Seat count per square metre: the arithmetic that survives a plan
Seat counts are argued about in business cases and settled in floor plans. The gap between the two is usually a tray aisle that nobody drew.
The two numbers that set the answer
Allow 1.0 to 1.2 square metres per cover including the chair and a 900 mm tray aisle, and keep 900 mm clear between a table edge and the counter. Those two figures, applied to the floor area that actually exists, produce a seat count that can be built. Applied the other way round, from a target seat count backwards, they produce a layout that loses a row at the first fit-out meeting.
The range is wide because the room is not uniform. Forty square metres of open floor with one wall yields fewer covers than the same area split by a party wall, since a wall run takes bench seating at 550 to 600 mm per person and needs no aisle behind it. Counting the wall as a wall rather than as floor is where a plan finds six seats.
Why the first draft is always over
The common first draft fills the floor with four-tops, because four-tops look generous in a drawing and photograph well in a pitch deck. Then the aisle behind them measures 700 mm, which is not enough for a tray, and the fix is to delete a row. Six covers disappear after the furniture has been ordered, which is the expensive order of events.
Two-tops along the wall and a mix of two and four in the middle almost always yields more usable seats than uniform four-tops. The reason is arithmetic rather than taste: a two-top can sit against a wall with one chair on the open side, which frees the aisle behind it, while a four-top against the same wall wastes the two chairs on the wall side.
Working the four zones separately
The collection point takes counter seating at 600 mm per stool against a 1,050 mm counter, with 400 mm clear at each end. That zone carries the most traffic and the shortest dwell time, and it is usually the cheapest seat on the floor per square metre.
The window takes two-tops at 700 mm with chairs facing out. The middle takes the flexible zone, a mix of two and four that can be pushed together. The party wall takes a bench run measured in metres rather than in tables, and it needs 1,600 mm of clear floor in front of it so a guest can get out without pushing the table.
What the seat count has to carry
Leave room in the arithmetic for the things that are not seats. The queue band of 900 mm at the till, 1,200 mm in front of the tray return, a 1,400 mm turning circle for a chair dolly and the bin station with 900 mm clear in front of it. None of those appear in a seat count and all of them come out of the same floor area.
Where a room is tight, seat count planning should produce two figures rather than one: the peak count with every chair occupied, and the trading count once the queue band is drawn. The second is the number the business case should use, because a seat that a queue stands on is not a seat.
For a first check, the working ranges are these: a 30 square metre room holds 22 to 30 covers, 50 square metres holds 38 to 50, 80 square metres holds 64 to 80 and 120 square metres holds 96 to 118. Where a proposed count sits above the top of the range, the difference has been taken out of the aisle rather than found in the room.
Checking the figure against the trade
Compare the seat count with the covers the unit expects to turn at peak. The sixty-cover room turning twice an hour needs the aisle widths that let a guest leave while another arrives, which is 1,100 mm rather than 900 mm. The same room at one and a half turns can run the narrower figure and gain two tables.
fast food layout planning is where that trade-off gets priced, and it costs nothing to run before the order. Once the furniture is on the water, two seat table sets are the only lever left, because pairs can be pushed against a wall in a way that four-tops cannot.
What buyers ask about this
Is 1.0 square metres per cover realistic?
Only in a room with wall runs and no queue. Most quick service units land between 1.1 and 1.3 once the queue band and the tray return are drawn.
How many covers does a counter seat count as?
One, at 600 mm of counter run. Counter seats are the cheapest cover in the room and the least comfortable, which is why they belong at the collection point.
Should the seat count include outdoor seating?
Separately. External seats change the permit, the fixing method and the material, and mixing them into one figure hides all three.
What if the landlord fixes the pitch?
Then the pitch sets the maximum and the layout works inside it. fast food furniture manufacturer advice at that stage is about which pieces fit the pitch, not about how many seats it should hold.
Related notes
Tray-width aisles: how wide a quick service floor really is
Send the floor plan, not just a model number
Room size, counter run, covers at peak and the delivery country. The reply carries seat counts, aisle widths and a written quotation.