Digital Techonoly Boost Restaurant Profits

When comptroller Gary Lamers was tasked with effecting savings and efficiencies at Cornerstone Bar & Grill in Ottawa, Ontario he identified that one of the key barriers to profitability was an outdated liquor, wine and beer (LWB) inventory system. Both the restaurant and bartenders had difficulty managing and accounting for inventory, since it was checked manually and inventoried only every week or so. This meant that at the end of a shift, bartenders would rely on the manual point-of-sale (POS) system to identify how much liquor they had sold. The restaurant had no way of confirming those reports until a physical inventory was taken days later, and no way of recouping the money if there was a discrepancy.

Managing spirits with digital technology

After Lamers and NRC-IRAP Industrial Technology Advisors (ITAs) Liza Medek and Sy Symoom discussed the strategic impact of implementing a new system, they agreed that digitizing liquor management would be the ideal first step. "We helped Cornerstone decide how to get the best return on their investment," says Symoom. "Gary is a savvy restaurateur who brought a lot of value to the table—an important factor in effective technology implementation." Medek was also impressed by Lamers’ foresight in seeking IRAP assistance, given that restaurants are not typical IRAP clients.

Pushing the success envelope

Cornerstone’s results are just the tip of the iceberg, and will swell as they are rolled out to the other restaurants:

• Inventory losses at Cornerstone are down 15 percent
• Savings have increased by $200,000
• Bottom-line profit rose by 2 percent
• Beverage manager hired in each restaurant to manage the system

"I would strongly encourage restaurateurs to look into digital technology, because it’s something everyone can use to advance the bottom line," says Lamers. He admits that, without digital technology, Cornerstone would not be so comfortably in the black, and knows there is "something for everyone out there."

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Restograph

Philippines' Restograph is a software-as-a-service platform which gather and transforms POS data into readable trends and projections that helps restaurant owners and managers strategize better, grow their business and prevent cases like restaurant theft. Restograph also includes presentation of customer ratings and reviews from Zomato and LooLoo.