Restaurant furniture: what it costs, how to source it, and what to avoid
The furniture in your restaurant works harder than the furniture in your house. Here's how to buy it right.
Restaurant furniture lives harder than residential furniture. It gets sat in hundreds of times a week by people who don't own it. It needs to clean easily, hold up to spills, and last 5–10 years minimum without looking tired. And it needs to do all of this while looking like you actually thought about the design.
What restaurant furniture actually costs
Contract furniture (the term for commercial-grade furniture) is priced differently from residential. You're buying in volume. Workshops price per unit on a sliding scale — the more chairs you order, the lower the unit price. Here are realistic ranges at supplier cost for a quality mid-market restaurant:
- Restaurant chair (contract grade, upholstered or wood seat): $85–$280 each
- Dining table (4-top, solid surface, steel base): $320–$750 each
- Bar stool (counter height, contract): $110–$340 each
- Banquette bench (upholstered, per linear foot): $160–$420
- Host stand: $400–$900
- Outdoor dining chair (commercial aluminum): $120–$300 each
A 60-seat restaurant at these numbers — 60 chairs, 15 tables, 8 bar stools — comes to roughly $18,000–$52,000 in furniture at supplier cost, depending on specification. Add 20% for procurement. Compare that to retail contract furniture prices, which run 180–250% of supplier cost.
Durability specifications to ask for
- Frame: welded steel or kiln-dried hardwood — no particle board, no hollow legs
- Seat foam: high-resilience (HR) foam rated 30kg/m³ or better — doesn't compress and flatten over time
- Upholstery: minimum 50,000 Martindale rubs for high-traffic seating
- Finish: commercial lacquer or powder coat, not brushed-on polyurethane
- Glides: felt-lined floor protectors that can be replaced when worn
Custom finishes and branding
Custom finishes are standard in restaurant procurement — specific stain colors, custom fabric COM (customer's own material), powder-coat colors that match your brand. Workshops that do contract work are set up for this. Lead times extend 2–4 weeks for custom finishes.
Need commercial furniture for a restaurant, bar, or hospitality project? We handle volume sourcing at supplier cost plus 20%.
See commercial procurement →Lead times for restaurant furniture
Contract orders typically take 10–18 weeks from order to delivery. Upholstered pieces take longer than wood. Custom finishes add time. If you have an opening date, reverse-engineer from it: we generally recommend starting sourcing 5–6 months out for a full restaurant fit-out.
What to avoid
- Residential furniture in commercial settings — it will break and look bad within a year
- Buying from a showroom without a commercial-grade specification sheet
- Skimping on seat foam — HR foam is the single biggest factor in how long upholstered chairs last in a restaurant
- No glides or wrong glides — the floor repair bill will exceed the furniture savings
- Ordering too late — 10–18 week lead times are non-negotiable for most workshops
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