A good festival WhatsApp message for restaurant customers does three things in under sixty words: it greets, it offers one specific thing, and it gives a link and a date. The templates below do exactly that for Holi, Eid and Pongal, three festivals that fall in the first half of the year and that most restaurant marketing calendars treat as an afterthought next to Diwali.
Each festival gets three messages: a pre-order announcement sent a week or more ahead, an offer for the day itself, and a follow-up that turns the festival into a repeat order. Copy them, replace the bracketed parts, and send them only to customers who have agreed to hear from you.
How to use these templates
- Consent first. Send festival messages to customers who have opted in, typically by ordering from you and agreeing to updates. A festival greeting is still marketing.
- One offer per message. A message with three offers gets none of them ordered.
- A link and a date in every message. The link is the store page or menu; the date is the cut-off or the day the offer ends.
- Send at the right hour. Pre-order announcements in the late morning, day-of offers by 10am, follow-ups the next afternoon.
- Template approval. If you send through the WhatsApp Business API, marketing messages must be approved templates. Submit them a week ahead; the template approval guide explains the wording that passes.
Regional matters more than national here. A Pongal message makes sense in Chennai and in a Tamil neighbourhood of Bengaluru, and very little sense in Jaipur. Segment by city or by what the customer has ordered before.
Holi campaign templates
Holi is a morning festival with a lazy afternoon. People eat sweets and snacks all morning, play, and then want a proper meal they did not cook. The pre-order is for gujiya and thandai; the day-of offer is for the afternoon meal.
1. Holi pre-order, seven days before
Holi is on [date]. Gujiya boxes of 12 and 24, thandai by the litre and a snack platter for guests are open for pre-order at [Restaurant]. Order by [date] at [store link] for delivery on Holi eve.
2. Holi afternoon offer, sent the morning of Holi
Happy Holi from [Restaurant]. After the colours, lunch is on us to cook: family thali for four at ₹[price], delivery slots from 1pm to 4pm. Order at [store link]. Our kitchen is open all day.
3. The day after
Hope your Holi was a good one. We are back on the regular menu today, and anyone who ordered with us yesterday gets ₹[amount] off their next order till Sunday. Code HOLI[amount] at [store link].
The Holi offer restaurant owners get the most from is the afternoon family meal with a delivery window, because the kitchen is quiet in the morning and slammed at 2pm. Open pre-orders for that meal too if your delivery capacity is limited.
Eid campaign templates
Eid ul-Fitr ends Ramadan and is a feast day with guests from morning to night. Eid al-Adha, around two months later, is also a family meal day. Both are pre-order festivals: trays of biryani, sheer khurma, kebabs and sweets ordered days ahead. The month before Eid ul-Fitr has its own pattern, covered in the Ramadan iftar box guide.
4. Eid pre-order, in the last week of Ramadan
Eid pre-orders are open at [Restaurant]: biryani trays for 6 and 12, sheer khurma by the litre, seekh kebab platters and sweet boxes. Order by [date] at [store link] for delivery or pickup on Eid morning from 9am.
5. Eid greeting with a quiet offer, sent on Eid morning
Eid Mubarak from all of us at [Restaurant]. Thank you for ordering with us through the month. If guests are arriving and the kitchen is full, our Eid platter for 6 is ₹[price] with delivery till 10pm: [store link].
6. Eid al-Adha, sent five days before
Bakrid is on [date]. Pre-order mutton biryani trays, nihari and kebab platters for your gathering at [store link] by [date]. Pickup slots on the morning of Eid, or delivery to [areas].
An Eid offer message should respect the day. A greeting with one useful option, rather than a discount banner, is what customers remember.
Pongal campaign templates
Pongal is four days in mid-January across Tamil Nadu and Tamil communities everywhere. The food is specific: sakkarai pongal, ven pongal, vadai, payasam and a full vegetarian meal on a banana leaf. Restaurants that do a Pongal special menu sell to families who want the traditional meal without the cooking, and to offices celebrating with staff.
7. Pongal menu announcement, five days before
Pongal special menu at [Restaurant] from [date] to [date]: sakkarai pongal, ven pongal with sambar and chutney, medu vadai and payasam, plus a full Pongal meal for ₹[price]. Pre-order for Thai Pongal morning at [store link].
8. Office Pongal celebration, sent to business contacts
Celebrating Pongal at the office? We cater Pongal meals from 20 to 200 people, served on banana leaf or packed in boxes, with sakkarai pongal and vadai. Reply "Pongal" for the per-head price list, or order at [store link].
9. Mattu Pongal and the long weekend
Happy Pongal from [Restaurant]. The special menu runs through the long weekend, and delivery is free on orders over ₹[amount] till [date]. Order at [store link].
When to send what
| Festival | Pre-order message | Day-of message | Offer that works |
|---|---|---|---|
| Holi | 7 days before | By 10am on Holi | Family lunch with afternoon delivery slots; gujiya boxes |
| Eid ul-Fitr | Last week of Ramadan | Eid morning | Biryani trays and sweets for pre-order; platter for guests |
| Eid al-Adha | 5 days before | Morning of Eid | Mutton trays and kebab platters for pickup |
| Pongal | 5 days before | Thai Pongal morning | Full Pongal meal; office catering; free delivery over a minimum |
The pattern is the same across all three, and across Diwali and Christmas too: a pre-order window that ends a day or two before, a short message on the day, and a reason to come back the week after. The 52-week WhatsApp campaign calendar lays out every festival in the year on this pattern, and the Diwali marketing ideas show the pre-order approach at its largest scale.
Writing your own festival offer message
If your city has a festival not covered here, such as Onam, Durga Puja, Gudi Padwa, Baisakhi or Lohri, the same four-part structure works:
- Greeting in the first line, by festival name, so the message is clearly for the day.
- One offer: a special menu, a pre-order item, a platter for guests, or a delivery promise. Pick one.
- The link to the store page where the offer can be ordered without replying.
- The date: when pre-orders close or when the offer ends.
Avoid the common mistakes: stacking three offers, sending at 11pm, sending to people who never agreed to messages, and sending the same message to every city regardless of whether the festival is celebrated there. Messages that get a customer to block you cost more than any order they might have brought.
One way to send these is Tezzu's WhatsApp campaigns, which go out from your own business number to the customers who have ordered from you, paid from a prepaid wallet, with the store link and any pre-order items already set up on your free store page. The guide to sending your first campaign shows the steps from template to send.
Send your next festival message from your own number
Set up pre-order items on a store page and send the announcement to your customers on WhatsApp. The free trial is enough to run one festival end to end.
Start your free 7-day trialFrequently asked questions
What should a festival offer message from a restaurant say?
A greeting by festival name, one specific offer such as a special menu or a pre-order platter, a link to order without replying, and the date the offer or pre-order window ends. Keep it under sixty words. One offer per message gets ordered; three offers in one message get ignored.
When should I send a Holi offer to customers?
Send the pre-order message for gujiya, thandai and party platters about a week before Holi, and the day-of offer by 10am on Holi itself, when people are deciding about lunch. A follow-up the next afternoon with a small code for recent customers turns the festival order into a repeat order.
Can I send festival greetings on WhatsApp to all my customers?
Only to customers who have agreed to receive messages from you, usually by ordering and opting in to updates. A greeting with an offer counts as marketing. Sending to numbers that never consented risks blocks and reports, which affect your business number's standing with WhatsApp.
Do festival messages need WhatsApp template approval?
If you send through the WhatsApp Business API, yes: marketing messages outside a live conversation must be approved templates. Submit them about a week before the festival with placeholders for the date and price. Messages sent from the WhatsApp Business app to broadcast lists do not need approval but are limited in reach.