Imran Sheikh

New podcast drop! Meredith Sandland and I review the top #restauranttech news of the last two weeks. This week we discuss how the digital consumer is evolving, what Senators are doing about hidden fees, and how restaurants are responding to the complexity of tech. Please subscribe to The Digital Restaurant on YouTube or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Links in first comment below.

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During April, the restaurant industry experienced a slowdown in job growth, signaling potential challenges amid a shifting economic landscape. Despite adding 6,600 jobs, this figure pales in comparison to the robust gains observed in previous months. According to the National Restaurant Association, 25,100 jobs were added during February, and 28,500 jobs were added during March. Amid these challenges, resilience and adaptability become paramount for restaurant businesses. By staying attuned to market dynamics, leveraging technology to enhance operational efficiency, and prioritizing customer experience, restaurants can navigate through challenging scenarios, including staffing shortages. #Restaurant #RestaurantJobs #RestaurantTrends

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Your restaurant's culture is a critical asset for success, worth more than you might think. To maintain a thriving culture, focus on recognizing, aspiring to, clearly defining, promoting, and consistently measuring the behaviors that align with your brand, ensuring long-term profitability and business prosperity. Read here to learn more: https://lnkd.in/gYahrusX #restaurateur #restaurant #success #businessadvice

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Restaurant technology truly has become the backbone of running high-quality operations, and Emma Blecker's wisdom (of Boqueria Restaurants) in standing up restaurant systems in an emerging restaurant group is second to none. Here's what I learned from Emma listing to this podcast: 👩🏻‍💻 Systems have to achieve the objective & help the guest and team 👩🏻‍💻 Systems are not ALWAYS the solve - work to understand the problem 👩🏻‍💻 Systems can't create the "magic & experience" 👩🏻‍💻 Systems can give time back to the team to make that magic & romance 👩🏻‍💻 Systems have to compliment the "human" and "community" ethos 👩🏻‍💻 Where do you get started: 🌟Focus on clearly understanding problems; prioritize based on need 🌟Getting people paid, schedules set, inventory 🌟Identify key platforms (POS, HRIS, Labor, Bookkeeping, Reservations, etc. 🌟Help managers manage the "moving targets" sales, labor, & COGS 👩🏻‍💻 Data is a powerful tool to help operators manage targets & fix problems 👩🏻‍💻 Sustainable results matter. Questions results that seem "too good" as well Shoutout to the Mosquito Supper Club in New Orleans! Have a listen: https://lnkd.in/dAJUej75

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Calling All Independent Restaurant Owners Are you tired of working endless hours in your restaurant without seeing the financial results you deserve? It's time to take control of your business and start enjoying the fruits of your labor. Download the One Page Restaurant Profit Planner and schedule a one-hour call with The Restaurant Coach™ to create a customized plan for your business. This worksheet is designed to help you identify areas where you can cut costs, increase revenue and improve your work-life balance. With this new action plan, you'll be able to make data-driven decisions that will not only help you make more money but also reduce the number of hours you spend working in your business. Don't wait any longer; download the worksheet and schedule your call today and start enjoying more free time and more profits! https://bit.ly/3LjJLwa

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I'm curious to see what other restaurant operators are seeing with their alcohol sales. There has been a lot of discussion about a rise in non alcoholic beverage sales and a focus on more people drinking less. At the same time Tequila continues to boom with beer and wine both seeing large drop offs in sales (nationally). There is a huge opportunity to offer a great NA program and there are a lot of great options there from Athletic Brewing Co. to Seedlip Drinks etc. I'm seeing more and more restaurants doing some sort of house made soda with interesting seasonal flavors and fresh herbs etc. In many cases these drinks aren't significantly less expensive than their alcoholic versions. What are you doing at your restaurant? Do you place huge importance on getting a liquor license at your new locations?

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Restauranteurs, Some in the industry consider #restaurantprofitability a dirty word or don't consider profitability a focus. That's very fascinating to me. Working with hundreds of people in the industry, I noticed four factors limiting the growth, longevity, and profitability of restaurants: 1) The Owner/Operator: One leader can do so much without systems, trained people, and processes. At some point, the Operator takes on so much that their Mental Capital becomes the limiting factor. We are human after all. Day-to-day kills tomorrow. Being an Operator is the hardest job in a restaurant. A redeeming factor would have been being open to new ideas. Many operators don't have the time, experience, or energy to look for solutions and transform their businesses. 2) FOH Leaders are like Sprinters in track. They are great at connecting with guests and solving problems fast. This tendency of explosive brain power leads to fast problem-solving and conflict resolution but also an impatience in building tomorrow. Building tomorrow requires meticulous planning and execution that comes from mental stamina and patience, not explosive mental power. 3) BOH Leaders. The heavy lifters and backbone of restaurants. Second hardest job in a restaurant is the job of the Chef. They are like professional cyclists. Work alone, work as a team, endures long hardship. Huge mental stamina. Ego, trust issues, and wanting to retain control seem to be the biggest restricting factors in collaboration. Control is good if can be executed well. The majority of hospitality believe Chefs should be in charge of purchasing. It would be great if a Chef could work for 4 months on purchasing contracts. That's how much time is needed to achieve a sizable change. Chefs mostly make purchasing decisions based on NOT rocking the boat, which switching to a new product or supplier could be considered rocking the boat. Distributors know their clients and exploit this tendancy in their pricing. Chef gets some discount from the existing supplier for 1-2 months and thinks that's a win. The discounted price slowly creeps back up 2 months later. 4) Accounting and HR. (Supporting elements.) There is a reluctance to: 🔅understand the day-to-day challenges faced by the Ops team, 🔅be humble, 🔅spend enough time on the field, 🔅connect with the Ops to build rapport, and 🔅explore ways to help and support the Ops even when Ops wasn’t vocal about help The BOH working under the heat and smoke, sometimes considers the admin staff dispatched from their reality. Support staff can make too many assumptions, and when these assumptions are wrong, they lose the respect of the Ops. But when you have the right types of people in supporting roles, they fulfill the gaps in the Ops which is a lifeline to success. Some Leaders in the industry are great at creating an inclusive environment and bringing all business functions together to work harmoniously. There should be more of those leaders.

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We're thrilled to bring you a special episode of The Digital Restaurant from the Food On Demand Conference at the iconic Bellagio in Las Vegas. Last week, Meredith Sandland and I dove deep into the transformative world of restaurant technology with some of the brightest minds in the industry. 🔍 Key Highlights: Andrew Custage from Medallia shared intriguing insights on the contrasting consumer perceptions of delivery and pickup pricing. How can your business adapt to these expectations? Deena DePhilips from Red Robin discussed the challenging yet crucial tech integrations and the strategic shift toward consolidation. Are you building or buying your next big solution? The highlight: Travis Kalanick emerged from stealth to talk about his vision for CloudKitchens and the future of food delivery. His thoughts on automating meal preparation and an "Internet Food Court" concept are game-changers! This episode is packed with invaluable perspectives that can help steer your strategies in the dynamic landscape of food services. Whether you're part of this fast-evolving industry or just keen on where food and technology intersect, you won't want to miss this! 👂 Listen, learn, and let us know your thoughts! We’d love to hear your reflections on these discussions. Check out the full episode through the links below. 🔗 Don't forget to subscribe for more updates from The Digital Restaurant, and share this with your network to spread the knowledge! #DigitalRestaurant #FoodOnDemand #RestaurantTechnology #CloudKitchens #InnovationInFood #Podcast #BusinessStrategy #FoodService #TechIntegration #LeadershipInRestaurants

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Starting a new restaurant adventure? Don’t miss the golden tip from our Director of Partnerships, Kelsey! Get ready to take notes—this advice could be the game-changer you need! 🌟 #RestaurantTips #RestaurantAdvice #RestaurantSuccess

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Have you ever seen a manufacturer demand rapid price increases for product that is experiencing rapid decline in demand? If you have purchased fountain soft drinks, you have. Fountain soft drink syrup prices have increased at a rate more than 50% higher than inflation, and without regard to underlying commodity pricing. Limiting soft drink companies’ increases can be a tough negotiation but getting a palatable level is possible if you approach it correctly.

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Include the cost of delivery in your item price versus separating it out….so says the data presented by Andrew Custage of Medallia who questioned customers on their preferences - here at Food On Demand 2024. What does your restaurant do on pricing delivery? The Digital Restaurant #fooddelivery #pricing

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WITHOUT RAISING PRICES (and having an instant impact).... How is Pepper Lunch Restaurants recapturing margins? CEO Troy Hooper spoke at the California Restaurant Association Presidents Panel, a few months ago; and one of the hottest discussions was how to defend restaurant profitability: ✅ From constant attacks of rising costs and regulations; and ✅ Without customers' having to carry the load I clipped this one-minute, forty-five second answer. Please watch and repost, so that it helps as many of our peers as possible! The restaurant industry will be here, forever. What are other ways we operators can be here forever, too?

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At 7shifts: Team Management for Restaurants, we've made an investment in the franchise ecosystem. Through our national agreement with Jamba, we have the opportunity to partner and scale with all of its franchisees. We've been fortunate to call Nathan Bracken a partner. He graciously shared his time with Kelly Fitzpatrick, one of our franchise sales leaders. Here are some key takeaways from their conversation: 1. Task management has been a huge value add, creating accountability and simplicity to complete tasks on tablets or phones real time 2. Employee communication is streamlined to share updates, shoutout employees and is increasing company culture 3. Shift swapping has saved managers in efficiently running their stores which then leads to higher retention as they can see their shifts and make time off requests 4. Tracking attendance automatically and being able to reward employees based on their attendance. 5. GM’s can make more intuitive decisions using our sales & labor reporting while optimizing their P&L. If you are a franchise brand, we are well equipped to support your system and we'd love to chat. #restauranttechnology #scheduling #7shifts #jamba #partnership https://lnkd.in/gMKuBkFE

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This was such a fun and informative Distill Ventures seminar I got to participate in moderated by Derek Brown. This is part of a series with topics Derek and DV have designed around all aspects of navigating the non-alcoholic category. 🍸🍹 People tend to lump what we are seeing with NA options into “the latest trend,” but really, this is unlike anything any of us have seen before, (mostly because we weren’t alive!) This isn’t like the tequila craze, or the bourbon boom; those were/are trends resulting from the masses RE-discovering, ( with a little help from celebrities and marketing 💰) a spirit, and then the world deep diving into them. Those options were always around, people just started paying more attention. With non-alcoholic spirits, what we are witnessing is the result of pure innovation! This is a BRAND NEW category (that didn’t even exist prior to 2015 ) JUST getting going. It’s like seeing the invention of gin in the 1500’s or vodka in the 1100’s! 🤯This is an entirely new spirit category and an option that I would guess ( based on everyday conversation) 1/3 people still don’t realize exists for them. If you haven’t checked these seminars out, definitely do! They have already covered some great topics, and will continue to do so. And a big thank you to Derek and Distill Ventures for creating this platform for education so that we can navigate this new category together, and watch as NA spirits make their mark on history! #nonalcoholic #spiritindustry #cocktails #menu #innovation

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"$100b (not a typo) that can be shared amongst the stakeholders" in the foodservice supply chain! Mani Kulasooriya and his team at Cut+Dry are some of the smartest people I know in this business. The latest Farm to Fork: The Innovators Podcast episode is absolutely a must listen. Money back guarantee! #FoodTech #PodcastEpisodes

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Pros and cons of opening a second restaurant location from someone who has 12 locations 😎 Pros ✅ Increased Revenue Potential ✅ Economies of Scale ✅ Operational Experience ✅ Increased Brand Awareness Cons ❌ Huge Financial Risk ❌ Resource Strain ie YOU ❌ Brand Dilution ❌ Market Saturation Follow for daily tips for your restaurant's success. 💯 #restaurantowner #restaurantsuccess #restaurantcoach #restaurantconsultant #profitablerestaurant #restaurantoperations

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