https://squareup.com/ca/en/campaign/biginrst">Square comes in.

From streamlining payments to managing orders and inventory, Square offers smart solutions designed to tackle the unique challenges that food and beverage businesses face every day.

We spoke to two popular Vancouver businesses about how Square became one of their top tools for success.

DL Chicken Shack

Square

East Vancouver’s DL Chicken Shack isn’t just a local favourite, it’s known for serving up some of the best fried chicken in the city.

Doug, a DL Chicken Shack partner, recalls how the company switched to Square’s point-of-sale (POS) system in late 2020. “The previous point of sale system that we were using did not allow for e-commerce, on top of just being a disaster in every other aspect. For us, we kind of saw Square as being very forward thinking on how to achieve goals and the ease of use.”

Square

For a restaurant adapting to the fast-paced world of takeout and delivery, having Square’s user-friendly tools made all the difference. Of course, it’s not only about taking payments, so the company also adapted Square’s Kitchen Display System (KDS) to keep this running super smooth.

Using KDS, Doug says, helps the team manage timing better, thanks to features like colour coding that show how long an order has been up on the system, and by integrating seamlessly with third-party direct-to-consumer apps.

“We can have [third-party app orders] populate at a different prep time than the regular orders that are in the space. That is really useful for us so that we can make sure that as drivers are showing up for delivery orders, they’re not waiting. That allows us to hit a better satisfaction rate with our peer-to-peer delivery systems.”

Square

For Doug, Square isn’t just a solution for today, it’s the future of food services.

“We want to look towards the future of what hospitality looks like. And I think so much of it is going to be rooted in providing the guests the opportunity to place an order at their fingertips.”

Oakberry Açaí

Square

Known for its delicious Açaí bowls, Oakberry is on a mission to dominate the healthy fast-food industry in Western Canada. Luckily, they’ve got Square by their side to help them do just that.

Oakberry uses Square’s KDS in-store, and the team praises it for seamlessly integrating with the Square POS system, along with third-party mobile ordering apps, overall making orders as simple as possible.

“You put the order through and it automatically populates the KDS screen. Team members can look at it and then all they have to do is tap the screen,” says Kyla Friesen, general manager at Oakberry.

“As a result of the simplicity and integration with our other third-party apps, we get the data we need on how we’re performing as a kitchen whenever we need it,” Oakberry CEO Carter Friesen adds. “Whenever I need information on how efficient we are, I can see it because of KDS.”

Square

Oakberry also uses Square’s Customer Loyalty Program to turn walk-ins into regulars.

Customers simply sign up at Square POS in-store, earn points, and redeem them in-store. It also gives the restaurant access to valuable data, including top loyalty customers, loyalty-attributed sales, and the average spend of loyalty customers versus non-loyalty customers.

“It’s a valuable program to know what our customers are thinking and doing,” Carter says. “We found… the number of customers [that] come back to us for specific discounts as a result of loyalty sign-up is significant. The average spend for our loyalty customers is also significantly more than our regular customers.”

Kyla recommends Squares customer loyalty to any business. “One, you get the data so you can keep them engaged. Two, it creates incentive to come back, right? If you’re feeling value from what you’re spending… you’re more likely to return.”

Ready to make big moves for your business? Head over to Square now to find out more.