A year(ish) in review…
It’s been a year since hospitality businesses in England started to re-open their doors after months of closure. So we took some time to reflect upon what we’ve been up to, in what has been a tumultuous (to say the least) 12 months for the industry.
Eagle-eyed readers may notice that it’s actually slightly more than a year, but what can we say, we’ve been too busy building cool features to keep track of time…
July 2021
It almost came home...
Well. We know how that went. But at least we made sure that no one had to miss any painful penalties by getting up to order a round, as we served pubs across the country during their record Euro sales. We can’t account for if you missed the game watching through your fingers, however.
When we weren’t watching football, we noticed that our users are generous tippers. So we launched a campaign to give a little something back to the industry, by doubling any tips given to staff. Read about it here.
August 2021
We started a Pay & Go revolution...
After those crazy days of downloading apps under a marquee in a pub car park, it became clear that enforcing order & pay technology in every venue wasn’t the way forward. (We also realised that we needed to give customers the choice of downloading an app or going to a web browser, so we did that too.)
We still think our ordering tech is great of course, but we spotted that the biggest pain point in many hospitality venues wasn’t ordering, but simply paying the bill at the end. So we built a way to pay your bill in a restaurant without having to wait for a card machine.
September 2021
We went back to school.
October 2021
We made a splash in the world of fine dining.
Armed with our Pay & Go solution, we set out with the very ambitious aim of changing the way we all pay in restaurants. Thankfully industry heavyweights The Wolseley Hospitality Group (formerly Corbin & King) came on board to help us out.
And when we saw that they were getting up to 10x more tips when customers pay with Pay & Go, we knew we were onto a winner.
November 2021
Yup, this was the month where we hired a Delorean.
December 2021
We got into the Christmas spirit.
Buying presents can be tricky. But a £50 bar tab will likely make you the best thing that’s happened to Christmas since Buddy the Elf reconnected with his dad.
We wanted to do a little more with our gifting functionality however, so teamed up with KidsOut to match any gifts sent via OrderPay with a donation to this incredible charity.
January 2022
We started the year with a bang.
January can be a slow month… but not at OrderPay.
We started the year by winning a competitive tender to become an official partner of The University Catering Organisation (TUCO). Joining forces with TUCO’s network of 130 universities presents a great opportunity to support universities and their students with QR codes in every dorm room, and student-led delivery services that could save local businesses thousands. Read about the deal here.
January also saw us cement our place as the UK’s #1 order & pay provider, expanding our network of venues with the acquisition of Butlr.
February 2022
We took a stand.
We’re firm believers in using technology for good. So we teamed up with Safer Sounds to add information about the Ask For Angela initiative into our products. We also ran this webinar about customer safety, with panellists including London’s Night Czar Amy Lamé and representatives from the Metropolitan Police.
At the same time, we made a few important updates to our products, including helping venues comply with legal obligations to display calorie information on their menus, and giving customers the ability to add a note to their order.
March 2022
We hit the green.
One of the great things about what we do is discovering ways to use our technology that we hadn’t previously considered. With the help of venues like Pine Ridge Golf Club (see their case study here), we found that the driving range is the perfect location for Order & Pay.
Which is why it was very exciting to welcome Topgolf to the club, helping their customers order drinks directly to their bay without having to miss a shot.
And when we weren’t busy practising our drives, we found time to onboard even more big names, such as Pho – take a look at their website and you’ll see our Click & Collect solution in action.
April 2022
We sat in beer gardens. (For work.)
Driving ranges are clearly a great example of where Order & Pay works well. Beer gardens are another.
So it was great to welcome Three Cheers Pub Co to OrderPay, and help them use both Order & Pay and Pay & Go across their 9 London venues.
See what they had to say about working with us:
May 2022
We did some digging...
The hospitality sector doesn’t stand still. And neither should our technology. So we conducted some research into how we can shape the industry even further with our recently acquired Open Banking licence.
The findings? We learned that whilst 37% of people hadn’t even heard of Open Banking, many more were open to the benefits it could bring.
Read more about how we think Open Banking is the future here.
As well as gazing into our crystal balls, we continued onboarding great venues at a rate of knots, including The Liberation Group and their amazing pubs in the south west and Channel Islands.
June 2022
Patriotism. And burritos.
In June, the UK celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. So in true OrderPay style we combined our love of data and pubs with some analysis of the nation’s drinking habits. Read it here.
Moving from Coronation chicken to quesadillas, we worked with Tortilla to help their customers save a loyalty card to their Apple Wallet or Google Pay. Regulars can now get a little something back by scanning their QR code with every visit.
July 2022
Reflection.
Is that everything?
Not quite, actually. We didn’t manage to fit in the fact that we’re now integrated with even more EPOS systems than ever. Or mention that we’re now live in over 3000 venues, including restaurants, hotels, sports venues, a zoo and a zip wire centre. Or even how we’ve improved our analytics, added marketing opt-in, built a suggested pairings feature, and added bill splitting to Pay & Go.
