Restaurant owners across all formats, be it fine dining, casual dining, or food aggregator platforms, reported an unprecedented surge in diners on Mother’s Day, surpassing the usual bookings observed on occasions like New Year’s Eve, Valentine’s Day, and even regular Sundays.
EazyDiner, a platform for discovering tables, making reservations, and processing payments, with over 15,000 restaurants listed, confirmed the trend.
Kapil Chopra, the founder of EazyDiner, revealed that bookings on their platform for May 12 more than doubled compared to the previous year, which incidentally was also a Sunday. He noted that lunch and dinner reservations on the app surged by 62% and 198%, respectively, resulting in an average restaurant occupancy of 92%. Chopra described the day as “absolutely crazy,” surpassing New Year’s Eve by 50% in terms of activity. He emphasized it as a fantastic day for Indians enjoying dining out in the food and beverage sector.
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He mentioned that Bengaluru experienced the highest growth this year, followed by Mumbai and Delhi.
Restaurant operators corroborated to this trend. “We haven’t seen such a high participation for quite some time. Every restaurant is fully booked. Zorawar Kalra, the founder & MD of Massive Restaurants, which operates brands like Masala Library, Pa Pa Ya, Farzi Cafe, and Made in Punjab, said, “I’ve personally never received so many calls for reservations across the country.”
Anjan Chatterjee from Speciality Restaurants, overseeing establishments like Oh Calcutta! and Mainland China, echoed similar sentiments, noting that all his restaurants operated at full capacity on Sunday, particularly the upscale ones in major cities. “We’ve ensured sufficient inventory at our restaurants. Days like Mother’s Day, Valentine’s Day, and Friendship Day consistently witness significant spikes in sales,” he remarked.
Riyaz Amlani, founder and MD of Impresario Hospitality & Entertainment, which encompasses restaurant brands such as SOCIAL, Smoke House Deli, and Boss Burger, noted a 20% increase in footfall compared to typical Sundays. “We offered special Mother’s Day meals and deals for the occasion,” he mentioned.
Even restaurants within major hotel chains rolled out the red carpet for mothers. For instance, Courtyard by Marriott Navi Mumbai provided a curated brunch at a 30% discount and welcomed mothers to enjoy a soothing express therapy session at its wellness corner.
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Compared to last year, restaurants witnessed larger family gatherings, leading to an increase in overall cover charges. The average per diner on the EazyDiner app rose by 35% to INR 4,952 this year from INR 3,702 last year.
It was a day of bustling activity for food aggregator platforms as well. Deepinder Goyal, founder and CEO of Zomato, remarked on X, “Mother’s Day, for the first time ever, is shaping up to be a much higher volume day than New Year’s Eve. Our office is buzzing with full war service scenes today. Fingers crossed that we can serve everyone treating their moms today.”