​Even before the pandemic, pizza restaurants operating with a legacy point-of-sale system struggled to keep up with rising consumer demand for online ordering and speedy off-premises delivery and payment services. Innovative point-of-sale technology was not a priority for many small- to mid-sized pizza restaurants. But after months of lockdowns and in-person dining limitations, “would be nice” restaurant technology became “must-have” tools for sustaining business and achieving profitable revenues.

From 2019 to 2020, sales in the pizza sector faced a mere 0.22% total revenue loss, despite economic and social uncertainty. By November 2020, 70% of restaurant consumers were ordering food off-premises. By late 2021, half of customers still order food and drinks from restaurants via takeout and delivery, and plan to increase use of digital ordering during the frigid winter season. *

​For more than 20 years restaurants have relied on Aldelo’s point-of-sale technology and solutions to operate their business. The Aldelo Express Cloud POS restaurant technology platform and Masa+ suite of customer-facing solutions reflect the company’s rich POS lineage that has relied on merchant-centric feedback and a clear understanding of the changing needs of the industry and consumers. The result is a breadth of reliable products with robust features designed for running a successful restaurant operation today, and tomorrow.

Aldelo Express Cloud POS offers everything restaurant owners need to manage their operation, including the ability to easily configure a store and set-up menu and staffing details through an intuitive Aldelo Set-up Wizard tool. In less than one-hour, the POS solution is up, running, and ready for business.

​Over the last two years, restaurants have learned to manage their business more effectively and resourcefully with less staff, less customers in the restaurant, and less revenue. Moving forward, new restaurants and chain locations are designing and configuring restaurant layouts around mobile and online operations. Restaurants are even transitioning to “ghost kitchen” operations that support exclusively off-premises delivery services, revolutionizing the food service landscape with a heightened emphasis on convenience rather than in-person dining experiences.

But not all restaurants can afford such drastic changes. Most owners and operators will continue adapting to digital solutions within their existing restaurant space, gradually managing their labor expenses, overhead costs, and monthly bills while they adapt to new challenges. Doing more with less is critically important to restaurant owners.

​Aldelo Express Cloud POS offers restaurants, bars, pizza places, food trucks, and more the tools they need to manage a complete in-person, online, and hybrid food service operation. Aldelo Express recognizes the importance of providing merchants access to a range of complimentary POS solutions by partnering with valuable third-party integration solution providers. 

Combining the power of the Aldelo Express Cloud POS restaurant technology platform with third-party integration partner solutions provide the Aldelo Express merchant community with options for composing an ideal POS environment for both their business and customers.

​Beginning in March 2020, contactless online ordering and off-premises dining became a lifeline for restaurants. While most restaurants in the industry needed time to implement new COVID “accommodations,” pizza restaurants were able to adapt more easily to the new market. Over-the-phone orders, online orders, takeout, curbside, and delivery have long supplied a good portion of the sector’s annual revenue, but often at an additional cost to merchants. Still, pizza sales have remained incredibly close to pre-pandemic levels, facing only a 0.22% total loss from 2019 to 2020, versus the 24% loss to the restaurant industry overall. *

As customers return to restaurants and sales gradually improve, Aldelo Express Cloud POS offers owners and operators a powerful restaurant technology platform with a full-featured point-of-sale and robust pizza module.

​Compared to the economic losses across the restaurant industry in the last two years, sales for pizza and pizza delivery have remained remarkably close to pre-pandemic levels. Off-premises dining services such as takeout, curbside, and delivery were standard pre-pandemic options in the pizza sector, putting local pizza places and national chains at an advantage when lockdowns and restrictions began in March 2020. In fact, the pizza sector only lost $0.1 billion compared to pre-pandemic sales. *

Still, economic uncertainty continues to pose operational challenges for restaurants, food trucks, pop-ups, and pizza places alike. With more than 20 years developing pizza solutions for restaurants, Aldelo Express Cloud POS offers owners and operators a full-featured point-of-sale solution that supports complex pizza building, pricing, and delivery solutions. The Aldelo Express Cloud POS technology platform includes the native Masa+ Online Ordering and Payments solution that utilizes the same Aldelo Express Cloud POS menu and pizza module, enabling customers to order and pay for meals in-store or remotely via any web-browser.

​Streetside food services have recently become more popular in urban and rural neighborhoods across the country. Customers enjoy trying creative homestyle and fusion food and drink options, and aspiring restaurateurs can more easily get their business “off the ground” with less expensive overhead and operational costs.
 
Historically, one phrase we have always heard related to the success of a restaurant is “location, location, location.” With social media, it is much easier to get the word out and gain a loyal following. Today, passionate chefs and business owners are leveraging mobile restaurant operations and social media to promote micro-brands that are taking the U.S. by storm. We see them everywhere from public/private spaces, sporting events, festivals, retail centers, and more. These on-the-go restaurant operations range from no-frills trailers to elaborate mobile units. Typical investments to launch a mobile restaurant operation are a fraction of brick-and-mortar establishments.

What do successful restaurants have in common? They provide a consistent level of service coupled with great food and drinks that does not go unnoticed by customers. After a great first impression and dining experience, customers expect a repeat performance. Restaurants that replicate consistent high quality dining experiences separate themselves from the competition and become local and national institutions.

Restaurants cannot accomplish such an achievement without POS technology that helps owners and operators manage and maintain great customer expectations.
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Restaurants looking for an affordable and efficient solution to streamline their front- and back-of-house operations must look no further than Aldelo Express’ Kitchen Display System (KDS) and Hostess Reservation solutions. These native iPad-based solutions offer seamless integrations into all restaurant POS devices and modernizes restaurant operations and production flows.

Recent limitations for dine-in restaurants prompted over half of U.S. restaurants to begin providing outdoor on-premises services. In the third quarter of 2021 that trend persists, with 65% of restaurant operators offering on-premises outdoor dining in patio, deck, parklet, or sidewalk settings.
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Surveys also report that even after pandemic restrictions are lifted, 90% of restaurant owners and 84% of adult customers would prefer restaurants to be allowed to continue offering outdoor dining on sidewalks, parking lots, or streets. To efficiently serve these now common dining environments, restaurants ideally need an all-in-one point of sale with both tableside and remote solutions that can ebb and flow with their business needs. Selecting a single and affordable, full-featured, scalable POS solution that meets a restaurant's needs can be difficult for owners. Restaurants are typically faced with purchasing multiple solutions that include hidden fees and add-ons that are costly, clumsy, and inefficient to manage.

Point of sale systems generate a billion-dollar industry across the restaurant and retail sectors. Cash registers, which began as secured cash drawers with mechanical calculators and bells, have since developed into multi-faceted digital POS solutions that provide businesses with secure payments, real-time back-office inventory, online records, and more.
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Yet the core reason for purchasing a point-of-sale terminal remains the same: to effectively manage and secure the business. However, restaurant operators often lower their guard to monitor the business for employee theft.
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Internal threats are rarely caught, and even less often legally reprimanded, contributing to employees stealing $50 billion dollars a year from their employers - or an average of 7% of a business’ annual revenue.* In periods of high unemployment and inflation, this threat to business owners becomes especially relevant.

​Profit leakage can account for thousands of dollars of loss per year at any unsuspecting restaurant. By having the proper security features and automated manager approval prompts built into a restaurant’s point of sale system, owners and operators ensure that every employee accurately processes orders and completes transactions. Eliminating user errors and deterring ill-intentioned employees for common POS functions like timecard logins, applying discounts, coupon tenders, error corrections, and more protects a restaurant’s bottom line. It is necessary for POS systems to offer restaurants built-in security functions and, through them, peace of mind. 

​Since March 2020, credit card fraud has increased in number and strategy. Scammers continue to spread fraudulent claims via email, phone, and even text message that promise free gifts, promos, or calls to action that often result in stolen credit card information from everyday customers.

While victims of credit card fraud are typically reimbursed by their bank, restaurants that received payments via a stolen or fraudulent card are rarely compensated. That is why the Aldelo Express Cloud POS solution offers multiple ways to reduce credit card fraud, chargebacks, and refunds in “targeted” settings such as restaurants and bars with the Aldelo Express Bar Tab Pre-Authorization feature.

Fine dining in restaurants dawned in the 18th century when French Revolutionaries and cooks came together with fine china, linens, and aristocratic recipes to create the first commercial “high-end” restaurant. As commercial fine dining spread, restaurateurs began accepting table reservations and offering waitlists to provide diners with private dining experiences and accommodate the high demand. Today, table reservations and waitlists are not limited to high-end restaurants and enable customers to easily dine with large parties and enjoy a dining experience on their schedule.

​As customers return to restaurants, they are calling ahead and making reservations so they are seated soon after arrival. Planning ahead provides customers with a frictionless and time-saving approach that they expect will translate to an easy and enjoyable dining experience.

Bypassing crowds and eliminating wait times is equivalent to first-class seating, especially when a POS reservation solution includes customer profiles that provide key details about the diners, such as celebrating a special occasion or the need for a highchair. When restaurants prepare seating areas in advance and recognize special occasions, customers feel like VIPs.

In an uncertain labor market, restaurants have struggled to maintain consistent hours of operation. Temporary shutdowns, unpredictable mandates, and economic uncertainty has discouraged millions of employees from returning to or beginning a new job in the food service industry. Once an industry employing over 12 million people, most American restaurants continue to struggle to retain employees.

In a time of such uncertainty, managing labor costs is critical for maintaining a profitable business. Labor is the most controllable expense a restaurant has, but mis-scheduling shifts, miscommunicating schedules, and a lack of control managing daily time cards can be detrimental to a restaurant’s bottom line.
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Aldelo Express Cloud POS includes Labor Scheduling and Employee Timekeeping modules that are available to restaurant owners for managing front- and back-of-house labor schedules, improving employee communications, and saving hundreds of dollars every month in unwarranted labor costs.

Labor is the most controllable expense a restaurant has towards achieving daily profitability. Managing labor through the Aldelo Express Cloud POS solution is simple for realizing immediate and sustained results.
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By utilizing the Labor Scheduling and Employee Time Keeping modules included with Aldelo Express Cloud POS, owners and operators easily manage front- and back-of-house labor schedules, improve employee communications, and protect hundreds of dollars a month in unwarranted labor costs.

​Forty percent of customers prefer to split checks when dining with friends. * Some guests pay their own way by alerting the waiter before ordering, while other parties load a group bill onto one card and pay back the cardholder after the meal. For those in groups tasked with itemizing a group’s guest check, the process is time consuming and tedious and there are always items that fall through the cracks. The experience is stressful and defeats the purpose of getting together for a fun and relaxing meal.

From family gatherings to get-togethers with friends, both diners and staff are familiar with the infamous “check war.” It is the battle of wills between family and friends insisting “dinner is on them” or they’ve “got it covered.” It is the race to grab the check as soon as the server arrives with the little black book at the table. Typically, the result is a compromise that results in portioning and separating the final check amount. Whether the debate at the table is tiresome or amusing, at the very least, it is guaranteed to happen at least once on any shift.

Restaurants that are seeking to acquire a point-of-sale solution tend to struggle to make confident decisions because solutions and features beyond basic POS functionality are priced separately or are intertwined with varying credit card processing rates and fees.
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Since the mid-2000’s, credit card processing companies have acquired POS solutions or developed native solutions. It has resulted in proprietary POS solutions that mandate restaurants use a provider’s hardware and/or merchant processing. Restaurants suffer by acquiring POS solutions from companies with core competencies in payments instead of POS, meaning that certain solutions and features are inadequate or come at a cost.

Aldelo Express is different …

With eight out of ten people carrying a personal mobile device in their pockets, consumer demand for contactless experiences is skyrocketing. Customers are utilizing personal devices to self-manage a wide variety of engagements and services that lead directly to payments.

The overall contactless payment market is expected to surpass $4.6 trillion by 2027, with North America poised to be the leading market. *
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With the growing number of customers preferring to order and pay for food and drinks online, restaurants must offer secure and convenient methods for efficiently managing payment transactions. Today, customers expect flexible and frictionless solutions that streamline online and in store payment transactions with minimal or no interaction with restaurant staff.

​Loyalty and rewards programs have been around for centuries. In the 1700s, retail shops in the United States would hand out copper tokens with each purchase that customers could trade in with future purchases for a free item. Eventually retailers moved from tokens to stamps and, decades down the line, to personal cards and online credit for airlines, retailers, coffee shops, hotels, and restaurants.

​​In the last two to three years, restaurant owners began moving their menus and food and drink transactions to online platforms. For operators, it provided them with an opportunity to broaden brand exposure, offer modern convenience, streamline operations, and expand their customer base. Going digital enables restaurant owners to communicate more effectively with customers. Restaurants that take a grass-roots community driven approach with loyalty and rewards programs see immediate and long-term results.

All Aldelo Express Cloud POS restaurant owners have FREE access to the platform’s native Masa+ multi-store digital Loyalty and Rewards Program available on the Aldelo Marketplace. Any restaurant can utilize the flexible loyalty and rewards solution for one or more stores that allows operators to directly cater to the needs of their business and influence customer behaviors.
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A restaurant can implement different types of loyalty programs for customers based on accumulated points, dollars spent, or items purchased. Customer rewards can include free items, discounts, or dollar rewards. Loyalty programs can disperse rewards instantly, over a specific period, or indefinitely.

​Restaurants that send out “cards” during the annual holiday season know that there is only one card type that provides them with an opportunity to spread joy through food, fun, and a great atmosphere to new potential customers. Gift Cards are vital to restaurants for extending their brand and reach to new customers through the loyalty of their current customers. Gift cards also provide restaurant owners with increased funds that are critical to sustaining the business during slower periods throughout the year.

Gift cards are a staple gift item during the holiday season. Traditional or digital gift cards allow customers to purchase, redeem, and recharge gift cards to use at their favorite local restaurants. As restaurants, bars, pizza places, food trucks, and more move to online ordering and payment solutions, electronic or “e-gift” cards are convenient for customers while making an immediate positive impact to a restaurant’s bottom line.