Every restaurant wants to have the success that they have seen Papa John’s achieve. The way that Papa John’s has been able to be so successful is by keeping up with the new trends in the restaurant industry and learning the best ways to increase their sales. One of the things that they have adopted is POS integration for their online ordering system. QSR stated in their article “Point and Click” that Papa John’s has received over 1 billion online orders since 2001 and the increase in sales has been 50 percent every year since. It’s no wonder why they have taken advantage of such a useful tool as POS integration to help with their increased sales. With the aid of integration, they have been able to keep up with their customers and offer excellent service time and time again.
Some restaurants may not even know they have the ability to use POS integration. The first thing that is important is to obviously have a POS system. Without one there is no need for integration. Once a restaurant has chosen and setup their POS system then can then have someone integrate it for them. This can be their online ordering provider or another company that deals specifically with POS integration. What restaurants should be aware of is that there are hundreds of different POS systems out there and having to ingrate each one is time consuming. It can take anywhere from a few months to almost a year to fully integrate a POS system. However, once it is completed it will be invaluable to a restaurant.
The procedure for using a system that is integrated is similar to one that is not except for one important step. Once a customer has visited a restaurant’s site and ordered, the order will be sent to the restaurant to be made. Now without integration, the order will be sent by email, fax, or even some other software which is designed for receiving orders. Next the restaurant will have to print out the order, have an employee take that order and manually put it into the POS system, and finally send it to the kitchen to be made. While this gives the restaurant a back up copy of the order, it allows for employee error and can slow down the ordering process. With POS integration, when a customer places an order online, the order is sent directly to the POS system and automatically put into the system. Then it will be printed out in the kitchen which will then begin making the order. This removes the “middle man” and is faster and more efficient for the restaurant. There is no room for error and it is almost instantaneously printed once the customer places the order online.
While this may be something that is not new, restaurants are still a little iffy when it comes to online ordering and POS integration. However, it can be seen that it has the potential to do great things for restaurants if they take the time to learn the steps involved and give it a chance to get going in their business. Who knows, maybe some restaurants will follow Papa John’s example and rise to the top of the restaurant industry.