Environmental Psychology as a Complement to Restaurant Revenue Management: Effects on Meal Duration and Table Turns
Posted: 4 Nov 2009
Date Written: 2005
Abstract
Environmental psychology complements restaurant revenue management by providing restaurant owners with information on physical cues that can affect meal duration and table turns.Thus, the effect that cues such as lighting, colors, and music can have on meal duration and table turns in restaurants is examined.The previous literature on restaurant revenue management and on environmental psychology provides the basis for the presented hypotheses. To study the effect of physical cues on restaurant revenue, a data set of full service restaurants was obtained from the New England state chapter of the National Restaurant Association.Semi-structured questionnaires were issued to 589 randomly selected restaurants, with 153 of the returned surveys deemed usable.A simple regression methodology was used to analyze the data. The results indicated that brighter lights and colors, an open kitchen, and a noisier setting did not affect average meal duration but they did decrease the range of meal duration while increasing the number of table turns.Louder, faster-paced music appeared to decrease average meal duration, while having no affect on variance of mealtime or the number of table turns.Finally, the interior layout did appear to affect the range of meal duration and the number of table turns. (AKP)
Keywords: Environmental psychology, Restaurant industry, Consumer preferences, Performance evaluation, Psychology, Consumer preferences
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation