How an Experienced Restaurant Solution Provider Can Benefit You
Restaurant owners and managers work long hours, holidays, and most weekends. There’s very little time off in an industry where the competition is fierce, most restaurateurs are still trying to recover from the pandemic and supply chain issues are causing shortages of everything from ingredients to take-out boxes. That’s a lot to have on your plate—on top of the normal day-to-day management of a restaurant, café or coffee shop—so it’s important to simplify whenever possible. All-in-one POS systems should make your life easier, not add to the list of items that need to be managed. When you’re considering new restaurant technology, it’s tempting to shop around for different restaurant tech stack components, especially if you’re trying to be cost-conscious.
However, assembling a technology system using several different vendors is never a good idea—instead, work with a single provider to coordinate an ecosystem that does everything you need with one point of contact.
Streamline Your Success With a Restaurant Tech Stack
Collaborating with a single restaurant solution provider is a great way to make shopping for a restaurant management system a seamless experience. When you work with one provider that understands your business, you can shop with confidence and know that you’ll receive more personalized service than you would at a larger, brand-name company.
When it comes to your restaurant tech stack, think of the point-of-sale (POS) system as the center of a wheel, and the other components and modules are the spokes that connect to it. This centralized approach allows you to customize an all-in-one system to your exact specifications, personalize it for your business or brand and get the features you need, without paying for extra functions or modules you’ll never use.
Not sure where to start? Convenience, loyalty, gift cards and similar functionalities are some of the most requested features by restaurateurs looking to create a customized experience for their diners.
Customer Experience
Diners want a personalized restaurant experience—they want to receive offers and coupons based on previous orders or visits, and they want to be rewarded for their loyalty. The competition in the restaurant industry is fierce, so providing a top-notch experience with personalized service will help you turn first-time customers into repeat ones.
The customer experience can be improved with the help of an all-in-one POS system that includes the right technology. The biggest draws are:
- Giving customers control over the ordering process by ordering through systems that leverage their mobile device as an ordering and payment solution.
- Flexible payment options to allow:
- Splitting checks between groups
- Taking mobile wallet payments from apps like Apple Pay
- Securely processing payments with EMV chip cards
- Capturing signatures from customers electronically
- Emailing customer receipts
- Soliciting customer feedback
- Offer customers the choice of a physical and eGift Card, which allows you to sell gift cards to a wider audience.
- Offer customers the choice of a physical and eGift Card, which allows you to sell gift cards to a wider audience.
When you need tech support or need to report an issue, there’s a single vendor website to log into, there’s no need to visit a laundry list of sites. A well-executed tech stack eliminates the need to log into various partner websites for reporting or call multiple vendors for support.
A Restaurant Tech Stack Provides Functionality From Top to Bottom
There’s a labor shortage threatening restaurants across the country, with many eateries shortening their hours or closing certain days because they simply don’t have coverage. Using a restaurant tech stack to automate as many processes as possible will help alleviate some of the stress and workload on your staff, while improving customer service without adding personnel.
Another must-have module is a kitchen display system (KDS) that automates the ordering process. A restaurant management system takes the orders right from the POS and sends them to the KDS, which helps streamline online, in-house and drive thru tickets. A KDS increases the efficiency of the kitchen, by eliminating the need for kitchen staff to spend time trying to read someone’s handwriting, asking questions, or remaking selections that were prepared improperly because the ticket got wet, lost, or was illegible.
Manage From Wherever, Whenever
Generating one report at a time can be time consuming, and more time sitting at a desk means less time chatting with customers and staff, upselling drinks and sides or lending a hand at the counter when it gets busy. Instead, you can run multiple reports using
the reporting dashboard. The dashboard is a back-office hub that gathers all the analytics with one click. Chains can run reports by location, region, state or country-wide to understand and compare performance.
- Gather insights such as:
- Net sales
- Labor costs
- Check averages
- Sales by period
- Employees on the clock
- And more
Everyone depends on their mobile device to keep their calendar, maintain contacts and help them stay connected, so why not put your Smartphone to work? With remote management programs connected to your all-in-one POS system, you can design a restaurant ecosystem that is accessible 24/7.
Whether you’re in a different restaurant location, at home, or on vacation remote management allows you to leverage your mobile phone to view information such as:
- Tracking items
- Sales by order type
- Overtime warnings
- Employees on the clock
- Employees by job
- Individual employees
- And more
Managing a restaurant is a full-time job, so whether you own or manage one location or a chain, the right technology makes your job easier so you can focus on your customers. Identifying your needs and building a restaurant tech stack that has all the modules and functionalities you require is the way to accomplish this. You don’t need to work with several vendors to get the job done, price shop components online, or assemble something piece-meal. Instead, choose an experienced provider that offers you an all-in-one solution that meets all your needs.
