According to the National Restaurant Association, 35 percent of full-service restaurant operators say they are using more technology in their dining rooms today than they did two years ago, and 30 percent say they do so in their kitchen and office areas.
While quick-serve restaurant operators have been the industry leaders in terms of implementing technology solutions — whether at the point-of-sale or in the kitchen — full-service restaurant operators are finally catching on.
"Foodservice-and-hospitality technology offerings have increased rapidly in the last several years and there are now more industry-specific products and services on the market than ever," said Peter Kilgore, NRA acting interim president and chief executive officer.
At the NRA's Restaurant, Hotel-Motel Show at McCormick Place in Chicago, the latest developments and trends in foodservice technology will be highlighted at the Technology Pavilion. The pavilion will be located on Level 3 of the North Hall, and will feature interactive-product demonstrations of their technology and services. The pavilion also will host a Cyber Café lounge with wireless Internet access; free e-mail kiosks; and several seminars.
"These products and services continue to offer ways to improve customer experiences through faster service, more options in ordering and payment, entertainment features and more. On the restaurant operator side, technology helps increase efficiency, train employees, track inventory, streamline point-of-sales, enhance marketing efforts, and much more," Kilgore said.
The World Wide Web
On the operator side, technology and the Internet are now two of the most commonly used tools to pursue a wider consumer market.
According to the NRA, 40 percent of family-dining operators; 52 percent of casual-dining operators; and a strong 75 percent of fine-dining operators report that they will use e-mail to market their restaurants in 2007.
E-mail has become one of the most cost-effective ways restaurant operators can communicate with their customers.
"You can think outside of the box in an e-mail. You can do children's programs and really segment to target demographics," said Jennifer Punches Botta, account supervisor for Alexandria , Va.-based Fishbowl Marketing, in the Fast Casual article, "Building an e-mail list."
"You can really bucket to who you're reaching out to and since it's so cost effective, you can bucket to multiple people," she said.
The NRA has partnered with Fishbowl Marketing, provider of permission-based e-mail marketing for the restaurant industry, to provide its members exclusive rates on e-mail marketing services. Fishbowl currently provides services to more than 12,000 restaurant locations, including McAlister's Deli.
Philip Friedman, McAlister's Deli chief executive officer, said the company wanted to communicate news and events, and reinforce McAlister's in the mind of the consumer.
"We felt the reach that Web-based marketing would give us would be tremendous," Friedman said. "We wanted this to be a very integrated marketing message consistent with our in-store materials."
McAlister's built their e-mail list in about 45 days and have an astounding 90,000 names already on it. Their goal is to average 750 names per restaurant, with 225 locations currently participating.
Fishbowl has established that with about 2,000 names per location, there is a proven return-on-investment on e-mail campaigns that involve three core messages: a welcome e-mail, birthday e-mail and a happy anniversary e-mail in subsequent years.
In addition, industry standards dictate an estimated e-mail open-rate of 25 to 30 percent.
