Why Your Restaurant Needs High-Ticket Catering

Why Your Restaurant Needs High-Ticket Catering

Hey everyone! My name is Aidan Heninger and I'm excited to connect with you today. You might be seeing this on Youtube, Facebook, Skool, or maybe somewhere else. No matter where you're joining us from, welcome to Catering Launch—we're glad to have you here.

Here’s a little about me: I’m a former restaurant owner who now specializes in helping Independent Restaurant Owners launch 6-figure catering programs. My company's name - Catering Launch - tells you everything you need to know about the company. The only way to build a 6-Figure catering program is to have a network of high-ticket catering customers that regularly send you orders of $1,000 or more.

If you own a restaurant, you need to have a 6-Figure catering program to stay competitive. Think about this for a minute. What could having $100,000 or $200,000 extra flowing into your business every year mean for your bottom line? This isn't some theoretical thing that could happen if 10 pieces fall into place. This is something that happened at my pizzeria after I built a network of food buyers—what I call people who order food for large groups of people.

There are 3 main sectors of catering. There's corporate catering, wedding catering, and event catering. A lot of what I talk about comes back to corporate catering, because that is the best sector of catering for landing recurring orders. That should be our goal every time - to deliver catering so well that the food buyer chooses to come back and order again and again, on a regular basis.

Let's talk for a minute about I got here…

So, when I was a teenager and up until 22 years old, I worked constantly in the food industry - at Papa John’s. I managed a location for several years and learned the pizza business.

At 23, I graduated college and went to work at a tech company. I worked as glorified tech support, and started to think that the corporate world wasn't as amazing as people made it out to be.

At 24, I was promoted to Office Manager. It didn’t take long to realize that the corporate world—and all its endless meetings—wasn’t for me. But there was one silver lining: part of my job involved ordering food for weekly lunches and events. I was spending thousands of dollars on catering each week, which gave me firsthand insight into how corporate food buying works. After 15 months in the role, I knew exactly what drives corporate food buyers and how I could leverage that knowledge as a restaurant owner.

At 25, I bought my restaurant and jumped right into building our catering program. We secured our first corporate catering client early on and gradually grew from there. However, progress was slower than I expected, and many of the strategies I initially tried didn’t work as planned. I spent months researching catering everywhere. I could.

At 26, I celebrated my first full year as a restaurant owner. What a year it was. In those 12 months, we launched and scaled our catering program, bringing in $137,000 in additional revenue from catering alone. This milestone didn’t come easily, but I had the foundation for how to launch an extremely profitable catering program.

At 27, I wrapped up my second year as a restaurant owner. We added $300,000 in catering sales to our total revenue. On average, we brought in $958 in catering sales every day we were open. For a small pizzeria making $1,100–$1,300 on weekdays, that was a big win. By constantly finding new ways to connect with food buyers, while maintaining the relationships we established our first year in business, we set every franchise-wide record and proved the power of catering as a business strategy.

At 28, I sold my restaurant to focus on Catering Launch, where we help Independent Restaurant Owners launch 6-Figure Catering Programs.

Now, that takes us to today and why I'm here. I know what it takes to launch a catering program from zero. I know all the ways restaurant owners can and should market their restaurants to corporate customers (with money to spend on their employees), wedding customers (who are willing to pay a premium for flawless service) and event customers (who always need reliable vendors).

When I bought my restaurant (an established franchise that had been operating in the same location for 32 years), I inherited a business that was basically breaking even. Some months we made a bit of money, some months we lost a bit. Catering was the one factor that took my restaurant from a bad situation, to setting every sales record in the book.

My restaurant was called Pier 49 Pizza in the city of American Fork, Utah. When I was in charge, we set the Pier 49 daily sales record ($11,247.46), the weekly sales record ($23,970.52), the monthly sales record ($80,423.21), and the yearly sales record of ($843,068.35). For a Pier 49 franchise, those numbers are unheard of. We were the first Pier 49 location to hit $600,000, then $700,000, then $800,000 in annual sales. This wasn't an accident, and it wasn't because I'm an operations genius. I'm not.

But I am great at catering and showing restaurants exactly how to launch their own catering programs.. If you're a small restaurant doing under $1,000,000 per year in sales, catering is without a doubt the most powerful way to grow your business. Yet so many restaurant owners overlook it. Why? Because it seems complicated, time-consuming, or reserved for big chains.

But here’s the truth: catering is for everyone. Whether you run a cozy neighborhood café, a pizza shop, or a family-owned BBQ joint, catering is the way - let me repeat that - the way to serve more people, make more money, and build stronger connections in your community.

It's not all about money. We're business owners, we need to sell enough to keep serving the community, keep our employees on payroll, and positively effect the lives of the people we serve. But let's be real. We need to make more money every year. Businesses that aren't constantly expanding - making more money than the year before - go out of business real fast. That's the truth of every industry out there, especially restaurants, that have such high fixed costs - rent, utilities, insurance, and labor to some extent.

Money shouldn't be such a taboo thing to talk about in the restaurant industry. We all need money to survive and take care of our families. If you're not interested in making more money, then Catering Launch is not for you. But, if you - like me - are interested in the idea of growing your business and growing your income, then you're in the right place.

There’s no shortage of people out there claiming they can help restaurant owners increase sales, but most of them never outline clear, measurable goals for you to aim for. Why? Because their entire approach is built around running ads, and they can’t guarantee how effective those ads will actually be. It’s a gamble—they’re hoping something sticks, but they don’t have the tools or strategies to create consistent, predictable results for your business. Ads might bring in some leads, but they rarely translate into long-term, sustainable growth for restaurant owners.

Hopefully you get results. But maybe you don't. And when you stop paying them, the customers stop coming in the door. Digital Marketing Agencies like these basically hold your business hostage.

The Catering Launch approach is different. We show you every step along the way of what to do. We take you behind the curtain so you can actually see what's going on. Our approach isn't about pouring money into an ads machine, it's about setting up a customer network focused on relationships. At my restaurant, I didn't land any of my largest customers through ads. I landed them by going out to meet people, saying exactly what they wanted to hear, and employing social proof to convince people that Pier 49 Pizza in the city of American Fork Utah was the best caterer around.

Unlike the other guys, I'll tell you exactly where Catering Launch wants to take you. We have resources that will help you land your first high-ticket catering order of at least $1,000. It could be just $1,000 or it could be a $5,000 monthly order. After that, once you've gotten your first success under your belt, we want to show you exactly how to launch a 6-Figure catering program. I owned a franchise pizzeria and scaled our catering program to $300,000/year in catering. I know you can do even better than that with the right strategy and the right execution plan.

You deserve a bigger paycheck every month, and catering is the best way to get you there. Catering gives you the opportunity to bring in predictable, recurring income that you can count on, month after month. Imagine waking up on Monday morning knowing you have high-ticket orders lined up for the week, ready to go. That kind of stability changes everything. At my restaurant, I knew all the dine-in and carry out sales would basically break the restaurant even. If I didn't have any catering lined up, I wasn't going to make any money.

But, if I had $5,000 in catering, I could expect to make about $3,000 - $3,500 just that week. On amazing weeks where we did $10,000 - $14,000 in catering, I could expect to take home $6,500 to $9,000. When you're running a small restaurant that used to just break even, those are huge numbers. $9,000 in a week is great for almost everyone out there.

But catering isn’t just about the numbers; it’s about relationships. When you cater for local offices, weddings, schools, or events, you’re not just delivering food—you’re becoming a part of their story. You’re helping them celebrate milestones, connect with their teams, and make their events unforgettable. And when people have a great experience with your catering, they don’t just become customers—they become fans who spread the word about your business.

So, how do you get started? That’s where I come in. Over the years, I’ve developed a step-by-step system to help restaurant owners like you launch and grow catering programs that work. It doesn't matter what kind of restaurant you own or where you're located. There are catering opportunities available. If there's an office in your area with 20+ employees, that's an opportunity. I want to teach you how to identify those opportunities.

The good news is, there are almost certainly hundreds of large offices in your area that are goldmines just waiting to be tapped into for new business opportunities if you know how to approach them strategically. Catering Launch wants to be your guide in taking you from zero regular catering orders to booking your first high-ticket catering customer of $1,000 or more, then onto a 6-Figure catering program that brings in $100,000+ into your business every year.

Corporate offices need your food. Weddings need your food. Local events need your food. Knowing this is a good first step, but you need ways to target these potential customer groups. Don't just go out and pour money into a half-thought-out Facebook ad strategy with no call to action, poor targeting, and a poorly designed graphic or video.

I lost hundreds of dollars on Facebook ads before I figured them out. And at the start of launching your restaurant's catering program, we focus on strategies that require more time than money. You don't want to spend money you don't have on running ads. You want to make your first 10, 30, 50 grand with catering, then scale faster by pouring a little bit of that extra income into running ads.

The best part of a catering program is your customers know you personally and will come back week after week, month after month. We're talking about recurring revenue. When you follow up the catering launch way (using multiple channels) and not overloading customers with communications, while at the same time not letting too much time go by so customers forget about you, then you're going to acquire loyal customers who send you $1,000 a month, $2,000 a month, $3,000 a month, or even more.

One high-ticket loyal catering customer could be worth 50 loyal walk-in customers - those folks whose names and orders you already know as soon as they walk in the front door. If this year, you don't launch a 6-Figure catering program, you're leaving 6-Figures on the table. I don't want to frighten you, but I want to motivate you to do the right thing.

Join one of Catering Launch's communities. We're here on Youtube, we have free Skool group and a free Private Facebook Group. I know you're going to get value of joining and chatting with other Independent Restaurant Owners that are in the process of launching their catering programs. My only ask of you is that you join us here on Youtube, on Skool, or Facebook. It's going to be the best thing you ever did for your restaurant's financial success.

This is the year you launch a 6-Figure catering program. Join one of our Catering Launch communities today. You’ll gain insight, support, and actionable ideas to help your business thrive. I’m excited to have you with us, and I promise it’ll be the smartest decision you've ever made for your restaurant. See you soon!