Student loyalty hangs on customer research. How effective are your customer surveys and feedback tools?

Today’s young, school-age consumers are savvy foodservice customers, and they appreciate having a voice and expressing their opinions about everything—and that includes everything about the school meal program, from the menu choices to the portion sizes to the food quality to the cafeteria environment to the friendliness of the staff. And you want their opinions! Customer feedback is essential to helping you meet and exceed expectations, retaining and growing participation and earning and maintaining a reputation as a desired foodservice destination.

But how best to capture these definitive opinions? Customer research approaches vary from simple techniques to comprehensive studies that all can be tailor-made to fit your resources (staff and budget), and help you achieve your goals.

No matter which customer opinion strategy you adopt, you can make the job easier and more effective with a little planning and strategic reflection. Here are three steps that can set the table to help make your surveys best in class...