Print or Digital?
Let’s face it, when was the last time you picked up a delivery menu and called the number on the menu to order food? With the advent of delivery mobile apps such as Deliveroo, UberEats, Zomato, Talabat, RoundMenu, etc 95% of consumers below the age of 35 are dependent on such mobile apps.
And why shouldn’t they be...The mobile app makes it very easy to save your address or show your current physica location to deliver food. Tracking the order on the mobile manages expectation on the delivery time, and more importantly read reviews before you order. Also the restaurant can do away with call centre staff to answer calls and upsell. Statistics show that there is a steady decline of orders coming directly to the restaurant via the telephone, with most brands its less than 15% of the total delivery business. Also the cost of printing and distributing the printed delivery menu out weighs the revenue it generates.
What about dine-in menus? Shouldn't we have printed menus atleast for dine-in guests?
We came across a newly opened Japanese restaurant Yugo Sushi who have taken it a step further and gone 100% digital. The Dine-In menu has been replaced with digital iMenus. Why? Research shows, a food video sells better than an image. Also having both Dine-in and Delivery menu in digital format gives the restaurant freedom to change prices, add menu items and remove non-performing items on the fly.
So why haven't we seen more of these digital menus? The upfront cost of creating videos of every food item and re-shooting everytime the presentation is changed or new items are added deters restaurant operators to go digital. One technology company in Dubai - TECHMTE has identified this as an opportunity and offers digital menus as a managed service for as little as AED 300 per month! Abhishek Bose, Business Head of TECHMTE said that the initial uptake was slow and the company ran it as a pilot project with a handful of restaurants and the response has been brilliant! Since then they have managed to sign up brands such as Mighty Quinn's, The Parlour and Sushi Art. After the initial success in UAE, Sushi Art has decided to roll it out in all their locations in KSA.
"Although the restaurant needs to invest one-time on tablets, but studies have shown that the increase in average check and repeat footfall recovers the cost of the tablets within the first two months of operation. And lets not forget, iMenu sells and cross sells by itself leaving very little to do for the service staff." said Abhishek Bose, Business Head of TECHMTE. TECHMTE currently has over 300+ restaurant clients in the region out of which 25+ are already using iMenu and has 20+ restaurants scheduled to go live in the next 30 days.
What do you think? Are restaurants ready to go 100% digital? Comment below…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fE-JZvyVGw
http://www.techmte.com/restaurant-point-of-sale-system-future-pos-dubai-abu-dhabi-muscat-302146.html
Abhishek Bose is an industry vetran, with over 20+ years of experience in hospitality technology. Started his career with Micros-Fidelio (owned by Oracle) with whom he was involved in 36+ pre-opening projects, following which he was the Asst Director of Technology with Burj Al Arab (pre-opening team for 3+ years) and since then has been selling to hotels. He has had over 60+ hotels as his clients and has consulted on over 300+ restaurant projects.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhibose
Contact details [email protected] | Mobile +971 50 2298622
If you need comments / statements from existing clients feel free to reach out.
About TECHMTE (http://www.techmte.com/):
A bespoke hospitality technology house focusing on innovative solutions which empowers your business to reduce costs and increase revenue. Being hoteliers first, focus is to introduce innovative solutions to an ever changing and challenging industry.
POS, Digital iPad Menus, Business Intelligence, Mobile Apps, Websites, Social Media, Sage Partners, WIFI authentication over social media, F&B Inventory Systems, Menu Design, Digital Menus, etc are few of the products and services they provide to an ever growing customer base. Currently have over 300+ restaurant clients in Oman & UAE
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