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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Wingstop

Week in Restaurants: A Classic SoCal Diner Goes Off-Premises, Dom’s Still Checking Pizzas

Why are you reading this and not grilling up a delicious Beyond Burger this holiday weekend?

As long as you’re here, let’s take a quick look at the week in restaurants. And what a week it was. With states halting the reopening of dining rooms, it’s clear the effects of the pandemic are far from over in the restaurant industry. Yet business keeps on, and there were a number of noteworthy developments from this week around ghost kitchens, AI pizza checkers, and the greatest diner of all time.

New NORMS

NORMS, a much-loved diner chain in Southern California, this week debuted NORMS Junior, a new store prototype geared towards to-go orders. The company says NORMS Junior will be the model for future NORMS locations — no surprise, given the pandemic’s effect on dining rooms (see above). NRN has some great slides of what this new NORMS will look like.

Next Stop for Wingstop: Ghost Kitchens

Also riding the off-premises wave strong is fast-casual chain Wingstop, who this week opened its first ghost kitchen in its hometown of Dallas, TX. The new facility is less than 400 square feet and is for delivery-only orders. Wingstop says one of its goals is to digitize 100 percent of its transactions. A delivery-only ghost kitchen will aid in that.

Taco Bell Redoes Digital Rewards

Simply dubbed Taco Bell Rewards, the new app-based loyalty program comes five years after the band’s original rewards program. Apparently the idea of a new loyalty app was so popular it sent Taco Bell traffic through the roof and temporarily crashed the site. To access the new rewards program, customers can download the latest version of the Taco Bell app, which includes a beta version of Taco Bell Rewards.

AI Will Continue Checking Your Pizzas

Domino’s and Dragontail Systems said this week they will continue their partnership, which puts Dragontail’s AI tech in Domino’s restaurants to ensure quality. The smart scanner uses advanced machine learning, artificial intelligence, and sensor technology to check the quality of pies before the go out for delivery. (Dragontail’s tech can also be used to ensure proper sanitization in restaurants.) The continuation of the partnership means more of these pizza scanners across more Domino’s locations. So far, the partnership between the two companies has been limited to Domino’s locations Australia. They have not yet said if this extended partnership will bring the technology to stores elsewhere in the world.

Week in Restaurants: Amex Launches Reservations Tool, Data Breaches Galore

Nursing a turkey hangover? Actual hangover? Longstanding grudge against your in-laws? A quick glance at the past week’s restaurant tech won’t cure any of those ailments, but it may give you a two-minute mental break from the holidays as we leave Thanksgiving behind and head towards Cyber Monday and the month of December.

Herewith, the latest news in restaurant tech from around the web:

Amex Launches Reservation Booking Tool
American Express this week introduced a restaurant reservation booking tool in to its mobile app that lets Platinum Card and Centurion Members search, book, and manage restaurant reservations. In a press release sent to The Spoon, Amex said it will “continue to invest” in digital initiatives around the restaurant experience, a goal evident in the company’s recent acquisitions of Resy, Pocket Concierge, and Cake Technologies. The reservations feature can be used by select Platinum Card members now and will become available to a wider base in early 2020.

Multiple Restaurant Chains Announce Potential Data Breaches
It’s the holiday season, folks, which means more people whipping out credit cards to pay for goods, services, and meals out. But at least three restaurant brands are dealing with potential data breaches, Nation’s Restaurant News reports. Church’s Chicken is investigating a possible card data breach, Checkers Drive-In Restaurants reported a malware issue, and On the Border is looking into a security issue with the payment-processing system at some of its locations. All three companies have released statements regarding their investigations. 

Wingstop Launches Online Ordering Extension with Twitch
In a bid to gamify the food-ordering experience, Wingstop has teamed up with livestream platform Twitch to offer an extension that will let users order food for delivery from within Twitch itself. The chain’s Wing Calculator asks viewers questions to determine their order size (e.g., “How many are in your crew?”), then makes menu suggestions based on that information. Viewers head over to the Wingstop site to complete the order and pay for it. Delivery is being handled by DoorDash.