A popular restaurant in New York City has been in business for many years, and while they still serve the same number of customers, their service has seemed to slow down.
They’ve done several obvious things to try and fix the slower service: hired more employees and have gone as far to removed items from their menu.
But, to no avail, they continue to receive negative reviews and complaints from patrons complaining of slow service and having to wait too long for a table. Upon further review, this popular restaurant notice that many other restaurants in the area had received the same complaints.
So what had changed in the past ten years to cause such a shift in customer satisfaction?
Old Surveillance, New Problems
This NYC restaurant did something really awesome. When you want to learn something and are bent on finding an answer, you go to these kind of lengths to figure things out.
Here’s what they did:
“Like most restaurants in NYC we have a surveillance system, and unlike today where it’s a digital system, 10 years ago we still used special high capacity tapes to record all activity. At any given time we had 4 special Sony systems recording multiple cameras. We would store the footage for 90 days just in case we needed it for something.
The firm we hired suggested we locate some of the older tapes and analyze how the staff behaved 10 years ago versus how they behave now. We went down to our storage room but we couldn’t find any tapes at all.
We did find the recording devices, and luckily for us, each device has 1 tape in it that we simply never removed when we upgraded to the new digital system!”
So they loaded up the old footage and found new footage with roughly the same amount of customers as ten years before. It was important they comparison be equal in all things. What they found may or may not surprise you:
In 2004…
“Customers walk in.
They gets seated and are given menus, out of 45 customers 3 request to be seated elsewhere.
Customers on average spend 8 minutes before closing the menu to show they are ready to order.
Waiters shows up almost instantly takes the order.
Appetizers are fired within 6 minutes, obviously the more complex items take longer.
Out of 45 customers 2 sent items back.
Waiters keep an eye out for their tables so they can respond quickly if the customer needs something.
After guests are done, the check delivered, and within 5 minutes they leave.
Average time from start to finish: 1:05”
In 2014…
“Customers walk in.
Customers get seated and is given menus, out of 45 customers 18 requested to be seated elsewhere.
Before even opening the menu they take their phones out, some are taking photos while others are simply doing something else on their phone (sorry we have no clue what they are doing and do not monitor customer WIFI activity).
7 out of the 45 customers had waiters come over right away, they showed them something on their phone and spent an average of 5 minutes of the waiter’s time. Given this is recent footage, we asked the waiters about this and they explained those customers had a problem connecting to the WIFI and demanded the waiters try to help them.
Finally the waiters are walking over to the table to see what the customers would like to order. The majority have not even opened the menu and ask the waiter to wait a bit.
Customer opens the menu, places their hands holding their phones on top of it and continue doing whatever on their phone.
Waiter returns to see if they are ready to order or have any questions. The customer asks for more time.
Finally they are ready to order.
Total average time from when the customer was seated until they placed their order 21 minutes.
Food starts getting delivered within 6 minutes, obviously the more complex items take way longer.
26 out of 45 customers spend an average of 3 minutes taking photos of the food.
14 out of 45 customers take pictures of each other with the food in front of them or as they are eating the food. This takes on average another 4 minutes as they must review and sometimes retake the photo.
9 out of 45 customers sent their food back to reheat. Obviously if they didn’t pause to do whatever on their phone the food wouldn’t have gotten cold.
27 out of 45 customers asked their waiter to take a group photo. 14 of those requested the waiter retake the photo as they were not pleased with the first photo. On average this entire process between the chit chatting and reviewing the photo taken added another 5 minutes and obviously caused the waiter not to be able to take care of other tables he/she was serving.
Given in most cases the customers are constantly busy on their phones it took an average of 20 minutes more from when they were done eating until they requested a check. Furthermore once the check was delivered it took 15 minutes longer than 10 years ago for them to pay and leave.
8 out of 45 customers bumped into other customers or in one case a waiter (texting while walking) as they were either walking in or out of the Restaurant.
Average time from start to finish: 1:55”
In the course of ten years our tools of productivity and communication has made a simple restaurant visit take an additional :50 minutes — nearly doubling the time it took ten years ago. Moreover, the cost to the establishment — hiring more employees — has increased.
Everything Has A Price
In the age of technology and ease, we must not forget that everything has a cost. The cost of human life to make these gadgets possible, and the surprising cost of time we spend consuming its offerings and investing in its curation.
As Believers, we are accountable for all things — including our time. As I read this, I am now a little more mindful of how I spend my time. I am more grateful for the time I spend having fun, loving friends and family, and curious as to how I might better invest my time into things that bear fruit worth partaking.
Thoughts?
[NYC restaurant story via Distractify | Foodie image via stijn via Compfight cc]
Emily Kantner says
Very interesting! Makes me want to throw my iPhone out the window 🙂
Eric Dye says
Seriously. 😉