Marketing Your Food and Drink Options at Your Hotel Pool
It’s almost spring and it’s time for you to start thinking about pool season for your hotel! Your guests are often spending a lot of their time at the pool while on vacations, and during this time your guests are going to get hungry and thirsty. Instead of your guests having to leave the pool area to find food and drinks, risking the opportunity for them to leave the property, provide options for food and drinks poolside.
In this blog post we will provide three menu design options on how to present your food options to your guests. Additionally, we will provide some ideas for other items you might want to have at your pool for giveaways for your guests. This blog is all on “Marketing Your Food and Drink Options at Your Hotel Pool”!
Before we get into the menu presentation, let’s first think about what you want on your pool menu. Remember it’s going to be hot outside, so heavier and rich tasting foods should be avoided. Additionally you want to avoid messy foods. Lastly, think of your staff and kitchen. Where is your pool located versus the kitchen? Usually these areas aren’t near the other so think of items that are easy to transport throughout your hotel. Pool menus usually include simple, quick to make and light foods. Items such as salads, fish tacos, and even chips and salsa to share are items that would be great to include on a food menu. For drinks, beer, wine and liquor options are standard. Consider offering specialty drinks named for your location, resort or pool. Last tip: think plastic, not glass. Broken glass is a nightmare to clean up and you don’t want anyone getting hurt. Now on to the menu presentation options.
SuperFlex Synthetic Menus - At first glance SuperFlex looks like paper but is actually a durable, simulated paper that contains no paper from trees. To the touch the material is smooth, but you are also able to feel the durability of SuperFlex and the high quality of the material. Menus that are laminated can have moisture and water can seep inside. With menus printed on SuperFlex, moisture and water wipe right off with SuperFlex. As an added bonus, you can add an extra coating to protect your menus from sunscreen.
Acrylic Menus – There are many menu presentation options with acrylic. Acrylic table stands can be used to present specials and events. These can be on every table and the inserts can easily change out when there is a new special. For your menus, acrylic boards and acrylic menu covers are both options to consider. While acrylic boards are great for holding two inserts, an acrylic menu cover can accommodate more depending on how large you have the cover made.
Beach Balls – Yes, I said beach balls. You can print your menus on beach balls. Can you see your menu being passed around the pool and lounge areas? It’s a great marketing piece for your pool and even better it’s made to be in the pool!
Branded Pool Items – In addition to pool menus, consider providing your guests with branded takeaways. One popular option is allowing your guests to keep the branded cup their drinks came in. Other items such as lip balm, sunglasses, hats, towels and flip flops are popular items that can all be used by the pool, and can be taken for future use by the guest. Branded items are a great way to build brand loyalty with your guests, extend marketing outside your hotel or resort, and will keep guests coming back!
Remember when planning your pool menu, the outdoor pool area is a different atmosphere than your hotel restaurant. When done right though, with attractive food and drinks options, and a presentation that is effectively marketing the pool offerings, this can equal additional profits for your hotel.
