Designing an online ordering system for pizzerias

[Paulie_Smith]

Hi all, first time posting here even though I’ve lurked around this forum for a bit (first found this post: http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?t=1021 when searching for how much cheese to put on my own homemade pie ).

A friend and I who are web developers are looking into creating an online ordering service specifically designed for pizzerias. I know there are some out there already, as well as some offered by POS vendors. We want to make something that will give you the quickness / ease of use of a site like Pizza Hut’s (or other big chains), and to focus a lot on online marketing once customers have accounts.

We are web guys as opposed to pizzeria guys, so although we’re confident in the technical aspect we’re looking for input as to what pizzeria owners will actually want / value in a service like this. So if anyone here is willing to share their thoughts on what you’d like to see in an “ideal” online ordering system I’d appreciate it!

For people who already have some kind of online ordering, how do you like it and what would you improve if possible? For those without, why not, and/or what would one need to offer for you to be willing to go for it?

Hopefully this an okay place to post this; we’re not trying to sell something at this point (since we haven’t started creating it yet!) but rather just trying to get some opinions from the pizza community.

Thanks
Paul

 

[Scott_Hack1]

Paulie,

I think I can give you a unique perspective on this. It has been about 5 years since I sold my shop. My wife introduces me as an entrepreneur, simply because I wear a lot of hats. My career now is a real estate broker. But because I sell homes… I had to learn how to develop and build websites. Which led me to WordPress. Which then led me to learning how to program in PHP. I also own a photo booth company with my brother. I’m basically a geek.

The problem you are going to run into in regards to online order is very simple. Unless you find a POS provider who is willing to open up their API/SDK – you have a maintain a separate system. Which sucks for the shop owner. That means there are two systems where pricing needs to be updated. There are two systems where customer data has to be aggregated from to do 30/60/90 day mailers, etc.

It also means that the order probably has to be entered a second time, by an employee into the “real” POS system. So product inventory, driver compensation, etc can all be accurately tracked. Sure entering the order a second time isn’t really hard, especially when you aren’t dealing with the customer slowing you down.

Did I mention coupons? How do you handle a coupon that was printed? Does that have to be entered into your system and the POS as well? Double work everywhere.

Lastly, how does the shop get the order? Fax Machine? Do people still use those? Computer based system that sends an alert? What if they don’t see it? Wifi connected make line printer tied to the net? All sorts of failure points. Plus, I can say from my 5 years of experience in shop ownership. Most of my employees where just there for a paycheck. So checking 2 printers was too much work for them. Not that they were stupid mind you… just mentally lazy.

So lots of duplication for anyone who has a POS system. Which means all you have left are shops who do not have a POS system. Pretty small market… and are they tech savvy enough to know or care about online ordering?

-Scott

 

[Paulie_Smith]

Scott - thanks for the perspective! Interesting to hear about your transition from pizza to programming… I sometimes imagine myself doing the opposite :lol:

I know the POS issue is a major one, and it’s one we’ve been pondering about a bit ourselves. Even if we found one/several POS providers that would be willing to integrate with us, there are just so many out there, it seems like every pizzeria is using a different one.

At least at the beginning, I can’t figure any way around having to re-enter the order into the POS. We’d try to justify it by saying that at worst, it won’t take any longer than getting that same order over the phone, and you’ll have higher accuracy / lower chance of communication issues on the order.

Overall I guess the main idea behind having the service is that your order volume will increase to some degree, due to the convenience / appeal to certain demographics, improved visibility in search engines and the like, and marketing emails and such going through the system. Hopefully we can get you enough orders that it’s worth the inconvenience of having to do double entry. And if your volume is high enough then maybe we can look into a one-off integration with your POS provider.

We’re also considering all different perks / selling points we could offer and hopefully minimize hassle… maybe we’ll update your prices/menu for you once a year for no extra charge, or make coupon campaign setup something you can easily do through the system.

It’s all still conceptual at this stage, so I’m just throwing around ideas. I appreciate you sharing yours!

Paul

 

[Daddio]

At various industry trade shows I have seen no fewer than a dozen different companies that are vying for market share in this field. What are you planning that will make your product/service anything more than a “ME TOO” operation? This is the question that each one of us must answer when venturing into the world of business. The answer will determine your success or failure in the industry.

 

[boatnut]

From my point of view any on line ordering system better had integrate 100% with my POS. If I have to check anything, enter anything, any benefit has vanished. Really believe you are starting a war that can not end on a positive note…

 

[Patriot_sPizza]

Rather than writing an online ordering system, write a pos system with online ordering…

Take the best aspects from, say, Point of Success and Big Holler and sell the software so the guest buys their own PC that functions as both the online server and the in house server…

Make your money from the initial sale & set up and small monthly support contract, for the first year or so…

Maybe Point of Success will do this in version 7.x…lol

 

[jackaloooooo]

We’ve been manually inputting faxes for our internet orders for about 8 years. The advantage to having online ordering is that customers like it and tend to spend more money. The disadvantage is you are much more likely to make a mistake inputting the order than taking a phone order. Our policy is that a 2nd person rechecks these orders.

What’s important to us is

1. A user friendly interface for the customers
2. Reliable delivery to our fax machine - and a system to let us know if we don’t get the fax
3. The ability for us (non techies) to make changes to our online menu easily.
4. A competitively priced service. (not a % of sale)

Paul

 

[bodegahwy]

Fax machine broke down 4-5 years ago. We never bothered to replace it. Don’t miss it.

Online orders appear on our makeline screen like any other order with a code that identifies it. Label prints out. We set the computer to make a special sound when an online order arrives in case it is slow and no one is looking at the screen.

Menu and price changes we make are uploaded and in place right away. Coupon offers can be created, started, paused… made to work only online or only in-store or both. All easy and seamless.

Customer info is loaded on the POS. System only works when we are open and the POS is running so it is impossible to place an online order when we are not open.

Credit cards are accepted online. Credit card slip prints out when driver checks out the run.

I can not imagine using a system that did not link up to the POS.

 

[Paulie_Smith]

Thanks for the feedback all.

The main selling point we’re going to go for over competing systems is to get you more/higher-value orders, and the main way we hope to do that is by having an excellent interface/experience that will make it as easy as possible for your customers to spend money… now that’s the part we have to start working on. Also stuff like SEO, marketing, etc.

I’m sure we won’t convince anyone who’s already on a POS-based system to switch… most of the people have said the same thing as a few of you guys - can’t imagine using a system without the POS integration. But, at least initially, we’re going to aim for the segment whose POS provider doesn’t offer online ordering, or have decided not to go with it for whatever reason. Probably something along the lines of what jackaloo mentioned. Once we have something going we’ll spend more effort seeing what our options will be for future POS integration.

There are a couple of people in our area (North Jersey) who are willing to try a pilot with us once we have a working system… I’ll let you guys know how it goes!

Paul