It sounds rude, but for the sake of the customer experience, your kitchen staff should never have to talk to your wait staff. There’s a singular point of contact that efficiently and effectively connects the two teams—the kitchen printer. The printer’s job is to convey all the information the kitchen staff needs to fulfill a customer’s order in a timely, accurate fashion. When your kitchen staff has to convene with your wait staff to ask for an explanation, valuable time is lost. When an order comes through inaccurately, you risk the customer’s health and evening.
When an order fails to meet expectations, you lose money, disrupt your inventory count, and upset the ambiance of your food establishment. The goal of a good POS system with a kitchen printer is to prevent these outcomes by delivering fast, clearly detailed messages for every order that is made. Here’s a closer look at the benefits these systems provide.
Top Benefits of a POS System With a Kitchen Printer
The implementation of a POS system with a kitchen printer will dramatically benefit your food establishment and its operations. Its ability to be customized to fit your business’ needs provides its own unique set of advantages to each team, but below are a few general benefits you can expect to see from a technologically-advanced POS solution.
Streamline Your Order Management Methodology
Every restaurant and food service outlet has its own way of transmitting a customer order to the professionals that prepare it. The method in which the staff organizes and disseminates information related to orders is a key contributing factor to the overall dining experience.
Consider:
- Do you have your wait staff memorize orders and then disappear to a remote terminal to pass them on to the kitchen?
- Does your wait staff carry pads and pens and pass the notes to your kitchen staff?
- Do your diners walk the floor and make their orders at a central point of sale?
The movement of people through your dining space is largely defined by your system of managing orders, so it is critical that a seamless method is in place.
A POS system with a kitchen printer provides the foundational groundwork for building an order management system that works for your establishment.
Keep Your System as Simple as Possible
Ideally, if you could boil your order selection down to a series of numbers that signified different menu items, that would be the easiest and simplest method. However, almost every restaurant and food service outlet doesn’t have the luxury to keep it that simple; you need to account for modifications and unexpected changes.
A POS system with a kitchen printer keeps its solution grounded in simplicity, but incorporates the ability to handle complexities. The trick is to build enough flexibility and creativity into the overall system so that the order’s message output always comes out in a clear and concise manner.
To do that, you need to carefully assign a series of printers to each intended target within your kitchen. By coordinating these outlets into a “tap-and-go” touch screen terminal for your wait staff, you can ensure the grill, bar, dessert, and entrée staff are only transmitted messages that pertain to their team services, while the front-of-house team maintains an overview of what to expect.
Ideally, for a waiter to enter each item in a three-meal order, they would simply tap a visual icon on an iPad and then the POS system would match each item with the appropriate destination.
Account for Particularities
The difference between a memorable and miserable evening for a customer is how you manage their dietary requirements and personal preferences. Your wait staff needs to understand the kitchen’s capabilities, and your kitchen needs to understand the importance of customers’ preferences and restrictions.
Once your staff has agreed on the parameters of meal modifications—from the addition and subtraction of ingredients to a safe range of cooking durations—you can assign these variables an easy-to-understand message within the POS system.
Integrate With Other Areas of Business
In the same way that a POS system can be networked to link every working member of your service team, it can also integrate with other aspects of your business.
The leading models are built around all-in-one software platforms that possess resources for your inventory, financials, sales analyses, live service monitoring, customer loyalty programs, and more. This provides you with a comprehensive snapshot of how your establishment earns and spends money.
At its core, a POS system with a kitchen printer is a cloud-computing management system for your whole business. You can access it at any time from any digital device, and generate integrated reports that reveal sales trends, popular dishes, common modifications, seasonal fluctuations, and the impact of individual staff members.
When the analytics are used to optimize your business, it can result in less waste with your food and beverage spend, and greater staff-wide accountability. This kind of feedback just cannot be replicated with a pen and paper.
Incorporate a Technology-Based Solution at Your Restaurant
The savings you generate from these data-based insights are only made possible if your staff utilizes the POS system with a kitchen printer in a successful manner.
With a little planning and staff training, it’s possible to have your kitchen and front-of-house staff go an entire service without having to exchange a word—except when passing on compliments to the chef, of course—maximizing their value and time.
The restaurant and food service solutions offered by Creative Media Products are made to match your unique needs to the latest technology. The result is an innovative POS system with a kitchen printer that assists your kitchen and wait staff with providing the best possible service to your diners. Reach out to us today to sign up for a demo and learn more about how Creative Media can be your valued POS partner.