How Many Regulars Do You Actually Have
Every owner has a number in mind and almost none of them can produce it. Why the definition matters more than the count, and the version that changes what you do.
Ask an owner how many regulars they have and you get a number, delivered confidently.
Ask how it was arrived at and the confidence goes. It is a feeling — usually the number of faces they can picture.
Why the feeling is wrong in both directions
It over-counts the visible. ⚠️ The people who talk to you are memorable. The quiet weekly guest who deals with one member of staff is not.
It under-counts the off-peak. You are there on Fridays. The Tuesday regulars are somebody else's regulars, and they do not exist in your mental list.
It includes people who stopped. ⚠️ Lapsed guests stay on the mental list for a year or more — you have not seen them, and you have not noticed not seeing them.
Defining it
The definition matters more than the count, and there is no universal one.
By frequency: more than N visits in a period. Simple, and it misses the twice-a-year guest who spends heavily and always returns.
By pattern: visits at a predictable interval, whatever the interval. ⚠️ Better for most venues — it catches the monthly guest and excludes the person who came four times in one week and never again.
By recency plus repeat: more than one visit, and one within their own normal gap. Usually the most useful single definition.
Pick one and write it down. ⚠️ Any consistent definition beats an inconsistent good one, because the value is in watching it move.
What the number is for
Not vanity. Three specific uses:
Sizing what you can do. ⚠️ A message to "our regulars" reaches a specific number of people. Knowing it changes what you expect from it.
Watching the trend. The direction matters far more than the level. Falling regulars with steady takings means new guests are covering a leak.
Finding the ones who lapsed. The list produced as a by-product, and it is the highest-value list in the business.
What to do the first time you produce it
Expect it to be lower than the feeling. ⚠️ Consistently, across venues — the mental list includes people who stopped coming.
Look at the ones you did not recognise. There will be several. They are regulars nobody at management level knows exist, and finding them out is worth the whole exercise.
Then compare it to last year, if you can. The direction is the finding.
The one to add
Spend, not just visits.
⚠️ A regular who comes weekly and spends little is a different asset from one who comes monthly and spends a great deal — both matter, and treating them as one number hides which is changing.
The definition has to be written before the number is useful
Undefined the number changes every time somebody produces it
Written the number can be compared to itself next month
⚠️ Any definition beats no definition, and the arguing about which one is right is almost always less valuable than picking one and holding to it for six months.
What a written definition needs
How many visits In what window Counted from when
⇒ ⚠️ The third is the one people leave out. "Four visits in three months" measured from today gives a different answer every day it is run, and the drift is invisible unless the start point is fixed.
Two mistakes that both make the number bigger
Counting bookings, not people one guest with three bookings is one regular
Counting the group as one four people arriving together are four
⚠️ These pull in opposite directions and rarely cancel out. ⇒ Decide which unit you are counting before you run anything, or the number will quietly mean something different each time.
Why the mental list is wrong in both directions
Too high the memorable guests feel more numerous than they are
Too low the quiet regular of four years is invisible precisely because they are easy
⚠️ The second error is the expensive one. The guests who never cause a problem are the ones nobody can name, and they are the base the business sits on.
The test
⇒ ⚠️ Write down who you think your regulars are, then produce the number. The gap between the two lists is more informative than either list alone.
The two flows matter more than the total
A flat total can hide twenty gained and twenty lost
Gained and lost separately tells you which problem you have
⚠️ Losing and replacing regulars is a completely different business from keeping them, and it costs far more, but the headline number looks identical either way.
Treating the first number as a baseline
Do not act on it the first number has nothing to compare against
Do publish it so the second one is produced the same way
⚠️ The first number is a baseline, not a finding. ⇒ The temptation to explain it immediately is exactly what produces a wrong explanation that then gets repeated.
The one worth adding second
⇒ ⚠️ How long a regular stays a regular. It converts the count into something you can plan against, and it is the number that tells you whether this year's intake will still be here next year.
Three to hold
Regulars by your stated definition, monthly. ⚠️ The definition written down, or the number is not comparable to itself.
New regulars gained and lost, per month. The two flows. A steady total can hide substantial churn in both directions.
Share of takings from regulars. ⚠️ Frequently much higher than expected, and it is the argument for spending attention there rather than on acquisition.
Where the record has to sit
Producing this needs visits attached to people, over time, on one record. If bookings are a diary and takings are a total, "how many regulars" cannot be answered and the number stays a feeling.
tasteck keeps visit history on the guest record, so a definition can be applied rather than estimated.
You do have regulars, and the number is real. It is just not the one in your head, and the difference between them is a list of people worth knowing about.
Read next
- Cast Analytics: Repeat Nomination Rate × Churn Rate — Service Quality You Can See in Numbers
- Repeat Nomination vs. Photo Nomination: The Difference
- The Guest Who Only Deals With One Person
- The Regular Who Stopped Spending
- The Regular You Lost Without Noticing
- The Guest Who Always Pays Cash
- What Happens On The Third Visit
- What Your Best Guest Would Tell You
- The Two Tuesdays
- Who Types The Request In
- The Request Fee Nobody Explained
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