Panera Bread Is Replacing Cashiers With Kiosks

Business Insider ^ | 05/05/2014 | ASHLEY LUTZ

[SeekAndFind]

Panera Bread is going to start using kiosks to input customer orders. The fast-casual chain will start adding about eight kiosks per restaurant, writes Venessa Wong at Bloomberg Businessweek. Customers will also be able to order by phone.

As a result, there will be one to two fewer cashiers in restaurants.

Panera Bread CEO Ron Shaich said that the new system would help accuracy of orders. Customers would also be able to customize their food.

Shaich told Businessweek that it won't be cutting back on workers. The former cashiers will now carry food to customers' tables.

[driftdiver]

No layoffs, just reduction in hours.

[Responsibility2nd]

I know a couple of Mickey D’s drive-thrus that get 1 in 7 right.

____________________________________________

If I go to a McDonalds drive through; I never leave the window without checking my order.

Years back - they would ask you to pull ahead from the window and they would bring your order out to you when it was ready. That way they could serve the car behind you.

They don’t do that anymore. I for one - would decline their request. I would stay at the window and make sure they got my order right before I left.

[for-q-clinton]

How’s that minimum wage working out now?

[wbill]

No doubt.....but less jobs for people at the low end of the employment spectrum. Figure that fast food joints could use a handful of automated kiosks (along with someone to keep them going, shared between restaurants), a couple of fry cooks, and one, maybe two people to swing a mop and restock the napkins. Contrast that with the ChickFila I went to this morning on the way to work. Must've been more than a dozen people there, between mgmt, counter staff, cooks, a couple of people out on the floor cleaning, and so on.

IMO, the FF workers who've been picketing for higher wages (plenty of articles here on FR about them) should be careful for what they wish for. They just might get it - as soon as the cost of labor outpaces the cost of automation.

[Wuli]

minimum wage laws strike again, sending additional signals to another industry to find ways to substitute humans with machines, helping to further the advance in the proportions of the bottom and the top with more hollowing out of the middle

[Alex Murphy]

Panera Bread is going to start using kiosks to input customer orders. The fast-casual chain will start adding about eight kiosks per restaurant, writes Venessa Wong at Bloomberg Businessweek. Customers will also be able to order by phone. As a result, there will be one to two fewer cashiers in restaurants.

"They say that Howard orders tons of sandwiches that no one picks up....guys, we're not all Howard."

[Buckeye McFrog]

Kiosks don’t smell funny, roll their eyes at you, or tell you to “take a chill pill, old dude!”

[jttpwalsh]

Thanks for your reply. The sad part is, I recall being a pimple faced kid making $2.01/hr, and being overjoyed, on payday. Saved up enough to buy a used car, a trip to Russia, and two years of state college. The fact that my nephews in Seattle won’t have that same opportunity is really too bad. FReegards.

[grania]

the place is nothing but portion control. I feel every time I eat there I am getting nickle and dimed, now this.

They're a huge success. They have some, not all, choices that are fine with my pure foods diet. Some of their food is high priced junk with vile ingredients.

I don't just feel the portion control; it's that sometimes they get careless about it and don't use full portions. $8 for a salad and then a drink of $3 is insane.

[Responsibility2nd]

$2.01, huh?

I well remember my 1st job sacking groceries was at $1.95 per hour - minimum wage. That was back in 1974.

[jttpwalsh]

The cool thing about having an In-N-Out drive thru nearby: after you order, they read the order back to you. Then you pull up to the first window, and they repeat your order, before you pay for it. Then you pull up to the second window, where they call out everything that they put in your “to go” carton and bag. Haven’t drove away with the wrong order, after several years :)

[Buckeye McFrog]

My first job paid $2.00 per hour. Minimum at the time was $3.35, but I was working for a nonprofit.

Worked hard and after 90 days got a raise to $2.50. Was damned happy to get it too, as I recall.

[jttpwalsh]

Mine was stocking shelves, and sweeping floors, at Woolworth’s, also in 1974. I wonder if it was the state (Connecticut) minimum wage? All of my pals that worked, also got paid $2.01. POSTSCRIPT: after six months, I landed an easier job, elsewhere, for $2.35/hr - man was I pleased ! ! !

[EDINVA]

They’ll do it thru attrition. WIth the turnover rate of fast food places, and others in the low income end, that won’t take long and they can rightly say they didn’t lay off anyone.

[Vince Ferrer]

That’s exactly what I was thinking. The turnover in the restaurant industry is so high they can cut by not replacing.

[Blackyce]

“They’ll do it thru attrition. “

Yep, no need to fire anyone at all. Even if attrition didn’t work on it’s own they could squeeze the hours down and force a significant percentage to have to look for other work.

[informavoracious]

The cashiers that are now servers can be paid less than minimum wage. Tips, of course...

[dfwgator]

"Enjoy your extra *BIG ASS FRIES*"

[Political Junkie Too]

The law of unintended consequences will be that the orders will come in faster than the service line can make them. That will leave customers with the impression that they are waiting too long for their food.

Say what you will about cashiers, they do pace the orders coming into the kitchen, and customers won't count the time waiting on line against the kitchen staff.

-PJ

[Political Junkie Too]

One final unintended consequence is the wait for tables. With everyone getting their orders in quickly and then seated, the table space will be taken up very quickly.

-PJ