Direct answer: The fastest way to get more catering orders is to convert businesses that already ordered once into standing weekly accounts. Call the person who placed the order within 48 hours, offer a standing order (same day each week, rotating menu, locked delivery window, one monthly invoice), and if weekly is a no, land a monthly order before hanging up. One office on a weekly standing order is roughly 50 orders a year from a single phone call.
The most ignored revenue in catering
Your best catering lead isn’t a stranger. It’s the office you delivered to last Tuesday.
Most operators treat that order as a win, close the ticket, and go back to chasing new customers. That’s the mistake. The hardest part of catering sales, getting a business to trust you with a real order, is already done. And nobody follows up.
Here’s what that costs you. A one-time office order is a transaction. The same office ordering every Thursday is roughly 50 orders a year. Same prep, same route, same invoice. You know your average catering ticket. Multiply it by 50 and that’s what one phone call is worth. Now count how many offices ordered from you in the last 90 days exactly once.
That gap is the most ignored revenue in restaurant catering.
Does the recurring order pitch actually work?
This framework is part of the catering system we run with Padrino’s Restaurants, a 5-location, family-run brand in South Florida. Their catering sales grew 62% year-over-year from March through October, and 52% across the full year.
Notice which number is bigger. The non-holiday months outgrew the year as a whole, because recurring office business doesn’t care what season it is. Holiday catering spikes and disappears. Standing accounts show up every week in February. That’s the point of this system.
The Recurring Order Pitch Framework
1. The window: 48 hours. The pitch happens within two days of a successful first order, while people in that office are still talking about lunch. Wait a week and you’re a vendor they used once. Call inside the window and you’re the caterer they just loved.
2. The person: whoever placed the order. Usually an office manager or an executive assistant. Understand what they actually want. It’s not more food options. It’s one less thing to figure out every week. You’re not selling trays. You’re deleting a recurring chore from their job.
3. The offer: a standing order, made stupid-simple. Same day every week. A rotating menu so nobody gets bored. A locked delivery window. One invoice at the end of the month. That’s it. You can add a small standing-account perk if you want, but the real perk is that they never have to think about this again.
4. The script. “Hey [name], this is [you] from [restaurant]. Glad Tuesday went well. Quick question. Most of the offices we work with end up putting a standing order in place, same day each week, rotating menu, locked delivery time, one monthly invoice. Want me to set that up so you don’t have to deal with ordering every week?”
Read it again. You never asked them to buy more food. You offered to take work off their plate.
5. The fallback. If weekly is too much, drop to a standing monthly order, or first-call status for their meetings and events. Either way, do not hang up without the next order dated. “No” to weekly is not “no” to next month.
Why standing catering orders work
Office catering decisions are made by busy people who hate making them. Every week, someone in that office has to remember, decide, and coordinate lunch. A standing order removes the decision entirely, and defaults are powerful. Once you’re the Thursday caterer, someone has to actively decide to fire you. Nobody does that over a sandwich tray that showed up on time. It’s the same principle as building demand before you need it.
You stop competing for the order. You become the routine.
What operators can do this week
1. Pull your last 90 days of catering orders and flag every business that ordered once. That’s your call list. It costs nothing. These people already know your food and already trust your delivery.
2. Build one standing offer before you make the first call. Fixed day, rotating menu, locked window, monthly invoice. Write it down so every call offers the same thing. Improvised offers die on the phone.
3. Make the 48-hour call a step in your process, with a name attached. Not “we should follow up more.” A specific person calls every first-time corporate order within two days. If it isn’t assigned, it isn’t happening.
The takeaway
Catering growth is not an acquisition problem. It’s a retention problem wearing an acquisition costume. Stop counting orders. Start counting accounts. The same follow-up discipline is what makes private events profitable.
Frequently asked questions
How soon should a restaurant follow up after a first catering order? Within 48 hours. The office is still talking about the meal, the person who ordered still remembers the experience, and the restaurant is still the caterer they just used rather than a vendor from last month.
Who is the decision-maker for recurring office catering? Usually the person who placed the first order: an office manager, executive assistant, or HR coordinator. They are evaluated on making things run smoothly, so an offer that removes a weekly task is more persuasive than a discount.
What should a standing catering order include? A fixed day each week, a rotating menu so the office doesn’t tire of the same meal, a locked delivery window, and a single monthly invoice. Simplicity is the offer.
Should a restaurant discount recurring catering orders? Not by default. The value of a standing order to the buyer is convenience, not price. A small standing-account perk can help close, but leading with a discount trains the account to expect one forever.
How do you track recurring catering accounts? Count unique business accounts and their order frequency, not just total catering sales. A restaurant with 20 weekly accounts has a more predictable catering business than one with 100 one-time orders.
About the author Sebastian Stahl is the founder of Breadth Restaurant Marketing, a restaurant marketing agency that runs catering, private events, and pre-opening campaigns for independent restaurants and multi-unit hospitality groups.
If you want to talk through what a recurring catering system could look like for your restaurant, I keep a few strategy calls open each week. No pitch, just a conversation about what’s working and what isn’t. Book one here