How to promote lunch specials for your restaurant

They decide lunch in the time it takes to cross the street

It is 11:10. The special is already on the board. A neighbor is leaving a meeting, or standing on the sidewalk with twenty minutes. They are not planning a night out. They are picking a place they can walk into now.

Last night's pasta photo does not answer that. A caption that reads like the dinner menu, with "also at lunch" at the end, does not either. Midday is a short window. The post has to name the dish, the price or the hours, and how to get it, before they keep walking.

Say the plate, the clock, and the door

Look at the lunch board, not the dinner book. Write one line for each thing they need before they leave the office or the car.

• The dish, in the name on the board. "Turkey club and soup" beats "a lunch experience."
• The price or the hours. "$14 until 2" is a decision. "Lunch specials available" is not. If you name a number, use the one on the check. How to show the price before they arrive is the longer habit. This post just has to match the board.
• How to come. Walk in, order at the counter, or call. One path.
• That this is lunch. Say the window so nobody reads the plate as tonight.

A caption that can go out as written:

Turkey club and tomato soup, $14, until 2. Walk in. We are on Oak, and the counter is the way to order.

That is the whole post. The photo is the plate in daylight, the way it looks at noon. How to shoot that plate on a phone is the habit. A window and a normal portion beat a dark overhead of the whole table. Candlelight and a wine glass will be read as dinner.

Post it while they can still change the plan

The useful window is late morning, about 10:30 to 11:30, while someone nearby is still picking a place. When to post is the longer clock. For a lunch special, the rule is shorter: the dish you named has to still be available when they arrive, and the hours you named have to match the board.

If you are writing this at 1:40 and the soup is gone, say what is still true. "The club is on until 2" is useful. "Join us for lunch" after you have stopped seating is not.

Send it where your regulars already look. If that is Instagram and Facebook, one post on each is enough. A Story works when the board changes:

Soup is gone. The club is still $14 until 2. Walk in if you are close.

Take that Story down, or post a new one, when you stop lunch. People who crossed the street for a plate you no longer have will remember the miss.

Do it before the first lunch ticket

You can finish this at the counter, before the rush.

1. Look at the board. Pick the one plate you would tell a friend to order if they only have forty minutes.
2. Write the price or the hours, and the one way to come in. Read it out loud. If it could be tonight's menu, add the clock.
3. Take five frames of the plate in the light you have at noon. Choose the one where the food is visible and the counter looks like yours.
4. Tell whoever is on the door what you promised: the dish, the price, and when lunch stops.
5. Post it. Your town and the word lunch do more than a pile of food tags.

If a cook knows the special will sell out by 12:30, trust that before you promise it until 2.

What to leave out

A lunch post fails in a few familiar ways:

• A dinner photo with no word that this is midday. They will try to book a table for 7.
• The whole menu. They needed one plate and a time.
• A price that changes at 2, with no note that it changes. The neighbor who arrives at 2:15 should not be surprised.
• "DM us to order" when the door is a walk-in. They are already short on time.
• Hours that do not match the board or the Google card. If lunch ends at 2, the post should say 2.
• A caption that never says today. Yesterday's special is not a reason to leave the office.

If you are closed for lunch, do not post as if the board is up. The neighbor who walks over will trust the next note less.

Tonight's empty tables are a different job. This note is for the hour before you stop seating lunch.

One clear lunch note

You are telling a neighbor what is on the board, what it costs or when it ends, and how to walk in before the window closes.

Name the dish. Name the price or the hours. Say how to come. Post it before they have already eaten.

If the blank caption is what stalls you, ChefMedia can draft the words from your restaurant's website so the dish and the hours start in your words. You still decide what is on the board at noon. A draft does not know you stop lunch at 2, or that the counter is the only way to order.