What is Casual Dining?
A casual dining restaurant is a full-service restaurant with a fun, comfortable, laid-back atmosphere and affordably priced menu.
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A casual dining restaurant is a full-service restaurant with a fun, comfortable, laid-back atmosphere and affordably priced menu.
Average Ticket Size
U.S. Casual Dining Sales2
Casual Dining Units2
US Market Share
Use Facebook the most to market their restaurant
Of owners, operators, and managers cite high operating and food costs as their biggest operational hurdle
These are fast casual restaurants that are redefining the industry
The main difference between a casual dining restaurant and a fast casual restaurant is that the former is full-service while the latter is not. Though they share the same ambiance, the average check size in a casual dining restaurant is typically double that of a fast casual concept. Casual dining restaurants often serve alcohol and appetizers; fast casual restaurants do not.
What separates casual dining restaurants from quick service restaurants is that casual dining restaurants are full service, whereas quick service restaurants are not. Quick service check sizes and table turn time are drastically smaller than casual dining restaurants.
A casual dining restaurant is a full-service concept with a laid-back, comfortable, family-friendly ambiance and an affordable menu; a fine dining restaurant has an upscale ambiance, a dress code, a chef-curated highly-priced menu, and service held to the "white tablecloth" standard.
The customer experience in a casual restaurant shares similarities with other other concepts; the biggest differentiator is that a casual dining concept is typically full service.
Here are the typical roles within a casual dining restaurant's front of house staff and back of house staff.
The menu in a casual dining restaurant is typically populated with familiar fare. Guests come to casual dining restaurants because of their propensity to serve dishes and drinks the general public recognizes; they can rely on a casual restaurant to make quality meals without any surprises.
To the right are some examples of dishes served at popular casual dining restaurants.
Paul Barron looks at millennial social restaurant visit traffic in casual dining as a predictor of the decline in casual dining sales.
An animated training on how to set a table at a casual dining restaurant.
Sources:
1 https://pos.toasttab.com/restaurant-management/restaurant-success-industry-report
2https://www.restaurant.org/Downloads/PDFs/Events-Groups/17_SHOW_PPT_5-4-compressed.pdf
