Service with a smile? not on the menu today

For many people, entering a restaurant for the first time can be a stressful experience. They know no one there; they have little, if any, knowledge of the layout; they have only had a glimpse of the menu on a board outside.

They may have read a review for the restaurant, but these can be deeply flawed. They are so often written by someone who has their own likes and dislikes, but enough ego to believe that others should be guided by their view.

To all intents and purposes, then, entering a new restaurant is like walking into the unknown. This is why the first step towards customer loyalty is down to the waiting staff in the front of any house.

If the waiters fail to make a restaurant's guests feel at ease, there really is no point in opening the doors to customers in the first place.

First impressions

I believe customers like to be met and greeted on arrival, to be shown to their tables quickly and efficiently, and to be served attentively, but not in a sycophantic, over-familiar way.

However, I fear there are some in the restaurant business who are more concerned with profit than they are with good waiting practice. The risk of this is that, ultimately, customers can become fickle.

I reached this conclusion after conducting a straw poll of some of my colleagues and friends about recent experiences of good and bad waiters at establishments in London.

The disturbing result was that for every 10 stories of bad experiences, there was only one good one - invariably, that was when the waiters had done what was expected of them.

The first story involved one of the restaurants in a prestigious government building. A friend, who had been a very generous regular in the past, was disgusted when the head waiter greeted him sneeringly with: "God, look what the cat dragged in."

Service howlers

Here are some other examples: plates were taken away from one group's table before everyone had finished the course they were eating (Harvey Nichols' Oxo Tower restaurant); service was so slack that the smokers at the table were able to get through three cigarettes between their starters and main courses (the Criterion); a waiter answered a customer's question about what beef was used in the dishes he was serving with: "Life's a lottery. You take your chances whatever beef you eat" (Kettners).

Other lesser, but still off-putting, examples had waiters arrogantly deciding to refill glasses without asking; asking customers to leave as soon as they had finished because other people had booked; and forgetting orders and having to be reminded.

I can hear the cries of "people in glass houses should not throw stones". All I can say is that, if anyone has any complaints about the service at the Cosmo, we want them to inform the management immediately. My wife Louise and I are not afraid to hear criticism. We would prefer it.

Because we do not want disgruntled customers spreading any word that our staff do not care, are slapdash, or even rude, we regularly refresh their training, taking them through what customers should expect at every stage of their visit.

But it causes me concern when I hear of restaurants charging much higher prices than ours for the experience of dining, when there is such slipshod waiting on tables.

In my experience, these are the places with the glamour and the trendy names, which attract new blood into our business. But if this is the sort of standard that is allowed to prevail in them, what chance do the rest of us have in finding good staff to fill our tables and sell our food and drink?

Staff shortage

As has often been reported, there is a growing paucity of staff available, despite the fact that the restaurant scene in Britain, and London particularly, is enjoying such a boom.

Perhaps we are all suffering from too many proprietors and managers being far too greedy with money they could be spending on attracting and, better still, training staff we all need to wait on our customers.

As in the mid-1980s, there seems to be an attitude that, while the good times roll and people feel they have more disposable income, improving service is not such a priority.

It is not good enough just to dress staff in smart uniforms. The effort we all need to make - business and government alike - is in training.

It will pay back, not only in a better quality of waiters, but also in improved customer loyalty. That means, when the next recession bites, it will not hurt as much as it has done in the past.