FH0320

TECHNOLOGY
suburbs make up [about] 70 per cent of store
sales, but that’s true because they’re free to
use,” he says. “We think about mobile order
ahead as the equivalent of what the drive thru
is in the suburbs.”
Reddy’s comparison may prove an increasingly
apt one, as Chipotle Mexican Grill
announced plans in December to begin testing
a new restaurant design featuring walk-up
windows to better support its billion-dollar
digital business.
Beyond the convenience of skipping the
line, mobile-ordering platforms also have the
added benefits of easy order customization
and allowing customers to save their favourite
orders to simplify future purchases.
Ritual goes a step further to facilitate what
Reddy refers to as a “peer-to-peer delivery
network” within office environments through
the platform’s “Piggyback” feature. The social
group-ordering feature allows a user to offer
pickup for their team when they place an
order and notifies team members so that they
can join. Ritual even incentivizes those who
pickup orders for their team members by
offering them extra rewards points, which can
be used towards future purchases.
For operators, digital-ordering platforms also
unlock insights and marketing opportunities,
including direct marketing and personalized
offers/incentives.
“We can finally answer questions for restaurants,
such as how many new customers
do you get every week, how many of them
return and, for those who return, how often
do they return? Also, what makes them
return?” says Reddy. “That’s invaluable data
for merchants.”
As with any new technology, its introduction
has resulted in a unique set of challenges.
“Many legacy POS systems don’t
have integration ability,” Reddy
notes. In these cases, the company
provides restaurants with a device
for managing orders. “And, they can
either input [orders] into their POS
in real time or download monthend
or week-end reporting for
accounting purposes,” says Reddy.
Efforts are also being made to
streamline the pickup experience
in restaurants.
“Menus become pointless when
60 to 80 per cent of people have
already ordered; what you need is
traffic control,” says Reddy. “You see
a lot of people coming into stores
wondering, where’s my order?
When is it going to be ready?”
The solution: displays detailing
orders in progress. These can
already be found in many McDonald’s locations
and Ritual retrofits restaurant partners
with tablets that serve the same purpose.
There are also a number of low-tech
restaurant features being rethought, including
store layouts and the design of order-pickup
areas. “The reality is most stores weren’t
designed for a mobile-pickup experience,”
says Reddy. “When you enter a
store…typically the first thing you do
is wait in line to order and then move
over to the pickup area. But, when
you have a lot of people coming in
that have already ordered, making
them cut through a busy line doesn’t
make sense.”
Some brands have developed
innovative in-restaurant solutions to
streamline the pickup experience. For
example, Little Caesars introduced
the industry’s first heated, self-service
mobile-order pickup portal in 2018, which
it launched in Canada in October. The
brand’s Pizza Portal pickup has attracted
attention as an innovative technology and
received accolades from the International
Franchise Association.
Customers who order through Little
Caesars’ app or website can bypass the line
when arriving at the restaurant and retrieve
their orders from the Pizza Portal’s secured
compartments using a provided three-digit
pin and QR code.
Last December, Chipotle began testing new walk-up windows,
Little Caesars’ Pizza Portal Pick-up (below)
Independent brands have also been developing
their own strategies to accommodate
demand for mobile orders. Vancouver-based
Tractor Everyday Healthy Foods launched a
new pick-up-only concept — Tractor Digital
— in June 2019, developed in partnership
with digital-product studio Apply Digital.
Leveraging intuitive design and AI, the Tractor
Digital platform offers advice and incentives
during the ordering process, optimizes menu
options and tracks customer satisfaction and
quality control.
“It’s an interesting time because we’re asking
ourselves where we think customers see
value and how people prioritize their purchases
for quick-service food,” says Meghan
Clarke, the company’s co-founder. “In the
heart of urban centres, the [Tractor Digital]
concept will probably, over time, be the format
that will really sing with customers.”
“My sense is that [digital ordering] is going
to become one of the most important dimensions
for restaurants to win on,” agrees Reddy,
pointing to the shifts that have taken place in
retail over the last decade as a road map of
what’s to come.
“It’s not about who ran the best store, it’s
about who embraced digital and understood
the game has changed. The same thing is
going to be true in the restaurant world.
Winners and losers are now going to be dictated
by those who understand and optimize for
digital versus those who don’t.” FH
46 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY MARCH 2020 FOODSERVICEANDHOSPITALITY.COM