Covid-19 has forced people to reconsider the dine-in experience.
With so many restrictions in place, including social distancing and capacity limits, many coffee shops have had to look at other ways to get food and beverages to their customers.
Across the world, major chains have restricted the dine-in experience in their cafes, instead prioritising delivery, carry-out, and drive-thru services.
Quick service restaurants have become reliant on drive-thru customers and click & collect during lockdowns.
The drive-thru experience, whilst becoming a necessity during Covid-19, has been on the rise in popularity over the last decade, yet this trend certainly accelerated in 2020.
Many restaurants have had to close at some point during the lockdowns, which has resulted in this rising demand for drive-thru. Businesses have had to find innovative ways to sell their products in order to keep their business alive.
New ‘touchless’ technologies are being developed and implemented across the food service industry to keep up with the demand. Drive-thru systems and self-ordering kiosks such as Hey You and Skip are enabling payments to be made before the customer arrives.
Cafes are also offering delivery to cars, whether that’s out the front of the shop or in the carpark using a DIY drive-thru setup. Curbside pickup and delivery options have also been added to popular online ordering systems such as Square.
‘Drive-thru’ nowadays does not necessarily mean you are receiving an inferior product or service, with quality cafes serving specialty coffee experiences and beautifully presented food.
The main benefits of drive-thru:
- Far fewer shared touchpoints
- Less opportunities for contamination
- Safety and peace of mind
- Serve more customers at a time
- Process transactions faster
- Increase profits
Whether Covid-19 is to blame or not, it seems the drive-thru coffee global trend will be here to stay as the new norm as businesses seek to expand their offering and keep up with consumer demand as well as their competition.
How to implement drive-thru in your cafe?
Cafe Containers are an affordable way to implement the drive-thru and curbside innovation and are set to be the future of portable cafes and drive-thru options.
At less than the cost of a coffee van or a full shop fit out, you can design your own shipping container cafe to suit your needs.
A container cafe can be placed just about anywhere with virtually zero set up time.
Barista Technology workflow designs and innovative equipment solutions offer the fastest and most efficient service options available anywhere in the world for shipping container cafes.
“Here at Barista Technology, we’ve taken our technology and innovation and applied it to our latest exciting offering – Shipping Container Cafes, otherwise known as the ‘pop up cafe’. We have one of the biggest container modification facilities, supplying Australia, Asia and the USA.”
Barista Technology specialise in container bars, restaurants, cafes, espresso cubes and drive thru QSR (Quick Service Restaurants).
Take a look at our special projects page, and you’ll see some great container conversions.
Or contact us to create your own style and design.
Global distribution opportunities are available, contact Barista Technology today.
