BentoBox 'Bento Door-to-Door' Complements Grocerant Niche Fresh Food Sales

Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® was the first too identify, quantified, qualified, the grocerant niche, then he coined the term Grocerant back in the day. Johnson was first to publish an article on both Nations Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality in 1995 tilted ‘Call them Grocerants’.

The grocerant platform has continued to evolve garnering consumers from every sector of food retail today. In fact, every sector of has evolved to include tat least basics of grocerant retail to some grocery stores doing 76.3% of all sales from within the grocerant niche. 

BentoBox, the hospitality platform that empowers restaurants to own their presence, profits and relationships, today announced the launch of Bento Door-to-Door, a convenient, affordable, and reliable delivery fulfillment solution for restaurants using Bento Ordering and perfect complement for grocerant niche retailers according to Johnson.

So, Bento Door-to-Door drives higher margins for restaurants through flat pricing, and BentoBox never takes a cut of the courier service fees. Besides affordability, Bento Door-to-Door offers fast setup and simple order management. The turnkey delivery service enables restaurants to access an on-demand network of best-in-class couriers to deliver orders directly to diners in their area.

So, how do they do that? Simple, by integrating delivery directly into their websites, restaurants benefit from simple, painless order management. Features include automatic driver assignment, visibility into order status, and control over settings like driver instructions and order minimums with the click of a button. By empowering restaurants to maintain ownership over customer relationships and data while outsourcing logistics, Bento Door-to-Door provides a compelling delivery option that helps restaurants to completely control delivery fees with a built-in, full or partial offset. 

Krystle Mobayeni, co-founder and CEO of BentoBox  stated "As part of our mission to help restaurants drive revenue, build relationships, and take control during COVID-19 and beyond, we are excited to announce this next evolution to our online ordering solution,”  “Restaurants have full ownership over branded ordering and customer information while also maintaining the convenience and simplicity of automatic couriers for incoming orders.” 

Bento Door-to-Door provides restaurants with access to an industry-leading delivery network, fast setup and service, and user-friendly integration. Bento Door-to-Door makes it incredibly easy for restaurants to add delivery fulfillment directly to their branded websites.  Are you empowering consumer choice within the grocerant niche? 

Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how Foodservice Solutions® can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit us on our social media sites by clicking the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter

Taco Bell Technology + Customization = Personalization

There can be no doubt that technology just might be the second most important part of any restaurant today according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. Enhancing customer relevance today requires that a technology edifies the non-food branded touchpoints in order to drive new electricity into the branded relationship according to Johnson.  

Certona, is a Kibo company that focuses on omnichannel personalization, it has partnered with Taco Bell to create a personalized experience for its guests. By working with Certona.  

In an effort to embrace customization and personalization while touchpoint for it customers Taco Bell wants  to personalize menu recommendations and offers for registered users of its mobile app. This solution enables Taco Bell to support individual guest preferences, past dining history, location, weather and restaurant specific menus and pricing creating a platform to save time and reduce ordering errors.

Johnson stated “that in my minds-eye the new electricity must be very efficient for the supply chain and includes such things as fresh foods, Online ordering, delivery, plant based foods,  sampling, toy’s, beer, developing brands, unique urban clothing, grocerant positioning, fresh food messaging, autonomous delivery, cashier-less retail, plates, glasses, cash-less payments, digital hand-held marketing.

All food and beverage retailers to survive the next generation of retail must embrace the artificial intelligence revolution while simultaneously embracing fresh food and beverages that are portable, fresh, with differentiation that is familiar not different.  Does your retail path forward look more like yesterday than tomorrow?  

Derrick Chan, Director eCommerce, Taco Bell stated “Taco Bell is all about satisfying our fans with the most craveable dining experience imaginable. Of course, we know each of our fans has their favorites and their own preferences. As a forward-looking company, we’re using the latest machine learning and AI technology to better deliver on those individual preferences,” … “That’s why we are thrilled to work with Certona and leverage their proven personalization platform with real-time support to present our fans with the most immediately craveable menu items every time they use our app, reducing the ordering friction and satisfying their appetite.”

Consumers are time starve, impatient, and want a frictionless transaction. If success does leave clues driving new electricity with technology to reduce ordering errors while saving time is you to remember.

For international corporate presentations, regional chain presentations, local educational forums, or keynotes contact: Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions.  His extensive experience as a multi-unit restaurant operator, consultant, brand / product positioning expert and public speaking will leave success clues for all. For more information visit www.GrocerantGuru.com , www.FoodserviceSolutions.us or call 1-253-759-7869

Microsoft Global Grocery Technology Platform Elevates Competitiveness

Microsoft excels at developing software technology platforms for business and Loblaw knows a good thing when they see it according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  

Yes, Canada’s largest food and drug retailer is leveraging Microsoft’s cloud computing, data analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) technology to help power its digital transformation, with a focus on developing a more personalized experience for customers, while edifying its competitiveness according Johnson.

We must note that Loblaw joins the likes of the top five U.S. grocery retailers by sales — Walmart, The Kroger Co., Costco Wholesale Corp., Albertsons Cos. and Ahold Delhaize — as Microsoft cloud customers.

The Redmond, Wash.-based tech company unveiled sweeping partnerships with Kroger and Albertsons in January and with Walmart last July to use its Azure cloud platform to help drive their digital initiatives. Costco adopted Azure as its hybrid cloud platform in 2017. Other food and drug retailers using Azure include Walgreens Boots Alliance, which announced a partnership with Microsoft in January, and Giant Eagle.

Loblaw worked with Microsoft to integrate its AI technology into the retailer’s PC Optimum loyalty program to tailor deals and offers to members based on their online preferences.  David Markwell, senior vice president of information technology at Loblaw “We’ve partnered with Microsoft to create digital experiences that not only meet our customers’ expectations, but exceed them,”

Markwell continued “A key objective was to “democratize” customer data stored in siloes, a project that Loblaw and Microsoft were able to accomplish in 90 days.” “With the data already collected but separated into different customer experiences, it made sense to move it all to the cloud and to leverage AI tools to drive results,” Markwell (left) explained. “With AI, I see this democratization of knowledge and ability to make decisions being moved out into the business units.”

Using Azure to securely store and process data, Loblaw redesigned its customer data by disassembling the siloed information and then anonymizing and aggregating it to build a feature to customize offers to PC Optimum members at scale.

“It allowed us to cross-pollinate user experiences and deliver it to millions of people at once,” said Peter Danforth, vice president of loyalty program strategy and management for Loblaw. “What AI enables us to do is make a decision at a scale that was just impossible before.”

By using Microsoft’s cloud and AI solutions to redefine the customer experience, Loblaw was able to develop more personalized deals, making a stronger connection with its shoppers. According to Johnson Loblaw is looking a customer ahead.

“Predictive AI can help us to communicate on a one-to-one basis with each customer or provide relevant offerings to each customer,” said Jenny McConvey, director of targeting support and systems at Loblaw. Are you elevating you brands competitive footprint?

Are you looking for a new partnership to drive sales? Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing tactics look more like yesterday that tomorrow?  Visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information or contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us Remember success does leave clues and we just may have the clue you need to propel your continued success.