Just wondering what everyone is using? We are currently on regular receipts. I am wondering how labor intensive labels are? Are they even worth it?
I’ve never been in a place that uses labels. I’ve sat down and tried to figure out how labels (with KDS) are suppose to work good but i just don’t get it.
There is no way that KDS / label printing would be better/faster than our setup at our locations.
My POS system prints an adhesive label that we use to prepare the food and then stick to the box or bag for delivery or pickup. I cannot imagine doing it any other way.
Could you run me through how it works from beginning to end? Just curious because I’ve toyed with the idea of trying labels, but could never really come up with enough good reasons to.
When you bag up food for delivery, how do you know what is in the bags? Does the driver have to open every bag up to see what is in there? Or do you label the bag as well somehow?
Who puts the labels on the box? The guy cutting? Doesn’t it slow him down? I’ve never had a label printer so I have no clue how quick it is to peel and stick labels on every order coming out… Seems like it would be a pain in the ass?
Our locations work like this - The kitchen ticket prints, the food is prepared and bagged then the kitchen ticket stays with it. For takeout orders, the ticket is placed in the plastic bag with the order, or folded and placed in the box with the customer name visible for quick locating. For delivery, the ticket is placed in the delivery bag “window” so the drivers can quickly see what is what. It’s worked for us great, but I’m always up for trying new things, especially if its a step forward.
Obviously for kitchens running some kind of KDS, I get it. No paper, no kitchen tickets, nothing to put in the bags, but if you are printing kitchen tickets already, why use a label as well? Please explain what I am missing
The label has a name, address if del., how many items in order, plus 1 of 5, 2 of 5, etc, what the item is and any added instructions, whatever station prepares item puts the label on the finished product. Like anything else, once you get used to it it becomes 2nd nature.
i have a set of barely used label printers available for sale if you are interested from our old store that decided never to use them
Brand??? and interface?
I may be interested in 1 printer, just need to know it will work with my software
Advantage LX Thermal Label Printers…PM your info and I can send you pics…they were used for one hour literally
I can’t imagine not using labels.
“When you bag up food for delivery, how do you know what is in the bags? Does the driver have to open every bag up to see what is in there? Or do you label the bag as well somehow?”
- Driver bags the orders.
- Printed run slip goes in the sleeve on the bag.
"Who puts the labels on the box? The guy cutting? Doesn’t it slow him down?:
- Order takers put labels on boxes and stack the boxes more or less in order on the cut table so the cutter takes the pepperoni pie out of the oven and puts it in the box with the label for a pepperoni pizza.
- Putting labels on boxes take very little time.
“Our locations work like this - The kitchen ticket prints, the food is prepared and bagged then the kitchen ticket stays with it. For takeout orders, the ticket is placed in the plastic bag with the order, or folded and placed in the box with the customer name visible for quick locating. For delivery, the ticket is placed in the delivery bag “window” so the drivers can quickly see what is what. It’s worked for us great, but I’m always up for trying new things, especially if its a step forward.”
- There was a long discussion last year some time about multi-station kitchens that us multi-part tickets and why that works better for some operators so I am not sure if this is what you have… but for a typical delco with a modern POS, there are no tickets floating around. No kitchen ticket needed when you have a screen at the makeline.
- Customer name is on the label so for takeout, that function is covered. For delivery, the driver uses the run slip for the bag.
“Obviously for kitchens running some kind of KDS, I get it. No paper, no kitchen tickets, nothing to put in the bags, but if you are printing kitchen tickets already, why use a label as well? Please explain what I am missing”
I don’t think you are missing anything. Most pizza operators are not using kitchen tickets. There is a driver run slip for the bag. Having the box labeled does prevent having to open the boxes and confirm what is in there when bagging for delivery on multi-pie orders when there are a bunch of orders ready to go.
Bodegahwy, this is pretty much exactly his we run our kitchen. We don’t have Kitchen Displays( yet, I’m hoping someday Arrow POS will work with iPads to do this like POSLavu does). Whenever an order is submitted it prints labels and to the kitchen printer, if it is for delivery, a receipt prints at the driver dispatch area. whenever the label printer is down or I forgot to order labels the kitchen and our order flow turns into a clusterfrick.
I see. Thanks for the explanation.
You’re right as far as us having multi stations. One of our locations has 5 stations. Definitely not a typical delco setup, but it does a decent amount of takeout and delivery.
Going that route would definitely be slower / more difficult than our current setup with our multi station / multi kitchen restaurant
Crusher… you are right, it sure would be a PITA to run out of labels. Our simple solution to running out of labels: Our labels come on a roll of 1000 labels. We get 24 rolls at a time. We put the last two rolls in the back of the file cabinet drawer in the office. A front counter person can not just grab the last one without noticing. When a manager goes to get one of those two rolls they know it is time to order. I have told them to text me and the GM right then and there. Depending on the time of year that gives us anywhere from 10 to 20 days to get new labels in.
We use the same approach for bank deposit slips and receipt paper.