What Restaurant Managers Can Learn From Disney's Magic

First time Disney visitors have a whopping 70% return rate. How many restaurants can say their customers are that loyal? Fortunately, the Disney Institute has published many of its parks' tricks in "Be Our Guest," so let's take a look and see what restaurateurs can apply to improving their own customer loyalty.

It's All About Process

Walt Disney was utterly obsessed with process and procedure, and this drive to develop processes which allow delivering a "magical" experience every time is the key to Disney parks' success.

It wasn't a question of "luck" for Disney... not ever. A theme park was a "factory" for entertainment and delight, and key to this level of service was designing great processes and rolling them out at scale.

For example, consider height limits on rides. After it became clear that kids were devastated by waiting in line and then being told they were too short for a ride, Disney implemented passes that would give turned-away kids permission to skip to the front of the line on their next ride.

Constant Optimization

Walt Disney was detail-obsessed, viewing the parks as ever-unfinished products which required constant improvement. He would tour the parks incognito, looking for minor staff slip-ups and track down supervisors to arrange a retraining program.

Even the sound system of Disney parks is designed for the perfect customer experience. The Disney World park uses some 15,000 speakers placed scientifically to ensure the volume of the music you hear is constant as you walk.

Training Staff To Understand Tone, Not Just Words

If a customer asked a seemingly nonsensical question like "When does the 3 o'clock parade start?" -- how would your staff react?

For Disney park staffers, known as "cast members" because Walt viewed every service person as part of the experience, the question isn't nonsensical. They're trained to interpret the tone and understand the question isn't necessarily meant literally. Often, the customer really wants to know "When will the three o'clock parade pass by here?"

The staff member then answers the "real" question appropriately, offering proactive advice if possible. Of course, their staffers are also trained in the best gestures, postures, and facial expressions and how humor or tone of voice produce the best possible experience.

Never-Ending Customer Research

Walt Disney strongly opposed the idea of an administration building, because he wanted his administrators walking around the park and seeing how customers interacted. He understood this was the only way those administrators could make good choices about how to improve the customer experience.

Nowadays, this principle is formalized with customer researchers going out and collecting data, but that doesn't mean it has to be formal for your restaurant operation. As with all of these Disney park tricks, you can apply it on a small scale every day yourself.