Catering Chronicles
Catering Chronicles are educational and training books for the hospitality industry. Each Catering Chronicle can be used as a part of a series or a single volume for not only employees, owners and companies of all sizes, but also students and educators interested in learning best practices.
Catering Chronicles Vol. 1–4
$19.99 printed book on Amazon
You asked for it and we answered ... Catering Chronicles Vol 1-4 is now available in print!
Catering Chronicles Vol 1-4 includes our first three published eBooks (Play Nice!, Make More Money! and May We Join You?) as well as a bonus early release of our fourth eBook, It All Starts Here! Running a Great Production Meeting.
This paperback book is a compilation of four quick reads that provides tips and tricks for all service industry professionals.
Play Nice – No More Sales vs. Service
$9.99 eBook on Amazon
Most caterers start their businesses because they have a passion for creating delicious food and designing beautiful events. As they continue to book larger and more frequent events, caterers need to expand their service team resources to accommodate this increased business. Quite often, this service piece is not strategically planned from the beginning but rather learned through necessity.
As off-premise caterers, the quality of our service teams, both front and back of house, is what truly differentiates us from our competition. Proactively developing your service team, including recruiting, training, providing ample work with timely paychecks, and retaining and retraining staff, may cost money, but is well worth the investment. This is so important for catering salespeople to understand and value.
This quick read offers guidance to all service industry professionals on how to encourage collaboration amongst your service and sales teams.
Make More Money – Budgeting As Your First Step
$9.99 eBook on Amazon
You can not run a successful catering business without a budget. Period. Market conditions during this new economic rebound will be unlike any others in the past. As the industry reopens and owners manage cash flow every day, recovery and budgeting needs to be a focus. Companies that run their business without a budget will not have the vision to react to revenue fluctuations. Now is the time to reset your company with an overall budget.
This quick read offers guidance to all small business owners on how to start writing an annual budget. Although the authors have 50+ years experience in running profitable companies in the catering industry, the practices presented in this book are relevant for all small businesses to start making more money.
May We Join You?—Investing in Non-Exclusive Venue Relationships
$9.99 eBook on Amazon
Most off-premise caterers are reliant on their relationships with non-exclusive venues. These are venues that are not owned or managed by the caterer and often have a preferred caterers list. Unfortunately, many caterers feel beholden to these venues and do not approach them as collaborative partners in business.
This quick read encourages forward-thinking caterers on how to change this mindset and start working on developing strong relationships with the multitude of non-exclusive venues in their region.
It All Starts Here—Running a Great Production Meeting
$9.99 eBook on Amazon
Although we are becoming more reliant on technology to communicate between front and back of house, there still is the need for sales and production teams to meet in person to discuss elements of upcoming events. This forum is called the production meeting and is essential for team members to share their visions of what needs to be accomplished to achieve customer satisfaction.
In this quick read, we provide tips and tricks for creating an organized, timely, great production meeting. By the end of the meeting, staffing, operations, culinary, and sales should know everything they need to produce a spectacular event.