When it comes to dark, cold Winter months, there is no word that better describes the ideal environment than Hygge. Wikipedia describes Hygge as a Danish and Norwegian word which can be described as a quality of cosiness and comfortable conviviality that engenders a feeling of contentment or well-being.
How about recreating a Hygge style environment to encourage people to leave their warm inviting homes and keep warm and cosy with you instead?
Comfort Foods
Cold, dark days and lack of sunlight and warmth definitely calls for a menu of comfort food. As a nation of foodies, nobody can refuse a delicious a deliciously satisfying bowl of homemade soup, served with a portion of warm, crunchy sourdough on a cold miserable day.
The Telegraph published a lovely article, back in the Spring of this year on British Comfort Food, featuring the most mouthwatering images. Check it out and see if your favourite food is included.
Crockery
The way food and beverages are served can often be quite different during colder months. Mammoth mugs that hold copious amounts of sweet hot chocolate are so comforting to clasp on a chill shivering day. Why is that a mug can make a drink taste so good?
Mugs Galore specialise in promotional drinks ware and offer a fantastic selection of mugs that can be custom printed with your chosen message or logo.
Our favourite is the Hug Mug, A uniquely shaped bulbous bone china mug. These would be heavenly, huggable perfection to sip hot chocolate from.
Home Delivery Service
Sometimes no matter how inviting your environment is, there will be people who for a variety of reasons are not able to get out. Families with young children and lack of childcare or poorly, people are just a few examples. So rather than let them miss out on all your delicious treats, why not offer a Home Delivery Service, say, in a radius of c5 miles from your location. Social media is the perfect place to promote your seasonal service offering, perhaps with the incentive of a nominal percentage discount off a first order. You could always limit your home delivery menu to orders that will be easy to transport in takeaway containers, i.e. cakes, pizzas and pies. This is a great marketing suggestion to ensure your business is busy and making profit even if your property is not at full occupancy.
Flexible office space for quiet times of the day
According to LFS there are an estimated 1.91 million freelance workers in the UK. Many Freelancers have no fixed office space and work from a variety of locations, including home, coffee shops and hotel lobbies.
So during your quieter periods in the autumn and winter, why not advertise your venue as a place where freelancers can work from using your complimentary Wi-Fi. Freelancers are renowned coffee drinkers and snackers and will be sure to spend money during their visits.
If you have any smaller more private dining areas these could be rented out as meeting room space too. Offering a meeting room with a minimum spend on food will keep your environment buzzing with interesting people and ensure you have transactions going through the till. Space doesn’t have to be limited to indoors either. Breakout space for smaller meetings could also include your outdoor dining area (subject to weather). Freelancers are always looking for somewhere quiet to take that all important phone call. Freelancers are excellent networkers so a combination of social media advertising and word of mouth will ensure your property is the talk of the local freelance community. This gives you constant busyness during your otherwise quieter day time trading.