  Does that mean me or my firm are the only ones qualified?  Absolutely not.  In fact, there are some restaurant consultants in the field that I highly admire.  They don’t market themselves too much though.  They are good enough that they have robust consulting practices through word of mouth alone.  When they are not consulting, they are probably CEO of a major restaurant chain.  Actually, they probably don’t even want to be called “restaurant consultants”, even if they do provide the service.  Who are a few of the ones I admire?  Lane Cardwell is one.  Phil Romano is another.  Brad Blum is high on my list.  These are the guys with credentials and track records.  There are several more.  Credentials matter, but also important is to have a personality and philosophical match.  First you have to cut through the clutter of who is for real and who is out there just because they thought it would be fun to be a ‘restaurant consultant’ after getting canned from another job.  Once you weed through that though, you have to make sure you’re going to enjoy working together and see eye to eye (for more on bringing out the best in restaurant consultants, see: http://aaronallen.com/articles/great-clients-are-made-not-born).

Bottom line…

You’ve worked too hard for your money to blow it on quack restaurant consultants.  Don’t be “sold”.  Ask to speak to the person that will be working directly on your account; the day-to-day person, not the CEO or figurehead.  Ask for their credentials.  Interview them.  If you feel warm and fuzzy about it, that’s a big part of the decision-making process.  If it doesn’t feel right, no matter what their credentials, don’t do it.  You have to really trust in the consultant you choose to get the most out of them and the engagement.  It becomes a bit intimate and you want to be sure you’re partnered up with someone that’s not only sharp, qualified and experienced, but also someone that you want to bring out the best in and have them bring out the best in you.

Personally, I refuse work that doesn’t inspire me and pass on anything that doesn’t feel right.  You should do the same.  Don’t get lured in to working with someone just because they showed up high in Google.  Ask the tough questions too though.  Make sure you’re not dealing with a quack.  The signs are there if you look for them.

Oh, and please leave a reply on your experiences and thoughts regarding the above.  I’d love to hear from you.

Best of luck!

The restaurant service you receive today is a direct result of our collective willingness to complain yesterday.

The United States of America was founded on complaining.

In the American Revolution, ragtag bands of complainers came together to shape the future of our country and our culture.  In those days, “Taxation without representation” was the call to arms.  13 colonies united in complaint that it was unfair to send the fruits of our land to a foreign nation.  It was in this spirit of complaining that Americans overthrew a monarchy and established a democratic system of government that was unique in all the world.

Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Gandhi – all complainers. The U.S. Civil Rights movement was a righteous complaint that was finally heard, and that helped amend more than a century of injustice.

Every inventor, innovator and entrepreneur who has ever brought something new into the world was ultimately acting out a kind of complaint – saying, “This isn’t right – the world needs to change!”

Despite this proud history of effective complaining, it seems to me that today in our experience as restaurant patrons, Americans have lost our will to complain.  It’s become almost impolite to complain when we have a bad experience at a restaurant – as if, as customers, it’s not our place to judge. We have become a nation that hugs failures (like a mean ol’ grandma) because it’s more in fashion to swallow down bad service than to complain about it.

There was once a time that restaurateurs shivered at the thought of a complaint.  A complaint, in those days, like a virus, could multiply.  A complaint that was left unaddressed could metastasize into an incurable cancer on the business.  The mere threat of receiving a complaint from an unhappy customer kept service people on their toes.  My, how faint of heart we are today.

Complaining in a restaurant today may get you looked at like you’re a grumpy old man who is too uptight.  “Just relax…it’s no big deal,” your faint-hearted friends will say.

But here’s the problem with that attitude: if you’re a customer at a restaurant, and the restaurant provides you with an egregious service failure, you are perfectly right to complain.

If a waiter spills food on you, or your entrée is served at an unsafe temperature, or your salad is wilted and drowned in oily dressing, or you have to wait a ridiculously long time for a table with no communication from the surly hostess – all of these situations are well worth complaining about.

Not only do you have the right to complain, but I would argue that all restaurant patrons – especially the ones who genuinely care about the restaurant business – have a duty to complain.

That’s right: you as a restaurant customer have a duty to complain when your experience is anything less than satisfying.

When you complain about a bad experience at a restaurant, you are not being rude or “high maintenance” – you are actually doing that restaurant a favor. Every smart restaurant manager wants to hear from his/her customers – and real restaurateurs aren’t afraid to hear some less-than-positive feedback along with the cheery compliments. After all, if they don’t hear the complaints, how are they ever going to improve?

If you have a bad restaurant experience and you decide not to complain, you’re not being “polite” – you’re actually participating in keeping that restaurant from being all that it could be. By choosing not to complain, you may actually be contributing to the restaurant’s eventual decline and failure – which would ultimately mean the loss of jobs for everyone who works there, and the loss of investment by the restaurant owner. Don’t you think the owner would have rather heard some complaints along the way – that would have helped the restaurant improve – rather than only hearing niceties (“Everything was just great!”) and then losing the whole ship?

Whenever you complain, not only are you doing a favor to the restaurant, but you are also fulfilling a responsibility to the other diners who will come after you.

Tonight, as I write this, I am recovering from a ridiculous drinking experience inflicted on me by an F&B manager at a prestigious hotel in Dubai.  The manager insisted, rather belligerently, that a martini was made from a “mix” and that it should be four (4) parts “mix” to one (1) part liquor.  He thought that Martini & Rossi was a “mix” and didn’t realize that Martini & Rossi was just a ”brand” of vermouth, which is only a minor ingredient in the modern day martini.  Any current or former bartender in the world knows that a martini is more parts vodka  (or gin) than it is vermouth!  And certainly anyone in the beverage business would know that there is no such thing as “martini mix.”

So I complained to his manager, who needs to know about his employee’s cluelessness and belligerence toward a paying customer. If it were not for my complaining, this same manager would be the man to place final judgment on your issue.  So unless you want to be drinking a vermouth martini and choking down poorly cooked steak, surrounded by shabby décor and indifferent service, I strongly encourage you to join me in embracing our collective responsibility to complain.

It’s not rude, it’s not petty, it’s not “picky” – complaining is honest, honorable, and ultimately helps to create better dining experiences for all of us.

January 4th, 2010

Some restaurateurs are innovating new ways to find capital.

If you’ve been to a Cheesecake Factory, you probably noticed that the menus were filled with advertising.  I first noticed this fact myself when running marketing for a luxury resort and placed an ad to promote our spa services.  It was expensive!  Around $9,000 for six (6) months, at the time.  As a chain, Cheesecake Factory – which also happens to have a $10.9m average unit volume – pulls in millions selling ad space in their menus.  Suffice to say, it more than covers the cost of the printing.

With a $10.9m average unit volume, this restaurant chain could more than afford to print their own menus.

Even back in my small home town in north Florida, I found that my favorite oyster bar (hole in the wall) sold space on just about everything they could think to put an ad on.  Their menus and now even their tables have advertising.  You can bet the value of the advertising paid for the furniture and then some.  In fact, the little oyster forks they brought out were plastic Nathan’s Hot Dog forks (not sure how they ended up in this here).

So, the question: Is it a good idea to sell space in your restaurant to raise capital or does it damage the brand?

My opinion is that Cheesecake Factory should run the numbers again and come to the conclusion I did – you can make more money and better reinforce your brand by putting your own ads in the menu, not a local car dealer.  In the case of the quirky oyster bar, I think it adds to the charm.  The decision really is situation-specific.  In general it’s risky.  In some cases, it may actually pay off and furnish your restaurant at a profit.

Aaron D. Allen

It used to be that an upset customer would tell 10 people over several weeks; now they Tweet 1,000’s from their table.

It used to be that an upset customer would tell 10 friends over several weeks.  This could then spread past the original 10 friends in an organic fashion over several years until finally the reputation of the restaurant was tarnished enough to warrant improvements or to be ushered out of business.  Today, an upset customer can take a photo, write up a gripe from their mobile phone and Tweet it to thousands or tens of thousands of people instantly.  If compelling enough, these thousands can make a split second decision to forward it to their lists reaching thousands more.

Some big restaurant chains are taking a wait-n-see approach to social media.  They want to make sure it’s not a fad before jumping in.  Have they lost their minds?  Not only is social media the fastest growing segment of the Internet, it is unquestionably a game-changer that has forever altered marketing and communication.  These chains may not want to get involved in a proactive sense, but you can imagine how fast they will have to scramble to figure it out when the “Perez Hilton” of the restaurant industry sends a scathing Tweet and a photo of one of their employees in uniform picking their nose.  What then?

For example, one employee in Australia at a McDonald’s left out one letter.  That small oversight went viral.  Sure, there were cars honking and people laughing passing by the restaurant, but that was small in comparison to the thousands around the world that got a good laugh while drinking their coffee and checking their Twitter feed.

Simply put, Social Media is not an optional endeavor for today’s restaurant company no matter how large or how small.  It’s better to participate in a proactive fashion than see your brand carried away down the mighty river that is Social Media.

If your slogan goes anything like the above….change it!

There is not a restaurant in America that prides itself on having poor service, atmosphere or food; at least not a successful one. From McDonald’s to famed Charlie Trotter’s in Chicago – they all have good food, good service, good atmosphere and offer a good time. These points go without saying when they are true.

When a restaurant claims these attributes in their slogan it immediately confirms that the restaurant making the claim has so little creative juice and competitive differentiation that they are the restaurant equivalent of a generic paper brown bag. Such a slogan can only be the product of utterly inept brainstorming, marketing acumen and laziness. It immediately confirms market irrelevance.

I’ve traveled the world and have seen some version of this tagline repeated hundreds of times. Typically the restaurants are run-down road-side pubs, a burger joint run by someone that doesn’t really like people so instead of working for someone else they opened a restaurant, or a ubiquitous greasy spoon. Occasionally though, you see a restaurant that has had serious money put behind it and, as if looking after every detail except what makes the restaurant different, the owner thinks of a brainstorm idea of what to put under the name: “I’ve got it! What we sell is good food, good times and good services – let’s use that as our slogan”. Good grief.

Yes, I am a bit exasperated and it is showing. I just cringe when I think of someone putting their investment at risk in such a way.

If you or anyone you know has some variation of “good food, good times, good service” as a slogan, please seek immediate professional help. If you worked with a marketing professional that gave an approving nod to such a slogan, you owe it to yourself and them to put a great deal of distance between you both.

There are 1,000,000 restaurants in the United States all claiming they have good food, good service and good atmosphere. This is just the ticket in to the game though, not a point of differentiation. It’s like a tomato saying it’s better because it grew on a vine. Tell prospective customers something else. Tell them what makes you different.

Restaurant Industry Journalists –
Here are a few story ideas for your consideration…

We are seeing dozens of very interesting restaurant industry trends shaping up which would make for fascinating feature articles.  Here are a few bullet points of ideas.  Please let me know if any catch your interest:

1.    Middle East Growth - Currently 1% of the GDP of Saudi Arabia comes from the restaurant industry.  That is expected to multiply to 5% of GDP within less than a decade.  By comparison, the US market is currently around 4% and was at 1% in the 1950's.  In other words, Saudi Arabia will grow in 10 years to the level it took our market 50 years to get to.  Staggering growth which presents equally impressive opportunities and challenges.

2.    Small Boxes - The techniques that were applied to manufacturing over the years after the Industrial Age to make it more efficient are being applied to the restaurant industry.  Essentially, a restaurant manufactures food.  Industrial engineering is being applied and one resulting trend is "shrinking the box" - making a restaurant more efficient through compression of size, staff and menu focus.

3.    Foreign Invasions - The Dollar is on a discount right now and foreign restaurant companies are seeking their piece of the American restaurant pie.  The US is by far the worlds largest restaurant market (we do more in restaurant revenues than some G20 nations have total GDP).  Restaurant companies from the UK, Italy, Philippines, Africa, etc are planting flags on our soil with plans to grow in to top national chains here.

4.    Who's Running Social Media - It used to be that an angry customer would tell 10 people.  Today, that same customer can Tweet 10,000+ people from their table!  Social Media is growing at staggering rates and our industry seems ill-equipped to handle it.  While some restaurant organizations are embracing social media as a means of promotion, they are caught flat-footed when complaints and short-comings go viral.  Many chains have put interns in charge of social media; a move they would never consider for other more traditional media such as their advertising or public relations efforts.  This is a fundamentally flawed approach.

5.    "Fresh" is Industry's Most Bankable Word - Fresh is a magic word in restaurant marketing today. It conjures the most positive associations for consumers.  American's are not yet ready to eat "healthy", but they will eat foods that are perceived as "healthful".  Foods that are fresh are implied to be more healthful. This concept ties in to a number of other emerging trends such as the locavore movement, organic, raw foods diet, etc.  Subway has built a highly successful marketing program around its "Eat Fresh" campaign.  Wendy's recently launched a $75m campaign around 'fresh'.  Season's 52, a Darden Restaurants concept, learned early on that 'healthy' food was rejected by mainstream consumers, but fresh was lovingly embraced.  As it stands today, "fresh" is one of the most bankable words in restaurant marketing.

6.    Authenticity - The world’s most valuable brand, Coca-Cola, is The Real Thing.  Genuine.  Or, in other words, "authentic".  The rise of programs such as Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations are paving the way for more authenticity in food.  In fact, today's average consumer is far more educated than any previous generation when it comes to food and food culture.  Tex-Mex has declined while authentic Mexican food has grown.  Examples of this are found in the birth of chains such as Rosa Mexicana or the increasing fame and following of Rick Bayless.  To highlight the shift that has occurred, one could point to the rise in popularity of sushi.  In the 1970's few would have predicted that raw fish would catch on in middle America and micropolitan markets.  Today, nearly every town in America has a popular sushi joint.  Sushi started and remained "authentic".  Now, consumers are seeking out more adventurous, educated and likely to seek out authentic offerings.

7.    Intellectual Property - The legal war of the future for the restaurant industry will be in the genre of Intellectual Property.  Moving beyond trademarks for logos, battles will spring up over infringement of recipes, menu item names, trade secrets, and more.  An industry that has long allowed copycats to get away with infringements will start to fight and protect more than ever before.  Intellectual Property is one of the fastest growing areas of law and is influencing sweeping changes in nearly every industry.  Intellectual Property laws and practices will soon greatly alter how the restaurant industry conceives and protects its ideas and other non-tangible assets.

Having represented thousands of restaurants in dozens of countries spread across six continents, we have seen a lot.  We keep our finger on the pulse of the restaurant industry.  The above story ideas are only a few of the important trends we see shaping up in the restaurant industry.  If you are interested in any of the above story ideas or are looking for a source for another upcoming assignment, it would be our pleasure to help you.  We will provide you sources not limited to ourselves or our clients but help you in any way possible to get the story you are after.  It is our goal to become a trusted and go-to resource for you for years to come.

Looking forward to hearing from you!  www.twitter.com/qmg

To schedule an interview, please contact Kristin Thistle at 407-936-1010 or kt@aaronallen.com

No one wants to eat singing heads on their pizza.

It was during a late night show that I saw something even more repulsing than watching the real estate millions infomercial for the millionth time.  It was a television commercial for a beloved hot sauce brand, Tabasco.

Tabasco has been long revered as a leading hot sauce marketing case study and success story.  Their brand was strong enough to carry them beyond revenues for their core business of hot sauce.  Tabasco jumped from the grocery aisle and restaurant tabletop to the mainstream and sold everything from neckties to silk boxers with their brand equity.

Brand equity, like any other asset, can appreciate or depreciate depending on how you invest it.  The newest pizza commercial serves as a reminder that well-intentioned marketers can take a century old (once flaming hot) brand and reduce it to a mild and smoldering simmer.

I can get the notion of selling Tabasco with the idea that people staying up late are likely fatso’s that are stuffing their mouths with pizza while watching Jimmy Fallon – one can overlook that overstretched stereotype.  I also can understand the premise that adding Tabasco can make your pizza sing.  But literally singing?  Old men singing in harmony?  It’s like some sort of gone-wrong pimple remover commercial.



I’m all for innovative marketing and innovative ways to stretch a brand in to new segments or uses.  I’m certainly all for creative marketing ideas and even for new ways to use that bottle of Tabasco in the pantry.  Whoever sold the executives at Tabasco on running this commercial should have put as much salesmanship in to the actual commercial as they did convincing the brand managers to run it.

Will fading taste buds spawn a new diet craze?

The tongue has approximately 10,000 taste buds.  These taste buds are replaced approximately every two weeks.  However, as we grow older, some cells stop producing taste buds.  An average senior may have only half of their taste buds working.  It’s logical therefore to conclude that you would seek flavors that are twice as potent when you have only 5,000 taste buds compared to the 10,000 you had earlier in life.

There is inherent to man to natural desire to maintain the status quo.  Consequently, America’s aging Baby Boomers – of which there are nearly 80 million - are seeking out bolder flavors.  This presents an interesting dilemma for restaurants and foodservice companies that have consumers both seeking saltier foods and simultaneously seeking to lower their sodium intake.

The industry is responding in a variety of ways.  You may have noticed that recently there has been a mass adoption of sea salt over iodized salt.  Average casual dining chains, and even a growing number of fast-food restaurants have tossed out the iodized salt in favor of sea salt, citing the more healthful aspects of sea salt.  This and many other similar moves point to the movement of both consumers and industry toward more healthful foods that don’t sacrifice taste or quality.

There is even a prediction that we will see the rise of a “bold flavor diet”.  The notion is that the more powerful and potent the flavors of food, the less we need to eat of it to feel satiated.  Who knows, this could be the next big thing now that the Atkins Diet and South Beach Diet have started to wane.

Follow me at www.twitter.com/qmg

Placing an Intern in charge of your restaurant's Social Media campaign is akin to making them Ambassador to a country with 200 million people.

Children shouldn't supervise children.  As responsible adults, we all know the consequences.  So, why is it that Interns are now being saddled with the serious responsibilities of managing Social Media/Networking campaigns for multi-million dollar restaurants?

It’s doubtful any successful restaurant chain these days would put an intern at the helm of its public relations and media outreach efforts.  It is also doubtful that an intern would be the first- or last responder to customer complaints or suggestions for a restaurant system with 10,000+ locations around the world.  Finally, who would think that an intern would have more power and authority than the legal department in today’s mega chain?  As far-fetched as these ideas may seem, this is exactly what is happening.

Social Media and Social Networking are phrases that didn’t really exist five years ago.  Today, approximately 20% of all global Internet traffic is in the territory of social networking (namely Twitter and Facebook).  This shift is consumer interest activity has businesses chasing the Social Media ball and launching new "departments" to meet the growing demand.  However, many of these departments are being run by interns.  An example of this can be seen in Pizza Hut's recently highly-publicized exploit, "Twinterns."

While I am all for interns seeing real combat and getting up close and personal with the harsh realities of enterprise, I cannot recommend myself or others put them in charge of a company’s image--not for a small company and certainly not for a multi-billion dollar brand like Pizza Hut (@PizzaHut for the Twitter crowd).

Let's put this into better perspective.  If Facebook were a country, its population would make it the 18th largest nation on Earth.  Can you imagine assigning an intern as Ambassador to the world’s 18th largest country?  Why, then, would you put an intern in charge of your social media efforts?  Sure, you may want to dip your toe in the social media pool; you may have a wait-and-see attitude on whether to commit.  Regardless, would you appoint an intern to represent a nation of 200 million people?

The average “chain” marketing department is greatly regulated by the legal department.  Ads and messages are closely scrutinized.  The (often) grossly overpaid Chief Marketing Officer must pitch and obtain approval for any 30 second spot he may want to run.  Meanwhile, an intern (whose name the Chief Marketing Officer may not even know) is riding the social media wild horse, unsupervised!  Why?  The answer is simple--neither the marketing or legal department fully understand and realize the power, influence, size and scope of social media.  "Let's put one of those kids in charge who knows about all of that stuff."  This movement is not a video game, and although interns may know something about the latest X-box game, they are not equipped to handle this level of social marketing.  The stakes are high and the losses can be overwhelming.

Could it be that many top marketers are using the “silly rabbit, tricks are for kids” mentality?  Are they equating social media to some sort of fad or short-lived school yard game?  Certainly, we must be alert and change with the times.  However, social media is more complex than opening a symbolic department and sending out a press release to showcase our latest fashion. Social Media and networking is a very important component of the Internet.  It is perhaps the most important communication evolution mankind has witnessed in centuries. Social Media can be compared to a 10-year old child who is growing up quickly. In our society, we do not let youngsters raise children--we should not let interns command the newest marketing and communication phenomena that has been spawned within the last three years (if not the last 300 years).  The excuse, "But I didn't know," will be no defense when breaking the law.  Companies will still be held responsible for the actions of their employees.  There is no 'get out of jail free' card issued for a lack of knowledge.

The time is now to address who will be in charge of your Social Media Marketing effort. Ask yourself one last question:  If you wouldn't put an intern in charge of your PR department, why would you put them in charge of your Social Media Marketing effort? Involve an intern if you like, but never send your Brand Image lamb to slaughter.

After years of traveling the world, eating at hundreds of restaurants annually, and representing thousands of restaurants spread across six continents, I finally found time to get a blog going! It's about time, as I sure got a lot of flack about not having one up sooner.

So, what can you expect from this blog? There are tens of thousands of blogs, so I need to make sure this one stands out and is worth your time. Here's what you can expect:

Culinary Adventures - So far I have personally been to 35 countries. My goal is to visit all seven (7) continents, all seven (7) wonders, 70+ countries and all 50 United States. I'm more than half way to my goal. I'll take you with me all around the world; sending Twitter updates of cool places, blog posts of amazing foods and culinary adventures, and even slideshows of must-see places of interest to foodies and restaurant industry professionals. I'm seeking out inspirational travel, so if it moves me, I'll bring it to your attention. It will be sort of like an episode of Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations but from a restaurant consultants perspective, not a chef's.

Peeves & Praise - It's no wonder I'm single! No date of mine can put up with all the analysis of the restaurants we visit. As a seasoned restaurant consultant and 3rd generation restaurateur, I have a trained eye for how a restaurant should operate and it's hard to shut that off. This section of the blog won't be about random gripes. Instead, I'll post the good and the bad of my restaurant experiences in hopes of providing insights to help restaurateurs evaluate their own operations. It's like a traveling restaurant critic but evaluating from a consultants perspective. Oh, and I'll feature some of our new Restaurant Cartoon series, "The Peeves".

Restaurant Marketing - You can come to expect a heavy focus on restaurant marketing, branding and growth strategies from this blog. Having worked with thousands of restaurants around the world on just that, you'll get a steady diet of tips, techniques and trends focused on helping emerging restaurant brands grow. You'll get case studies of those doing it right, those doing it wrong, and approaches for senior management at high volume independent restaurant operations to the multi-national industry giants.

Industry News & Analysis - I'm fortunate to have a dedicated team of researchers that cull through thousands and thousands of articles each week to provide me with a custom restaurant industry news digest. It keeps me in the know with what's happening in the restaurant industry on a global scale. I'll share the best with you here on my blog, via Twitter and our newly launched newsletter: Aaron'sBrief (www.aaronsbrief.com)


Please keep in touch and let me know what you think and what you'd like to see. My goal is to give you a restaurant industry perspective currently absent among regional and national trade publications and to provide some inspiration on improving restaurants and embarking on global culinary adventures. You can rate blog posts and make comments too, so please get involved so this is a conversation, not just a one-way broadcast.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Best regards,

Aaron D. Allen