By Wayne Wilson
Everybody has a birthday. Whether they like to celebrate big or prefer to play it low-key, going out to eat is something everyone can agree is a good idea. With that in mind, shouldn’t your bar/restaurant be making the most of this opportunity?
Here’s what local bar and grill Fozzy’s did to get more people coming in on their big day.
Who Is Fozzy’s Bar and Grill?
Fozzy’s Bar & Grill has locations in Loves Park, Ill. and Spring Hill, Tenn. In addition to great food and beer, they also have weekly events like Bike Night, Karaoke Bingo, live music featuring local bands and artists, and raffles with prizes to attract regular customers.
While a calendar of events is a great way to get repeat customers, Fozzy’s wanted to appeal to visitors who might not have seen or heard about them otherwise. That’s why they decided to focus on advertising their special birthday program.
Birthday Marketing Strategy
Fozzy’s has been sending birthday mailers for years to attract new visitors, doing all of the hard work to send paper postcards themselves. Recently, they partnered with Inside the Box Marketing, a postcard marketing agency that specializes in the restaurant industry, to launch a unique advertising campaign that would improve upon their current efforts.
Unlike most existing rewards or loyalty programs that only target people who have opted in, the program targeted everyone living in the neighborhood around Fozzy’s. Every month, nearby residents with a birthday that month received a postcard with a personalized message specifically for their birthday.
Postcards That Stand Out
Inside the Box uses a few key techniques to make their postcards stand out from the junk mail in people’s mailboxes, and be more successful. First, they use heavy laminated materials, not the same cheap paper as everyone else. Second, each postcard contains a pop-out gift card for a free entree and dessert, so it feels like a true gift. Finally, since the gift cards pop-out, they can easily be saved at the register when someone redeems them, making it easy to measure the effectiveness of the campaign.
For Fozzy’s, the extra thought and effort clearly showed in the results. Here’s what Nick Foseberg, Owner of Fozzy’s, had to say:
“The number one promotion I’ve ever run as getting new customers in the door is always a birthday mailer. However, once I started using Inside the Box Marketing plastic postcards, we’ve seen our redemptions increase by 25-50%. We just keep sending 1,000 per month and people walk in the door like clockwork.”
A Winning Combination
People look forward to mail on their birthdays. Cards and gifts from family and friends feel much more personal than a generic “Happy Birthday!” text message or post on somebody’s Facebook profile. As Fozzy’s has seen, birthday postcards from bars and restaurants can be a great strategy, and it’s a strategy where everyone can win. Your customers will love the gift and might become a regular. But even if they don’t, you’ll make more than enough profit from their visit, because nobody goes out to eat on their birthday alone.
