8 Things You Can Automate In Your Restaurant To Cut Costs

Modern technologies are changing the vision and the overall approach of the food industry. A menu by QR code, robot assistants in the kitchen, taking orders online - all this seemed like fiction a few years ago. However, now a business without restaurant automation is at a loss to compete effectively with it’s competitors. Capterra says that 76% of restaurants have already implemented a minimum of three automated tools.

Thanks to the latest technology, you can now issue orders faster, reduce labor costs, and improve service. This all leads to attracting more customers and offering a better impression to the customer from the restaurant.

In this article, you'll discover how restaurant automation can benefit your business and how to implement this without a significant budget increase.

Restaurant automation is the use of machinery to simplify or improve the processes of cooking, service, accounting, etc. What can robotic devices do?

• cook meals;
• deliver food to the guests;
• take orders;
• issue invoices and make online payments;
• accept bookings, and more.

Of course, it is only possible to replace some of your personnel with robots. According to Capterra, a chef is the most complex role that is difficult to automate. But such roles as host, runner, waiter, barista, dishwasher, and drive-through operator can be replaced.

Thanks to the use of robots, you can process requests faster, and reduce your operational and administrative costs.

Also, they will bring some uniqueness to your place of business and may help to attract more customers to you.

But if your restaurant is more traditional and you strive to keep personal communication as a primary part of your service, there are other ways to automate the processes in your food business.

Let’s take a deeper look at the ways you can save money, maximize your profit, and satisfy your customers' needs with food industry automation.

1. Operational costs reduction

Running a restaurant is not cheap but you can reduce your operational costs thanks to automation.

Innovative technologies give you the ability to analyze the preferences of guests and correctly calculate the number of products you order so that they do not spoil unnecessarily. This will help reduce your costs on food.

As for labor costs, you can automate some processes and avoid using staff for these purposes. This solution is cheaper because there is no need to pay them a monthly salary. Moreover, robots don't take vacations and they don't get sick.

2. Waste decrease

Due to incorrect calculations, it can turn out that there will be a lot of extra food that is simply thrown away. This approach is both uneconomical and irresponsible.

You can run inventory management more efficiently with automation. This system can track the amount of needed and used products and can give recommendations on how to use them. It will help to save time for your employees and also decrease waste.

3. Ordering speed improvement

When guests come to a restaurant, they always wait for the waiter to come to them, bring the menu, and take the order. This process is often time-consuming. It may also happen that the waiter does not have enough time to serve everyone on time.

With automation in restaurants, the guests can independently view the menu using the QR code and order dishes. Such technologies reduce their waiting time and contribute to the loyalty of your guests.

4. Human resources optimization

First of all, you don't need to hire as many staff. A restaurant is not only about chefs and waiters. Administrators, cleaners, dishwashers, accountants, directors, and hostesses are all important roles of the team. With the use of restaurant automation, robots can do many of these tasks instead of people, such as cleaning, accepting booking, taking orders, and more.

Secondly, there is no reason to waste your time on onboarding and training. Thanks to automated training programs, new hires can learn this way, freeing up your time for more important tasks. Just to be sure that they have completely mastered the material, you can allocate some of your time to review the tasks.

5. Error elimination

Robots do not have unsuccessful days, bad moods, a reluctance to work, or memory gaps. Properly configured technologies work like a Swiss watch, day in and day out. The chances of error are very low, almost close to zero. You also do not need to monitor processes, give time off, or look for a replacement when someone needs sick leave.

Furthermore, Machine Learning algorithms study and learn from their mistakes and historical data, so their accuracy grows with time.

6. Customer experience and satisfaction improvement

By reducing the waiting time for receiving orders and serving dishes, you increase the level of satisfaction of your visitors. Guests will want to come back to you again and again if you provide fast and high-quality service.

You can also add entertainment for your visitors to watch. For example, an open kitchen with robots or virtual voice assistance at the table that can take an order or assist your customers with a choice can be a great addition to your place.

1. Self-ordering

A self-ordering system offers the benefit of reducing your staff. With a self-ordering system, the number of duties of your waiters is significantly reduced, and accordingly, they can perform many more productive tasks.

Another great benefit of a self-ordering system is in improving customer service. Your customers often have to wait a long time for their waiter to come to them, and the impression of your restaurant is immediately spoiled. If your guests are able to order by themselves, they don’t waste their time just waiting uselessly.

And the final benefit is the elimination of errors and mistakes. Due to human factors, waiters may not perfectly remember everything or might even confuse dishes. This system also helps to avoid ordering errors.

Mcdonald's is a good example of self-ordering. Simply approach the machine, choose your dishes, add to your basket, pay, and wait for your order to arrive.

Do you serve craft beer in your establishment? If so, lots of tasks related to processing your orders can be automated too. As you can tell by checking out the website of Ollie Order Inc., the tool allows you to do more than just streamline beer and production. You can also automate order processing, payments, inventory, and other crucial tasks discussed below, all from a single platform.

2. Payment systems

Such virtual solutions allow visitors to pay their bills online. Your guests do not need to call the waiter, ask for the bill, and wait for him or her to bring it. For example, they can read the QR code and pay by card from their phone.

This is very effective for your business, as your visitor will leave the restaurant faster and free up their seat for other guests. In addition, the guests will have good feedback for your restaurant, since they will not have to wait very long for their bill.

Asian cuisine restaurants “Noa” is a good example of successful automated payment services implementation. With the help of the QR code, the visitor can see his bill online, pay via Apple Pay, and even leave a tip.

3. Food preparation

Food preparation robots are one of the most useful examples of restaurant automation in the kitchen. Yes, it’s true that robots cannot replace a chef and can’t control every aspect of the cooking process. But using this method is a good solution for faster delivery of dishes.

For example, robots can layer ingredients on a salad or burger, cut vegetables, grate cheese, or even make a pizza. With this technology, you don’t need to hire so many staff, so your salary costs will decrease. Plus, cooking time will be shorter.

It’s worth it to mention Stellar as a relevant kitchen automation tool. This is a track with a robot inside which deals with all the many processes of pizza preparation.

4. Customer reservation

There are several options for your patrons to reserve a table: call, make a booking online, or make an appointment on the spot. When guests reserve a table by phone, they cannot choose where to sit. In order to find a table at a restaurant, customers have to spend their time getting to your place of business.

__Online booking is the best way to see all the available tables, choose the most preferable one, and make a quick request. __

Your customers may book a table directly on your website or by using an application. For this you can hire MEVN stack developers to add a customer reservation feature.

It’s convenient for any business because there is an automated system that controls the number of booked tables and handles all the reservations.

Moreover, you can set up an email marketing campaign and send reminders to your visitors so that they come to your restaurant more often.

5. Digital menus

All restaurants often change and update their menus. This can happen once or even 3-4 times a year. In addition to this, many cafes have seasonal menus. Design and printing always takes a lot of time and money. In order to save on unnecessary costs, you can offer guests a digital menu.

With digitalization, you may add new items and remove old ones in just a few clicks. Especially since the beginning of COVID-19, most guests prefer to reduce their contact with other people, and look at the menu online on their phone rather than using a paper version.

In addition, guests can independently study your assortment without waiting for a waiter to come and bring a menu.

Almost every restaurant has started using digital menus instead of printed ones. Your visitors can view your menu using the QR code or via opening it in an application.

6. Automated inventory

You always need to allocate a lot of time for inventory. It happens very often that the previous review was not so accurate and many errors occured. To avoid such discrepancies and save your employees' time, you can automate your inventory.

A special system will count how many drinks, food, kitchen and bar utensils there are at the end of the month. It can also compare the data with the previous month and show the difference.

To implement automated inventory in your restaurant, you may develop a custom management system or use an existing one, such as Magestore, MarketMan, and Lavu.

7. Computerized training

When you hire a new employee, there is a need to train him/her. It means that instead of doing your core duties, you or your colleagues will spend time explaining your work processes. Moreover, an employee may quit within the first days of work, and your time investment and effort will have been wasted.

In order to properly organize training, it is necessary to digitize it. Create one online system with everything you need: your restaurant information, the core responsibilities of your team, company values, their tasks, and FAQs.

In this way, all of your employees will have equal access to information and will gain complete knowledge of your requirements. And you, in turn, will not waste your time on training.

8. Delivery

Food delivery is a complex process that involves the work of many departments. Once a guest makes an order, your administrative team processes it and sends it to the kitchen.

Then your chefs prepare and issue the order, the delivery person picks it up and takes it to your customer. It is very difficult to control all of these operations without using a single system.

Automation of delivery will give you the opportunity to avoid errors, speed up the work process and reduce your workload. The fastest way to digitize delivery is food delivery app development.

Adopting a solution such as Uber or GrubHub will help you stand out from the competition. One more benefit that an efficient delivery service can bring you is the expansion of your customer base, as you will cover more distant locations.

Can restaurants be automated?

Of course, you can automate your restaurant starting from services such as booking or ordering and ending your kitchen operations such as washing dishes or cooking.

How much does restaurant automation cost?

The cost may vary depending on what automated restaurant equipment you would like to use. For example, online menu implementation can cost about $2,000. And for $3,500 per month, you can deploy a cooking robot in the kitchen.

How does automation improve customer experience?

Thanks to automation in restaurants, your guests will wait less time to be served, receive all of their meals faster, and always get exactly what they ordered.

Automation in restaurants is not just a temporary trend. It offers more opportunities for your business to grow. Thanks to restaurant automation tools, you save a lot of time, speed up the processes of cooking, delivery, service, and increase the level of customer satisfaction.

In order to understand how to automate your restaurant business correctly, you need to analyze your strengths and weaknesses. Check out how your competitors deal with industry challenges and what tools they use. After this analysis, start boldly implementing automation in your place of business.