Top it off: your ultimate guide to restaurant uniform shirts
Are your restaurant staff dressed to impress? Your front-of-house staff are pivotal in creating an excellent first impression, so it stands to reason that they should be dressed appropriately.
When picking restaurant uniform shirts, pants, and aprons, you must ensure they give off a vibe that matches your restaurant brand. In this guide, we’ll share how to pick or custom-design uniform shirts and pieces your staff will wear with pride.
Why you need curated uniforms for your restaurant staff
Whether you’re a casual dining cafe or a Michelin-star restaurant in the trendy part of town, having matching restaurant uniform shirts adds legitimacy or formality to your establishment. Here are the top three reasons you need a uniform dress code for your restaurant:
- It helps guests identify the staff: Aside from bad food, few things are worse than a guest who needs to talk to a staff member or server but can’t identify who they are in the room. With sharp restaurant uniform shirts, customers can easily find your team members, even in a crowded room.
- Adds to your sophistication: Sleek and on-style uniforms add a touch of class and sophistication to your dining establishment. It says you care about professionalism and creating reliable customer service and experiences.
- Supports your brand identity: In business, everything you do must relate to your brand identity. This includes having uniforms that match your visual style and the mood you want to set. For example, a Michelin-star restaurant front-of-house staff wouldn’t likely wear denim aprons, and a casual cafe hostess in Chicago wouldn't wear a sequined cocktail dress to greet customers as they come in.
What’s your vibe?
The first step to choosing new restaurant server shirts is to know your brand vibe. For example, if you’re a casual restaurant with beachfront patio dining, the Men’s Wheat Striped Cabana Shirt would fit that vibe perfectly. The Heather Blue waist Apron would work well if you're a craft brewery downtown.
Styles and option inspiration
Need some inspiration for your restaurant server uniforms? Here are a few places to start:
- Quality: As you know, restaurant uniforms go through harsh use during a typical shift. They need to withstand everything, including stains. You also want to maximize your investment by buying higher quality uniform pieces that will last longer than off-the-shelf uniforms at your local restaurant supply surplus store.
- Style: Choose a style to match your vibe. Whether that’s Men's Banded Collar Service Oxford for your dining room bartenders or a more casual Women's Short Sleeve Blue Stretch Service Chambray for your food cart or mobile catering service staff.
- Material: Chambray is a great casual material option for restaurant server uniforms. Twill is durable cotton that makes for great aprons. Waxed canvas is a fabric workhorse that develops stylish, distinctive “cracks” (similar to leather) over time. Anything in cotton is excellent for its breathability and ability to absorb moisture (like sweat). It will help your servers stay cool in the heat.
- Color: Classic color options include white, black, brown, and beige or neutral. However, don’t be afraid to go bold and choose a color that matches your brand, like this Cardinal-colored apron.
Restaurants that do uniforms well.
A classic steakhouse has a certain inherent vibe about it. When we designed the uniforms for RPM Steak in Chicago, we helped the client put a contemporary spin on the classic Chicago Steakhouse Uniform.
Their servers now wear a slim, double-vented suit coat made from white tropical poly, a white dress shirt, a black tie, and black slacks. The bartenders wear a similar outfit, but we swapped the jacket for a double-breasted waistcoat.
We love touring our client’s establishments to understand better the vibe they’re looking for in their custom-made restaurant server uniforms. The Cherry Circle Room in Chicago was full of iconic city history, making a resurgence.
For this client, we used a “secret society” theme with embroidery and apron flaps on a rich midnight navy with gold trim to reflect the windowless, mysterious vibe of the Cherry Circle Room.
Momotaro is where traditional Japanese aesthetics merge with Western society. We were tasked with carrying this vision in a subtle, smart way.
The result was a combination of carefully selected materials that used Japanese design conventions and Western garments' functionality. The staff shirts are a standard button-down, designed to fit both men and women, with the addition of a modern stand collar.
Are your current uniforms matching your vibe?
If you’ve been unhappy with your restaurant staff uniforms for a while, now might be the time to upgrade and get something custom-designed. If you’re opening a new establishment or a new location of an existing one, now is the perfect time to start on the right foot with new uniforms.
When your staff is wearing their uniforms confidently, they’ll provide a better customer experience with guests raving about your restaurant. At Stock, we have modern uniforms for every industry, whether you want something curated, custom, or direct from our catalog.
Browse our online restaurant uniform curated looks for inspiration, then contact us, and we’ll create a customer restaurant uniform shirt and outfit to match your brand personality.
Contact us today for a custom consultation to get started.