Ordering fast food tables is mostly a matter of deciding four numbers and then refusing to let anyone change them quietly. Here is what those numbers are, and where the specification usually slips.
Seat count starts with the aisle, not the grid
A floor plan drawn as a grid of tables will always produce a number, and the number will always be too high. Room is taken out of circulation first: the queue band, the route to the accessible position, the gap the staff need behind the counter.
Draw fast food tables into the plan with every seat pulled out 150 mm, then draw the queue as a 900 mm band starting at the till. Whatever the band covers is not floor space, whatever the drawing claims.
The three measurements that decide the count
Back-to-back seating needs 1,800 mm from seat back to seat back. Seating facing a wall needs 1,100 mm from the wall to the next obstruction. Main aisles need 1,200 mm, secondary aisles 900 mm, and the accessible route 1,500 mm to allow a wheelchair to turn.
Reduce any of those and the plan still holds furniture, but it stops holding guests. The seat count that survives a busy Saturday is the one drawn inside these numbers rather than outside them.
Where the accessible position belongs
The accessible table needs 800 mm of clear width, 700 to 750 mm of knee height and a route that does not pass through the queue. It also needs to be somewhere a guest can reach without asking for help, which usually rules out the corner nearest the door and the bay beside the bin station.
Mark it on the plan rather than leaving it to the fit-out crew. Once a promotion stand arrives, an unmarked clear route becomes storage and nobody notices until a guest has to ask.
Planning the floor for a reset
A quick service room changes shape between dayparts. Breakfast may need forty covers, the evening thirty with a larger collection area. Where that shift is real, ganged fast food chairs should come out of the plan before the seat count is fixed, because a fixed bench cannot be moved to make room for a queue.
Work the two layouts side by side. Zones that hold their furniture all day are worth more than a higher count on paper that has to be rebuilt at four in the afternoon.
Checking the plan before the order
Overlay the plan on the actual floor, take photographs and walk the queue with a stopwatch at a busy hour. Two hours of that answers more than a week of discussion, and it costs nothing.
Where a plan is still open, fast food layout planning is worth doing before the furniture is specified rather than after, because the furniture follows the plan and not the reverse.
Where these figures can be checked
The plan and the furniture have to be drawn in the same round. The fast food tables pages carry dimensions including custom heights, and the figures quoted are measured on the finished part rather than taken from a catalogue.
Load and finish reports sit together under seat count planning, and request a quote sets out the route from an approved drawing to a packed crate.
Where a room mixes more than one family, QSR sets is usually specified last and fits worst, so settle it in the same drawing round.
The full range is set out under quick service furniture, grouped by where each piece stands on the floor rather than by style.
Questions buyers ask
How many covers does a room hold?
Work from the aisle rather than the grid. The 30 square metre room holds 22 to 30, 50 square metres holds 38 to 50, and 80 square metres holds 64 to 80 once circulation is taken out.
What is the minimum for an accessible table?
800 mm of clear width, 700 to 750 mm of knee height, and a route that does not pass through the queue.
Can a fixed bench be part of a flexible floor?
It can, as long as the zone that changes shape is furnished with loose chairs. The fixed bench cannot be moved to make room for a queue at four in the afternoon.