Apidays New York 2024 - The value of a flexible API Management solution for O...
Optimizing food ordering and serving process at a restaurant
1. Team 2:
Swati Adhau
Stephanie Chaisson
Maura Rizzuto
Emily Rose
Eric Sher
Ben Solomon
OM726 – Fall 2013
Optimizing Food Ordering/
Serving Process at Viga
3. Overview
304 Stuart Street, Boston
About Viga:
Family-run take-out & catering
business started in 1999, with
3 locations in Boston (our
focus was on Stuart St.
location in Back Bay)
Who are Viga’s Customers?
Business professionals
stopping in on their lunch
break who do not have a lot of
time to wait in line
(busy schedules)
4. Goal &
Competitive
Advantage
Goal:
“Provide a quality product at
a reasonable price
with superior customer
service…”
Competitive Advantage:
Very fast service
High-quality, fresh food
Proximity to nearby
businesses
5. Layout of Viga (Stuart St. Location)
Kitchen
G
l
a
s
s
W
i
n
d
o
w
Pizza/
Pasta
Calzones
Hot
Cold
Sandwiches Sandwiches
Cooler
for Cold
Salads
and
Drinks
Cashier
1
Cashier
2
Cashier
3
Small
Counter
L
a
r
g
e
Silverware/
Napkins
Entrance/Exit
L
a
r
g
e
G
l
a
s
s
W
i
n
d
o
w
6. Existing Process Flow Diagram
Decision Point
Choose Station
Queue
Queue
Place and
receive order at
Pizza/ Calzone
station
Grab Chips,
Drinks and
Queue
Desserts
Queue
Queue
Queue
Queue
Place and
receive order at
Pasta station
Place and
receive order at
Hot Sandwich
station
Queue
Queue
Queue
Pay at
Cash
Register
Place and
receive order at
Cold Sandwich
station
Pick up
napkins/
silverware
Exit
7. Observation
Our Goal:
Find out ways in which Viga can improve its front-of-house operations.
Our Questions:
Are people abandoning the line, or avoiding Viga altogether due to perceived
wait time?
Is Viga’s management utilizing its limited physical space in a way that would
allow for maximum capacity utilization?
What type of technology might allow Viga to utilize its small space in a more
revenue-maximizing way?
Our Method:
Explore Viga’s front-of-house process by observing/collecting data on their
daily operations at times of peak demand (12 – 1PM) throughout the week.
Observe volume of customers coming in and out (in 5 minute intervals) and
customers’ throughput time during the hour.
8. Data collection
• Date
• Time of day
• Throughput time
• # customers in
• # customers out
• # customers abandoned
Date:
• Sampled over six random
weekdays
• Treated days equally
Time of day:
• Took several observations around
lunchtime (12 – 1 PM)
• Recorded data every five minutes
Throughput time:
• Picked random customer
• Tracked time from entry to exit
# customers:
• The #in gave us the capacity
• The #out gave us the cycle time
(#out/5min)
• The #abandoned gave us clues
when there might be a problem
9. Station Task Times
We attempted to measure individual task times for each station
Found it nearly impossible without interfering with their business (limited physical space)
We could easily conclude based on # of steps per station and station popularity, that the
hot sandwich and pasta lines take the longest and cause the bottleneck.
Hot Sandwich Station Tasks
1. Choose
bread
2. Choose
meat/filling
3. Scoop
sauce
4. Add
cheese
5.
Wrap/close
sandwich
3. Sprinkle
cheese
4. Cover
5. Add sticker
6. Package
7. Add
sticker
Pasta Station Tasks
1. Scoop
2. Add meat
Cold Sandwich Station Tasks (often open and had two workers)…
7 steps/2 workers = 3.5 steps per worker
1. Choose
bread
2. Choose
condiments
Pizza Station Tasks
1. Put on
plate
2. Put in bag
3. Choose
meat/filling
4. Choose
toppings
5.
Wrap/close
sandwich
6. Package
7. Add
sticker
10. Discovering the problem
Hypothesis: high throughput times = long lines and abandonment
02:00
01:00
Higher throughput time from 12:30 to 12:45
Abandonment can occur when > 5 min
Lines are likely out the door
5
5-minute time periods
12:00 PM
11:45 AM
1:15 PM
0
1:00 PM
12:45 PM
12:00 PM
11:45 AM
12:30 PM
Time of entry
00:00
10
Lower cycle time from 12:15 to 12:45
Does not become less than 8 sec
Abandonment occurs when people are moving
What does this tell us?
1:15 PM
03:00
15
1:00 PM
04:00
20
12:45 PM
05:00
25
12:30 PM
06:00
12:15 PM
cycle time
(seconds/customer)
30
12:15 PM
Throuhghput duration
(min)
07:00
11. Measuring success
At cycle time = 8 seconds, capacity in five minutes = 37.5 customers
CU = (60sec * 5min)/8sec
CU = 300sec/8sec = 37.5
450
Throughput time (sec)
Capacity utilization
140%
120%
100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
0%
5%
Reduction in customers
10%
15%
20%
Max CU at peak time = 123%
Max CU < 100% if cust.reduction > %20
Max CU goes from 123% to 98%
Average CU becomes 60% from 76%
25%
400
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
0%
Reduction in customers
5%
10%
15%
20%
Max throughput at peak time = 6:22 (min:sec)
Max throughput < 5 min if cust.reduction > 25%
Max throughput goes from 6:22 to 4:51
Average throughput becomes 2:42 from 3:38
This is our goal, but how do we get there?
25%
12. Recommendations
Goal 1: To achieve shorter avg. throughput time, increased
capacity and increased revenue
Utilize the large
glass windows
behind the cash
registers as literal
takeout window.
Build an online
ordering platform to
shift 25% of the
current in-store
sales online
Online orders can
be prepared during
the small periods of
downtime they have
throughout the peak
lunch time period.
To Achieve
Shorter Avg.
Throughput
time, Increased
Revenue and
Capacity
Avg. throughput time can
be reduced by
designating an employee
to hand out paper
menus, to help customers
decide their orders while
in line.
Exit
13. Recommendations
Goal 2: To improve customer service
Light System for
cashiers to indicate
their availability.
Designate an
employee at the
door who can pass
out paper menus to
people in line.
Install large signs
above each food
station to reduce
the confusion.
Add a prepackaged
utensil set
(fork, knife, spoon
and napkin) while
bagging customer’s
order.
Improved
Customer
Service
Viga could re-order
stations so that
items that
customers are likely
to pair, are next to
eachExit
other.
14. New Process Flow Diagram
In-Store
or Online
order?
Start
Decision Point
Choose Station
Queue
Queue
Queue
Place and
receive order at
Pizza/ Calzone
station
Grab
Chips, Drinks
Queue
and Desserts
Queue
Queue
Place and
receive order at
Pasta station
Place and
receive order at
Hot Sandwich
station
Queue
Queue
Queue
Pay at
Cash
Register
Queue
Place and
receive order at
Cold Sandwich
station
Place
Order
Online
Queue
Show
receipt and
collect
order from
takeout
window
Exit
15. Impact on the bottom-line
• Online prepaid orders would
reduce the customers in store
line by 25%
• Shorter in-store lines would
decrease the rate of
abandonment and attract new
customers looking for faster
service
• Increase in the number of
customers served between the
peak period of 12 – 1pm = 25%
• Current customers = 450
25% increase = 112.5 customers
Avg order/customer = $7
• 25% Revenue increase/day = $787.5
• 25% Revenue increase/month = $15,750
We interviewed the location’s manager, Flavia, in person and by phone. She has been with the company for 10 years, and told us that in her view, Viga’s strong points are: fresh food and (fast) customer service.
Stations are labeled with signs along the wall (but can be difficult to see from the back of the line).The hot and cold sandwich stations are cramped together in one corner, making it hard to distinguish between the two lines and creating one of the many bottlenecks in the process. There’s a prepared foods case with salads and racks for a variety of chips that are inconveniently located near the entrance and next to the pizza/calzone line.
One line of customers (general queue) splits into four lines based on product offerings: Pizza/calzonePastaHot sandwichesCold sandwiches.Customers need to decide what they want to order, and then join the appropriate line.Viga employees shout to customers when there are openings at their stations. Customers place their orders.(The manager, Flavia, acknowledged that some people may not like the yelling, but it was necessary in order to keep everything running quickly.)
We wanted to observe at a time when the employees were working to the greatest capacity utilization, so we’d be able to identify inefficiencies more easily.We focused on throughput and cycle times instead of task and wait times because it was difficult to get physically close enough to the action without getting in the way (packed house).By observing during this peak time and collecting data in small increments of time, we were able to notice fluctuations within the hour that led to our conclusions and recommendations for improvement.
In order to increase revenue despite the space limitations, we recommend that Viga institute an online ordering system. This system would permit customers to order and pay for their lunch ahead of time. They could then verify their order by showing the cashier the order confirmation printed or on their smart phone. This process would allow Viga to immediately reduce the number of customers coming in and out of the door, and hopefully to recognize more revenue in the same window of time.In order to seamlessly incorporate the influx of online customers to collect their pick up orders to the already space induced crowd in the store, we propose Viga utilize the large windows behind the cash registers as literal take-out window. By doing so, this category of customers won’t even need to enter the restaurant. As a result, they will not add to confusing line situation or contribute to a higher average throughput time for the other customers. These customers take longer to order because they cannot see the menu until they are very close to it, or essentially next up to place an order, at which point they may have to switch lines and hold up customers behind them. To alleviate this we recommend that Viga designate an employee at the door who can pass out paper menus to people in line, answer any questions and perhaps offer samples of pizza, calzones or pastasRather than having cashiers shout to customers that their cash register is available, we recommend that Viga use a light system, similar to that used in large stores like Marshalls to direct customers to the next available cashier. For example, if it takes an average of 30 seconds to make a menu selection and customers are able to do that while idling in the line, average throughput time will decrease.
In order to increase revenue despite the space limitations, we recommend that Viga institute an online ordering system. This system would permit customers to order and pay for their lunch ahead of time. They could then verify their order by showing the cashier the order confirmation printed or on their smart phone. This process would allow Viga to immediately reduce the number of customers coming in and out of the door, and hopefully to recognize more revenue in the same window of time.In order to seamlessly incorporate the influx of online customers to collect their pick up orders to the already space induced crowd in the store, we propose Viga utilize the large windows behind the cash registers as literal take-out window. By doing so, this category of customers won’t even need to enter the restaurant. As a result, they will not add to confusing line situation or contribute to a higher average throughput time for the other customers. These customers take longer to order because they cannot see the menu until they are very close to it, or essentially next up to place an order, at which point they may have to switch lines and hold up customers behind them. To alleviate this we recommend that Viga designate an employee at the door who can pass out paper menus to people in line, answer any questions and perhaps offer samples of pizza, calzones or pastasRather than having cashiers shout to customers that their cash register is available, we recommend that Viga use a light system, similar to that used in large stores like Marshalls to direct customers to the next available cashier.
One line of customers (general queue) splits into four lines based on product offerings: Pizza/calzonePastaHot sandwichesCold sandwiches.Customers need to decide what they want to order, and then join the appropriate line.Viga employees shout to customers when there are openings at their stations. Customers place their orders.(The manager, Flavia, acknowledged that some people may not like the yelling, but it was necessary in order to keep everything running quickly.)
