Lunar New Year (Year of the Horse) marketing for UK restaurants & cafes

17 February 2026lunar date (approximate)

Lunar New Year (Year of the Horse) fell on 17 February 2026 this year. If it came and went without a post, you're in the majority — and that's exactly the gap worth closing before it comes around again. The working angle for the UK F&B: prosperity dishes, dumpling specials and red-and-gold table settings.

The window

For 2026 this moment has passed; the play now is to put it on next year's calendar with a 14-day head start.

Occasions with a longer lead time reward operators who book the content shoot and the campaign brief before the rush week.

What to post

• A 15-second reel shot in your own room, on your own product — prosperity dishes, dumpling specials and red-and-gold table settings is a visual brief, not a caption exercise.
• Two or three stills in the same aesthetic for feed and stories, sized per platform.
• A Google Business post with the practical line — dates, hours, how to book. It's the surface diners check last before walking in.
• A carousel that tells the gathering story — tables, sharing platters, the room filling up — rather than a single dish.
• Captions and search copy in your own register — the fastest tell of agency-template content is that every cafe sounds identical during occasion weeks.

Campaigns that fit

Clone one and the whole campaign — reel, stills, carousel, copy — is rebuilt around your product and your room, with Lunar New Year (Year of the Horse) already on the brief.

Color Drench

A single saturated hue floods everything — product, ground, props, light — for a bold, high fashion monochrome-tonal…

Color Illustration

Comic Illustration

Sharpen the craft first

The occasion sets the moment; these playbooks cover the content itself: