Speed vs. Service

Schmidt, Bradley (2007). Speed vs. Service. Hospitality Technology Magazine. 9/28/2007.

http://www.htmagazine.com/HT/archive/0707/toc_jul07.shtml#

The article I read came from the Hospitality Technology magazine. The article discussed the importance of speed as well as service in a fast casual restaurant. The article showed how both things can be achieved with a good Point Of Sales system. In a fast casual restaurant it can be like a quick service restaurant with the speed element of the food but it has more menu choices as well as a “white table cloth” environment having a wait staff. Many quick service restaurants also want to incorporate a take out window, online ordering and curbside to go ordering. The IT director for Forklift Brands, Jennifer Martinez, predicts that curbside to go is going to be a big part of fast casual restaurants in the next few years. With all these things offered at a restaurant for the convenience of their customers to pick and choose where they want to eat the food from a certain restaurant, it can become difficult with the old fashioned paper ticketing system. In the article they discussed how the kitchen display system implemented into the kitchen saved the restaurant 10-20 seconds per ticket. They also discussed how expediting could be much easy and could manipulate the screens so that only a few orders could be seen at the time so the staff does not become overwhelmed. These POS systems are starting to become very critical in fast casual restaurants as well as all restaurants for great workflow from the front of the house to the back of the house.

I liked this article because I have worked in the same seasonal restaurant for the past three summers. I love it there, it’s called Curtin’s Wharf and it is part of a boating marina. The atmosphere is fantastic, the customers are fun, and the food is delicious. The only thing that really started to get to me this past summer was how behind in technology the restaurant has become. There is no computer POS system, everything is written on a ticket and given directly to the bar or kitchen in person. This does cause service to be a lot slower than if it was all linked together through a computer system. One of the points in the article discussed how the POS system is also designed to time an order that was called in to go so that it stays out of the kitchen for a certain amount of time until just the right time for the order to come out hot fresh and ready when the person comes to pick up the meal. This was a major thing at my restaurant that caused a problem. When people would call in to go orders either the ticket would not go into the kitchen in a correctly timed fashion or the food would come out cold and soggy most of the time. My manager/owner of the wharf thinks that because it is seasonal it would be silly to implement a computer system. She claimed it would be too costly and not as easy to take care of as shed like. Do not get me wrong I enjoyed every chance I got to walk into the kitchen and say hello to my boys on the line or have a chat with the bartenders while they make my pina colada. However, I tried to convince her that she needed to update her technology to stay alive in the business. I may have gotten through to her but maybe someday I could be the manager there and make some changes of my own!