There’s a world of variations to deal with when building a successful international business – but for two hospitality giants, EPOS has not been on the issue list.
BrewDog and Marugame Udon are two of the biggest success stories of recent years, continuing their rapid expansion in the toughest times.
At the heart of both businesses is great customer service – and at the heart of that lies restaurant management technology that streamlines the guest experience from reservations and ordering to payment and even leaving reviews.
Both organisations use Aloha EPOS from NFS Technology, not only because of its functionality but because of its ease of deployment in different countries.
Chris Cartmell, Head of Sales for Aloha, said: “While these organisations are very different, they are both working hard to build incredible businesses around the world and rely heavily on the support of the right technology.
“BrewDog have well over a hundred bars in more than 20 countries, while Marugame opened their first restaurant in Europe with the help of Aloha last year and are already expanding in the UK.”
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For both businesses, fiscal compatibility is crucial from their restaurant management system.
“They both like Aloha’s ability to be deployed easily in countries with different, stringent financial regulations,” said Chris.
“We have the experience to make the deployment easy in a wide range of settings. For instance, we’ve helped BrewDog deploy Aloha in countries as varied as China, India, the US and Australia – we shipped the hardware out to them to speed up deployment Down Under
“For Marugame, a leading Japanese group, it was important to implement a technology that can be used throughout Europe as they continue to expand.”
For Keith Bird, CEO of Marugame Udon Europe, selecting the right restaurant management technology was one of the keys to success in the European project.
“We selected NFS and Aloha following an extensive tender process, with solution functionality, integration potential and customer service as our key priorities,” he says.
“Integration support and flexibility were key ingredients in making this technology project with NFS a great success.”
James Brown, Head of Bars for BrewDog, says digital technology offers many opportunities to enhance customer service if used in the right way. For instance, ordering at the bar is important to many of their customers but mobile ordering can also be a positive experience.
BrewDog has built customer experience into their use of the mobile ordering app by allowing customers to order tasters on it, and also hit a button to ping a server to discuss a particular beer.
“So it’s not just about ordering, it’s a communication opportunity,” he says. “We’ve tried to lace that customer experience through the design of the programme.”
Chris Cartmell says groups working to expand their brand internationally require flexibility alongside reliability and user-friendliness.
“Today’s EPOS software needs to reflect the fact that many brands operate all over the world. It must make it easy for them to expand into new territories, dealing effortlessly not only with local regulations and laws, but also adapting to local customs and preferences,” he says.
“We feel it’s these characteristics that are making Aloha from NFS the technology of choice for many of the world’s fastest growing hospitality brands.”
