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Mobile ordering coming to a QSR near you
7/13/09 - Christa Hoyland
Just as the drive-thru changed the ordering experience, mobile phone applications are poised to do the same.
With a few touches on their cell phone, consumers already can find the nearest quick-service restaurant. Soon, they will be able to place and pay for their order before heading in that direction.
Consumers are comfortable with online ordering from pizza restaurants, and the prevalence of smartphones makes mobile ordering a logical next step.
"It's part of a larger trend of tools for convenience technology," said Noah Glass chief executive officer of GoMobo, which hosts online and mobile ordering solutions for restaurants. "It definitely appeals to customers that are on the go."
An estimated 455 million Smartphones are in use throughout the world, including the United States and Western Europe. Glass said about 30 percent of iPhone users fall into the Generation Y (18-34) demographic, and they tend to be more affluent, with 57 percent of iPhone users earning $70,000 or more a year.
GoMobo has developed branded mobile apps that allow consumers to place orders at restaurants, including quick-serves. The company is testing remote ordering for Burger King and Subway and it also has worked with Dunkin' Donuts, which last month debuted its Dunkin' Run app to facilitate group ordering.
The company's apps are currently only available for the iPhone, but they will soon be moving into other smartphone platforms such the Palm and Blackberry.
Making the case
Glass said remote ordering, especially from a mobile phone instead of from a PC, fits into the lifestyle of QSR customers. For example, GoMobo has found that coffee restaurants receive a lot of mobile phone orders from morning commuters on their way to work. At dinner, consumers use a mix of online and mobile ordering, but offsite lunch orders tend to be made from a PC.
Providing an app for consumers to order before they reach the QSR benefits both consumers and operators.
"That saves time for the consumer," Glass said. "It also makes the store more efficient because it automates taking the order and the handling of payments. And ultimately, both groups win because of this new enabling technology. I think it's an inevitable trend that is sort of moving forward, and more restaurants are coming onboard."
Operators also benefit from higher order totals and customers' ordering more frequently. Glass said the average remote order is 25 percent higher than those placed in the store, and those customers tend to return 42 percent more frequently than customers who order in-store.
GoMobo's app combines a store locator function with mobile ordering from the most current menu. It also allows consumers to pay for the order by credit card directly from their phone. Having them pay ahead speeds the pickup process but also helps eliminate no-shows at the store.
The app sends the order directly to the store's point-of-sale system, and the customer receives a text message notifying them of the time the order will be ready.
Remoted ordering also can help with line busting in the store, especially in stores like Burger King and Subway that already have a pick-up area. As incidents of remote ordering increase — Glass said GoMobo anticipates remote ordering to become 25 percent to 50 percent of QSR orders — other stores may convert a cashier lane to a pick-up one.
Mobile app options
Although Glass said it has several large quick-serve customers who will be among the remote ordering applications the company will launch in the next three to five months, some brands are not ready for the technology. For those brands, GoMobo has a store locator app, like one it recently launched for Burger King.
GoMobo also has plans for future applications, including one that would tie into a vehicle's on-board navigation system via touchscreen or voice activation.
Dunkin' Donuts is considering adding remote ordering in the future, but in the meantime recently launched its first mobile app, Dunkin' Run, also available online. Customers can text their friends from their PC or Smartphone to see who wants to be in on the group order. Individuals complete their order, which is compiled and available in a printed or mobile phone screen for the "runner" to take to the store.
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Cynthia Ashworth, vice president of consumer engagement for Dunkin' Donuts, said the company took its time launching the application, one its creative agency Hill Holiday had suggested two years ago. Earlier this year, with the "explosion of social media and the increasing importance of mobile and mobile web devices" the company decided the time was right.
The company plans to conduct research with the app's users and store managers and crew in a few months to gather input into how to improve the group ordering process.
For now, Dunkin' is pleased with the unexpected "huge wave of interest" received in the first week of the app's launch. Ashworth would not provide figures but said the company has received customer e-mails about how fun the Dunkin' Run site is to use.
"It's more fun, more viral and more efficient both for the person doing a Dunkin' run and the store operations than just your traditional (call out for a group order)," she said. "At the store level, it's great because the runners come in with this incredibly accurate order so there's no room for (mis)interpretation."
