Seated in a cafe, you decide to check out some paintings. No problem. Just look around, and you'll find the gallery right inside the cafe. And if any one of the smartly designed cups, saucers and even the furniture, catches your fancy, you can buy it on the spot.

Inside the outlets of a leading pizza chain, crew members perform a jig at least 2-3 times a day or more, depending on the requests from patrons. And in Mumbai, a renowned coffee chain organises theme clubs and events as part of the service offerings at its outlets.

Welcome to the exciting new world of quick service restaurants (QSRs), where coffee, good food and hanging out is a given, but it's the innovative extras (like the ones described above) that marketers are deploying by the dozen to pull in customers and get them to stay at their outlets just a little bit longer.

Leading players in the fray like Cafe Coffee Day, Pizza Hut, Mocha, and Pizza Corner are hard at work, looking at interesting ways of giving their patrons something more. The marketing objective - heighten the brand experience and the crowds will follow.

Arvind Mediratta, CMO, Yum Restaurants, likes to describe the new experience of eating out as not just about food but about entertainment as well, and has even coined a new term for it. 'It's about 'eatertainment',' he says.

(www.hospitalitynewsresource.com)