Fast food restaurants have long prided themselves in providing their products to the customer quickly. Now, a new technology distributed by a Naples company may make the process even faster. Its owner, a graduate of Florida Gulf Coast University, plans to hire other FGCU graduates as the company grows.
Benseron Information Technologies Inc. has started placing automated ordering systems in many Subway franchises around Southwest Florida. The small kiosks can be set up by the counter, and they feature a touch-screen system that gives customers the opportunity to design their own sandwiches before they get in line.
The menu choices include the type of bread, meat, cheese, condiments, and other ingredients for the sandwiches, as well as additional items such as beverages and chips. The final order can be reviewed or revised, then paid for by credit card at the kiosk if the customer chooses to use the “self-checkout” option. The machine then produces a reipt that is presented when the meal is ready to be picked up.
“We call it the line-buster,” said Onur Haytac, president of Benseron Information Technologies Inc. “By the time the customer gets their cup and drink, the sandwich is usually ready. It’s advantageous for the restaurant owners, too, because the automated order handling allows the franchice to become much more efficient. We’ve also seen a lot of ‘add-on’ sales increases, where the customer decides to put more items on the sandwich when they see all the options they have.”
One of the locations now using the new kiosks is the Subway Restaurant at the Collier County Government Center. Haytac is currently working on a procedure that will allow government employees to order meals from their desks via the Internet. By the time the customer walks over to the restaurant, their order should be ready.
Benseron Information Technologies Inc. is the main supplier of Subway kiosks for the state of Florida. The location at the Government Center is one of 11 in stores around Collier and Lee counties with the ordering system, and the company has several orders to provide them to stores in Miami.
Haytac was encouraged to start his own business while he worked on a MIS degree in Computer Information Systems at Florida Gulf Coast University.
“I met some outstanding executives in the school’s Masters program,” he said. “One was Joe Candito, who is the development agent for Subway. He’s one of the rising stars in the United States, and has more than 100 stores that he’s responsible for right now in the Southwest Florida region.”
Candito was experiencing difficulty collecting “point of sales” (POS) information, which is gathered from the cash register when a customer orders a meal at Subway. Usually the information is saved in a database and later sent to Subway’s corporate offices, so that the customer’s purchasing trends can be tracked. However, due to technical and software issues, the system would crash and the database would be down for a few days, which forced employees to track the data manually.
Benseron Information Technologies Inc. subcontracted with Subway Regional Development to provide franchises with POS systems throughout Southwest Florida, and Haytac wrote a computer program that backed up all the restaurant’s data on a disk twice a day. It was a small and easy idea, but it helped a lot, he said. Today, if something goes wrong, a new POS unit can be sent out quickly, and the collected information from the disk can be transferred toi the new system. Haytac can also access the systems remotely for trouble-shooting.
“Everybody loves it,” Haytac said. “We pretty much sold it to every Subway store in the area.”
In addition to POS technolog and automated ordering kiosks, the company also installs security systems for restaurants to help cut down on thefts from the cash registers.
“A lot of owners have issues with money being stolen from the stores, sometimes by store managers or employees who are doing things that they don’t want anybody to see,” Haytac said. “One of the ways that people steal from the company is to push ‘no sale’ to open the cash register drawer and take money out.”
A security surveillance system offered by Benseron Information Technologies Inc. is integrated with the cash register and connected to a digital video recorder positioned overhead. Whenever the employees touch the cash register’s screen or push certain buttons, the system comes on and records the transaction, including every button that is pushed. The information is stored in a datebase, and the storeowner can review everything at the end of the day and quickly track down a problem if money is missing.
“This system can be integrated into any POS system at any restaurant or other business,” Haytac said. “It’s Web-based, and whatever is on the register screen can be viewed remotely by the owner from their house, or anywhere in the world if they want to.”
Other video recorders can be positioned at locations throughout the store for added security. The information they collect can be saved for up to 30 days.
Benseron Information Technologies has been in business for about two years, and currently has four employees who are all either graduates of, or students at, FGCU. Herman Pardo is a computer information undergraduate who works in the field, and Douglas Korinke is a student majoring in finace who provides marketing and cost accounting services.
FGCU believes in teaching students to be readily able to deal with changes in the business world, Korinke said. “I can be working on marketing flyers one minute and then get a completely different task, from web design to database management,” he said. “Whatever it is, I know I have the skills to get the job done.”
As Benseron Information Technologies continues to grow, Haytac plans to offer internships to FGCU students, and will look to the university as a source of new employees.
“I’m very grateful to FGCU and for my connections with the professors,” he said. “I feel like they kind of created me and this company. I want to make the university a part of the company in the future, and as long as we need people, we’re going to get them from FGCU.” BtoB
*Benseron is not a licensed contractor and does not install wiring or hook up electrical connections.