Mike Tillis was not long ago hired as VP of Functions and Assist for Your Pie, a nationwide fast informal pizza franchise. Tillis is a veteran of the restaurant industry, obtaining expended additional than 30 a long time in franchise management roles with Honeybaked Ham and Checkers Travel-In. He joins Your Pie at a time which quite a few restaurant executives are adapting their enterprise design in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and striving to establish a roadmap for long run operations.
Your Pie was crafted as an in-retailer eating idea, as buyers could find their choice of favored toppings and be able to appreciate a fresh brick-oven pizza inside minutes in the company of mates or loved ones. A 12 months ago, 80-85 {1e368efdbc5778293a1dba36f2d6241a4c7f47e278b3535a9e6c60a245c5f01f} of its company arrived by means of in-retail store eating. Today, more than 55 p.c of the chain’s business enterprise comes from off premise.
The pandemic forced most dining places to absolutely go away from in-retail store customers for a time. Even as eating rooms bit by bit reopen, Your Pie has been compelled to pivot to new approaches this sort of as on the net purchasing, third-celebration shipping and delivery expert services curbside pickup. They have experienced to changeover their operations on the fly to tackle a substantially larger quantity by means of these channels.
The challenge for Tillis and other restaurant executives is how to sustain and grow these new methods of organization as they get ready to welcome customers again to their retailers as dining practices little by little return to regular in the coming calendar year. What can they do to strike the operational stability in cultivating the roots of the standard eating working experience whilst catering to a developing viewers that has develop into reliant on taking in at dwelling?
“The history of Your Pie has emphasized the in-store working experience of the visitor and the lifestyle of the enterprise,” mentioned Tillis. “The essential is retaining and preserving that knowledge whilst we also develop the off-premise shoppers. These expert services have been a increasing pattern before the pandemic, but now it is the new usual for a lot of individuals. It could be a long time right before they change back again, and some men and women may well never ever occur back again in that potential. They have come to be so accustomed to third-get together shipping or curbside pickup that some people today may stay with that permanently. We will need to be prepared to maintain that restaurant encounter and authenticity alive and very well whilst rising the new gross sales channels.”