Compression Dining was a term, I first heard coined from Peter Morris of Excelsus Hospitality, while we were discussing a mutual client. It describes an occurrence that is common in the Senior Dining space as well as in public restaurants.
The idea is, at certain day parts within dining, residents or patrons flood your facility right at opening or shortly thereafter. The organization has done everything to encourage reservations, however, they can’t seem to get buy in from the Residents or Patrons. In the public dining arena this is a little easier to solve because you can control your capacity for exceptional service with staggered seating. This is much more difficult in a Senior Living Community because it is the Resident’s home, and often, they will walk right by you and seat themselves anyway.
I often must explain to operators the perception of waiting. If I did not have the capacity to immediately provide you service, would you want to be seated at a table, and then wait 10 to 15 minutes before anyone came to greet you and take a beverage order?
Of course not! You would feel neglected. However, if you wait in a lobby, or bar, for 10 to 15 minutes and then are seated, and a server immediately takes your beverage order, your perception is much different.
In Senior Living communities, the main issue is that 100+ people may enter a dining room within a 30-minute period. Their entire dining experience may be 1 hour, and then, they will all leave at once. It is difficult to schedule for this because you are dealing with non-tipped servers, with only a two-hour period that you may need them. How do provide exceptional service without increasing labor?
In a public dining space, the pain is the same, however, it is not labor you are as concerned with as profitability. My restaurant was in a downtown environment. The clientele was large organizations, who all had the same time for lunch. I had to maximize my efficiency within a small period to maximize revenue in that window.
So how do you solve Compression Dining?
A tablet POS solution with a progressive model for service.
Picture this. As Residents or Patrons are quickly filling your dining space, your server approaches the table. Using a tablet POS solution, the server takes the beverage orders around a 6 top. Those beverages are sent to remote printer in the main bar or service bar. The bartender gets drinks from Juice and Soda to Champagne and arranges a tray. A beverage runner takes them out to the table.
While that is happening, the server takes soup, salad, and appetizer orders around the table. These also go to remote printers or Kitchen Display System. An expediter gets these on a tray, and sends them out to the table with a food runner.
By the time the server has finished going around the table taking the entree order, the beverages and appetizers have already arrived. The entrees will be arriving in 10 to 15 minutes, the busboy has his eye on the table to replace necessary silverware and remove dirty plates. The server can turn their back and begin waiting on the table directly adjacent.
All we did is use a tablet POS solution and restructure jobs. We can now put the strongest employee running food, the employee with the best balance running drinks, while the employee with the best personality waits tables. We created an environment that is conducive to quality prompt service. We can even enhance this accomplishment. Now the server can spend more time with the guest building a relationship you want, suggestive selling the guest into the decisions you would prefer, whether they are cost or profit driven. They will always be right in the background to make sure as a drink runs close to empty, they are asking if the guest would like another. They have the time to suggest this fantastic Peach Cobbler and even suggest it with that scoop of French Vanilla ice cream.
Using a POS tablet solution, you can solve your compression dining problem. It will drive satisfaction scores up, increasing profit as a side effect, and increase employee team participation without driving up labor.
Is Compression Dining Hurting Your CCRC?
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