No-Show Report 2024: When restaurant tables stay empty

Summary

Over the past few weeks, the media has frequently reported on restaurants plagued by no-shows. At the same time, we have been receiving an increasing number of requests from restaurateurs asking to be able to require guests to provide a credit card to protect themselves against losses in the event of a no-show.

We took this as an indication of an intensifying no-show problem and set ourselves the task of taking a closer look. Since we processed reservations for around 10 million guests in 2022 and have access to reservation data from the last 10 years, we believed we were in a position to quantify the no-show problem in German-speaking Switzerland through statistical analysis.

The result is an insightful report that also shows that smart restaurateurs should rely on data to maximize their revenue and minimize losses.

Enjoy the read!

In this report, we provide an overview:

• Data overview
• Key findings in numbers
• FAQ

Data overview

No-show rate over the last 10 years

First, we asked ourselves how the no-show rate has developed over the last 10 years.

Between 2013 and the first year of the pandemic in 2020, the no-show rate remained stable at 0.1 percent. The upward trend following the reopening of the hospitality industry in 2021 is quite striking.

Rising number of no-shows since reopening

Next, we took a closer look at the months following the reopening of the hospitality industry in April 2021. It was immediately apparent that the no-show rate began to rise continuously, resulting in a fivefold increase to over 0.5 percent by December 2022 and January 2023.

Key findings in numbers

Over the past few weeks, the media has frequently reported on restaurants plagued by no-shows. At the same time, we have been receiving an increasing number of requests from restaurateurs asking to be able to require guests to provide a credit card to protect themselves against losses in the event of a no-show.

FAQ