If “adapt or die” has become a rallying cry for restaurants in the 21st century, the restaurant industry would be wise to look towards an unlikely source for inspiration: your local brewery.
Gone are the days of dimly lit breweries with sticky floors, long lines and stale bar snacks. Though once disregarded for their one-dimensional service offering and counter service approach, high performance breweries are shifting gears and embracing a multi-faceted business model. This includes offering high-quality food, branded merchandise and a range of beverages in addition to beer, oftentimes with servers tending to expansive indoor and outdoor spaces.
But there’s more than just a range of services that makes these modern brewpubs a model for dining establishments. Out of necessity, the pandemic fueled a drive for restaurants to invest in technology that focused on off-premise takeout and delivery. But as consumers have returned to dine-in and are looking for out-of-home escapes, these same establishments have not always given the same level of attention to the in-house guest experience.
Breweries, on the other hand, have placed extra emphasis on that in-house experience. By investing in smart technology, like QR code ordering and mobile tab management, breweries are providing an elevated level of hospitality on-premise while cutting costs on labor and driving overall transactions. In today’s challenging environment where every dollar counts and loyalty is at risk, the creative use of digital has been a game changer for breweries leveraging this approach.
But that creativity can be easily applied to the restaurant model. Here are a few ways restaurant operators can take a page out of the brewery playbook to improve the guest experience and run their business better.
1. Embrace Omnichannel
Like we’ve seen with successful retail and e-commerce companies, breweries lean into many different channels to drive additional revenue and enhance the dining experience at every guest touchpoint. Smartly deployed technology can simultaneously drive efficiency and guest satisfaction.
Through tools like QR code ordering, mobile tab management and checkout, as well as online ordering, high-performance breweries streamline the ordering and payment process for beverages, food and merchandise in an effort to meet guests where they are, whether it’s mobile, online or face-to-face.
One brand that has done this exceptionally well is Maui Brewing Company, Hawaii’s largest craft brewery. The brewery onboarded on-premise QR code mobile ordering and payment in order to give guests on-demand control over their own dining experience, eliminating the hassle of waiting in line or flagging down their server to order another round or pay for their tab. Their website also provides customers the opportunity to search for store and restaurant locations where their beer is sold wholesale as well as order merchandise for delivery. With this approach, Maui Brewing is enabling easy access to their offerings through all channels – in person, mobile and online – driving additional revenue for the brand and improving the overall guest experience.
Now, it’s time for restaurants to catch up and tap into these same channels to create a more cohesive and well-rounded brand experience that offers guests multiple ways to transact.
2. Deliver Hybrid Hospitality
Despite the boundless potential technology provides, some tools are still controversial. For instance, it’s not often you’ll find a QR code stuck to a white table cloth at a fine dining restaurant. High-performance breweries recognize that there are various guest preferences and provide the ultimate level of hospitality by simply giving guests the ability to choose the layout of their dining experience and the extent to which they interact with their server.
For example, Other Half Brewing – a Brooklyn-based craft brewery with seven locations across the Northeast – has servers around to greet guests, make recommendations, answer any questions and start a tab for guests. From there, should guests prefer no waitstaff interactions, servers can send the tab to guests’ mobile devices through a text code, where guests can access and continue to order and checkout from their phones. Know what they want? Guests can start and end the entire process via mobile QR code. This way, guests can order off the QR code at the cornhole board in between tosses, or walk up to the bar to discuss the IPA on draft versus the Pilsner with an expert team member.
The benefit of this flexible model is that it meets the needs of every guest based on their individual preferences and doesn’t force technology – or the lack thereof – down people’s throats. It also helps operators maximize throughput with less staff required, increasing operational efficiency without sacrificing hospitality.
3. Make Smart, Data-Enabled Decisions
As the restaurant industry continues to invest in digital, operators can’t look past guest data as a means to make smarter business decisions. Breweries, for one, are leveraging technology to gain access to previously siloed data from various off- and on-premise guest touchpoints to inform targeted marketing campaigns for future visits, ecommerce offerings such as to-go cans and merchandise, and more.
California-based Stone Brewing takes direct marketing to the next level with personalized offers and communications based on actionable guest insights. Through advanced technology providers, the brand is able to identify a guest that ordered four Hazy IPAs on their last visit, for example, and invite them to stop by the following week to try their specialty ‘Enjoy By’ IPA series.
Gathering actionable guest data opens up the floodgates to guide decisions as it relates to targeted marketing, personalized communications, off-premise takeout and delivery offerings, operational changes and even real estate selection for those looking to expand. For restaurants, this would enable brands to cater their offers and communications depending on guests’ previous orders, most frequented locations, preferred dayparts, and more, to build deeper guest relationships and improve their overall dining experience.
4. Become The Third Place
There’s been a lot of attention lately on the concept of “third places,” establishments or locations where people gather socially and feel comfortable spending free time aside from home and work. Modern breweries have excelled at becoming that kind of third place, largely due to their relaxed and community-centric approach.
Here too, digital tools can help restaurants transform from transactional experiences to transformative ones. Using a digital-enabled service model, merchandise offerings and the creative use of their space, restaurants, like high-performance breweries, can embrace branding and become more than just a destination to eat or drink, but can instead become a community landmark that fosters culture and belonging.
This concept was a driving force behind Pryes Brewing Company – a spacious craft beer taproom in Minneapolis. The brewery utilizes its large square footage to frequently host local events – from professional wrestling matches to bingo nights – as a way to build community and generate traffic.
While quick turnover is a standard goal for high-traffic times, restaurants can drive incremental revenue by practicing similar tactics during weekdays and their off-peak hours. By getting more involved in local events, themed nights or even offering merchandise, operators create an opportunity to enhance hospitality and build a sense of community around the restaurant, which in turn, can lead to increased sales, visit frequency and overall guest loyalty.
Moral of the story…while breweries were once considered one-dimensional, they provide the ideal case study for restaurant operators eager to improve operations and the guest experience by way of smart digital strategies. Through solutions like QR codes and mobile tab management coupled with unique practices such as hybrid service models, data driven decision-making and community engagement, breweries have embraced technology and created a warm, modern environment that is as much influenced by Silicon Valley than Cheers. Restaurant operators, with a commitment to transformational change, can do the same.
AUTHOR BIO
Patricia Mejia is Chief Marketing Officer at GoTab, a leading restaurant commerce platform helping operators run lean, profitable operations while making guests even more satisfied. With deep expertise in digital marketing, branding, and public relations coupled with hospitality experience from several restaurant jobs in college as well as a 30+ year marriage to a chef, her passion lies at the intersection of marketing and technology and helping businesses grow. Prior to GoTab, Patricia held numerous marketing and consulting leadership roles with an affinity for startups and early stage companies. Outside of GoTab, Patricia is a mother of two beautiful adults and an adorable eight-year-old Lab mix. As a chef’s wife, she’s incredibly patient and views a messy kitchen as the appropriate price of a great meal.
