Young Women Placing Order To A Waiter At Cafe

This article is part of our Restaurant Business Startup Guide—a curated list of articles to help you plan, start, and grow your restaurant business!

Whether you’re just starting out or already have an up and running business, these are resources you’ll find useful for starting and managing your restaurant.

Get to know the industry

Weekly videos including tips, tricks, and strategies

Ryan Gromfin is a restaurant consultant and former head chef with extensive experience in the industry. In The Restaurant Boss, a five-part, free video series about starting your own restaurant, Ryan discusses everything from keeping costs low to increasing sales and avoiding stress on your way to success.

Learn from the best

News, opinions, and resources from leading restauranteurs

If you like to learn directly from the experts, Restaurant Business Online is a great resource. It’s frequently updated with everything you need to know about the restaurant industry and includes tips on running a company meeting, interviews with taste-making restauranteurs, and much more.

To start you off, here’s a fascinating article on solar power, and whether or not your restaurant should consider it.

Restaurant case studies and event ideas from OpenTable

OpenTable is an online restaurant reservation service. Their blog is a great place to get ideas from the other successful restaurants they showcase, and you can also get some creative event and holiday promotion inspiration for your own restaurant as well.

Here’s a post on places to splurge when you get your tax refund, and another one on how businesses are creating fun menu ideas for Greek Orthodox Easter. They even have a separate blog specifically related to running a restaurant business, with industry news and interviews with business owners.

Managing your restaurant

Connect with other restauranteurs on Monster.com’s Chef’s Blade

Did you know that Monster.com has a whole section dedicated to the restaurant industry? Not only is it a place to network and connect with others, but it’s a great resource for recipes, information on culinary schools, and restaurant industry forums.

And, when you’re ready to start hiring, it’s a great place to look for qualified job candidates.

Marketing

The Restaurant Den blog

If you’re looking to improve your restaurant website, the folks over at Restaurant Den have a great blog, packed full of actionable tips, suggestions, and tools you can use to run your restaurant business more smoothly.

Be sure to check out their article on 20 Ideas to Get New Customers In Your Restaurant if you’re looking for creative ways to attract more customers.

Money

Focus on restaurant finances with the experts at Nerd Wallet

For content that has more of a financial focus, the money experts over at Nerd Wallet have a lot of articles aimed specifically at restaurant owners.

There isn’t a page dedicated explicitly to restaurants, but if you use their on-site search feature, you’ll find some real gems. Check out this article on the 9 Unexpected Costs of Opening a Restaurant.

Popular industry apps

Answer reviews, upload menus, and do special promotions on Zomato

Zomato, previously known in the U.S. as Urbanspoon, has a great app for discovering restaurants. On the user-facing side, people can write reviews and find great places to eat. For businesses like yours, you can use the app to answer reviews, make sure your menu is up to date, and even run specials or discounts.

Do you serve or enjoy eating oysters? There’s an app for that…

Pearl App not only provides prospective diners with the locations of top quality oysters in their area, but if you’re a restaurant or oyster farm who wants to be featured, you can fill out the form that is right on their homepage and put yourself on the map—literally.