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January 16, 2021

Food Tech News: Muniq Raises $8.2M for Protein Powder, Danone Launches Plant-Based Cheese

Welcome to this week’s Food Tech News round-up! This week, news that caught our attention included Muniq’s recent funding round, Danone’s new plant-based cheese, Torchy Taco’s new contactless services, and Zero Egg’s restaurant debut.

Muniq raises $8.2 million for blood sugar regulating protein powder

Muniq, a protein powder created specifically for blood sugar control and gut microbiome health, raised $8.2 million in its Series A round. The round was led by Alpha Edison and Acre Venture Partners, with participation from Baron Davis (former NBA star and investor) and Cathy Richards (founder of SimplyProtein). The protein powder contains a high amount of prebiotic resistant starch that can help regulate blood sugar and weight management, and it was developed specifically with those who live with diabetes or struggle with weight loss in mind. Muniq’s five flavors of protein powder include Chocolate, Vanilla Creme, Mocha Latte, Vegan Vanilla, and Vegan Chocolate. A bag of protein powder with 28 servings costs $99 and is available for purchase on the company’s website.

Photo from Danone’s website

Danone launches plant-based cheese through So Delicious Brand

Danone’s So Delicious brand recently announced the release of new dairy-free cheese products, which include plant-based shredded cheese, slices, and spreads. All of the cheeses are vegan, gluten-free, soy-free, and non-GMO, but it is currently unclear what the main ingredient in these new products is. The shredded and sliced cheese products are now available in stores such as Target, Walmart, Market Basket, Fresh Thyme across the US. The cheese spreads will be released sometime in March.

Photo from Torchy’s Taco website

CardFree and Torchy’s Taco partner to develop contactless services

Torchy’s Taco, a fast-casual taco chain, partnered with CardFree, a provider of modern ordering services, to revamp online ordering and contactless services in the restaurant’s location. Customers eating at Torchy’s will now be able to use the Text-to-Pay solution, which enables them to pay on a mobile phone for both phone-in and drive-thru orders. The new Order@Table solution allows customers to add to their order while dining in without getting back in line or interacting with a cashier. The taco chain is also trialing curbside pickup with “I’m Here” notifications for curbside pickups; the customer can simply send this notification from their phone to let the restaurant know they have arrived. These new features and services are now available in Torchy’s 83 locations across seven states.

Zero Egg makes debut in Birmingham, AL restaurant

Plant-based egg producer Zero Egg made its first restaurant debut at Tropicaleo, a Puerto Rican restaurant in Birmingham, Alabama. The restaurant created a special menu to celebrate Veganuary, and several of the menu items showcase Zero Egg’s soy, potato starch, and chickpea-based eggs. The speciality dishes include breakfast sandwich with vegan cheese, Zero Egg biscuit, and Beyond Meat patty, as well as a rice bowl with Zero Egg scramble, Beyond Meat sausage, and sweet plantains. These menu items are available now, and it is unclear if they will become permanent menu fixtures.

June 1, 2020

Revention Rebrands as HungerRush, Launches Off-Premises Enhancements

Restaurant tech company Revention has rebranded as HungerRush and announced a new set of features aimed at helping restaurants fulfill off-premises orders. According to a tip sent to The Spoon, new products include contactless delivery capabilities, driver tracking, and integration with third-party delivery services.

HungerRush’s focus on digital ordering and off-premises orders isn’t completely new. As Revention, the restaurant management platform already included integration with some delivery companies, mobile and online ordering, and the ability to manage customer loyalty programs. 

The new features are mostly enhancements to existing products. HungerRush Drive lets restaurant operators track drivers as they deliver orders, which is becoming a more common practice nowadays. There is also messaging system for curbside pickup orders, where customers can notify the restaurant when they arrive, as well as the addition of more integrations with third-party delivery services, including Postmates, Grubhub, and “hundreds more,” according to today’s press release.

HungerRush is rebranding and releasing these features at at time when most restaurants continue to focus on improving their digital ordering as well as the process for takeout and delivery. The pandemic forced many restaurants into the off-premises world, and though dining rooms have reopened in a lot of states, they’ve done so with reduced capacity, not to mention customer base rather wary of going out to eat. It’s pretty much assumed at this point that restaurants must continue building to-go strategies to make up for lost revenue and keep the lights on.

Many a tech company promises to help in that area. Toast, Presto, CardFree, Sevenrooms, and a boatload of others have all announced new features or product enhancements that emphasize digital ordering and contactless delivery/pickup.

How well they deliver on these promises is what will determine who has value and who’s expendable when it comes to choosing a restaurant tech platform. For example, having a system for customers to message the restaurant when they arrive for their curbside order is smart. But geofencing tech, which automatically alerts the restaurant when a customer arrives, is even more efficient. 

HungerRush is old guard when it comes to restaurant tech companies, having been founded in 2003. (It’s also very popular with pizza chains, for some reason.) Time will tell if these new enhancements to its platform will be enough to compete with the dozens of other offerings vying for dominance as the restaurant industry reinvents itself. 

May 21, 2020

CardFree’s Streamlined Platform Hints at the Restaurant Tech Stack of the Future

We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again: in today’s pandemic-stricken restaurant industry, restaurant tech companies have to fight hard to stay relevant, and only those solutions that can help restaurants make their digital operations truly efficient will be left once the fallout is over.

CardFree, a company based in San Francisco and something of a restaurant tech vet, is hoping to make the transition to digital easier for restaurants. The company makes an all-in-one mobile merchant platform that integrates digital ordering and payments, coupons, and loyalty programs into a restaurant’s existing setup. It also offers a pay-at-the-table function that uses a customer’s own mobile device, rather than a tabletop kiosk (aka germ repository). It also recently added a new way for customers to process payments — not through any earth-shattering new technology but via some good old-fashioned SMS messaging with its new text-to-pay function.

The company was founded in 2012, a time when the concept of mobile payments via a smartphone was first gaining attention and many wondered if the credit card would disappear entirely. It didn’t. In fact, CardFree’s CEO and cofounder Jon Squire told me over the phone this week that the company saw “early resistance” even to pay-at-the-table concepts, where a user processed the payment themselves instead of handing over a credit card.

As global health crises do, though, the COVID-19 pandemic changed everything. Digital orders were up 63 percent in March, according to NPD Group, and one recent survey found that 73 percent of consumers ordering takeout and delivery said they would be more inclined to get takeout (over delivery) if the experience were contactless. Meanwhile, the National Restaurant Association’s restaurant reopening guidelines clearly state that “Contactless payment systems, automated ordering systems, mobile ordering apps, website updates and simple texts can help you to communicate and conduct business with reduced need for close contact.”

CardFree’s platform is one of many out there offering tools to make the restaurant experience more contactless. A restaurant can choose one or more of the technologies the company offers (mobile ordering, payments, etc.) and add to the stack over time. Squire said that of all the technologies out there, mobile ordering itself is probably the most important one for restaurants to add right now, though in terms of a solution, “You’re going to want something you can expand.”

As I mentioned above, that expansion might include some SMS messaging. CardFree has launched what it calls a pay-to-text feature, where customers call in a to-go order and can receive a link via SMS to pay for their meal. This is less cumbersome than reading a credit card number over the phone, and more sanitary than passing one between customer and cashier at the actual restaurant.

“Almost all the folks we’re working with are taking the person’s cell phone number as part of the order process,” says Squire. Once the phone number hits CardFree’s system (which is integrated with the restaurant POS), the user receives a text with a link they can click through to pay using Apple or Google Pay or their credit card:

Squire said that of the restaurants he’s talked to, many still see “about 60 percent” of orders placed ahead of time come via a phone call to the restaurant, not placed through a digital property like a mobile app. Finding a way to make the telephone experience more contactless from start to finish will be important going forward. That said, not many restaurant tech solutions pushing “contactless” bundles currently offer any kind of feature that addresses phone orders. That gives CardFree something of a leading edge here.

Squire doesn’t necessarily believe the pandemic and seismic shifts in the restaurant biz will render the credit card obsolete, as some have suggested. Of going “card free,” he said “Doing it’s our name and we’ve been doing it for 10 years and [credit cards] still exist. I’m reticent to say they’ll go away.” 

Regardless, restaurants will need to go more digital, even if they’re accepting credit cards. And to help make that possible for cash-strapped businesses that are currently lucky to keep the lights on, CardFree has been giving away its products for free for small-to mid-sized independent restaurants. While there is technically a three-month time stamp on the free period, Squire suggests that’s a fluid deadline where certain restaurants are concerned. For CardFree, which has historically worked with enterprise-level brands, this is a way of helping the whole restaurant industry stay afloat, not just mainstream chains.

As Squire said, “It’s been helpful to know [we’re] doing something to push this in the right direction.”

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