The restaurant industry is a special enterprise that depends largely on human connections.
It's difficult to work in a restaurant. When the kitchen is chaotic, the clients are picky, and you're on your feet for hours, it's too easy to burn out.
While an inspirational quote cannot replace things like fair wages and a pleasant working environment, it can help to boost morale and make your employees feel valued. Restaurant quotes are an excellent way to influence people's behavior and mindset. It can help employees feel valued, bring about positive change in a business, and provide inspiration when times are tough.
Here are some inspiring restaurant quotes regarding the hospitality industry, cooperation, culinary delights, and more.
Restaurant Quotes for Employees
The kitchen isn't just a job for many restaurant owners, managers, and staff members; it's a calling. Find some amazing restaurant quotes for employees here.
"Every restaurant is a theater, and the truly great ones allow us to indulge in the fantasy that we are rich and powerful. When restaurants hold up their end of the bargain, they give us the illusion of being surrounded by servants intent on ensuring our happiness and offering extraordinary food.
But even modest restaurants offer the opportunity to become someone else, at least for a little while. - Ruth Reichl, Restaurant Critic, and Author.
"It’s amazing the relationships you forge in a kitchen. When you cooperate in an environment that’s hot. Where there are a lot of knives. You’re trusting your well-being with someone you’ve never before met or known."
– Alexandra Guarnaschelli, Chef and Television Host.
"Capitalism has turned human beings into commodities. To the owner of a restaurant: the cook and a bag of potatoes are equally important."
- Mokokoma Mokhonoana.
"If you want a reliable tip, drive into a town, go to the nearest appliance store and seek out the dishwasher repair man. He spends a lot of time in restaurant kitchens and usually has strong opinions about them."
– Bryan Miller.
"Restaurants free us from mundane reality; that is part of their charm. When you walk through the door, you are entering neutral territory where you are free to be whoever you choose for the duration of the meal."
- Ruth Reichl, Restaurant Critic, and Author.
"Fortunately, I knew the cardinal rule of getting on with one’s fellow cooks. It applies in any kitchen and can be summed up in two short words: bust ass."
– Jacques Pépin, Chef.
"A business absolutely devoted to service will have only one worry about profits. They will be embarrassingly large."
- Henry Ford.
"One thing I always say is being a great chef today is not enough – you have to be a great businessman."
– Wolfgang Puck, Chef.
"The discovery of a new dish does more for the happiness of the human race than the discovery of a star."
– Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, Philosopher.
“There’s a bond among kitchen staff, I think. You spend more time with your chef in the kitchen than you do with your own family.”
– Gordon Ramsey
"Nothing goes perfectly, especially when you're opening a restaurant."
- Bobby Flay
"If I ever own a restaurant, I will never allow the waiters to ask if the diners like their dishes. Particularly when they're talking."
- Orson Welles
Restaurant Quotes for Customers
Showing even the smallest acts of kindness goes a long way in ensuring that your customer service is impeccable since they give your clients the impression that you are genuinely attempting to make them feel comfortable. Find some amazing restaurant quotes for customers here.
(Interesting restaurant quotations reveal that great food along with customer service helps a restaurant to grow).
"Every company’s greatest assets are its customers because without customers there is no company."
– Michael LeBoeuf, Author.
"Loyal customers, they don’t just come back, they don’t simply recommend you, they insist that their friends do business with you."
– Chip Bell, Founder of Chip Bell Group.
"We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better."
– Jeff Bezos.
"You Don’t Need A Silver Fork To Eat Good Food."
-Paul Prudhomme
"Good food will always welcome you back with a smile."
– Anthony T. Hincks.
"Customer satisfaction is worthless. Customer loyalty is priceless."
- Jeffrey Gitomer
"Joy can only be real if people look upon their life as a service and have a definite object in life outside themselves and their personal happiness."
- Leo Tolstoy
"The goal as a company is to have customer service that is not just the best but legendary."
– Sam Walton, Founder of Wal-Mart.
"If you love your customer to death, you can’t go wrong."
– Graham Day, Business Executive and Lawyer.
"Rule 1: The customer is always right. Rule 2: If the customer is ever wrong, re-read Rule 1."
– Stew Leonard, CEO of Stew Leonard’s.
"Human Beings Do Not Eat Nutrients They Eat Food."
- Mary Catherine Bateson
"Dealing with people is probably the biggest problem you face, especially if you are in business. Yes, and that is also true if you are a housewife, architect, or engineer."
– Dale Carnegie, Writer, and lecturer.
"I was at this restaurant. The sign said 'Breakfast Anytime'. So I ordered French Toast in the Renaissance."
– Steven Wright
"If you have a good experience in a restaurant, you tell 2 people. If you have a bad experience, you tell 10 people."
– Anthony Bourdain.
"Your customer doesn’t care how much you know until they know how much you care."
– Damon Richards
"When you go to a restaurant, the less you know about what happens in the kitchen, the more you enjoy your meal."
– Jeffrey Wright, Actor.
"If you have good food, people will come to your restaurant."
- Mickey Gilley
"In a restaurant, one is both observed and unobserved. Joy and sorrow can be displayed and observed "unwittingly," the writer scowling naively and the diners wondering, What the hell is he doing?"
-David Mamet
"The most important adage and the only adage is, the customer comes first, whatever the business, the customer comes first."
– Kerry Stokes, Businessman.
"The customer experience is the next competitive battleground."
– Jerry Gregoire
"The business of feeding people is the most amazing business in the world."
– José Andrés, Chef and Founder of World Central Kitchen
"Make a customer, not a sale."
– Katherine Barchetti, Store Owner.
"Merely satisfying customers will not be enough to earn their loyalty. Instead, they must experience exceptional service worthy of their repeat business and referral. Understand the factors that drive this customer revolution."
– Rick Tate, Author.
"People who love to eat are always the best people."
– Julia Child, Chef, Author, and Television Host.
"The only thing I like better than talking about food is eating."
– John Walters, Broadcaster.
Inspirational Restaurant Quotes
As a restaurant owner, manager, or team member, restaurant quotes can be a tremendous source of motivation. Find more inspiring restaurant quotes here.
"The best fame is a writer’s fame. It’s enough to get a table at a good restaurant, but not enough to get you interrupted when you eat."
- Fran Lebowitz, Journalist.
"Food is our common ground, a universal experience."
-James Beard, Chef, and Author.
"Life is like a restaurant; you can have anything you want as long as you are willing to pay the price."
– Moffat Machingura, Author.
"A restaurant is a fantasy-a kind of living fantasy in which diners are the most important members of the cast."
– Warner LeRoy
"Happiness consists in giving, and in serving others."
- Henry Drummond
"Restaurants get you in with food to sell you liquor; religions get you in with belief to sell you rules."
- Nassim Nicholas Taleb
"I want to enjoy my life, and food is a big part of it."
– Gwyneth Paltrow, Actress.
"A good restaurant is like a vacation; it transports you, and it becomes a lot more than just about the food."
– Philip Rosenthal, Television Writer, and Producer.
"There is no love sincerer than the love of food."
– George Bernard Shaw, Author.
"There are people with otherwise chaotic and disorganized lives, a certain type of person that’s always found a home in the restaurant business in much the same way that a lot of people find a home in the military."
– Anthony Bourdain, Chef, Author, and Television Show Host.
"One cannot think well, love well, sleep well if one has not dined well."
– Virginia Woolf, Author
"If anything is good for pounding humility into you permanently, it’s the restaurant business."
– Anthony Bourdain.
"The other night, I ate at a real nice family restaurant. Every table had an argument going."
– George Carlin
"When you are able to shift your inner awareness to how you can serve others, and when you make this the central focus of your life, you will then be in a position to know true miracles in your progress toward prosperity."
- Wayne W. Dyer
"There is a difference between dining and eating. Dining is an art. When you eat to get the most out of your meal, to please the palate, just as well as to satiate the appetite, that, my friend, is dining."
– Yuan Mei, Painter, and Poet.
"I eat at this German-Chinese restaurant, and the food is delicious. The only problem is that an hour later, you’re hungry for power."
- Dick Cavett
"Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly."
-M. F. K. Fisher, Food Writer
"Although the skills aren’t hard to learn, finding happiness and finding satisfaction, and finding fulfillment in continuously serving somebody else something good to eat is what makes a really good restaurant."
- Mario Batali
"A restaurant on the moon could not have had less atmosphere."
- Geoff Dyer
"Hospitality is central to the restaurant business, yet it’s a hard idea to define precisely. Mostly, it involves being nice to people and making them feel welcome.
You notice it when it’s there, and you particularly notice it when it isn’t. A single significant lapse in this area can be your dominant impression of an entire meal. "– John Lanchester, Journalist.
"Some people ask the secret of our long marriage. We take time to go to a restaurant two times a week. A little candlelight, dinner, soft music, and dancing. She goes Tuesdays, I go Fridays."
– Henry Youngman
"Numbers written on restaurant checks within the confines of restaurants do not follow the same mathematical laws as numbers written on any other pieces of paper in any other parts of the Universe."
- Douglas Adams, 'Life, The Universe and Everything' (1982).
"The sole purpose of business is service. The sole purpose of advertising is explaining the service which business renders."
- Leo Burnett
"A generous heart, a kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things that renew humanity."
- The Buddha
"Never eat at a place called 'Moms', but if the only other place in town has a sign that says 'Eats', go back to Moms."
- W. C. Fields ('20s).
"The disparity between a restaurant’s price and food quality rises in direct proportion to the size of the pepper mill."
- Bryan Miller
"The secret of a successful restaurant is sharp knives."
- George Orwell
"After a good dinner, one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations."
– Oscar Wilde, Author
"Eating at fast food outlets and other restaurants is simply a manifestation of the commodification of time coupled with the relatively low-value many Americans have placed on the food they eat."
-Andrew F. Smith, ‘Encyclopedia of Junk food and Fast Food’ (2006).
"The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same."
– Colin R. Davis, Conductor
“Fame itself… doesn’t really afford you anything more than a good seat in a restaurant.”
– David Bowie, Singer
"Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless."
– Mother Teresa
"The Restaurant at the End of the Universe is one of the most extraordinary ventures in the entire history of catering. It has been built on the fragmented remains of…it will be built on the fragmented..that is to say, it will have been built by this time, and indeed has been.
"- Douglas Adams, 'The Restaurant at the End of the Universe' (1980).
"The highway is replete with culinary land mines disguised as quaint local restaurants that carry such reassuring names as Millie’s, Pop’s, and Capt’n Dick’s."
-Bryan Miller
Restaurant Customer Service Quotes
Set a positive example by knowing the value of good customer service. Find more restaurant customer service quotes here.
"There are advantages to being a star, though – you can always get a table in a full restaurant."
– Ingrid Bergman
"The murals in restaurants are on par with the food in museums."
- Peter De Vries
"In the world of Internet Customer Service, it’s important to remember your competitor is only one mouse click away."
- Doug Warner
"Although a great restaurant experience must include great food, a bad restaurant experience can be achieved through bad service alone. Ideally, service is invisible. You notice it only when something goes wrong."
- Dana Spiotta
"You are serving a customer, not a life sentence. Learn how to enjoy your work."
– Laurie McIntosh, Educator, and Author.
"Good service is good business."
– Siebel Ad
"Never eat in a restaurant that has a bowling trophy on the cash register."
- Warren Miller
"Customer service is just a day in, day out ongoing, never-ending, unremitting, persevering, compassionate, type of activity."
– Leon Gorman, CEO of L.L. Bean.
"Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning."
- Bill Gates, Founder of Microsoft.
"Always render more and better service than is expected of you, no matter what your task may be."
- Og Mandino
"It’s so beautifully arranged on the plate – you know someone’s fingers have been all over it."
– Julia Child
"In a restaurant choose a table near a waiter."
– Jewish Proverb
"The path to your own happiness is usually found in service."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
"To give real service, you must add something which cannot be bought or measured with money, and that is sincerity and integrity."
- Douglas Adams
"Earn your success based on service to others, not at the expense of others."
-H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
"I'm working harder than ever now, and I'm putting on my pants the same as I always have. I just get up every day and try to do a little better than the day before, and that is to run a great restaurant with great food, great wine, and great service. That’s my philosophy."
- Emeril Lagasse
"A customer is the most important visitor on our premises, he is not dependent on us. We are dependent on him. He is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it.
He is not an outsider in our business. He is part of it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us an opportunity to do so.”– Mahatma Gandhi, Lawyer, Activist, and Ethicist.
"Being on par in terms of price and quality only gets you into the game. Service wins the game."
-Tony Allesandra, Author and Speaker
"Bistromathics…..The first nonabsolute number is the number of people for whom the table is reserved.
This will vary during the course of the first three telephone calls to the restaurant and then bear no apparent relation to the number of people who actually turn up or to the number of people who subsequently join them after the show/match/party/gig, or to the number of people who leave when they see who else has turned up.
"- Douglas Adams, ‘Life, The Universe and Everything’ (1982).
"Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong."
– Donald Porter, Vice President of British Airways.
"Spend a lot of time talking to customers face to face. You’d be amazed how many companies don’t listen to their customers."
– Ross Perot
"Friendly makes sales – and friendly generates repeat business."
– Jeffrey Gitomer, Author, and Speaker.
"Men are rich only as they give. He who gives great service gets great rewards."
- Elbert Hubbard
"I was doing stand-up at a restaurant, and there was a chalkboard on the street out front. It said, ‘Soup of the Day: Cream of Asparagus. Ellen DeGeneres."
– Ellen DeGeneres
"If you’re not serving the customer, your job is to be serving someone who is."
– Jan Calzon, former CEO of SAP Group.
"Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it. It is what the client or customer gets out of it."
- Peter Drucker
"We give you an eating experience that you’ll never forget."
– Anthony T. Hincks
