Five Ways to Streamline Carry-Out for Your Restaurant

The good news is most of your customers are used to ordering carry-out or delivery. In fact, even before the pandemic, more than half of consumers in the United States ordered delivery or takeout at least once a week. Since February, these numbers have increased to over 66%, according to the National Restaurant Association. The same study shows that consumers expect to order carry-out more frequently in the coming months.

To prepare for and capitalize on this shift in consumer behavior, you need to start thinking of ways to streamline your current carry-out offerings.

Here are five suggestions to get you started:

1. Simplify your menu.

To reduce the strain on your kitchen staff (and wallet) as more customers begin to rely on carry-out, consider simplifying your menu.

Think back to the beginning of the pandemic, when restaurants were required to offer carry-out and delivery only. What dishes were your customers more inclined to order? Perhaps pizzas, sandwiches, and wraps became more popular while full entrée options such as pasta dishes were not ordered as often. Shifting your carry-out menu to focus more on those dishes that tend to be ordered to-go more often can help you maintain profitability. While you’re thinking about your menu, analyze overall ingredient costs. If one dish requires completely different ingredients than the rest on your menu, consider taking it off for now. Making small changes like these will help you save money and streamline kitchen operations for carry-out orders.

2. Offer family or holiday meal packs.

While you’re evaluating your menu and consumer behaviors, take a moment to consider the holidays. After all, they are right around the corner! Many people will be reducing the size of their gatherings this year, and some may not be able to gather together at all. Perhaps your restaurant can bring a little flavor of Mom’s homemade holiday meal to those who are feeling lonely this season.

Think about adding a holiday special carry-out pack to your menu and encourage your customers to let you do the cooking for them. After the holidays, you can move forward with this idea and add family bundle meals to your menu. Don’t forget to include the following details on your website for each bundle:

• Pricing
• The amount of people the meal serves
• Everything included in the meal
• Any heating or re-heating instructions
  

This can help you keep costs down and maintain smooth operations.

3. Provide insulated containers.

Another key component to consider when streamlining your carry-out options is your container plan.

Keeping carry-out food warm from restaurant to kitchen table is a challenge in the winter months. You can help your customers out by making sure your carry-out containers are insulated for trapping heat in and keeping cold out. If you’re offering delivery, you can take the insulation one step further by transporting meals in insulated bags. Of course, you can’t control how far the food travels before it’s consumed. Even if you provide the best containers you can, the food still might be cold by the time it reaches its destination. To show your customers how much you care about their experience, consider including heating or re-heating instructions with their order.

4. Enhance your online ordering solution.

Especially now that more of your income might be coming from carry-out orders, it’s important to optimize your ordering experience. One of the best ways to do this is by adding or enhancing online ordering on your website. You’ll want to make sure that your online solution is user-friendly and easily adaptable to both desktop and mobile devices.

If you need a solution like this, we can help! Total Touch integrates with the top online ordering systems for restaurants, Total Touch Web Ordering, a mobile and online food ordering platform, to make placing carry-out orders simple.

5. Offer curbside pickup and payment options.

Offering contactless curbside pickup and payment options is a great way to show customers you are committed to their health and safety. Here are a few ways you can streamline the curbside pickup process for your staff and customers:

• Ask for the car make, model, and color upon order completion
• Dedicate parking spots for curbside customers
• Clearly mark a phone number for customers to call when they arrive

If you haven’t already, consider adding a mobile payment solution to your current payment acceptance methods. This way, your staff can quickly, easily, and safely process credit card payments at the customer’s car, eliminating the need to run in and out of the restaurant. This saves time and hassle for everyone. Plus, it is a safer option for the staff member tasked with moving across a busy parking lot in inclement weather.

Our preferred payments partner, Electronic Merchant Systems, offers simple and secure solutions for mobile payment acceptance. Click here to learn more.

We hope these five ideas inspire you as your restaurant prepares to tackle a COVID winter. For more tips and resources to help in these challenging times, check out these blog posts:

How to Reassure Your Customers in Troubling Times

Tips for Switching Your Restaurant to Carry-Out Only

Sources: National Restaurant Association