Industry Standard: Coupon etiquette

[Robin Garr]

INDUSTRY STANDARD:
Insider Info For Those Who Dine Out
With Columnist Marsha Lynch

Great news! Your great Aunt Hortense finally stopped sending you a hand-written $15 check for your birthday. This year, she sent you a $75 coupon to a swanky restaurant you’ve been dying to try. Now what?

Well, of course, first you brag to the person you’re going to take with you to said swanky restaurant. Then you pull up the restaurant’s website and click through to the dinner menu. Mmmm. Pan-roasted pheasant — that sounds delicious. And how about the pork belly appetizer? Sounds good, and if you share a starter, each have an entrée, and both of you get that crazy new cocktail, you’ll still get out of there totally free.

Hold on a minute there, birthday boy or girl. Read the fine print. It probably says something like, “This offer is not good in combination with any other special offer or discount, and does not apply to alcohol or gratuity.” It may also say, “Not good on holidays or other special occasions, or at private functions or charity events.” (Reasonable people: “Well, sure — that makes sense.” Unreasonable person: “This is AWESOME. I’m a ‘Highlands V.I.P.,’ and along with my Louisville Originals card, my AARP discount, my AAA discount, and my ‘Roller Coaster Enthusiasts of the United States’ membership badge, they will owe ME money when we leave!”)

Just consider the restaurant owner or manager. What is their motivation for selling or giving away discounted coupons for use at their place of business? To bring in business they wouldn’t necessarily have gotten otherwise.

Please, use your coupon, but DON’T:

Try to walk for free. Take advantage of the discount, but look at it as a chance to expand your horizons. Don’t limit yourself to the dollar amount of the coupon.

Try to use the coupon for drinks. Most coupons prohibit this explicitly, and giving away alcohol in most cases violates state law. And again, be sure and tip the bartender or server accordingly.

And try not to use your coupon on Derby Eve or Mother’s Day or to offset the cost of your meal during “Dining Out for a Cure” week or some other such charitable event. That would be tacky, as well as problematic for the staff — nobody wants to have to come to your table and explain in hushed tones why they can’t honor your request to apply your coupon during a special holiday menu, or why they can’t let you use all of your myriad discounts at once.

Here’s what you should DO:

Try somewhere new with someone who appreciates an adventure.

Tip your server and/or bartender on the amount you would have spent without the discount. Sorry, but there’s no reason a server should take a cut in pay just because the owner decided to take a hit on food for promotional purposes.

Be gracious to the staff, and of course, expect the same quality of food and service you’d get if paying totally out of pocket for the meal — as long as you don’t break any of the above rules.

Finally, if you receive a “gift card” to a restaurant, rather than a “discount” or “coupon” — go crazy. That’s prepaid money you can normally use for alcohol, tip, etc., because someone already paid for it, dollar-for-dollar.

No offense, Aunt Hortense.

Marsha Lynch has worked at many Louisville independent restaurants including Limestone, Jack Fry’s, Jarfi’s, L&N Wine Bar and Bistro, and Café Lou Lou. She is currently a teaching assistant at Sullivan University, her alma mater.

I've got a related question that I've been pondering for awhile. When it comes to discount programs and certificates like restaurant.com, how much use is too much? For example, if a consumer's favorite place is on restaurant.com, that person may be tempted to buy several certificates and eat their every week for next to nothing. As Marsha said in her article, the restaurant owner's goal with these programs is to bring in new business, not necessarily to lose money on regulars. From a strictly consumer standpoint, why wouldn't one want to eat a places they love at a huge discount? From someone who loves our local scene and wants to see it continue to flourish, I wouldn't make that decision just based on what I wanted. I would at least think about how repeated use would impact a particular location. Frankly it's not a situation I have taken advantage of. I've used the certificates but never more than once at a particular location. Thoughts? How many times do you dip into the discount well?

I don't feel bad in the least bit when I buy five $25 gift certificates at Restaurant.com for Shogun at a huge discount. I probably wouldn't frequent the place as often without them.
You can only use one per visit and you have to spend $35 total to use them. You can go through 35 bucks real quick when sitting at the sushi bar.
I (as most people in the Bizz do) tip pretty well, so if the business at hand is offering the discount I don't think I should feel bad for taking advantage of the offer.

Restaurant.com coupons usually have a fine print that says one per customer per month. Now its almost impossible to track, but we have stopped regulars from doing it based on that once we noticed the trend. Since Winston's is part of Sullivan University, we usually have 90% of the exact same in house Friday lunch crowd, and since we all know them from our school days, we notice when the same person brings them in multiple times in a month, and its apparent that they will continue to do so, so we invoke that clause.

Beyond that, its up to the operator to enforce the fine print - if they choose not to track that, its their business. Just keep in mind that the operator does not see one penny from the original restaurant.com purchase price (thats why they are allowed to discount them so heavily and often). Using the above $25/35 coupon, the restaurant only sees the extra $10 on $35 worth of food. In most places that will barely, if it even does, cover the cost of food, leaving nothing for important things like wages, electric etc. So order more than $35, try an extra couple apps you normally wouldn't etc. But, like Dan said, the business ultimately is responsible for tracking and monitoring all promotions, and if they can't show that restaurant.com is worth it, they should pull the program, rather than let money trickle away to the extent that it harms the business.

Just a point of discussion . . .

Most consumer packaged goods companies known that it's much easier to boost sales by driving your current customers to spend more/buy more frequently/similar than it is to convert a non-user. Thus, the vast majority of CPG couponing, refunding, and advertising is really aimed at current users (not all, but the majority); it's cheaper, it drives money in faster, and it pays out better.

I'm always surprised when some restaurants say that their coupons are to bring in triers. Yes, that can work (especially for new restaurants), but (as those with loyalty programs will likely testify) rewarding current customers pays off better, and still results in new business (as current customers will bring in their friends).

In other words, if you're having trouble with regular users coming in along and monopolizing your deals, then re-write the deals so they are only good in larger parties, or change conditions to encourage customers to bring others in for trial - it can be done, and you'll "win" in the long run!

Best wishes too all---\\
something' for nothing' is really a silly expectation=
if y'all want a free meal - propagate a tasty dive and tip well
some peeps do it right
-some not soo much

All these posters make very good points. All of these ideas expressed are pretty valid.

Most businesses introduce coupons into their advertising structure as a way to track the effectiveness of their advertising dollars. The reasoning is... if you want to know where your business is coming from, run a different coupon with each different ad source. Voila, the most coupons redeemed wins! But not really. When you put a coupon out there you usually get a coupon user as a customer. (Please no one get their hackles up; I'm a coupon user for some things myself.) Coupon users follow the coupons and seldom stay loyal to a business sans coupon. Usually, not always. Then what will happen is the customers that already know and love you will now use coupons at your place and ultimately spend fewer dollars with you. In my advertising experience coupons are a wash. Run them if you feel you must but ultimately it's the quality of your product that will make a valued customer for you. Coupons do more to add money into the pocket of the advertising medium than they actually do to add money to the advertisers bank accounts.

Never forget... the object of the game is to build a strong , loyal customer base that is happy to share their great experience with others (known as the infuentials) Don't lose sight of that just so you can track your advertising.
Think of it this way... When someone asks a recent cusomer of yours why they chose your restaurant do you really want them to say, "Oh, well, we had a coupon." ?

thank you, thank you, THANK you Marsha!

thank you, thank you, THANK you Marsha!

LOL, Madi - we ate at your place last night, and the server that brought our water thanked me personally for the column. Heh.

Great column Marsha!

I have a question related to Annemarie's post though. Why do some restaurants that don't derive a significant portion of their income from alcohol sales make deals dine-in only? If you're expecting to serve several drinks over the course of a meal, then it makes sense to me. If not though, it seems like you're just unnecessarily occupying a two top and dirtying a bunch of dishes.

What about ordering water and then boxing up your leftovers?

It's a good article but it's sad that you have to tell people to tip on the pre-discount amount and to follow the rules on the coupon.

If you have to tell them that, perhaps you should also have told them to write a thank-you note to their aunt for the gift card. Stuff I thought was obvious isn't anymore.