As an avid foodie and an advertising person to boot I am often confronted with questions that really intrigue me. And the questions more often than not, from my restaurant owner friends, take the stance that they do a lot of things for their customers but it doesn’t quite work out the way they had thought it would.

The ROI on any investment they had made doesn’t quite prove to be attractive. And the event becomes unsustainable.

It is on occasions such as these that I am tempted to ask for a brief moment of clarity as we go back to basics. A restaurant (and I am using this animal only for the discussion) is a place designed and developed, conceived and deployed with the sole purpose of serving a potential audience a particular type of food and beverages.

Anything that the restaurant throws in by way of activity or by way of events and strategies designed to generate Word of Mouth are nothing but limited attempts to create triggers that ripple off a wave of activity that results in more people frequenting the restaurant in question.

To a certain extent, and for a certain period of time an event or an activity can take center stage and look like it is the cause for enhanced activity and more walk-ins. But at the end the restaurant finds a place in the mind and hearts of its people only on the basis of its product and its service.

Music…and music of all kinds of genres have for long been a favorite with restaurants. Everything from pop music to jazz, from blues to bhangra and from ghazals to ghetto-rap have been offered as incentives to customers. But the place has done well and cashed in on the additional attention only if its basic product or service…or both…were up to the mark.

And this is more true of specialty restaurants. Those of you who have frequented for instance the old Trattoria at the President Hotel in Mumbai may remember that the outlet was a beehive of activity and hosted not only the early serenades but also perhaps the only Indian version of a genuine Elvis lookalike concert that had everyone in splits and raptures.

But the restaurant was and will always be remembered for the fabulous Pizzas and Pastas that it dished out. Perhaps an exception can be made in the case of activity driven restaurants or bars like 10 Downing Street which may find a Karaoke evening more saleable than their brand of snacks. That admitted, even the Hard Rock Café which is a fairly international icon, has its onion ring reputation more intact than the kind of rockers you may be tempted to associate with.

The lesson one needs to learn is that an event, however special can only succeed in attracting an audience or at least informing an audience that a place exists. Once the audience comes in on the basis of the event’s attraction capability it is the restaurant’s responsibilities that the customer takes home an unique experience that he or she would like to come back for.

If the restaurant owner has not taken special steps to ensure that his new audience gets to sample his ware, he has not only wasted his time and opportunity he has also created a situation where his or her restaurant can be seen more as a venue for the same or similar events than a restaurant that serves a specialty.

And that indeed is a pity.

We need to learn from the Ohris who had, perhaps even today have, a restaurant called Daawat in Secunderabad that was famous for its ghazals and qawallis but more famous for its food and frequented for that reason. The original Fusion 9 restaurant that pioneered Jazz is also an example. How many people remember the Charminar Jazz Collective…but everyone remembers F9 and its food.

And that is simply because the management used every opportunity given to them to cater to varying audiences to pamper them with what was quintessentially the restaurant’s original proposition. Great Food.