PAUL Bakery: Using New Tech to Solve Old Problems
2021 | Case Study
Founded in 1889 France, PAUL is a family company built upon a foundation of time-honored production methods passed down for five generations. An ambassador of the French “art de vivre”, the exquisiteness of PAUL was shared with the world in 1985, when they first started expanding globally. Today, over 750 PAUL bakeries can be found in 47 countries across 5 continents. PAUL remains family owned and committed to the same time-honoured methods of production first laid down by Charlemagne Mayot in 1889.
Since the first PAUL Bakery was established in Singapore in 2012, operations have expanded to include seven locations and a full catering service.
With a limited workforce on the island-nation of Singapore, together with perpetually strict employment rules, PAUL was consistently faced with staff shortages and an ever-fluctuating resource pool. PAUL began to explore how they could utilize technology to help address these issues, and opened conversations with Waitrr. Today, PAUL uses Waitrr’s expertise to manage staff shortages, increase restaurant efficiency, and minimize cost, while simultaneously improving the customer experience.
“PAUL Singapore has been using Waitrr’s contactless QR ordering and payments technology since June 2018. With Waitrr, we have increased table turns and improved customer satisfaction, while raising productivity for our busier outlets by more than 15%."
-- David Yang, Chief Operating Officer, PAUL Bakery, Singapore
MANPOWER: MANAGED
Staffing has always been an issue in Singapore with a limited manpower pool, higher-than-average salaries, and limitations on foreign hires. The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated the problem, putting even more pressure on restaurant operations as the economy reopened. The team at PAUL began advocating QR ordering more strongly, with 80% of all orders now being sent to the kitchen through the Waitrr platform. The result is PAUL Bakery continuing to thrive, despite having the limitations of a reduced workforce.
SERVICE RECOVERY, ON THE SPOT
Still owned by the descendants of the founder, PAUL is a Maison de Qualité, priding themselves on quality eats and exceptional customer service. So, when a customer’s expectations haven’t been met, David wants to know about it. PAUL uses Waitrr’s live feedback feature to give in-store operations managers an opportunity to perform service recovery before guests leave the store. The result is turning a negative experience into a positive one, and reducing the chance of customers complaining on social media.
POSITIVE EXPERIENCES FOR CUSTOMERS & EMPLOYEES
A family business with a strong identity, brand and experience are top of mind for PAUL – both for the customer but for the employee. Together with Waitrr, PAUL has developed a fully customized white label solution that “faithfully captures our brand identity, and applies it to an easy to navigate menu that maximizes the average ticket size”. On the back end, orders are printed in the kitchen or bar, without the need for manual interference from front of house staff. This reduces the room for human error, shortens customer wait times, and allows for faster table turns, without compromising the customer, or the employee, experience.
Waitrr was designed with operational efficiency, and customer experience in mind. COVID aside, PAUL will continue to work with Waitrr to help improve their restaurant operations.
Learn more about how Waitrr helps dine-in restaurants achieve their goals, or connect with Waitrr by emailing hello@waitrr.com.
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