A veteran operator is showing the industry how to boost revenue easily through corporate drop-off catering
By Howard Riell
More and more restaurant operators hungry for additional revenue are finding it right under their noses – their current customers – and expanding into corporate catering.
“If you’re a restaurateur looking for a shot in the arm, corporate drop-off catering is your ticket,” promises Michael Rosman, industry veteran and founder/CEO of The Corporate Caterer (https://thecorporatecaterer.com/). “You’ve already got your operating license, your staff and your kitchen, and you know foodservice.” Corporate catering, he says, “is a great revenue stream, particularly for restaurants that are looking for that extra 10%, 15%, 20% but just don’t know how to do it.”
Rosman grew his own corporate catering operation from $150,000 a year to $150,000 a month. After watching too many colleagues working too many hours for too little profit, he created The Corporate Caterer, a multimedia membership website and consulting company for restaurateurs and caterers who want to beef up their bottom line by beginning or grow their corporate drop-off catering business.
The Corporate Caterer is “basically a culmination of the lessons learned, the real-life situations and all of the skill set I picked up over the years,” Rosman says. “I look at it as a go-to resource for any and all things corporate catering.”
Those who benefit most from the program are up and running restaurant and catering operators in North America who want to begin or grow a corporate drop-off catering business. “It’s really geared toward places that are licensed and already in business,” he says, though it can also serve as the foundation of a start-up business.
The benefits of membership, Rosman points out, are many, including invaluable content, templates and forms, sample letters, emails and promotions, training materials, interviews with veteran operators, live webinars, outside-the-box ideas, the chance to network with fellow operators, a leads program and more. Taken together, The Corporate Caterer is “an incredible resource for both beginners and advanced people in the industry.”
Rosman’s instruction begins at the beginning -- with the nuts-and-bolts of running an operation, such as establishing policies and procedures, collecting menus from competitors and in general systematizing operations. In fact, one of the first questions many operators ask is how, at just $19.95 per month for membership, Rosman can afford to provide all of that so inexpensively.
“The industry has been good to me,” he explains. “I want to try to give back to as many operators as possible, so we’re hoping to cover a lot of ground with an affordable solution for them.” What many www.thecorporatecaterer.com members feel is the best part of the program is the fact that they can draw on existing customers for much of the additional revenue.
“What I like most, and what the best feature for members is, is the repeat business, or what I like to refer to as recurring revenue,” Rosman confides. “Once you establish a clientele and break through that ceiling, half your business will be repeat. As long as you’re working hard, doing a good job and doing what you’re supposed to do, the phone will keep ringing and the internet will keep chiming with repeat business.”
Not collecting the revenue already sitting on the table is nothing but a waste – and in some cases could prove the difference between a business surviving or not.
