Super Bowl Sunday is one of the year’s first big business spikes of the year, and the independents that win it don’t win by getting fancy. They win by getting focused: repackaging what already sells, forecasting the surge, and using smart guardrails so the kitchen doesn’t melt down at kickoff. Ahead of Super Bowl LIX on Sunday February 8, 2026, SpotOn analyzed Super Bowl-related items added to independent restaurant point-of-sale menus between Dec 2024 and Feb 2025, and found that operators overwhelmingly treat the Super Bowl business like a fast-paced, high-volume holiday: 81 percent of Super Bowl items were added between January and February. The key to success is to lock in your game-day menu, prep and order workflows early, then spend the final weeks driving pre-orders and tightening execution. Here’s a few practical insights from independent restaurants to guide your planning for Super Bowl LX based on menu data from SpotOn, plus tips along the way. Build a “Throughput Menu,” Not a New Menu: The most successful Super Bowl menu formats aren’t brand-new inventions. They’re packaging strategies: SpotOn finds the most popular formats for Super Bowl menu items included bundles, platters or catering (30 percent); drink or alcohol related (25 percent) and chicken or wing items ( 25 percent). Guests aren’t asking you to become a different restaurant for one day, they’re looking to you to make it easy to feed a group quickly. Tip: Don’t invent new menu items. Re-package best sellers for groups as a throughput strategy. Turn your top movers into game-day…
