What We Made in 2025: A Year of Restaurant Uniforms and Supplies, in Numbers and Photos

Every finished order that leaves RestroCart has a chance of being laid flat on a wooden floor and photographed before it is packed. Over a year, those photographs become an honest record of what restaurants, cafes, bars and hotels actually ordered. This is our 2025 year in review: what RestroCart made, counted from the 2025 photo archive, and the colour, fabric and style trends that show up when you look at 280 finished pieces side by side.

A quick note on the numbers before we start. We are counting photographed pieces in our 2025 archive, not total sales. A single photograph usually shows a set (two chef coats and an apron, a shirt with trousers, a pair of polos), and many orders are delivered without being photographed at all. The counts tell you what restaurants asked for. They are not a sales ledger.

2025 in numbers: what the archive holds

Our full work library holds photographs from 2022 to 2026, and 280 of them are dated 2025. Uniforms account for 243 of those 280, tableware for 28 and merchandise for 9. Uniforms dominate the archive, with menus, coasters, badges and mugs making up the rest.

Three things stand out. Kitchen, apron and service photographs are almost level, which suggests restaurants are dressing the whole team, not just the chefs. Winterwear is a real category (18 pieces), not an afterthought. And menus are by far the largest tableware category in the archive. You can browse all of it on our work gallery and the latest dispatches on recent deliveries.

Trend one: colour moved into the kitchen

If you had asked a restaurant owner a few years ago what a chef coat looks like, the answer would have been white, double-breasted, with black buttons. In our 2025 photographs, white is still there, but it rarely stands alone. The chef coats we made came in navy, black, charcoal grey, teal, bottle green, olive, tobacco brown and beige, and many of them carried a contrast: a pink, red, copper, orange or gold collar, piping down the front, or a coloured cuff.

A few details repeated often enough to call them trends:

• Contrast collars and piping as the brand colour. The body of the coat stays practical (dark, stain-hiding), and the brand colour lives in a thin line of piping. It is also easier to match across reorders than a fully coloured coat.
• One piping colour across several coat colours. Our hero image shows five coats in five colours, all tied together by the same pink piping and embroidery. That is a clever way to separate ranks or sections while keeping one kitchen identity. Our guide to kitchen brigade uniforms by rank goes deeper on this.
• Names embroidered under the logo. Several 2025 coats carry the chef's name below the brand mark. It looks premium and works in open kitchens, but it changes how you reorder (more on that below).
• Short sleeves and wrap collars. Short-sleeve coats with a crossover collar, like the olive coat below, showed up too, a practical choice for hot lines and pass counters.
• Denim chef coats. Three denim coats made it into the archive, in rinse and mid-blue washes. Read more in our denim in restaurant uniforms article.

Trend two: aprons became more considered

Aprons were the joint second-largest family in our 2025 archive, and the photographs show plenty of alternatives to the thin black bib apron that was once the default.

• Canvas in earthy shades. Tan, khaki, mustard, olive and brown canvas aprons, often with pen loops and patch pockets, appear again and again.
• Denim with a contrast waistband. Denim bib and waist aprons appeared with beige or stone waistbands and ties, a detail that makes a plain denim apron look finished.
• Leatherette straps and hardware. Cross-back straps in tan leatherette with metal clips and eyelets, which take the weight off the neck during long shifts.
• Solid colours as brand colour. Red, purple, pink, grey, mustard and brown bib aprons, each with the logo embroidered or printed on the chest. For many cafes the apron is the uniform, worn over the staff's own t-shirt or a simple tee.
• Long bistro waist aprons. Knee-length waist aprons with contrast pocket trim, practical for service and quick to put on.
• Waterproof aprons for dishwash, prep and seafood sections, a quieter but useful category (see our waterproof aprons guide).

If you are choosing between these, our comparison of canvas, denim and leather aprons covers weight, care and cost, and the apron gallery shows hundreds of finished examples.

Trend three: service sets, designed as sets

The 44 service uniform photographs in the 2025 archive are almost all complete sets: a shirt or polo, trousers, and often a matching apron and cap, photographed together as one look. That is a change from the old pattern of buying polos from one vendor, trousers from another and aprons from a third.

What the service sets have in common:

• Beige, khaki and stone shirts with contrast collars in bottle green or black, a warm, cafe-friendly look that hides everyday marks better than white.
• Mandarin collars with piping on tunic-style shirts, which read smart without a tie.
• Colour-blocking. One shirt in the archive uses three colours across the body and sleeves with a printed brand curve on the front. Bold, and very memorable on a busy floor.
• Striped shirts with white collars and cuffs for a more classic dining room.
• Polos with contrast tipping on collar and sleeves, and round-neck t-shirts with playful back prints, such as a croissant graphic paired with a caramelising pun, for cafes and bakeries that want staff to be part of the brand voice.

If you are deciding between shirts and polos for your floor team, our guide on polo vs shirt uniforms for service staff compares the two, and the steward and server uniform guide covers fabric and fit.

Trend four: managers, housekeeping and winter layers

Managers

Thirteen manager photographs show a clear preference for waistcoats over full suits: double-breasted waistcoats in navy, beige and burgundy, a Nehru-collar vest in grey-green, and blazers in bottle green and black with an embroidered crest. A waistcoat over a shirt gives a manager authority on the floor without the heat of a jacket. See our manager uniform guide.

Housekeeping

The twelve housekeeping sets are tunics with elastic-waist trousers, almost always two-tone: beige with black trim, purple with beige, navy with white, brown with beige. Mandarin collars, piped plackets and trimmed pockets make them look designed rather than issued. Our housekeeping uniform guide explains why contrast trims also help with laundry sorting.

Winterwear

Eighteen winterwear pieces: zip jackets, hoodies, sweatshirts with large back prints, V-neck sweaters and cardigans. The big back graphic, often the brand's illustrated mascot, turns a practical winter layer into a piece that doubles as merchandise. Plan these early; our restaurant winterwear guide explains why October is already late in north India.

Beyond uniforms: menus, coasters and table pieces

Tableware made up 28 photographs in 2025, and menus were the clear leader with 19. MDF menu boards with ring binders or screw posts were the most common format, followed by leatherette menu covers, including arched-top designs. Laser-engraved cork coasters, QR table stands, a wooden cutlery caddy, table napkins and printed mugs round out the year. Our guide to MDF menu boards and clipboard menus covers the format that dominated, and the tableware catalogue lists everything we make.

What 2025 means for your 2026 order

Trends are only useful if they change a decision. Here is what we would take from the 2025 archive if we were planning a new outlet or a uniform refresh this year:

If you are planning a full opening order, our new restaurant uniform checklist and the restaurant opening supplies checklist will help you build the list. For a refresh of an existing brand, see our guide on rebranding and uniform refresh.

Get a quote for your 2026 uniforms

RestroCart has done one thing since 2018: customised uniforms and supplies for restaurants, cafes, bars, bakeries, hotels, caterers and cloud kitchens, designed in-house, sampled for approval and delivered to your door anywhere in India. Send your logo, roles and headcount on WhatsApp +91 98213 34906, email info@restrocart.com, or build your list in our quote builder.