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Growing a restaurant or catering business is no small feat. If your catering business isn’t growing as fast as you’d like, you might be facing some common roadblocks. Inefficient Operations and Workflow One major hurdle that can slow down the growth of your catering business is inefficient operations and workflow.
An average wedding produces 400 pounds of garbage – and a large amount of this waste comes from the catering. As a caterer, having eco-friendly options for your business can help you build relationships and get more customers, all while limiting your company’s own impact on the environment. Buy Local Ingredients.
I thought the mixture of customerservice, catering, and serving up great food would fit me and my family well, so I decided to move forward. I have very high standards for customerservice, and it’s really important to me that all of our team members welcome our guests and treat them well.
The productivity puzzle is one that is most complex in the catering industry. Skills shortages, margin pressures, and a high turnover, ‘revolving door’ culture contributes to a difficult environment to be time-efficient within, all while making sure you’re providing optimum customerservice.
This frees up valuable labor resources to focus on what really matters—serving customers at the restaurant level, and focusing on customerservice and business growth at the distributor level. Return to office ordering : Restaurants are seeing a shift in demand, with increased orders for office catering and lunch pickups.
So, what can brands do to address the impacts of COVID-19, while being mindful of the past, present and future of customer experience? First and foremost, keeping your customer’s safe is good customerservice though beforehand it may not have been such a high priority.
By outsourcing functions like the recruitment process, regular kitchen cleaning, and exterior and janitorial services, managers and staff alike can focus on their core expertise. First, the amount of time managers spend recruiting can have a distracting domino effect on food service operations.
Starting a catering business from home offers a unique opportunity to combine your love of food with the convenience of working from your own kitchen. It's a path that allows you to set your own hours, build a business around your passion, and cater to a diverse clientele. What is a home-based catering business?
With an increasing number of Millennials spending more on dining out each year, it is evident that restaurants that successfully cater to this generation stand to gain a competitive edge. Building lasting relationships : Acquiring customers who have recently moved can lead to long-lasting relationships.
One trend gaining traction is the introduction of premium add-ons to appeal to different customer segments. From garlic-butter crust options to artisanal oils, offering “good, better, best” options allows pizzerias to serve budget-conscious customers while catering to those willing to splurge for higher quality.
"Embracing AI signifies a shift towards customer-centricity, where innovative solutions can cater to each and every customer – from automated interactions, seamless reservations, instant inquiries, and beyond – all converging to place the customer firmly at the heart of the restaurant experience."
For hospitality and catering businesses, tech can also provide key insights and easy access to non-anonymised basket-level data that helps them make better, more informed decisions. By freeing up staff from standing behind counters and tills, they can add experiential value by proactively supporting and greeting guests.
The last, and most important, piece of the puzzle is customerservice. Brands need to ensure that they are taking care of their customers, whether it be in restaurant, online or through customer support. How can a brand develop a program that is flexible enough to offer more to a variety of potential guests?
Savvy restaurateurs are looking at technological innovations not as a side dish, but as one of the main ingredients in a restaurant’s direct relationship with its customers. This includes integrating point-of-sale terminals, fixed and mobile POS devices, and tabletop tablets for easy ordering and paying.
As a result, restaurants had to quickly adapt by offering takeout and delivery options to cater to their customers' changing needs. To meet and exceed these expectations, restaurants have had to embrace change and invest in technology, streamlining their operations and improving their customerservice levels.
Although the development and implementation of loyalty programs have become increasingly popular, they still have a widespread reputation as generic, focusing more on margin-eroding “spend-to-get” and not catering to the individual customer.
We’re going to see companies come to market with the ability to tap into their security systems and use facial recognition and audio, enabling them to: Identify customers and attach them to loyalty programs. Verify cashiers are saying the right things at the register, upselling and providing appropriate customerservice.
Seating to First Server Contact : Cameras can track the duration from when a customer is seated to when a server approaches them. By harnessing AI for personalization, operators can suggest related items based on customer history and preferences.
With the increasing customer inclination towards a health-conscious diet, even the restaurant industry has to adapt to the trend by adding dishes catering to their health-conscious guests. Restaurants using ghost kitchens may directly provide delivery or use delivery services. Health-Conscious Food Will Dominate Menus.
Heading into 2024, these restaurants, caterers, and other foodservice providers are becoming increasingly aware of the importance that incorporating sustainable practices within their daily operations has on drawing in the growing masses of eco-conscious consumers.
Acquiring this technology allows restaurant owners to focus on creating delicious food and providing excellent customerservice — the POS system takes care of the rest. With this innovative AI solution, Panera aims to decrease customer wait times, enhance order accuracy and help employees prioritize guest interactions.
To cater to these situations, restaurants should have a digitized checklist or a recipe management software tool. Both of these technological advancements are instrumental in ensuring excellent customerservice and reducing food waste. Erroneous data can lead to either shortage or excess.
They must connect to priorities across key operations, marketing, customerservice and finance roles. Sustainable restaurant expansion requires balancing excitement with patience and perspective. Define the one or two KPIs most critical for your top growth goals. KPIs lose relevance if unrealistic for teams execute across the business.
Brands like Chick-fil-A are known for their excellent customerservice, which is foundational in their brand value and competitive advantage. Still, QSRs are faced with daily challenges of disrupted supply chains, new consumer habits, and constantly changing regulatory mandates at the federal, state and local level.
In the restaurant business, employee engagement – whether that’s a smiling face at the door or someone that will go the extra mile to make sure the order is correct – can be the difference between customers coming back for more or never returning again.
ezCater announced the launch of Subway's new online catering platform as part of the sandwich chain's overall focus to create even greater digital convenience for guests. "ezCater's platform provides effortless online ordering and exceptional customerservice." ” Subway on ezCater Platform.
In fact, he was likely to rally his employees to excellent customerservice by saying, “Yesterday was fantastic. When COVID-19 first started shutting down our traditional restaurant service, we recognized we would need to change our business model to focus on to-go and delivery. What can we do today to make it better?”
For now, restaurants are using AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) to streamline operations and improve customerservice in a much less tech-savvy environment. For example, KFC even has facial recognition technology to cater to repeat customers. What are AI and ML? Role of AI in Back of House.
. “As businesses continue to face economic pressures, we’re seeing them invest in growth and experimentation as they find new, streamlined ways to work and deliver exceptional customerservice – particularly through using time-saving and experience-enhancing technology.” ” A Year of Challenges U.S.
As the trend of digital nomadism continues to rise in the future, catering to this growing demographic becomes increasingly important. Stored value will also emerge as a critical element in loyalty programs, offering added flexibility and customer benefits. 2024 could be a breakout year for fast casual restaurants.
Whether it is a busy working professional who orders lunch on the go or a family scheduling a weekend takeout, SMS automation caters to everyone. It reduces the phone call overload and frees up staff members to focus on their food preparation and customerservice. How Does SMS Automation HelpRestaurants?
full service restaurants surveyed plan to introduce cateringservices. In turn, that time can be spent on more meaningful work, such as customerservice and creating real connections with diners. Ninety-four percent of operators are planning some form of expansion and more than half of the 600 U.S
Managing Shifts in Consumer Expectations A unified process management platform empowers staff to deliver consistent and outstanding customerservice. By automating behind-the-scenes operations, staff are able to dedicate more time to training, compliance, and customer relations.
For example, rather than giving heavy discounts on items they’re already seeing margin hits from, restaurants can incentivize customers to purchase other items that provide better returns. – David Tracz, Partner at / /387.
That’s why we decided from the start to stay "payment processor agnostic," allowing us to cater to our customers’ needs and build our business around product value, not processing fees. They say the customer is always right, and more times than not, they are.
Additionally, by keeping employees on the roster for longer, customerservice quality is bound to improve. By catering to the career aspirations of employees, whether they seek growth within the hospitality sector or aspire to other career paths, restaurant owners are laying the foundation for a committed and skilled workforce.
which delivers drinks and provides a fun, novel experience for guests, while allowing employees to focus on customerservice. Many companies sell robots, but do not service, integrate or repair the robots, making it more difficult for customers to maintain.
Many dining establishments found ways to use AI to track and flag stock quantities, automate schedule-making for staff, implement customerservice chatbots and process online orders. Leveraging AI tools to increase efficiency and productivity while automating simple processes was a major boon to the industry.
Augustine, Florida, a new self-serve store in Bayonne, New Jersey, focused on catering with a late-night walk-up window, and a counter-service store in Navarre, Florida, that will appeal strongly to tourists. "This The company has 12 new U.S. This summer, TCBY will open a new drive-thru in St. ” Freebirds Continues Expansion.
Before COVID the marketing message was mostly catered to providing a pleasant dining experience with a promo code to sweeten the deal for consumer. It is done through the packaging, food presentation and overall customerservice. Has restaurant marketing changed since COVID? Are you advising clients differently?
This variety creates a dynamic market where different business models cater to various customer preferences and needs. Each model has its own set of requirements, costs, and potential customer base. Specialty Bakeries Specialty bakeries cater to specific dietary needs or preferences. What makes you stand out?
Stored value will also emerge as a critical element in loyalty programs, offering added flexibility and customer benefits. There's a growing recognition that mobile apps alone cannot cater to all aspects of loyalty, paving the way for alternative solutions like kiosks and more integrated loyalty program structures.
In the late 1980’s, Hattie Marie brought her culinary talents to the masses and opened a bakery/cateringservice, Pie Face Bakery. With over 40 years leading major restaurant brands, Guido has consistently built value for stakeholders by identifying strategic opportunities to provide exceptional customerservice.
It underpins an umbrella of operations – from kitchen to accounting, from marketing to customerservice, and beyond. From online ordering to catering, from building your app to order aggregation, Lunchbox takes care of all.
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