10 Trends in UK restaurants for 2018

2018 has proved a tough year for the restaurant trade with multiple closures of both casual-dining chains and fine dining restaurants. The number of restaurants in the UK has fallen for the first time in eight years. The combined squeeze from rising business rates; food inflation; growing minimum wage costs are all taking their toll. 

Consumer confidence is falling with the prolonged uncertainty of Brexit; and rising inflation is putting pressure on discretionary spending and we’re seeing a like-for-like fall in the growth rates for the casual dining sector and continued promiscuity from consumers who are spoilt for choice.

Yet we’re continuing to see innovation in the UK restaurant sector and there are rewards for operators who are doing the right thing. What are the key trends for the rest of 2018? What can restaurant owners and chefs not afford to ignore if they want to stay ahead of the pack?

1. ALL DAY EATING

Traditional dining out for lunch or dinner is evolving, with consumers seeking new places to socialise, to work and to hold meetings. Flexible working means people aren’t restricted to restricted lunch-hour and want to eat at all times of day. Traditional office environments are being traded in for remote working environments as consumers swap their desk for a cafe.

The future landscape of the restaurant industry will be shaped by millennials (those born between 1982 and 1996) and Generation Z (those born from 1997 onwards), due to their frequency and spend on eating out-of-home for breakfast and brunch as well as lunch and dinner.  This generation is discerning and look for value for money as well as a good experience whatever time of day.

2. ACCESSIBLE FINE DINING

Meanwhile, formal dining occasions are not dead but customers are looking for the top quality food and service of traditional fine dining restaurants but in a more relaxed and accessible environment. With a new generation of chefs, we’ll continue to see a move away from luxury and formal dining with white tablecloths and long tasting menus, to simple, informal restaurants that won’t intimidate younger diners.

3. START YOUR DAY WITH BREAKFAST

Gone are long working lunches in favour of breakfast. The breakfast trend is mirrored on our social media accounts with "breakfast" being hashtagged on Instagram more than 50,0000 times in 2017.

Restaurants must adopt opening hours and menus to offer great breakfasts, either to sit and savour or to grab-and-go. This must include healthy options as well as indulgent treats. Granola and avocado on toast have long been favourites of the Instagram world, but now consumers are looking for something new whether that’s pimped up porridge or a cracking shakshuka. In South Wales, Llanelli's Sosban’s Sunday Brunch is regularly booked out with over 80 covers a week.

4. IMMERSIVE & AUTHENTIC EXPERIENCES

While chains offer customers the familiar and reliable, consumers are fickle in their brand loyalty and show a willingness to experiment. 79% of consumers are open to trying new types of cuisines they have not had before.

As consumers grown increasingly savvy, they will see through ‘concept dining’ in favour of the authentic. Old school establishments that stick to doing what they’ve always done well, like 30-year-old French restaurant Le Café du Marché in Smithfield will attract younger customers looking for the genuine article.

Special events from guest chef nights, wine tastings, charity fundraising evenings or just special menus to mark occasions from Valentine’s to Harvest Suppers create a reason for your customers to come back.

5. THE RISE AND RISE OF FOOD HALLS

This year has seen the rise of the Food Hall springing up around the country with empty spaces from derelict markets (Mackie Mayor in Manchester), tube stations (Fulham) and empty shops (the former BHS on Oxford Street) all offering thousands of feet of communal dining spaces from multiple outlets and creating increased competition for bricks-and-mortar venues.

For chefs and restaurateurs, food halls are a low-risk opportunity to test a concept in a high-footfall location. Julio Bruno, CEO of Time Out Markets which began in Lisbon and is rapidly developing sites around the world says: “We are democratising fine dining. Some of the best-known chefs in the country want to be part of this,”. 

For consumers, Food Halls offer a fun experience where they can experiment with new tastes and groups of friends can eat completely different styles of food while sitting together. Nick Johnson, co-founder of Mackie Mayor says: “People lust after spending time with other people in real time, eating, drinking, people watching – they always have and always will, we’re hard wired, it’s part of being human. All our vendors are passionate and independent. We are originators. It’s an antidote to brand mentality.”

6. POP UPS AND STREET FOOD LEAD INNOVATION

Street food's transient and fluid nature act as a barometer of consumer interests and trends and chefs and restauranteurs should follow the street food scene to stay ahead of the curve. 

For over a decade chefs and entrepreneurs have been using street food stalls or pop-ups in empty spaces to enter the market with low entry costs and flexibility to respond to consumer feedback. Research suggests that 2.5 million people per day ate street in 2017 and we continue to see the growth of marketplace operators like Kerb and London Union creating hubs crowded with people looking for something more interesting than a Pret sandwich for lunch. 

But as the number of vendors grows, so consumers are coming more discerning and voting with their feet as they demand more sophisticated offerings, new flavours and higher expectations when it comes to service. As the BBC’s recent series Million Pound Menu shows, consumers are demanding authentic and honest food - it’s no longer enough to build your business on Cubanos when you’ve been to Cuba once on holiday or to churn out frozen fish from the cash & carry when consumers demand sustainably sourced fish.

7. WOMEN CHEFS’ TIME IS HERE

The recent furore caused by Clare Smyth’s award of Best Female Chef at the World’s 50 Best Restaurant Awards has highlighted the latent inequality in professional kitchens. If nothing else Smyth’s award and subsequent debate have drawn attention to the issue and we should expect to see greater recognition and opportunities for female chefs.

Other female chefs have claimed the award is ‘bizarre’ and ‘outdated, yet only four of the restaurants in the World’s 50 Best are run by women. The low representation of women isn’t just at the top end of the industry. It’s estimated that out of the 250,000 professional chefs in the UK, only 18.5% of them are women (about 46,000). Although figures from the Office for National Statistics suggest the number rose by a third, from 1 in 5 to 1 in 4 chefs in 2016. 

More of a concern are reports of sexual harassment in the hospitality industry, which in the #MeToo era will be tackled publicly or behind closed doors.

Restaurant operators and the media will seek out and develop female talent, with employers needing to be more accommodating about flexible working hours for parents (both male and female) as healthy fast food chain Leon has done.

Customers will look for opportunities to support female chefs and we should expect to see more women chefs rise to senior levels.

8. VEGAN IS HERE TO STAY - LIKE IT OR NOT

The unstoppable rise in vegan diets is something that can’t be ignored and chefs will have to embrace the evolution or lose out. It’s the less virtuous side of vegan food that is set to grow fastest as demonstrated by Temple of Seiten’s fried vegan chicken, and vegan burger restaurant Pure Filth. When bleeding veggie burgers become a hot menu option, it’s clear we are seeing a bigger movement than just consumers wanting to eat more healthily.

All outlets will introduce more plant-based dishes to their menus and entice strict vegans and flexitarians with creative, visually appealing dishes using unusual ingredients like tempeh, jack fruit and aquafaba.

There’s been a 350% increase in the number of vegans to over half a million in Britain in the ten years to 2016 and while there’s no recent data that number is estimated to have significantly increased since. And let's not forget the estimated 22 million “flexitarians” – those who enjoy meat and dairy but want to reduce their consumption.

9. EVERYONE'S A FOOD CRITIC

Online reviews turn all your diners into food critics. Seven out of eight consumers routinely go online to discover dining destinations. This makes online listings and reviews sites (Google, Tripadvisor, Facebook as well as restaurant specific sites like Tomato and OpenTable) critical. 87% of UK diners say they’re influenced by online reviews, with 64% turning to Google (more than any other review site).

Keep your listings up to date on all these sites and make sure you include contact numbers, maps and opening hours. 86% people say they check menus online before booking so keep yours up to date on your website and elsewhere.

Monitor and respond to reviews on all the channels. A quick and considered response can turn a negative experience into a positive one.

10. EMBRACE TECHNOLOGY

The volume of bookings from third-party sites (OpenTable, Res Diary, Square Meal, etc) is set to grow and facilitates a surge in last-minute reservations made within 90 minutes of seating. These sites are also blamed in part for the increase in no-show bookings because it’s so easy to make a booking - find time to call and confirm bookings to build a personal relationship.

Once at the table, we are all benefitting from new technologies from self-service menus; mobile ordering and payments and technology which facilitates splitting the bill between friends.