We live in an age in which we depend on mobile applications to aid us in conducting our busy lives.
iPhone applications help us keep tabs on our bank balances, find directions to the nearest hair salon and view show times for the latest Hollywood blockbuster. It stands to reason that life's greatest necessity, eating, would be front and center when it comes to such apps. However, come time for lunch or dinner, restaurants-big and small-become inundated with a slew of customers eager to dine-in, or out, on a tight schedule. The problem for the restaurant owner becomes maximizing her profit given the time-related demands of the customer; all too often, take-out orders are lost in translation and fall by the wayside.
Imagine if those busy, convenience-craving restaurant patrons could carry their favorite restaurants with them wherever they went, on their smart phones. Patrons would be able order their go-to sandwich for pick-up exactly when they wanted it and have it paid for and ready to eat en route to their meeting when they stepped through the restaurant door. A select group of iPhone app developers are making that scenario a reality with suites of products that provide for streamlined and efficient ordering via a restaurant's website and iPhone food ordering applications branded specifically for that restaurant. The virtues of the former option are simple to see, while the potential of the latter (mobile apps) is varied and dynamic.
The chief benefit of iPhone restaurant apps for the customer is convenience. The positives of such applications for proprietors, however, are greater in number. Smartphone ordering maximizes service efficiency, negating the time it takes to take such orders over the phone or fax machine (apps now on the market link directly to handy tablets supplied to restaurants). However, the greatest potential for restaurant owners is having their own personal application which their satisfied customers can recommend to co-workers, friends and family. With these applications small-to-mid-sized brick and mortar restaurants can easily and dramatically increase not only their efficiency, but their notoriety and, thereby, their market share.
Consumers now more-than-ever are demanding, and rewarding, convenience, efficiency and consistency. Mobile applications are being developed at breakneck speed in order to meet these demands in every arena of business, but the restaurant industry, particularly smaller, local proprietors have struggled to keep up. By harnessing the power of the exciting new mobile technologies on offer, principally mobile food ordering applications, restaurant owners can catapult themselves into a new era and a new way of doing business.
