Author Archive
CONGRATULATIONS
January 30, 2012 | 
Author BIG CONGRATULATIONS…
Kim Slavin, who has been promoted to Implementation Support!
Posted in 
January Newsletter 2012
5 Food Cost Tips
Make sure your cooks aren’t guessing at portion sizes, but rather are using specific measurements. Also, after your tables are cleared, take note of any food that your customers aren’t eating – if there is food consistently not being finished from plate-to-plate, your serving size may be too large. Enacting stricter portion controls can have a positive – and noticeable – impact on your food inventory.
The National Restaurant Association says this is an effective way to control food costs, and it makes sense. Waiting to prepare food until after an item is entered into your POS ensures that you don’t have any unrecorded sales occurring.3. Keep track of your spillage and waste
Document any mistakes, spills, contamination or customer returns – otherwise, “invisible” waste could distort your inventory numbers. Tracking waste effectively and accurately will provide you important data that enables more precise food orders.
4. Educate your staff
In order to successfully keep your costs low, your team needs to know how important it is to keep your inventory in check. Confirm that your cooks are following the recipes precisely. Educate your servers on proper drink portions. Make sure your staff knows the importance of recording wasted or spilled food.
5. Utilize an inventory control system
Inventory systems today can offer real-time data access, be customized to fit your current inventory organization and can be scaled to meet your needs, whether as a single restaurant or multi-unit chain.
1. Know your employees. How well do you know the people that are working for you? There is no substitute for working as closely as possible with your team and knowing their various personalities and routines. That cannot totally prevent theft from occurring, however. Check your applicant’s references before hiring them and conduct employee screening if necessary. If you notice your employees behaving inconsistently, or having a change in attitude, you may want to observe them closer. Establishing a rapport with your staff can at least provide a degree of intuition into whether theft may be occurring.
2. Develop a comprehensive loss prevention program for your restaurant. Clearly define the expectations on handling cash, processing transactions, providing food comps and voiding orders. Discuss theft prevention in the hiring, training and review processes. Heighten awareness of preventing employee theft within your team and reduce the opportunities for them to steal, making sure they understand the response to incidents if/when they occur.
3. Get to know the scams. There are many ways that your staff can take from your cash drawer – most involve comps, voids or the transfer of food items. Here are just a few of the scams that can occur within a restaurant.
- Callie Sheffield – Aloha Support Specialist, IMP Department
- Jon Thole – POS Technical Support Specialist, CSD
- Rachel Perkins – Aloha Support Specialist, IMP Department
BIG CONGRATULATIONS…
Kim Slavin, who has been promoted to Implementation Support!
Rioja elected to Fine Dining Hall of Fame
Nation’s Restaurant News inducts Denver restaurant Rioja into its Fine Dining Hall of Fame for 2011.
2011 Best of Aurora Award-Garbanzo Mediterranean Grill
Garbanzo Mediterranean Grill, which has locations in Boulder, Denver, Fort Collins and Colorado Springs, was selected for the 2011 Best of Aurora Award in the restaurants category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA). The USCA “Best of Local Business” Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country.
December Newsletter
The State of the Gift Card [INFOGRAPHIC]
Did you know that gift cards are the number one item on Americans’ wish lists? The statistics shown in this infographic reinforce what we all know – selling gift cards just makes sense! After being wowed these statistics, continue through the newsletter as we highlight ways for you to increase your gift card sales heading into the final stretch of the holiday season
Have You Tried These Gift Card Promotion Ideas?
You’ve got the slick gift card display at the check-out counter. You’re also offering gift cards for sale on your website, but you are still struggling to realize a lift in your overall gift card purchases. Try these simple but effective ideas that you may not have considered for improving the promotion of your gift cards.
6 Big Gift Card Sales Mistakes
Consumers were eager to make purchases for themselves and their loved ones, and chances are that you were ready to participate by offering gift cards. But selling gift cards is more than just throwing up a display stand with some plastic cards and envelopes. Are you making any of these gift card mistakes
4 Ways Social Media Helps You Sell Gift Cards
It’s true that gift cards can boost sales during the holidays and help you generate revenue through the year – but all of your competitors are going to be competing with you to a big slice of the gift card pie this season. Sure, you can place the cards by the registers and put marketing materials in your store – but are you doing anything your competitors aren’t? Here are four ways you can use social media to sell and promote your gift cards.
Our Welcomes and Congratulations!
We are excited to announce our newest additions to the BEC POS team! Please welcome:
- Dottie Shannon- Accounting
- Patrick McDermont- Aloha Support Speciality, Implementation Department
- Anthony Moscardino – POS Technical Support Specialist, Customer Service Deparment
A big CONGRATULATIONS goes out to Tia Kelly, who has been promoted to Administrative Assistant!
Comments Section
We at BEC always want to know what you as a client or potenial client may want. Please email us or let us know in our contact section here.
States announce 2012 minimum wage rates
States that automatically tie their state minimum-wage rates to inflation are beginning to announce their 2012 wage rates.
In Colorado, the wage increases to $7.64 from $7.35 starting Jan. 1, 2012; in Florida, to $7.67 from $7.31; in Montana, to $7.65 from $7.35; in Ohio, to $7.65 from $7.35; in Oregon, to $8.80 from $8.50; and in Washington, to $9.04 from $8.67.
Check out the NRA’s map showing all state minimum wage rates. The map also shows minimum cash wages for tipped employees in states where employers are permitted under certain conditions to apply a “tip credit” against their obligation to pay employees the minimum wage.
Forbes says Smashburger No. 1 ‘most promising’ company
Denver-based Smashburger is the nation’s most promising company, according to Forbes Forbes Latest from The Business Journals Mutual Mobile named a ‘Most Promising Company’ by Forbes Forbes: Canes valued at 9MThree local cos. on Forbes’ ‘Most Promising’ list Follow this company .
The 4-year-old “fast casual” restaurant chain topped Forbes’ “America’s Most Promising Companies” list for 2011, released Wednesday.
Smashburger has 131 operating locations across the United States, as well as commitments from franchisees to open another 450 across the country and world. The company this week announced its expansion into Canada.
A total of seven Colorado-based firms made the Forbes’ top 100 most promising companies list.
“These privately held up-and-comers have compelling business models, strong management teams, marquee customers, strategic partners and precious investment capital,” Forbes said of the companies on the list.
At No. 7 is Denver-based Allonhill, a financial company that audits residential mortgage loan files for institutions that invest in mortgage-backed securities.
Denver-based Four Winds Interactive Four Winds Interactive Latest from The Business Journals Digital signs of the times: Four Winds on fast trackVisitors take directions from Four Winds’ signs Follow this company , which sells software to create and manage content for digital signs and interactive kiosks, came in at No. 16.
In the No. 23 spot is Latisys, based in southeast Denver’s Inverness Park, which runs a network of data storage centers. Latisys last week announced expansion plans.
At No. 69 is Louisville-based Market Force Market Force Latest from The Business Journals Market Force: Kohl’s beats Nordstrom, Macy’s for fashionThree Boulder County firms get new capitalMarket Force Information crosses the pond Follow this company , a retail consulting firm.
Greenwood Village-based Performance Enhancing Meat Snacks, maker of Perky Jerky, a caffeinated beef jerky product, got the No. 93 spot, followed by Denver-based Ispirato, a members-only luxury vacation club, at No. 94.
Forbes teamed up with Manhattan-based research firm CB Insights and its data-crunching software called Mosaic to compile the list.
“Mosaic mines data from 30,000 sources (from press releases and social networks to job boards and court filings) to come up with one score that measures a company’s potential,” Forbes said.
Forbes also interviewed people from the companies to get added color and perspective on their operations.
The companies on the list come from 22 industries, with software-and-services representing the biggest share at 35 percent, Forbes said. Ninety of the 100 companies have raised outside capital, and 70 have a CEO who is also one of the founders. Twelve have a CEO who is under 35 years old.
November 2011 Newsletter
Restaurant Guard Makes the Harvard Business Review
We are honored to announce that the Harvard Business Review used Aloha Restaurant Guard, a loss prevention tool that protects your restaurant’s bottom line profits by identifying fraudulent activity at the point-of-sale, to show the future of hosted technology as an example of where cloud computing is already making an impact today! You can read the article here, on page six.
How does mobile technology give restaurant owners greater flexibility?
Mobility provides operators the ability to receive information that can be acted upon anywhere at any time; therefore, important decisions can be made immediately, rather than after the fact, hours or days later. Watch this video to see how the combination of real-time store data, cloud-based insight and a powerful mobile application positively impact your business.
BEC eLearning
If you have a software and/or hardware maintenance contract, don’t forget to utilize BEC eLearning, an online training and education service for Radiant and Aloha products. You or your staff can access the BEC eLearning through the internet anywhere, at anytime, to maximize the benefits of your solution. Make use of the demos offered through the BEC eLearning as refresher courses for yourself, or even to help train new staff members.
Contact us for more information!
Gift Card Sales Tips – Don’t Miss Out!
It’s true that gift cards can boost sales during the holidays and help you generate revenue through the year – but all of your competitors are going to be competing with you to a big slice of the gift card pie this season. Here are six quick things you can do to increase gift card sales.
1. Send a promotional email promoting gift cards.
2. Make sure employees are trained on suggestively selling gift cards.
3. Package gift cards so that there is no extra wrapping necessary.
4. Run an employee contest for most gift cards sold.
5. Use your social networks to remind your raving fans what you can offer them for the holidays. Here are some tips to get you started!
6. Do a special “social network only” promotion, offering a percentage off of any gift cards purchased that day.
New Credit Card Compliance Required for MasterCard & Discover
Have you heard about the new credit card mandates for MasterCard & Discover? MasterCard and Discover are modifying their rules concerning the processing of debit, prepaid and gift cards.
What are the requirements? MasterCard and Discover are requiring that all merchants support the following:Balance response transactions – For prepaid and gift cards, once the card has been used, the remaining account balance will be transmitted along with the authorization response. The remaining balance must be printed on the customer receipt, displayed on the Web page or point-of-sale terminal, or both.
Partial authorization transactions- When a customer’s transaction amount exceeds the balance available on their debit, prepaid or gift card, instead of declining the transaction, a partial authorization for the amount available to the customer will be returned. This will allow the customer to pay for the remaining amount with another form of payment. This is called a split-tender transaction.
Authorization reversals – An authorization reversal is a real-time transaction initiated when the customer decides that they do not want to proceed with the transaction, or if the merchant cannot complete the transaction for any reason. Authorization reversals free up the customer’s available balance on their debit, prepaid or gift card.
What is required to support these mandates?
Several factors determine what you need to do to support these mandates, such as whether you accept PIN debit. In all cases, an upgrade to Aloha EDC v7.0 is required, and you may also require an upgrade of the Aloha POS version in use.
So what should you do?
At your earliest opportunity, contact your processor representative to determine the enforcement time schedule and any fees that may be associated with non-compliance to the mandates. Then contact our office so that we can conduct a needs assessment of your site to determine what you need to do to be compliant with the mandates.
Top 10 Headlines of October
Did you hear about all of the great things that happened last month? Take a look – it was a great one, filled with Scary Stories and mobility features! Make sure to leave a comment if there’s anything else that should have made the Top Headlines list for October.
Restaurant Horror Stories
Halloween was last month, and we’re all aware of the stories of the Headless Horseman or the Great Pumpkin. But, how well do you know – or can relate to – the tales of horror and fright within your restaurant? Now that Halloween is over, make sure your restaurant is prepared so that you don’t have to face any of these six horror stories.