How eatPOS can help your hospitality business during a second national lockdown
England is set to be placed under stricter measures from Thursday (5 November) in an attempt to slow down the spread of Coronavirus.
These will be some of the new restrictions for England:
– Only leave your home for a specific reason (essential work, childcare, education).
= No mixing of households, unless for childcare or support.
– All pubs, bars & restaurants must close, takeaways and deliveries are allowed.
– All non-essential retail to close, but deliveries and click and collect services can continue.
– Food shops, supermarkets & garden centres can remain open.
– Weddings & civil partnership ceremonies will not be allowed except in exceptional circumstances.
– Hotels & hostels will remain open for people travelling for work or other essential reasons.
Scotland currently has a five tier system in place, with level 0 described by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon as “the closest to normality we can safely get to without more effective treatments for COVID”.
Northern Ireland have a month long measure in place from 16 October, which includes the closure of bars, pubs & restaurants aside from takeaways and deliveries.
Wales is currently under a two week “firebreak” system that will end on 9 November, people are only allowed to leave their homes for limited reasons and must work from home where possible.
How can we still trade?
The answer is our eatPOS online ordering platform. We allow businesses to operate as a takeaway & collection service with ease, guaranteed to get your business up and running within 48-72hours. There are a number of benefits to our online ordering platform as demonstrated below.
It offers convenience for your customers. Going digital undeniably makes ordering easier for your customers. With online delivery, or even online click-and-collect, you are removing the need for customers to take a big chunk of time out of their day as was required with traditional takeaway orders where customers would go in, choose their food, wait for it to be prepared and then finally receive their order and leave.
During these unprecedented times, we are used to social distancing & keeping contact to a minimum, our online ordering means you can order and pay from the comfort of your home
It’s a trend which is expected to last. As we enter a new decade, it looks as though the food delivery hype is here to stay. With the second lockdown approaching, businesses have had to adapt in order to keep trading, more restaurants each day are opting to trade delivery & takeaway and build that loyal customer base. Food delivery allows businesses to operate in a safe & efficient way. MCA Insight predicts that the market will be worth £9.8 billion by 2021, and it’s important to note that over half of home delivery and takeaway orders are now placed online.
After a second lockdown it is inevitable that businesses will still have to adhere to social distancing and safe spacing in restaurants, meaning you’re not able to accommodate as many customers as once before. Online ordering means you are able to do more volume during these uncertain times. If you want to succeed, you must meet the needs of your clientele and those establishments who are lagging on the online ordering front will be left behind in favour of restaurants who have stepped up.
Online ordering extends your customer reach. By transitioning your food business to include an online platform, you are opening up an additional income stream in an industry which is hotting up even as you are reading this. You will also be extending your customer reach, both demographically and geographically. For example, maybe once upon a time, you weren’t getting many customers coming into your restaurant on a Sunday evening, but with online delivery, that Sunday could now turn into one of your busiest days with food going out the door left, right and centre to all different parts of your city – and because of this your profits steadily creep up.
The team at eatPOS are always there to help and offer friendly advice to restaurants in order to generate more traffic to their delivery websites and apps. We will also help you set up a loyalty program to encourage repeat business as we know that regular customers spend up to 67% more than those who just order once.
Most customers would prefer to cut out the middle man. One big barrier stopping businesses from making the transition to online ordering are the hefty fees that are associated with it. Companies such as Deliveroo and JustEat are taking up to a whopping 30% commission from their orders, whilst others simply add a small fee onto each and every order. But these ‘small fees’ eventually add up.
Now we know that 70% of consumers would rather order directly from a restaurant, as they would prefer that their money goes straight to the restaurant and not a third party, it is time to put systems into place so that they can do this easily online. At eatPOS, we offer a whole online ordering package with your very own app and website for a set monthly fee, so customers can rest, assured that their money is going directly to their favourite restaurant.
Plus, opting for having your own online delivery website and app means that you will also have full access to your customer database, so you can build up a profile on those who use your service and even create a loyalty scheme to keep customers coming back for more!
If you would like to find out more about setting up online delivery for your business in preparation for a second lockdown, take a look at what we offer, or feel free get in touch with our expert team at eatPOS. We can help you design and create your very own delivery website and app for your business without any scary fees and in under 72 hours.