Did you know that inside a table-top restaurant, customers spend up to 25 percent of their time waiting? They wait to order, wait for food to arrive, etc. They don’t feel comfortable if the space is too crowded, and they don’t feel comfortable if the space is too empty. The question of how many seats can fit in a particular dining space largely defines the experience a guest will have in the restaurant. The trend in major metropolitan areas seems to be to squeeze in just 1 or 2 more tables, even if it means the difference between pleasant and disastrous.

New Yorkers, for example, are used to tiny apartments and crowded subways, so they may tolerate jostling and closeness much better than others. It’s true that filling a restaurant with diners helps create a general air of excitement, which designers take notice of and sometimes exploit in their designs. Possibly exciting… but is it safe? As long as we mention New York City, the fire codes here do not specify or limit the number of seats based on total square footage. Instead, the codes require restaurants to maintain three-foot-wide clear aisles leading to emergency exits. Restaurants with 74 seats or much more are needed to have two emergency exits; those with fewer than 74 seats should still have clear aisles, but may lead to only one exit.

Most people think about how to accommodate crowds; but in larger spaces, you might also consider separating your dining area into smaller spaces (or spaces that seem smaller) when things are slow. Many restaurants sit in only 1 of two or three dining rooms off-peak. A good guideline is to allow 15 square feet per seat. This figure includes hallways and waiter support stations, but typically excludes the entryway and restrooms. Of course, your figures can be modified by the shape or size of the dining room and the sizes of the tables and chairs.

Various types of facilities have industry-accepted standards for dining room assignments, as shown in the “Size and Space Guidelines” discussion. Typically, the lowest seat allocation is in a school cafeteria, at 8 to 10 feet; the tallest in restaurants with a tall average check, 15 to 18 feet. One factor to consider may be seat turnover, or seat turnover, which may be the number of times a seat is occupied during a meal. The amount of billing you have depends on the method of service, the time or day, the type of customer, the type of menu and atmosphere, and even the availability of alcoholic beverages in the restaurant.

Table and Booth Arrangement – ​​After agreeing on the overall space of the dining room, you need to consider how the tables or booths will be arranged within that room. On paper, drawing the chairs, not just the tables, helps you remember to leave enough room to pull them out and seat people comfortably. You can find infinite variables in the arrangement of the tables. Please note that the diagrams do not take into account elements such as columns, doorways and architectural features (unusual placement of walls) that frequently exist. Another reality of seat rotation is that even when your dining room is “full,” not all seats may be. A party of two can occupy a table that seats four, and so on.

This partial vacancy rate can be as high as 20 percent in table-top restaurants or 10 to 12 percent in cafeterias or cafeteria counters. Vacancy rates do not apply to facilities where all meals are eaten at exactly the same time, for example, prisons and military mess halls. However, for most restaurants, table sizes can help control the vacancy rate. Arrange tables for two (deuces or twotops) so they can easily be pushed together to create larger tables if necessary. Quick-service establishments can also try stools and counters or classroom-style seating with tablet arms to accommodate solo eaters.

Banquet/Meeting Rooms: Flexible space plans and style statements can rejuvenate meeting and banquet spaces. What sells these days is really a combination of exclusive style and market-driven features. What makes meeting and banquet spaces more attractive to potential guests? Convenience. Outdated audiovisuals, inadequate lighting, and run-of-the-mill banquet chairs make private spaces go out of style. Make sure you have diffused lighting to reduce eye strain, and select chairs that are comfortable for those long corporate meetings (8+ hours). Use tables on wheels (on lockable casters) so you can customize the space for each event with a minimum of staff time. Easy to use. Incorporate audiovisual (A/V) equipment into the room design.

Avoid the unsightly and unsafe practice of having to tape wires and cables across meeting room floors. Allocate space for people running the meeting, and make sure you have enough space in the back of the room to load and unload dedicated A/V equipment for home users. customization Minimize built-in furniture/accessories to allow for maximum flexibility. Include a provision for electronic locks to ensure each guest can have a personalized key for their room, if needed. Consider making the main walls of meeting rooms with tack boards covered in rich textiles so presenters can easily put up flip charts. Flexible lighting controls allow clients to individually determine the correct lighting level for their events. Technical knowledge. Clients using the meeting rooms travel in their own comfort today, carrying laptop computers, individual digital assistants (PDAs), smartphones, iPods and individual DVD players.

These devices have become ubiquitous. Your meeting space guests have quickly grown accustomed to constant connectivity and expect facilities to accommodate them. These days, the baseline for high-tech meeting rooms is wired or wireless high-speed Internet access. In fact, Internet access has become a substitute for many other technologies, such as video conferencing and, in some cases, teleconferencing, which can be done over the Web. Essentially, meeting planners and associations are looking for a simple plug and play capability in a meeting area. This requires access to the Web, a large screen and LCD projector, and easy setup and/or an A/V professional on call to help when needed.

Organization of spaces for banquets/meetings. An important decision to make early on is whether to offer round or rectangular tables for seating at a banquet. When planning this room, it is especially important to have enough aisle space, as the servers will be really boisterous (with full trays) in this environment. With the right tables and large paper plans, the same space can take on several personalities for every occasion. There is a useful formula for calculating banquet seating: If you are using standard rectangular tables, divide the square footage of the room by 8 to find out how many seats will be accommodated in the area.

For example, a 500 square foot area, divided by 8, will accommodate 62 or 63 people. When using round tables (of any standard circumference), divide the square footage of the area by 10. A 500 square foot area with round tables will seat 50 people. This formula also allows for chair space as well as aisle space. Their use is limited only by columns, entrances or service doors that would require fewer people to sit in particular areas.