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| Thorntons Hatfield: PANINIS PRONTO! |
 CST CustomerCall helps Thorntons Serve FASTER
Hot eats such as toasties and paninis are taking over the sandwich menu in coffee shops, offering the customer a better feeling of 'added value'. But getting them to the customer's table once they're hot can be tricky. If you don't want to keep customers standing around waiting, you tend to end up calling their order or sending out staff to try to find them.
There has to be a better way. And Thorntons, the premier confectionery and café chain, reckon it's found the answer.
Thorntons has been trialling a CustomerCall pager system from CST (Call Systems Technology) in its Hatfield Galleria café. The system is not only improving food quality and enhancing the customer experience, it's also reducing need for extra staffing at peak times.
Thorntons is best known for its confectionery but the company now also has 30 coffee shops in the UK, under the care of Operations Manager Lee Francis. "We opened the first one in 1996, in Moorgate," he explains. "That was before the coffee shop explosion and it was as much a marketing exercise as a money-making one. The directors of the company had seen similar operations in confectioners on the Continent and believed it was the way forward. They were right!"
Thorntons expanded the café side of the business but always organically, carefully selecting sites that would work. The success of the approach is reflected in the fact that the coffee shop business turns over a highly profitable £9 million a year. A new site is about to open in Livingston, Scotland, and now third-parties are talking to Lee about Thorntons running their coffee operations.
Thorntons coffee shops are definitely upmarket, though prices are lower than most of its rivals; "We want customers to enjoy the Thorntons experience," says Lee. The menu is made up of hand-made cakes, patisseries and sandwiches - and those increasingly popular hot eats.
"We knew we had to change the way we handled them; the logistics of getting them to the customer hot just wasn't working, especially in our bigger outlets. The old ways were unprofessional, time wasting and often ended up with staff or customers in a dither - and the food cold."
So Lee decided to trial CST's CustomerCall pager system in the Hatfield Galleria site. The principle is simple: Customers ordering a panini, toastie or other hot eat are given a pager and can go and find a seat in the café or carry on browsing in the shop. When the hot eat is ready, staff simply send a message and the pager alerts the customer to come and pick up the food.
Says Lee: "Staff think it's great because they don't have to worry about getting the food to the customer - the customer comes to the food. Customers love it because they know they'll get their food quickly, without hassle and piping hot. And the managers love it because it saves staff time, so the whole operation is slicker - efficiency-wise it's ten times better than anything we tried before. "
Thornton's Galleria manager Raj Thakker agrees. "We can seat 105 here, directly inside the shop and outside, but at our busiest, like during Mother's Day or Easter periods, we can be serving 300-400 in an hour. And our paninis and toasties are some of the most popular things in the Hatfield Galleria, so it's essential we serve them efficiently or we could lose business.
"We originally tried calling the orders but that's confusing and distracting, because every customer hears it and has to work out if it's there order or not. We tried giving out numbered wooden spoons, but they were inconvenient. My staff hated wandering around trying to locate the right customer - and customers would put the spoon flat on the table so we couldn't see where they were anyway.
"But this new system is working wonderfully."
The CST CustomerCall system is easy to operate, inexpensive and - since it's wireless - easy to install. The pagers themselves have a promotions window to carry advertisements, for example for Thorntons confectionery.
Lee Francis has seen the system working perfectly in the Galleria, and is convinced. "We're now hoping to roll the system out into all outlets with over 50 covers," he confirms. "It's the best way to serve hot eats."
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Call-Systems Technology Ltd, Middlesex House, 29-45 High Street, Edgware, Middlesex HA8 7UU |
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