4 Ways to Master a Restaurant Design

The restaurant and hospitality industry are constantly evolving to improve the customer experience. With all the moving parts, changing trends, and challenges, it’s important to know the 4 ways to master building a restaurant.

What restaurant design trends are owners looking for?

1. The Consumer Should be the #1 Focus

Right now, there are a lot of different requests in new and existing facility remodels because of the shift in restaurant trends. Instead of communal tables, owners are requesting chef’s tables which enhance the customer experience. When it comes to building materials, heart pine and specialty wood flooring combined with unique millwork elements are catering to an authentic, rustic taste.

The bar scene within a restaurant is also changing as owners have begun to implement and create more mixology programs. Since this calls for people to use the bar in different ways it’s fulfilling a new set of desires and for specific areas within a restaurant.

There is a growing demand for consumers to have an exceptional restaurant experience. Having designers and contractors centered around the latest trends and consumer tastes is key.

2. Be an Expert at the Mechanical, Electrical & Plumbing

The biggest challenge in restaurant construction is the amount of mechanical, electrical and plumbing, which typically makes up about 50 percent of the budget. These elements take up large and vast areas within the walls and ceilings, and the goal is to make these pieces vanish so it isn’t visible to the customer enjoying a meal.

3. Understand & Meet Property Requirements

The second challenge is the ensuring all key components within the property are warrant-able to the property and, that they meet the requirements associated with the individual owners use. For example, it’s important to know the requirements for a dish washing room are different than the requirements for an open kitchen. All these elements need to work together in terms of durability, function, and how they are utilized by guests.

3. Collaborate between Contractor, Owner & Architect

Lastly, and most importantly, is making sure the contractor, owner and architect are in sync well in advance at the time of signing the lease for the restaurant or commercial space.

This sounds like a simple concept, but more often than not, owners are moving forward with brokers who are pushing their own agenda in order to try to close the deal. It’s not uncommon for owners to be brought into a property that doesn’t have the core elements necessary to make it a restaurant. Things like having exhaust assemblies for going to the roof, proper water line size, and even sprinkler systems are not the broker’s focus when trying to close a deal. By involving an architect or contractor in the process from the very beginning, you’ll be able to prevent yourself from making these mistakes.

How does ZMK approach a restaurant build?

Our company is dedicated to the restaurateur. General conditions and fees are sometimes dedicated to the design contractor for becoming a member of the ownership team, in such that when hired on to a project, the contractor is on the owner’s payroll.

With that said, it opens the conversation with regards to contractor and subcontractors, making sure that the subcontractors and the owners are meeting with each other from the beginning of the construction process. By doing this, it provides increased savings and optimum value engineering.

Value engineering is an area where some contractors differentiate from others in the industry. To save money, we preserve the design intent. This means we find creative ways to switch out products, like substituting a hard pine for a stained Cyprus, which looks almost identical to the dream product.

By doing this we have been able to save $50,000 on the material alone.

Additionally, with regards to our company, one of the main focuses we have is making sure all of our team is involved in each unique internal process. It’s important to us to make sure that the kitchen is set up for the chef, rather than meeting the general manager’s criteria, or even the owner’s criteria in some cases.

We are always looking to implement minor ideas that do not cost the owners extra money, while still making a property functional. It’s simple things like putting in a drain assembly near the coffee station so people can pour the excess coffee into a drain rather than a garbage bag. Providing this service means the owner doesn’t have to spend additional money for a beautiful space that is functional for both the restaurant staff and its guests.