5 must have features for a catering software

Catering software is essential for any food business that wants to grow and expand. 

 

The year of 2020 has proven that restaurants and cafes need to make the most of technology on hand; otherwise it could be detrimental to their survival. 

 

It is simply not enough to have a systematic operation manually, like using Excel sheets to record orders.

 

It is not only time consuming but will also be costly in the long term.

 

This is why white label solutions and software for catering businesses are becoming increasingly popular because they have become essential to the success of a food business.

 

Since there are a lot of catering software out there in the market, it might be difficult to choose one because they all have great value propositions.

 

If you are in the market to choose catering software, you have come to the right place.

 

We will list down the 5 most important features that a catering software should have:

 

 

  • Ordering and invoicing

 

 

One of the most important things a restaurant has to ensure is that their ordering and invoicing system is a concrete one. 

 

The catering software, like Flex Catering software, have built in systems in their dashboards that will allow you to log in the orders and invoices in a systematic way. 

 

Such features allow a restaurant to be efficient, and make it easier to track the progress of an order from start to finish.

 

The best part is, that you can always access this data on the click of a button and you won’t have to worry about losing it. 

 

It is crucial that food businesses have this data on hand as it provides valuable insight as to how a business should grow. 

 

This is different from recording this information on Excel formats, as it won’t only take forever to log in orders but it is very easy to make a mistake.

 

 

  • Event management

 

Having an organized event management system allow for a smooth workflow and minimal bottlenecks. 

 

Catering software have great event management system, where you can record everything that has to do with planning an event and executing it.

 

This involves recording it on the calendar so you never double book or mix up dates, managing the timings of the event and when to provide catering, what the status is of the event and a lot more.

 

This reduces the amount of paperwork that comes with organizing an event, because you will have everything you need in one place.

 

 

  • Cost management

 

 

The white label solutions and catering software have smart features that will let you record the cost of ingredients, how much of it you have in stock and the information of the suppliers.

 

This not only ensures that your costs are kept at bay, but you will also minimize issues to meet an order requirement because of low supply. 

 

Since all this information will be in one place, you will have insight as to what ingredients are driving up costs so that you can take a decision to find an alternate supplier for those ingredients.

 

 

  • Dashboard and reports

 

 

The best thing about having a catering software is that you will have a holistic picture of how your food business is performing. 

 

This includes information on the sales, on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. You will see how well the business is doing in terms of sales, what the most important products are that are contributing to sales.

 

You will have information on customer acquisition, which provides extremely valuable insight for growth and marketing purposes. You will see where your customers are coming from, if the marketing strategies are effective or not, how many repeat customers you have and how many unique ones.

 

You will also be able to access the main kitchen production reports, which will give you an overview on how much production is being done on a daily or monthly basis.

 

All this information will not only tell you about the performance of your business, but you can leverage it in your marketing efforts. 

 

You can also choose to decide where to allocate your investments this way. 

 

More importantly, the dash board will allow you to construct comprehensive reports of different aspects about your food business. 

 

You can use these reports to evaluate how your business has been performing overall, and report to the superiors. 

 

 

  • Customer Management (CRM)

 

 

If you are using catering software, you should also have a Customer Management System built in. 

 

This will allow you to record customer orders, add notes, food preferences and a lot more. 

 

Such information will allow you to analyze customer behavior patterns, and you can prepare beforehand the food that is relatively more popular with your audience. 

 

You will also have insight on the demographic and their preferences, which you can leverage in your marketing technique to target similar audiences. 

 

The information recorded can also provide convenience to repeat customers, as it will give them the option to repeat their orders. This will enhance their customer user experience and leave a positive impact. 

 

Conclusion

 

Now that you know what features to look out for in a catering software, you can go ahead and hunt for the best one. 

 

Some great ones out there will have a lot more features that will help you run your restaurant or cafe, like third party integration which will provide a variety of payment choices such as Stripe, Paypal, Ebay and more.

 

A white label solution will not only add value to your food business, and allow for operations to be more efficient and effective but it will also enhance the customer experience of your audience. 

 

These things will be responsible of helping your business grow, especially when you will be able to collect all that important data. 

 

But in this day and age, not choosing to go with a white label solution will not be a wise choice. 

 

Sharing is caring!

Similar Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.