With rising prices and changing habits, restaurants today face unique challenges. Fortunately, there’s an easy way to bring in new customers, increase loyalty and generate additional revenue-offer new payment options. People today are using digital wallets, cryptocurrency and other alternative payment methods at retail; they want to use these methods in restaurants, too.

To provide more insights on today’s diners, Grocery Dive’s studioID surveyed industry leaders across the U.S. and Canada for Blackhawk Network (BHN), and generated a report, How Payment Strategies Can Deliver Restaurant Sales Amid Rising Prices and Shifting Demand. All information and stats in this blog are taken from this report.

Digital wallets are already here

As you know, cash is still among the top payment options in restaurants, especially in fast food. But since the pandemic, consumers have adopted more digital and alternate payment options at an accelerate pace, and that’s not going to change. Digital wallets, in fact, is now the fourth most-used payment option (after cash, credit cards and debit cards) at fast-food and sit-down restaurants, which is consistent with overall business trends.

Let’s look at some numbers:

Diners paying by digital
wallets on a weekly basis
Fast Food: 12%
Sit-Down: 10%

Fortunately, the majority of restaurants now accept digital wallet payments, with fast-food restaurants taking the lead:

Your diners want more options

People love to eat out. As the world’s economic uncertainty grows, they'll be looking more and more for ways to stretch their dining dollar. Using alternative payment options could give them the stretch their looking for-which is good news for sit-down and fast-food restaurants that provide those options.

According to the BHN report, these are the alternative payment options consumers have considered using over the six months leading up to the survey.

The younger the consumer, the more they want to use these new payment options. In addition to the options mentioned above, younger consumers also want to use PayPal, Venmo other digital payment platforms. So, yes, if your restaurant caters to younger diners, you’re under a bit more pressure to provide more payment options.

Adding options can add to your bottom line

Let’s lead with the scary news from our report:

35% report they may not go to a
restaurant that doesn’t accept
their preferred payment method.

Now, the good news: When you offer more alternative payment options:

You will attract more diners.

Those diners will come back more often.

And they will spend more.

Let’s break this down between fast-food and sit-down restaurants. We asked if the following restaurants accepted more forms of payment, would they be more likely to…

Talk to BHN

For more stats, tips and insights, just fill out the short form on this page to download the full report, How Payment Strategies Can Deliver Restaurant Sales Amid Rising Prices and Shifting Demand.

Then, when you’re ready to give your customers what they want and grow your restaurant business, click here or call 844.487.1369 and talk to a BHN expert.