With the popularity of cafes booming in Malaysia, where the visual appeal is just as important as the smell, repeat customers are the golden ticket. You have a nice place, a nice menu, perhaps, a couple of hundreds of followers on Instagram. Why then do they not come back?
Amazingly, it does not always have to be food, prices or even you service. It may be something very simple: hygiene. And we do not only mean table clearing. Whether your customers know it or not, the hygienic quality in your cafe can either make or destroy your business, silently. This is when a service of a commercial cleaning company becomes a nice-to-have to a must-have.
It is not Coffee, It is the Corners
According to a 2023 poll done by Malaysian F&B customer organization FoodSafe, more than 68 percent of the customers reported visible dirt and foul smell as the biggest factors which had stopped them to come back to the said restaurant even after food was good. Put it into consideration. More than two-thirds of individuals would never come back to your well-designed cafe experience because the floor was sticky or the toilet was stinky.
Now, imagine this: when the dust sits in your light fixtures, maybe a smear left on the glass frames and the bin is filled up in the area with the self-serviced water station, your customers already know. They are not supposed to grumble. They can even complete their food. However, there is a probability that they will not be back.
It is particularly the case in the Malaysian cities, such as Bangsar, Damansara, or George Town in Penang, where the cafe-hopping culture is the norm, and people have a choice of a dozen photo-worthy bars within a 5-minute stroll.
Clean is not sufficient: it has to feel clean
The thing is that cleanliness is not only visual, but emotional as well. Hygiene is synonymous with professionalism, safety, and care amongst the customers. A clean environment is an indicator that you respect your area, your trade and above all your customers.
This is where most of the cafe owners fail though. They presume that staff wipe-down twice a day suffices. It’s not. Small restaurants whose staff rosters are constrained frequently ignore areas that are hard to reach or high-touch such as:
- Corners and skirting boards under-seat
- Air-conditioning vents
- Door knobs and checking devices
- Exhaust fans in the bath room
- Behind and underneath cooker appliances
This is the area where commercial cleaning service can come in and do the missing patches. This is contrary to general cleaners and these services are trained to give deep cleaning and sanitizing to sections that often go unnoticed but they are visited by your customers either automatically or involuntarily.
The Unseen Builds the Customer Loyalty
You can believe that people are coming to eat matcha latte or sourdough sandwich. The thing is though, people will return because experience was pleasant. A lot of that comfort is unseen and it is a clear environment.
Consider the case of a mid-range restaurant at Subang Jaya that had improved its cleaning aspects out of observing a drop in weekday traffic. They included weekly deep cleaning, resolved existing problems with mould in the bathroom, and spent money on scent-free-floor products. Not only did their Google reviews become better within six weeks but customers also began labeling them with such words as so clean and cozy, a thing that never occurred previously.
Nothing new in the menu. No large marketing exercise. Simply, a more superior experience.
Business Price of Dirty Spaces
Ringgit time. The cost of obtaining a new customer ranges between RM 20-RM40 (Depending on your mode of marketing) as stated in a 2022 F&B industry report by SME Corp Malaysia. Retaining one? Just RM5–RM10. It is a huge difference in cost.
Therefore, in case you do spend on influencers, advertisements, and even offer promo deals, and remain unsuccessful to attain returning customer, then you may need to look no further than the adequacy of cleaning as the missing link. An investment in a commercial cleaning service that is not huge may be exactly what it takes to reduced your churn rate, increase word-of-mouth, and build the long-term credibility of your brand largely unnoticed.
Final Sip
In the highly competitive caf- scene of Malaysia, it takes more than good coffee. Everything is watched, felt and smelled by your customers. Cleanliness is not only a health code, it is an emotional stimulus, a point of differentiation and a silent killer in the deal.
