KBTG Product Highlights 2020: Eatable by KBank
Restaurant industry is undeniably one of the biggest casualties from the COVID-19 pandemic. Towards the end of March 2020, the Thai government has imposed a lockdown to mitigate the severity of the situation. This prompted many restaurants to cease their dine-in operation and pivoted to takeout instead. Pre-orders were made available via LINE or Facebook Messenger. In addition to that, food delivery started gaining traction as we saw many service providers continuously thrive amid crisis. Due to the high GP (Gross Profit) cut, however, forming a partnership with them might not have been so worth it if you were a small eatery or café owner. Then again, some restaurateurs were willing to succumb to this if it meant their business could survive during this tough time.
When the situation began to improve and lockdown was loosened up, the café and restaurant scene slowly recovered its pace. Although customers were once again allowed to return to the establishment, many were still concerned about the risk of COVID-19 and decided it would be best to continue getting takeout or having food delivered to their home. This posed a brand new challenge for the restaurant owners. They needed to figure out how to redesign the dine-in experience that would suit the so-called New Normal era.
Recognizing this pain point, KBTG has created “Eatable”, a food-ordering platform that covers the 3D options: dine-in, dine-out and delivery. Eatable is like your personal waiter who’s always at your service. Regardless of where they are, customer can always savor a dish that is packed full of flavor with a dash of convenience and topped off with sanitation in mind.
At the press conference on 29 June 2020, Krating Ruangroj Poonpol, chairman of KBTG, revealed that this change in consumer’s behavior created a huge impact to the restaurant industry. Even the business titans could not afford to stand by idly. For example, Starbucks — world’s renowned coffee shop chain — is planning to close down up to 400 stores in North America and turn their focus to pick-up services. These calls might be a no-brainer for big corporations, but it’s the opposite for small business owners who live on monthly income. KBTG would like to create an innovation that could help these people adapt as quickly as the giants can, hence Eatable. The main selling point of this platform is the user-friendly management system accessible through a web app. This means no requirement to purchase a new device or even download an app. Instead, you can operate it using any web browser or smart device in your possession, whether it is a computer, tablet or smartphone.
Aside from our chairman, Surasak Chantasirichot, Advanced Partnership Engineer, and Charoenchai Boworntummarat, Senior Principal Visionary Architect, were present to discuss other interesting features, along with a panel of real-life business owners who were part of the pilot group and have already tested out this product. Below are some of the key takeaways.
New Normal: Protect Both Customers and Employees
Safety is one of the top priorities of the New Normal era, especially when we head outside. Despite the convenience food delivery service brings, it couldn’t compete with the atmosphere you get when you sit in a café or restaurant. Businesses need to find a way to adapt in order to relieve customer’s worries. For this, Eatable has created a simpler way of placing an order. By scanning a QR code, customers can access the menu and make a selection virtually. This contactless process helps both them and the restaurant’s staff maintain social distancing, no need to even touch the menu booklet.
Old Normal: Fast and (no) Furious Order
The perk of ordering food via QR Code doesn’t stop there. Having developed this platform since before COVID-19 hit, KBTG’s aim is not only to deal with pain points of the New Normal era, but to resolve the long-lasting issues that all restaurateurs have been facing. Complaints like staff leaving customers hanging or mishearing their orders are so common that they’ve become the old normal. The situation is so bad that sometimes we choose to just accept this fate and don’t even acknowledge how problematic it is anymore. KBTG refuses for that to be the norm any longer. With Eatable, customers can now shoot their order to the kitchen or bar directly, eliminating the middleman. As a result, the staff has more time and attention to tend customer’s other needs and provide excellent services.
Pick-up & Delivery: Have Your Favorite Dish at Home
When restaurants couldn’t open its door to the customers, takeaway and home delivery were the only means of survival. Seeing that this trend won’t go away any time soon, even in the post COVID-19 world, Eatable also makes it possible for customers to place an order from anywhere with online order links. Once they click on it, they can check out the available menu, select the one they want and customize it to their liking. From then, they can choose whether to pick it up themselves — specify what time they would like to do so — or have it delivered to their home. Furthermore, to serve both Thai and foreigners, Eatable can be made multilingual. The languages currently available are Thai, English and Chinese, with more to be added in the near future.
With a myriad of features, it must cost a fortune to use this platform, right? Not at all! In fact, Eatable is free for all to use, no fees or hidden charges. We just want to create an end-to-end service that will help empower our customers as they empower theirs. And as of December 2020, Eatable has integrated a payment system. Customers can now pay through the platform by using QR Code, online credit card or cash if they prefer. With the plan to fine-tune the features and the aim to acquire at least 10,000 merchants across the nation by the end 2021, Eatable is prepared to revolutionize the restaurant industry, granting small people the opportunity to transform their business into the 4.0 version.
If you’re a cafe or restaurant owner, register to join Eatable now at https://eatable.kasikornbank.com/
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