Supervisors

The purpose of this thesis was to help restaurants to recognize the potential and new cus-tomers, while maintaining better relationships with the regular ones, and to acquire loyal customers for the growth and sustainability of the business. Further, it also discusses the importance of customer service, shortcomings and possible solutions. This thesis is based on qualitative research method and it is totally subjective to individual experiences. The main focus was to study the selected ethnic restaurants in Kokkola, along with their customers, in terms of customer service. The questionnaires were provided one to each of the representatives of the restaurants, and two of them were distributed to the respective but random customers, whoever the personnel selected. In total, seven restau-rants were provided with the questionnaires but only five of them did respond. A part of this thesis is confidential as it deals with vital personal information. According to the research results, the restaurants in Kokkola have not been able to provide optimal quality of customer service to the expected level and there has not been a real poli-cy in treating first time customers. The communication between customers and restaurant staff members has not been to the required level. Hence, there has been a room for im