7 Restaurant Technologies you can’t ignore in 2020

The present pandemic has pushed the world in the direction of digital transactions where most of the people would prefer to perform functions digitally rather than relying on human efforts for human intervention. Restaurant technologies like contactless transactions have started gaining popularity and reliability like never before.

When every sector of the economy is integrating digital solutions and technologies into the traditional business process, the restaurant industry is not going to lag behind. It is one industry that has to deal with hundreds of customers personally on a daily basis.

Right from the Restaurant POS to the kitchen, smart restaurant leverages technology in every operation. Even technology producers have understood this Trend and hence are coming up with easier, speedier, and more affordable restaurant solutions to temp the market.

In case you are a restaurant owner/manager who is in search of a reliable and effective technological solution, then here are 7 restaurant technologies that should be on your list.

7 Restaurant Technologies you can’t ignore

Online Ordering

Do you own/manage a restaurant that offers takeaway services to customers? Or a fast food joint that believes in quick orders and services and managing the customer queue efficiently to save customers from the long waiting time?

Customers nowadays prefer to perform online transactions, and placing food orders or shopping holds a great portion of these transactions. Hence, the demand for online food ordering technologies (for restaurants) is increasing. If you wish to deploy an online order technology in your restaurant, you can expect the following benefits:

Higher Revenue:

An online ordering system allows customers to take their time while ordering, and they can order from the comfort of their home. There is no pressure. Usually, when the order has to be placed in-person, customers cannot take enough time to make a decision.

More Accurate Orders:

If you are accepting orders over a phone call, you must have experienced many instances of miscommunication or tied up lines. This leads to incorrect or orders, which leads to wastage of food, and bad customer impression. The online ordering system saves you from all these negative experiences.

Understanding the trends

When customers place orders through your website, you get precise reports. You can use the sales data to understand the buying behavior of most ordered food items and the frequency or time of the orders. You know how to use this data to ensure better customer relationships.

Email Marketing

Email marketing campaigns are undoubtedly one of the most affordable and effective restaurant technologies to deploy. Email service providers are third-party software that you can deploy to manage and send marketing content/campaigns, notifications, etc. to the customers.

This software allows you to access templates that you can use to create attractive emails to your customers. Tracking analytics is possible through this software. Data such as which customer has received the content, which has opened it, which has clicked on the link, etc. can be extracted. This data will help you manage your campaigns accordingly.

Table reservations

Guest Management Technology, which is also known as table management software or reservation management software, is a solution that helps in managing reservations, customer waiting lists, and more, which help restaurant managers to organize and handle the customers better. The data received from the software can help update customers about the exact waiting time.

Some reservation management software allows customers and access to the present wait time so that they can make reservations accordingly without having to call the restaurant. This way, they do not have to wait outside the restaurant and can be served in time with proper attention to them.

Important customer information such as birthdays, anniversaries, food allergy (if any) can be extracted to provide a better dine-in experience.

Controller

This restaurant technology helps you accept customers’ orders, organize it, and display it on the KDS. It is more like a computer tower that helps the kitchen display system to function at a high rate. Controllers are built and designed in a way that they can withstand a kitchen environment of high temperature. This makes them durable.

Bluetooth temperature sensors

Many restaurants have started deploying Bluetooth temperature sensor systems to ensure that their food and equipment is up to par. Customized temperature limits can be set for each food or equipment. If the temperature goes above the set limit, managers or the concerned team will be notified. Bluetooth sensors can record temperature readings and save them, saving time for the staff and the paperwork too. Product loss can be monitored to a great extent here.

Virtual reality onboarding

Being a smart restaurant, why don’t you use smart Technologies to manage your employees? There are advanced technologies like virtual reality, which can be used to manage staff onboarding. Using this technology, new staff can be given a unique training experience without having to ensure the cost of actual training sessions. Right from having a 360-degree tour of the facility, they can also test their skills through simulation games.

Automated inventory alerts

As a restaurant, one of the biggest mistakes you have to avoid is to run out of food or raw material. You must always maintain enough food to serve every customer demand. Here, automated purchasing tools play an important role. Such tools are linked directly to the inventory system and hence help you maintain a perfect quantity of stock. Smart purchasing suggestions can also be expected from this POS system based on the product lead times, estimated sales, and custom par levels.

The system will place an automatic order or raise a notification to the manager whenever the stock reaches a certain level. It saves human efforts and time.

In today’s world, restaurants cannot just rely on good food to impress customers. Technology has become a great deal here. Customers want to feel relatable, contemporary, and special when they visit your food joint. Plus, you do not want to miss a single chance of treating them with the best facilities as their loyalty & satisfaction matters to you. Here, technology plays an important role.