Restaurant Furniture Blog

There are a number of restaurants I visit regularly and most have a similar restaurant tables layout - tables arranged with diners sitting back to back. With one small twist, you can create a much more comfortable dining experience and increase your table numbers.

No one likes to be crowded when eating out. To arrange tables with the seats that are back to back normally means you need at least six feet between chair back when they are pushed in. That can be a lot of wasted space. However, when people are seated, that empty space is reduced by well over half, and if both diners, sitting back to back, get up at once, they will most likely clash chairs.

I said one twist could solve that problem - and it can. Turn your tables 45 degrees so they are now lined up diagonally or corner to corner. In that format, diners are never back to back and can get up and sit down with ease, never clashing seats.

By arranging your restaurant tables layout in a corner to corner arrangement, you can often squeeze in one or more extra tables. This is because the four feet of space you have between tables can now be reduced to three or four feet. If you have five or six tables in a line, this represents a saving of five to six feet or more, room for one extra table.

If you think about your restaurant tables layout carefully, there are almost always changes you could make that will not only increase your numbers, but can make for a dining experience that is more comfortable than your current layout.