August 2027 food holidays and promotion ideas for restaurants

August 2027 has no federal holiday and no single big eating day, so a restaurant's August is about routines: families going back to school, fantasy football draft parties (National Day Calendar puts Fantasy Football Draft Day on Saturday, August 21) and getting Labor Day, Monday, September 6, ready. The food days are plentiful: National Watermelon Day (August 3), National S'mores Day (August 10), National Waffle Day (August 24) and the whole of National Sandwich Month. School start dates vary by district, so ask your regulars rather than guess.

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August 2027 at a glance

The food days come from National Day Calendar, a private registry, so treat them as marketing hooks, not official holidays. OPM lists no federal holiday in August.

Month-long observances

• National Sandwich Month (National Day Calendar): one featured sandwich a week, Cuban Sandwich Day on August 23 as the finale.
• National Farmers Market Week (National Day Calendar lists it from August 2): a market-produce special if you buy locally.
• Back to school. There's no national date; districts start from early August to after Labor Day.

Which August dates are worth a promotion?

Back-to-school weeknights

The first weeks of school are when parents stop cooking on weeknights. A family meal for 4 with a weeknight-only discount code gives them a reason to make you the Tuesday habit. Run it Monday to Thursday for three weeks and cap the uses. See the worked example below. Ready line: "Back-to-school weeknights: family meal for 4, $5 off Monday to Thursday until Sep 2."

Saturday, August 21: Fantasy Football Draft Day

Drafts are home parties and bar back-room events that run for hours. Sell a draft-party pack (sliders, two dips, chips, a dessert tray) for 8 or 12, and if you have a private room, a table booking with a set menu. Ready line: "Draft day is Sat 8/21: party packs for 8 or 12, order by Thu 8/19."

Late August: Labor Day setup

Labor Day is Monday, September 6. Open meat-by-the-pound and cookout-pack pre-orders around August 23, using the menus in our Fourth of July menu templates. More in September food holidays. Ready line: "Labor Day weekend BBQ: pre-order by Wed 9/1 for Sat or Sun pickup."

Promo copy you can paste

Email to your own list (send from your email tool):

Pop-up banner on your menu: "Back-to-school weeknights: $5 off the family meal for 4, Mon–Thu, code BTS5." Announcement bar (under 100 characters): "Weeknight family meal for 4: $5 off Mon–Thu with code BTS5 until Sep 2" Social caption: "First week of school? Skip the cooking. Family meal for 4, $5 off Monday to Thursday. Link in bio."

Under CAN-SPAM, a promo email needs an honest subject line, your valid postal address and a clear way to opt out, and you must honor opt-outs within 10 business days (FTC). If your customers order on WhatsApp, keep it for order updates: Meta does not deliver marketing template messages to US (+1) phone numbers, so in the US WhatsApp sends order updates (utility messages, about US$0.0034 each), not promotions. Use email for offers. More in WhatsApp ordering for US restaurants.

Worked example: a back-to-school family meal with a capped code

These are example figures only. Use your own costs.

At a 33% target cost, $13.80 ÷ 0.33 = $41.82, so a price of $42 puts cost at 32.9%. With the $5 code the customer pays $37, and cost rises to 37.3% of what you take, which is still a healthy margin for a dish you can batch. Set the code with Days Monday to Thursday, start August 16, end September 2, Total uses 150 and Per customer 3. The most the deal can ever cost you is 150 × $5 = $750. If all 150 uses happen, that's $5,550 in sales against $2,070 of food and packaging over 12 weeknights, about 12 or 13 meals a night. Try other prices in the menu price calculator.

Your August prep timeline

How to run August promotions in Menuthere

1. Put the family meal and party packs online (Free). Add each with sizes (for 4; for 8 or 12), or upload a photo or PDF of your printed menu; AI reads the dishes and prices for you to check. 0% commission on every plan.
2. Create the weeknight code (Lite, US$17 a month). A flat $5 off, a minimum order if you want one, Days Monday to Thursday, start and end dates, total uses and uses per customer. Codes can't be limited to a time of day. See create a discount code and limits, days and validity.
3. Take party-pack pre-orders (Lite). Turn on Prebooking, choose Specific items and tick the packs, set the Earliest booking time to 2 days and Only made on to Saturday.
4. Announce it (Lite). Schedule a pop-up banner for the code's dates and add an announcement bar line. For posters, pick General offer in the festival poster maker.
5. Reward the regulars. On Pro (US$39 a month), loyalty points reward repeat weeknight orders; on any plan, a printed stamp card from the free loyalty card maker works too.
6. Deliver with your own drivers (Pro). The rider app runs on iOS and Android, and customers get a live tracking link. You assign each order with one tap. See the rider app.

Customers pay the full amount online by card through Stripe, into your own account, and sales tax shows as "Sales tax" at checkout. With a Branded App you can send app users a push notification on the first day of school. See pricing and pre-orders and table booking.

Discount codes and pre-orders start on Lite, with a 7-day free trial (a card is needed to start; nothing is charged until the trial ends).

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More months: July · September · full restaurant marketing calendar.