It’s become a Cri de Coeur in most urban areas. Café owners can’t afford to pay the wages that allow servers and staff to live in the city, and servers can’t afford to live in the city. As low and middle-income workers migrate to more affordable cities and suburbs, small business owners are feeling the pinch. The tables are not any emptier, but there are fewer servers to wait on the people sitting there. How can owners of small, independent cafes, bars, and restaurants make less work like more? The answer is in the apps.
Table Tablets and Service with a Smile
Bringing in technology allows efficiencies in front of the house and also reduces ordering errors. Table management keeps waitlists manageable and can even page customers when their table is ready. Ordering by tablet results in fewer errors as the order goes from customer to kitchen without the server’s presence – which also means fewer complaints. Finally, the café POS system makes paying and tipping easy for cards and contactless payment systems. Tip management is built in and makes sure that tips are accurately reported and distributed.
Front to Back of House
By combining everything from kitchen management to café POS system under one app, there’s less of a chance for functions to fall through the cracks. Your servers and staff cover more tables with less effort and getting a grip on expenses, accounting, and reporting is easier. Alternatively, restaurants and cafés are relying on customers to do part of the labor such as bussing dished that was traditionally performed by staff and servers. While being greeted with a smile and a menu may be going the way of the horse and buggy, restaurants will find creative ways to survive and bring their business into the 21st Century with apps and ingenuity.
