Here we go then ! Finally opening on Monday ....

[Arfa Daily]

Indeed, Tim. There's generally very few options to ever have a second go at a first impression. Our cafes were built on that concept, and both the missus and daughter never let the quality of food or service drop from the very high standard that they set right from the off. We still see many of our old regular customers out and about, and honestly, without exception so far, they have said that it's just not the same since we sold them to new people. It's not that there's anything wrong with the way that they are being run now, it's just that they have lost the 'edge' over the competition, which is oh so small, but oh so important ...

Arfa

[Arfa Daily]

Agreed. You will always get someone who is a serial complainer, and has to have a pop, just for the sake of it. In the seven years that we had the main cafe, without any lie, you could count the complaints received on less than two hands, and of those, probably no more than five were legitimate complaints where something had genuinely gone wrong with a customer's food, and we're all human and all make mistakes, occasionally ... :-)

Arfa

>

[Arfa Daily]

You're making me hungry, Colin ! On the photos, a 'staged' picture of the product can be a double-edged sword. I mean, how many times have you been through a well-known drive thru' and ordered a "Double Whammy Salsa Soaked Mexican Chilli Cheeseburger Special Limited Edition for This Week Only" , based on the yummy picture, and when you've got it, it looks nothing like the one that tempted you in the first place ... Always disappoints me, which takes us back to the 'first impressions' discussion.

The chip shop in my village has pictures like you describe, as does the Pizza / Kebab takeaway, and I don't think that I have ever had fare from either, that looks like the pictures !

Arfa

[Bob Minchin]

>>>>>

Very strange. It just hangs for me with IE, Firefox or Seamonkey. I was just curious to look around having followed your progress on UK d-i-y. Bob

[Nightjar]

Which, of course is what you want to do to your customers. Marketing people will tell you that, if you are selling sausages, you don't sell them on the sausage, you sell them on the sizzle - the sound they make frying in the pan and the associations that creates in the mind of the customer.

I suspect they are using stock photos - the sort of thing you will find if you search on hamburgers here:

have the option of showing real photos of your actual products, which should avoid the problem. As I said, they are well established as a sales aid - people like to see what they are buying before they choose. A good photo can even make them choose a more expensive burger than they otherwise would - an upsell in marketing terms.

Colin Bignell

[Tim Streater]

Oh Colin, give over! "chargrilled just for you" ?? That's the sort of marketing speak seen so often now that it's a pain in the bum. Vomit vomit!!

You'll be asking Arfa to say "torn chicken breast" and "drizzled with olive oil" next. Where do they get these phrases from, I wonder? I cringe with embarrassment whenever I see them.

[Tim Streater]

Name of chippy please? We might pop in there on the way home from Lewes next time.

[tony sayer]

Spot on with that human nature at its best example.

How many remember all the times you went to start your car?, remember them?..

Course not;!..

Remember the times it did NOT start betcha remember those;!....

[Robin]

FWIW (a) it's fine here in IE8 and Firefox 5 and (b) my traceroute ends with:

18 215 ms 232 ms 228 ms po16.dsr02.hstntx1.networklayer.com [70.87.253.102] 19 156 ms 144 ms 142 ms po2.car05.hstntx1.networklayer.com [207.218.245.18] 20 140 ms 138 ms 149 ms ns2.microlite8.com [74.55.135.43]

[ARWadsworth]

I am delighted that the burger joint is not near me. I would end up being a fat bastard in no time:-)

[Nightjar]

The reason it appears so often is because it does increase sales and that, after all, is what being in business is about.

Marketing consultants have teams of 'creative thinkers' whose job it is to come up with such phrases. I have to say that when I have provided a marketing consultant with what I thought was a perfectly good bit of advertising matter, they have always come up with something that sounds much better. Whether it represented good value for money is something I never quite made my mind up about though.

Colin Bignell

[Frank Erskine]

A bit like "line-caught pan fried" fish served on a "bed of French Fries".

[Thomas Prufer]

"Our purest Aberdeen Angus beef burgers, chargrilled for your pleasure by our young buxom wenches, wrapped in the thinnest hand-made coverings lightly outlining their laviscious mouth-watering curves, ..."

Thomas Prufer

[Tim Streater]

I think they all need a good smack.

[Arfa Daily]

LOL !

Arfa

[John Rumm]

>>>>>>>

Have you tried access via google's cache?

[Arfa Daily]

Ah, you've already been in then, Thomas ? :-)

Arfa

[Arfa Daily]

>>>>>>>>>>>

I've just put some photos up on Flickr, Bob. (New post also with address for those who have stopped following this thread).

Try

[djc]

+1

[Bob Minchin]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

>> Arfa Thanks Arfa. Looks Good! Shame you're not nearer otherwise I'd be tempted to sample the wares!

Are the punters flooding in?

Bob